The Television Situation Comedy, or TV Sitcom

Copyright 2011 by Gary L. Pullman

A situation comedy (or “sitcom”) involves a continuous cast of regular, recurring, and unique stereotypical characters in comedy that arises from a shared environment, from a specific set of circumstances, or from a particular situation that results in predictable behavior and rapidly resolved conflict. For example, The Andy Griffith Show portrays the life of small-town sheriff Andy Taylor as he interacts with his family, Aunt Bee and Opie, his deputy Barney Fife, and his friends, neighbors, and fellow townspeople.

Regular characters are those which occur in almost every episode of a sitcom series. Such characters include the protagonist, or main character, and the supporting characters with whom he or she routinely interacts, such as a spouse, a child or children, servants, friends, neighbors, coworkers, or roommates.
Often, a regular character is a foil to the protagonist, highlighting the main character’s personality traits by exhibiting traits that are opposite to the protagonist’s qualities. Often, when a foil is part of the regular cast, the sitcom will be filmed in a single location, in a relatively small space, such as an apartment, that the foil shares with the protagonist. Andy Taylor, the sheriff of Mayberry, North Carolina, is the protagonist of The Andy Griffith Show. As such, he is one of the show’s regular characters. Other regular characters include his Aunt Bee, his son Opie, and his deputy Barney Fife.

Recurring characters are supporting characters who interact less frequently with the protagonist or one of the other regular characters than do regular characters; recurring characters may include visitors, government officials or representatives, customers, out-of-town or distant relatives, or supervisors. Some of the recurring characters on The Andy Griffith Show are schoolteacher Helen Crump, Andy’s girlfriend; Thelma Lou, Barney’s girlfriend; barber Floyd Lawson; mechanic Gomer (and, later, his cousin Goober) Pyle; fix-it man Emmett Clark; city clerk Howard Sprague; Aunt Bee’s friend, Clara Edwards; and Mayor Pike.

Unique characters appear only once in a single episode of a sitcom series. The character who is portrayed by a guest star (a actor of some renown) is a special type of unique character. Such a character appears in an episode because the celebrity who plays this character has charisma or glamour that adds interest to the sitcom. A guest star’s appearance may coincide with “sweeps weak” or may occur during a decline in the show’s ratings, to increase the show’s audience. Other unique characters usually appear for a specific purpose, such as to fulfill the need of a particular plot.

Regardless of whether a character is a regular, a recurring, or a unique character, he or she is usually a flat character and a stereotype whose behavior is predictable. A flat character is one that is made up of only a few personality traits are present in most sitcom characters, and these traits can be identified by a short list of adjectives. Barney is a flat character, whose fictitious personality is summed up by such adjectives as “vain,” “sensitive,” “self-important,” “inept,” and “braggadocios.” A stereotypical character is one that fits preconceived ideas about the class of individuals of which he or she is a representative. The sitcom character also usually behaves as viewers imagine such a type of character would behave--that is, according to type. A rustic character is apt to be simple, unaffected, and gullible; an urban character, urbane, pretentiousness, and cynical. Therefore, such characters’ behaviors would be predictable. The simple rustic is likely to misjudge situations or people, underestimating them; provide overt indications of his or her true thoughts and feelings through his or her facial expressions, body language, and speech; and be deceived by unprincipled characters. Gomer is a good example of such a character. A trusting soul who gives everyone the benefit of the doubt, he sometimes chastises those he’s underestimated by shouting, “Shame! Shame! Shame!” at them after they have hoodwinked him with one unlikely story or another. On the other hand, the urban character is apt to see several more implications concerning a situation’s significance or several meanings concerning a deed that would escape the rustic character’s notice; to disguise or hide his or her true thoughts and feelings; and to dismiss good intentions or noble feelings as the motivations or causes of another character’s behavior. On The Andy Griffith Show, Mayor Pike comes the closest to such a character.

