Origin of the laugh track
Brad Filippone
laugh track comes up quite often here. I was reading a book I found in a
ocal library. The book is called "What the Heck is a Grape Nut?" and
basically it answers all kinds of everyday questions that people might
wonder about. It is part of a series of questions posed by the listeners
of CBC Radio in Canada and was published in 1991. (And in case you were
wondering, a grape nut is neither a grape nor a nut but is rather a blend
of whole wheat and barley toasted in such a way that it doesn't turn soggy
in milk).
Anyway, the book has a section entitled "Why do TV shows have canned
laughter?" I'll quote it in it's entirity:
--
The laugh track that tells you that a sitcom actor's line is supposed to
be funny has been the subject of ridicule for many years. Among observers
of the broadcasting industry, there are those who feel the use of canned
laughter is also a question of ethics.
The use of prompted audience response began even before TV, in the
theatres of Paris around 1820. These theatres used to hire people to
applaud, laugh, and cry at the appropriate time, so that the production
seemed more successful to the paying audience than it really was. These
hired applauders were called a claque.
However, it would be unfaur to say that canned laughter is just another
form of claque. In the early days of radio, most programs were broadcast
without a studio audience. The comedies in particular sounded hollow
without audience response so producers introduced the studio audience to
bring the spontaneity of vaudeville and theatre to radio.
When radio variety programs such as "The Jack Beny Show" moved to
television, they brought their studio audiences with them. Originally,
producers did not try this with radio sitcoms because they felt it would
be too complicated to film those kinds of TV shows in front of a live
audience.
"I Love Lucy" overcame this problem. Unlike other filmed programs, which
are shot scene by scene over and over like a movie, "I Love Lucy" was
filmed live with three cameras. The three films were then edited together
and included the laughter of the studio audience.
"Amos and Andy" was one of the first programs to add a laugh track after
the program was filmed and edited. But this laugh track was real. Each
episode was shown in a theatre and the audience response was recorded.
The laughter was then added to the film soundtrack for the program's
broadcast.
While the purpose of the studio audience ws to recreate the theatre
experience, producers learned they could manupulate the television
audience's perception of a program by "sweetening" the laugh track.
Program engineers sweeten a laugh track by adding pre-recorded responses
to give a punch line or pratfall more impact. What started out as adding
a chuckle here and a guffaw there developed into the art of completely
fabricating a program's laugh track. Even cartoon shows like "The
Flintstones" were given a laugh track. This practise reached it's peak
(and its greatest public opposition) in the 1960's.
Since then, the claim at the end of a TV program that it is "recorded
before a live studio audience" has been worn as a badge of honesty by the
program's producers. Even these programs, however, are edited, their
flubbed scenes are reshot, and their laugh tracks are sweetened.
Some TV critics and producers have claimed that a number of innovative new
programs that have failed in recent years, such as "Slap Maxwell" and "The
Life and Times of Molly Dodd," did so becuase they had no laugh track.
---
The Other Brad
AOHELL actually
>Date: 02/02/2002 1:30 AM
Thanks Brad. That was very interesting.
Somehow, showing Amos & Andy to a LIVE movie audience for the laughter seems a
correct way, if there is such a thing, of doing a laugh track.
Now that I've had the chance to watch MASH without the laugh track, it has
added a different dimension to the dialogue.
I never thought I'd like it. Now, I won't watch WITH the track.
Eddie
======================================
"We will not tire, we will not falter and we will not fail"
George Dubya Bush
Bob Gassel
done in the last year of "All in the Family" (after Mike and Gloria left) and
"Archie Bunker's Place".
BG
David Brunt
>As far as showing a completed episode to an audience for
>reactions, it was also done in the last year of "All in the Family"
>(after Mike and Gloria left) and "Archie Bunker's Place".
AFAIK the first to use that method was 'The Phil Silvers Show' in 1957...
Recent seasons of 'Red Dwarf' also used this technique.
David
Andrew Smith
I've always been dubious of the claims made by shows that were filmed in
front of a live audience ever since I was given tickets to the taping of
a new sitcom. During the warm-up, before filming started, we were
assured by the "warm-up man" that our laughter would be heard when the
show went to air. What he failed to tell us was that this laughter would
not be our initial responses to scenes but rather a composite of our
"best" laughs over the course of the taping. As it was we saw scenes run
through over and over again due to actors missing lines or technical
difficulties. By the time the scene had been completed successfully,
usually on the third or fourth take the most we could muster would be
the occasional titter, maybe a cough (and that curious sound of
crickets). So it was no surprise they used whatever laughs we could
manage on the first take. But we always felt our laughter was forced,
even when it was spontaneous due to the constant reminders from the
warm-up man "to laugh it up BIG".
Certainly turned me off even contemplating seeing another show taped.
For those aussies in the list - the show was "Bligh" and starred Michael
Veitch and some of the other D-Gen crew. And it ranks just below "Hello
Larry" on the grand scale of tv sitcoms.
Brad
"Andrew Smith" <Andrew....@its.monash.edu.au> wrote in message
news:3C5DD7EA...@its.monash.edu.au...
> Certainly turned me off even contemplating seeing another show taped.
> For those aussies in the list - the show was "Bligh" and starred Michael
> Veitch and some of the other D-Gen crew.
Ouch. Hard to find laughs through the first take, let alone after three or
four I'd imagine. I remember the series "Bligh" and I'm sad to find out the
D-Gen crew had anything to do with it.
--
Brad