Prime-time Comedy

Watching television is one of America’s favorite pastimes, especially watching sitcoms. Three prime-time sitcoms that fit this statement are: “Friends,” “Frasier,” and “Just Shoot Me.” These shows have all been nominated for awards and have been on television for at least five years, but do sitcoms portray real life accurately? How close to reality are these sitcoms? The truth is, they are very unrealistic. All aspects of sitcoms are unlike the world real people live in; from the work place, to lavish lifestyles, TV sitcoms depict the wrong picture of American life and the viewers can’t get enough of it.

One very important characteristic these shows all have in common is that there is an abundance of personal relationships. On “Frasier,” Frasier lives with his father and very often his brother comes by to see him. In the office he is friends with his co-workers and in this particular episode he shares a relationship with a girlfriend. The show “Friends,” is based on intrapersonal relationships. There are two girls that are roommates, two boys that are roommates, a brother and a sister, and a boyfriend and girlfriend in this episode, and of course they are all friends. On “Just Shoot Me,” it shows relationships with co-workers, and between a daughter working for her father. All of the relationships these people share with one another are fun, the times they share together are hilarious, and they are all charismatic, beautiful people. In real life, there is always someone who is too ugly to go out with, or somebody who gets put down for where they come from. In real life, relationships involving sex aren’t just exciting and sexy; there is jealousy, pain and sometimes abuse. Sitcoms only show the good side of relationships, when in reality, relationships (whether it be friends, family or lovers), can be the hardest and most difficult part of life.

The characters on these shows have values and beliefs just like real life people. A value that usually isn’t considered a “good” value is displayed in all three episodes. All of the characters care too much of what other people think of them. For example, the character, Nina, on “Just Shoot Me,” doesn’t tell the other co-workers that her rich boyfriend broke up with her, because she couldn’t bare the thought of them thinking she was a “loser;” she even goes as far as sending herself flowers to make the other co-workers think he is madly in love with her. Another example of this type of value is on “Frasier.” His family doesn’t believe that he is dating a super-model, so he tries to take a picture of his girlfriend, while she is asleep, so his family will believe that he is in fact dating a super-model. In real life, kids are taught not to care what others think and to be yourself.

The characters on American sitcoms encourage certain types of behavior. One behavior that is displayed by these characters is that working is a joke, for example, on the show “Just Shoot Me,” it is a show that is based on a magazine company and it’s setting is in the office of the company. Instead of working, two employees were making bets all day, two other employees were making jokes and laughing, and a father (who owns the company) and his daughter (who works for him) were talking about anything but work. This kind of behavior shows that Americans don’t work hard and suggests that work is fun and easy, when in reality, Americans do have to work hard for what they want and the competition for good jobs is fierce. On “Frasier,” Frasier went to work for two minutes of the show and didn’t even work, he just talked to his friends. Frasier is a radio psychiatrist; people in that line of work have to go through eight years of college, and who can even guarantee one gets a job after eight years of college? On this show it suggests that hard-to-get, well paying jobs are easy to achieve and not really hard to do at all and even though the characters don’t do any work they still have luxurious apartments and tasteful expensive lifestyles. TV allows one to enjoy what life has to offer, by watching make-believe characters do it on a screen. The actions of comedic television encourage a lot of glamorous lives that are easy and fun, but in the real world, these types of lives are just fantasy.

Even with all of the false perception of American lifestyles, these shows are very appealing. One thing that is appealing on these shows is the people. On “Friends,” the three girls that are friends, while having different features, are beautiful. Their make-up is always flawless and even when they have been doing something active, not one hair is out of place. Another thing that is appealing about these people are their clothes. They never wear the same outfit twice and their ensembles are always very tasteful and very expensive. Niles, From “Frasier,” is always wearing designer suits and Rachel, from “Friends,” is always wearing brand name clothes as well. But why do all of these things appeal to the viewers? Todd Gitlin says, “. . . TV points to everything we might ever want or need.” (184). This statement is very true for the American viewers. The characters on these shows are beautiful, successful, and always have fun with each other. That is the goal in life for most people, but for most people these types of lifestyles are unreachable and unrealistic, so the public watches everything that they want in life happening on television instead.

If someone from another place were to base their life on the viewing of any one of these sitcoms they would be materialistic, sex-pots. They would have values like: a poor work ethic, they would think that there are no real problems in life, that having people in your life is the most important part, and of course, everything is funny. In all three shows no one pays bills, ever runs out of money and the problems they do address on the shows are only minute. For example the biggest problem the cast of “Friends” has on the show is which two of their friends are actually dating. They didn’t worry about real problems like living on welfare, drug abuse, or disease. As far as the rich and materialistic area, these shows cover that generously. The characters all have great jobs, like Frasier having his own radio show, the crew on “Just Shoot Me” all work at a top magazine company, and Rachel from “Friends” works at a main branch of Ralph Lauren. Their apartments are in fabulous locations, they never wear the same clothes twice, and they are always having a good time because of it.

Sex is probably the largest topic on all three sitcoms. If someone from another world were to see all of the sexual references and situations addressed in these shows they would behave in a very sexual way to anyone who isn’t family or of the same gender. In fact, sex was the whole plot of this particular episode of “Friends.” In the first two minutes, before the theme song comes on, the character Phoebe sees the characters Monica and Chandler having sex through the window of another friend’s apartment and that is what the rest of the show is about. On “Frasier,” the whole episode was about him having sex with a super-model and on “Just Shoot Me,” the opening joke was two men (characters: Finch and Elliot) flipping through a copy of their company magazine picking out which girls they would chose to have sex with and who Elliot has already had sex with. This type of sexual conversation goes on throughout the whole show by Finch making a bet referring to Elliot’s sex life. This type of context still goes on, because “According to sociologists and psychologists, human beings are driven by certain basic human needs and desires,” says Michael Petracca and Madeleine Sorapure of the book Common Culture. (241) Since they mention “romantic love” (241) as a basic need people want to see it on the screen, but someone from another culture seeing this type of material on all of these episodes might think that Americans don’t have any substance at all; they just think about sex, and life is all a barrel of laughs.

Real life is serious and very different from what is on television. Sitcoms are an escape from the real world. “Friends,” “Just Shoot Me,” and “Frasier” are filled with laughter, beautiful people, and fun-filled days that don’t involve work. That is why people like sitcoms, they are as far from real life as possible. Besides Steven D. Stark says, “After all, the more that television sitcoms have moved in the direction of “realism,” the less authentic they become.” (380). Sitcoms aren’t supposed to be realistic, no one would watch them if they were. So the public watches their fantasies come true on the television screen where they can live a worry free life, and forget about all of their problems. . . at least for a half-an-hour.