In some situation comedies, two or more characters share the same environment. In some instances, one of the regular supporting characters is a foil to the protagonist. Because of their diametrically opposed qualities, these characters are doomed to disagree and, often, to annoy one another. They see things altogether differently, often in opposite terms to one another’s perceptions, thoughts, feelings, attitudes, or beliefs. For example, in The Odd Couple, Oscar Madison is a slob who shares his apartment with Felix Unger, an obsessive-compulsive neat-nik. Much of the show’s conflict--and comedy--stem from their attitudes toward cleanliness.

The shared space can be, and usually is, larger than an apartment. On The Dick Van Dyke Show, Rob Petrie shares an office with his fellow comedy writers Sally Rogers and Buddy Sorrel and his home with his wife Laura and their son Richie. Likewise, the entire community of Mayberry, including the courthouse, Andy Taylor’s house, Wally’s Filling Station, Floyd’s Barber Shop, Emmett’s Fix-It Shop, Weaver’s Department Store, and several other locations, make up the shared space of The Andy Griffith Show.

The sitcom situation is of an everyday sort, such as viewers themselves might encounter in their daily family or work lives or during their leisure time. Each situation gives rise to a commonplace conflict that is resolved within the span of the show’s duration--typically, thirty minutes (no counting commercial messages). Some of the conflicts that occur in plots for The Andy Griffith Show include Opie’s discovery of the harm to relationships that lying causes; Goober’s learning that pedantry is apt to cause others to feel contempt instead of admiration for know-it-alls; and Andy’s willingness to let others retain their personal dignity by taking credit for the good deeds that he has done.

The themes (or subject matter) of sitcoms suggest the type of topics that television audiences find amusing. Over the years, various types of sitcoms have aired on television, several of which types overlap:

• Offbeat comedies (The Addams Family, The Munsters, My Mother the Car)
• Comedies of the workplace (Alice, The Andy Griffith Show, The Bob Newhart Show, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Oh! Susannah, Laverne and Shirley, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Rhoda, Night Court, Our Miss Brooks, That Girl, Cheers, Home Improvement, Frazier)
• Comedies involving single-parent families (The Andy Griffith Show, Bachelor Father, The Courtship of Eddies’ Father, Make Room For Daddy, One Day at a Time, WKRP in Cincinnati, My Three Sons, Full House)
• Comedies involving merged families (The Brady Bunch, Eight Is Enough, Yours Mine and Ours, Please Don‘t Eat the Daisies)
• Colleges about roommates (Bosom Buddies, Three’s Company, Friends, Laverne and Shirley, The Odd Couple)
• Comedies featuring black families (The Cosby Show, Good Times, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air)
• Comedies focusing upon nuclear families (The Cosby Show, Good Times, Leave It to Beaver, Father Knows Best, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Donna Reed Show, Married. . . with Children, Roseanne, Home Improvement)
• Comedies centering upon multi-cultural families (Diff’rent Strokes)
• Comedies featuring extended families (The Mothers-in-Law, Everybody Loves Raymond)
• Comedies about married couples (The Jeffersons, Ozzie and Harriet, The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show, I Married Joan, I Love Lucy, The Honeymooners)
• College comedies (Dobie Gillis)
• Comedies concerning high schools or private postsecondary schools (The Facts of Life, Welcome Back, Kotter, Happy Days)
• Rustic comedies (The Dukes of Hazzard, The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, Petticoat Junction, The Real McCoys)
• Espionage comedies (Get Smart)
• Supernatural comedies (The Flying Nun, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeanie, The Ghost and Mrs. Muir, The Girl with Something Extra, Topper)
• Military comedies (The Phil Silvers Show, F Troop, Gomer Pyle, USMC, Hogan‘s Heroes, M*A*S*H)
• Beach comedies (Gidget)
• Political comedies (The Governor and J. J.)
• Extraterrestrial comedies (My Favorite Martian, ALF, Mork and Mindy)
• Animal comedies (Mr. Ed)
• Comedies about a Servant (Hazel, Who‘s the Boss?, The Nanny)
• Comedies focusing upon musical families or groups (The Monkees, The Partridge Family)
• Comedies about superheroes (Batman)