Friday Questions

Hello fellow shut-ins. How about some Friday Questions to give you something to do for ten minutes?

Jeff Alexander leads off.

With everyone encouraged (and almost mandated) to stay at home during this coronavirus pandemic, can you recommend a TV series available on DVD to "binge-watch"?

I'm sure that you would recommend "Cheers" or "Frasier," but I was thinking of ones in which you were not personally involved.

For sitcoms I would say EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND, 30 ROCK, BECKER, FAWLTY TOWERS, THE COUPLING (British version), BLACK ADDER, THE DICK VAN DYKE SHOW, THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, THE BOB NEWHART SHOW, and TAXI. And if you want to go way back, THE PHIL SILVERS SHOW and the 39 classic episodes of THE HONEYMOONERS.

For dramas, BREAKING BAD, THE SOPRANOS, MAD MEN, JUSTIFIED, KILLING EVE, HUSTLE (British show), THE FUGITIVE, THE ROCKFORD FILES, COLUMBO, HILL STREET BLUES, THE PRACTICE, L.A. LAW, and LOST (just don’t count on a great finale).

I’m not a sci-fi or horror guy so there are a lot more if you’re into those genres.

From -3- :

With everybody hunkered down to avoid the Trump Flu, is traffic going up on the archives? Or is it just old weirdoes like me reading through?

Just curious.

Traffic has gone up since our National House Arrest, but it’s hard to tell with the archive. The stats will show that someone logged onto a particular post, but it won’t know if it’s a regular reader or someone just finding that post on Google.

Interestingly, more people go back and listen to archive episodes of my podcast, which delights me.

I invite you to dive in to either or both.

Bob Gassel asks:

When MASH episodes were being performed, shot and edited, was any consideration given to leaving time for the laugh track? I always assumed there was, but recall Larry and Gene claiming that wasn't the case.

No. None. The laugh track was always an afterthought and we sprinkled it in as judiciously and unobtrusively as possible.

We never asked actors to hold for laughs when filming.

And finally, from C. Warren Dale:

More and more shows these days - almost all streaming dramas, more and more network and cable dramas, and even a few streaming (The Kominsky Method) and network (The Good Place, The Conners) comedies embrace a serialized story structure. This can make for good television but it makes it impossible to write a spec. Any assumptions you make about the characters, setting, or storyline could be blown apart by the next episode that airs. As television moves in this direction, how do you think new writers will be able to demonstrate their skills in that context?

There’s no question this is a big problem. I always tell young writers to just pick a place in the run and begin your episode there. You’re obviously not expected to know how the series really goes, but if you can find a place in the season where they take a breath, that’s usually the best place to jump in.

Hopefully your writing and handling of the characters and tone will make up for not knowing where their story is going.

I know of one producer who read a spec script of a serialized series and said, “Shit, his way was better than ours.”

Best of luck.

Stay safe. Take a deep dive into the archives.