June 1, 2023
Dear parents of our Laugh Track elective students,
This week we're wrapping up a fascinating trimester of cultural analysis and TV criticism. I'm writing with a summary of what we explored together.
In the opening weeks I introduced many ways to dissect a sitcom, but the topic these kids kept coming back to was stereotyping, in particular gender roles and expectations. It turns out pretty much every sitcom is about gender in some way! Since our featured episodes ranged from the 1950s (I Love Lucy) to literally this year (Abbott Elementary), and since we did not view them chronologically, the class easily picked up on the dissonance between their own ideals and the dynamics playing out on the screen. Over time, this conversation expanded to include debates about portrayals of young people (Family Ties), elderly people (The Golden Girls), and gay people (Will & Grace).
A sizable cohort of students was also interested in the narrative structure of the episodes: the relevance of secondary plotlines, surprise twists and then last-second twists on those twists, and common tropes such as the annoying neighbor (Urkel! Kramer!) and the odd coupling (Ross and Rachel, Zack and Screech, etc.). These kids had lots of opinions about the choices made in the writers rooms and the value of realistic acting vs. cheap laughs. As a group, they overwhelmingly preferred more contemporary single-camera sitcoms over multi-camera productions with a live studio audience or laugh track.
A highlight of the trimester was our theme weeks. Elevator Week allowed us to compare how different sitcoms utilized the plot device of characters getting stuck in elevators and having to resolve conflict with difficult peers in a cramped space; two of these episodes (Doogie Howser M.D. and All in the Family) even had a woman go into labor in the stuck elevator. Death Week gave us insight into why people feel compelled to laugh in the face of death, with hilarious funerals from The Mary Tyler Moore Show, The Golden Girls, and The Office.
I struggled with whether to show an episode of The Cosby Show, one of the most consequential sitcoms ever but one that is now tarnished by the revelations about its creator and star. Those of you who know me won't be surprised that I leaned into it, letting the kids laugh along with the famous pilot episode in which Cliff negotiates a budget with his son Theo using Monopoly money and then spending the next period discussing different perspectives on how to approach "art made by monsters." As always, the students rose to the challenge, and I'm glad I brought it up with them.
Today the students will finish presenting their projects, for which they watched multiple episodes of a single sitcom of their choice and looked for patterns, tropes, and cultural insights. I hope they come away from this elective as more perceptive viewers of entertainment, more curious consumers of culture, more deliberate crafters of narrative, and maybe even funnier people. For this, I apologize! :)
Best wishes for a relaxing summer filled with laughter and binge-watching.
Sincerely,
Mike Fishback