I've been thinking: A live studio audience could well make writers try harder and therefore make the content funnier.
For example, if a writer knows that his show will not be an audience sitcom, then he could potentially not put the funny bits in, as no writer wants to hear silence from an audience when they should be laughing.
A show without a track, however, can get away with being far less funny because there's no real proof that it isn't.
Quote: Dave @ 23rd January 2016, 7:15 PM GMTI've been thinking: A live studio audience could well make writers try harder and therefore make the content funnier.
For example, if a writer knows that his show will not be an audience sitcom, then he could potentially not put the funny bits in, as no writer wants to hear silence from an audience when they should be laughing.
I can't imagine a writer deliberately not putting in great jokes, the critics would mention the lack of good material. Than there's their own pride, I mean you want to put your best jokes in your own show even if there is no live audience, don't you? So writers have every incentive to create the best possible "product". Besides that, I think the studio audience would laugh and cheer in any case, they're not as critical or cruel as the people at home in front of the telly. So I don't think that it makes a big difference.
I'm not really sure what this is about. If you want to write comedy of course you want a reaction.
Sorry Dave but that doesn't make any sense to me. That suggests that comedy with a live audience is funny and what's known as 'single camera' comedy isn't funny.
Just because you can hear people laughing in an live audience comedy, that's not really proof that it must definitely be funny. You could hear big laughs all the way through 'The Wright Way', not many people found it funny.
There are plenty of good and bad sitcoms filmed in both styles.
I know what Dave means. There's definitely more pressure on studio sitcom writers. It's a harder format to get right, and more obvious when it goes wrong. Many writers say it - particularly the family-friendly variety - is the hardest form of comedy to write.
I presume Dave means sitcom, as doing a show like Live at the Apollo with the audience gagged would be a bit daft I think.
There's no doubt the trendies in comedyland don't like laugh tracks on sitcoms and have been following RG's lead since The Office. The results have not been good for sitcom with barely a classic sitcom made since The Office. Yes I know some will shout Peep Show but they are wrong - a cult sitcom isn't always a classic sitcom and Peep Show's the defining example of this.
The one saving grace I gave NGO was its laugh track, Mack got that right, and making it funny, if nothing else.
The trouble isn't with the studio audience/lauhg track format, it's with the quality of sitcom scripts. They're getting less funny, less subtle and much less well crafted. IMO because commissions are being given to the wrong people. And maybe we're more demanding after being given classic sitcoms week in, week out in the 60s, 70s and 80s.
Sitcoms just need to get back to being funny and characterful and sitcommy and the prods won't have to get their cans out/manipulate the audience laughter to serious fraud levels like they do now. Morning, as you were.
Quote: Dave @ 23rd January 2016, 7:15 PM GMTA show without a track, however, can get away with being far less funny because there's no real proof that it isn't.
Very true and the reason why we've had so many multi series sitcoms in the last 15 years which were really half hour comdrams. 
There are times when no laughter delivers the funniest effect. Consider "The Office" and the dead pan humour, the awkward moments, where the audience might not all laugh at the same time. It ruins the joke if someone laughs before you get it. It's not as awkward once someone laughs.
So surely this is a horses for courses conundrum ? 
Quote: Aaron @ 24th January 2016, 12:08 AM GMTI know what Dave means. There's definitely more pressure on studio sitcom writers. It's a harder format to get right, and more obvious when it goes wrong. Many writers say it - particularly the family-friendly variety - is the hardest form of comedy to write.
I think you're right. I also think that, because fo this, live comedies might be more likely to throw a bone to the audience, use easy gags and catchphrases because they know they'll get a reaction. A recorded show that only 1 in 100 viewers laugh at is fine; a live one is a bit of a disaster.
I don't think it is too much of an issue for TV as you can see the funny. I certainly prefer any radio comedy to have a laugh track.
Yes, I meant this to mean sitcom. I posted it in the sitcom section but it must have been moved.
With something like 'Detectorists', there's no audience, so it can afford to be subtle and wry and less punchy than, say, Not Going Out (or, if we were to be more brutal in our criticism, it can not be funny at all). They know an audience wouldn't really laugh at it that much. They may smile, but that doesn't make any sound, so there's no point in putting them there.
Laughter tracks are a rip-off anyway. I don't mean canned laughter which is too crude for today, but they deliberately pump the audience up: Warm-up acts, mixing in laughs from two performances so it sounds like people are laughing twice as much, prizes for the person who chortles hardest etc. Plus studio (as opposed to club) audiences like to giggle as they want to feel part of the action. A good writer's gonna cram his / her script with gaglines anyway, so I don't think it makes much difference.
I think the evolution of sitcoms has rigidly split into two distinct groups, sas and non sas and their comedy styles have become much more distinct than they both used to be. Why is a good question but I'd say the handing out of most sitcom commissions to non writers is a big factor as well as well as letting sitcoms be too production led now. All shows are way over produced now, especially sases.
Unfortunately it's led to a complete polarising of the two formats where hardly a new sas is made which isn't cringingly overdone with false sounding laughter - See Miranda or Vicious and hardly a non sas is made which isn't a comedy drama with little comedy and sometimes very heavy drama - see Rev which had turned into something completely different by the end. It certainly wasn't sitcom.
If the choice was between canned laughter and a live audience then it has to be a live audience all the way! You never know how an audience will react - I'm sure that the scene in Only Fools and Horses where Rodney and Casandra had got married and were about to leave the Nags Head Pub when John Sullivan wanted to know why no one was laughing at the jokes as the happy couple left the pub to begin married life and the reason the audience wasn't laughing was because they were crying with joy! If canned laughter was used this reaction wouldn't have happened.
If it's a choice between canned laughter and no laughter at all - then canned laughter is a must! Look at Red Dwarf X - no laughter at all!!! Canned laughter would have made it funny.
Happy Families was better for not having a laughter track in my humble opinion. (Note: 'IMHO' is English for 'This is true.')
When MASH was shown in the UK it was without a laughter track which I think was to its advantage. In fact one of the best features about the DVD was to have the track on/off and, for me, it was so much better with it off.