Download or read book Beyond Sitcom written by Antonio Savorelli and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2010-04-13 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the mechanisms that have driven the evolution of televisual comedy from the classic sitcom, a genre deeply rooted in its theatrical origins, toward a more mature stage of television's history. It analyzes four comic series--Scrubs, The Office, The Comeback, and Ugly Betty--revealing how each separates itself from the traditional sitcom archetype and shows increased awareness of the comic genre. Throughout the author focuses on two cardinal themes: the relationship between comedy and euphoria; and the relationship between comic texts and reality.
Download or read book Beyond Sitcom written by Antonio Savorelli and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2010-04-27 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the mechanisms that have driven the evolution of televisual comedy from the classic sitcom, a genre deeply rooted in its theatrical origins, toward a more mature stage of television's history. It analyzes four comic series--Scrubs, The Office, The Comeback, and Ugly Betty--revealing how each separates itself from the traditional sitcom archetype and shows increased awareness of the comic genre. Throughout the author focuses on two cardinal themes: the relationship between comedy and euphoria; and the relationship between comic texts and reality.
Download or read book Beyond the Black and White TV written by Benjamin M. Han and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2020-06-19 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beyond the Black and White TV argues that depictions of racial harmony on variety shows between their white hosts and ethnic guests aimed to shape a new perception of the United States as an exemplary nation of democracy, equality, and globalism during the Cold War.
Download or read book Television Aesthetics and Style written by Steven Peacock and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2013-07-04 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although Film Studies has successfully (re)turned attention to matters of style and interpretation, its sibling discipline has left the territory uncharted - until now. The question of how television operates on a stylistic level has been critically underexplored, despite being fundamental to our viewing experience. This significant new work redresses a vital gap in Television Studies by engaging with the stylistic dynamics of TV; exploring the aesthetic properties and values of both the medium and particular types of output (specific programmes); and raising important questions about the way we judge television as both cultural artifact and art form. Television Aesthetics and Style provides a unique and vital intervention in the field, raising key questions about television's artistic properties and possibilities. Through a series of case-studies by internationally renowned scholars, the collection takes a radical step forward in understanding TV's stylistic achievements.
Download or read book Open TV written by Aymar Jean Christian and published by NYU Press. This book was released on 2018-01-09 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Introduction: independents change the channel -- Developing open tv: innovation for the open network, 1995-2005 -- Open tv production: revaluing creative labor -- Open tv representation: reforming cultural politics -- Open tv distribution: struggling for an independent market -- Scaling open tv: the challenges of big data television -- Epilogue: open tv and the future of the networked era
Download or read book Beyond Dixon of Dock Green written by Susan Sydney-Smith and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2002-05-24 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1955 a brand new television series, "Dixon of Dock Green", came to Britain's screens, whose eponymous hero had featured in "The Blue Lamp" (1950). Although it has traditionally been assumed that the uniform police series begins with the Ealing film, this book, based on original archive research, challenges this assumption, proposing that in fact these series were shaped by changes in television's social role from the relaying of news to the replaying of stories. Susan Sydney-Smith demonstrates how the development of the British television police drama - and indeed British television in general - was more complex than accepted accounts allow. She traces numerous lineages, from inter-war public service films, live studio crime reconstructions and story documentaries such as 1942's "Target for Tonight" through to the mix of public service and entertainment values embodied by the BBC Television Light Entertainment's "Dixon of Dock Green". Showing how the genre mapped new social and regional geographies, from Dixon's metropolitan policeman to the gritty northern realism of "Jacks and Knaves" and "Z Cars" with its irascible "Barlow", the author follows the increasing commercialization of television in the sixties, investigating how the BBC set about restoring the values of southern England in the 1966 "Z Cars" spin-off "Softly, Softly", with its more palatable protagonist. The book also offers insights not only into the relationship between early British television and its cinematic forebears but also early radio.
Download or read book Music in Comedy Television written by Liz Giuffre and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-03-27 with total page 215 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The study of television and music has expanded greatly in recent years, yet to date no book has focused on the genre of comedy television as it relates to music. Music in Comedy Television: Notes on Laughs fills that gap, breaking new critical ground. With contributions from an array of established and emerging scholars representing a range of disciplines, the twelve essays included cover a wide variety of topics and television shows, spanning nearly fifty years across network, cable, and online structures and capturing the latest research in this growing area of study. From Sesame Street to Saturday Night Live, from Monty Python to Flight of the Conchords, this book offers the perfect introduction for students and scholars in music and media studies seeking to understand the role of music in comedy onscreen and how it relates to the wider culture.
Download or read book Television Series as Literature written by Reto Winckler and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-01-19 with total page 357 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores how television series can be understood as a form of literature, bridging the gap between literary and television studies. It goes beyond existing adaptation studies and narratological approaches to television series in both its scope and depth. The respective chapters address literary works, themes, tropes, techniques, values, genres, and movements in relation to a broad variety of television series, while drawing on the theoretical work of a host of scholars from Simone de Beauvoir and Yuri Lotman to Ted Nannicelli and Jason Mittel, and on critical approaches ranging from narratology and semiotics to empirical sociology and phenomenology. The book fosters new ways of understanding television series and literature and lays the groundwork for future scholarship in a number of fields. By questioning the alleged divide between television series and works of literature, it contributes not only to a better understanding of television series and literary texts themselves, but also to the development of interdisciplinary scholarship in the humanities.
Download or read book Learning to Love Form 1040 written by Lawrence Zelenak and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2013-03-29 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: No one likes paying taxes, much less the process of filing tax returns. For years, would-be reformers have advocated replacing the return-based mass income tax with a flat tax, federal sales tax, or some combination thereof. Congress itself has commissioned studies on the feasibility of a system of exact withholding. But might the much-maligned return-based taxation method serve an important yet overlooked civic purpose? In Learning to Love Form 1040, Lawrence Zelenak argues that filing taxes can strengthen fiscal citizenship by prompting taxpayers to reflect on the contract they have with their government and the value—or perceived lack of value—they receive in exchange for their money. Zelenak traces the mass income tax to its origins as a means for raising revenue during World War II. Even then, debates raged over the merits of consumption-based versus income taxation, as well as whether taxes should be withheld from payroll or paid at the time of filing. The result is the income tax system we have today—a system whose maddening complexity, intended to accommodate citizens in widely different circumstances, threatens to outweigh any civic benefits. If sitcoms and political cartoons are any indication, public understanding of the income tax is badly in need of a corrective. Zelenak clears up some of the most common misconceptions and closes with suggestions for how the current system could be substantially simplified to better serve its civic purpose.
Download or read book Latinas and Latinos on TV written by Isabel Molina-Guzmán and published by University of Arizona Press. This book was released on 2018-03-27 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critically looking at how Latinos/as have been represented in network sitcoms and what so-called colorblind humor really means--Provided by publisher.
Download or read book Friends written by Simone Knox and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2019-09-16 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a long overdue, extensive study of one of the most beloved television shows: Friends. Why has this sitcom become the seminal success that it is? And how does it continue to engage viewers around the world a quarter century after its first broadcast? Featuring original interviews with key creative personnel (including co-creator Marta Kauffman and executive producer Kevin S. Bright), the book provides answers by identifying a strategy of intimacy that informs Friends’ use of humour, performance, style and set design. The authors provide fascinating analyses of some of the most well-remembered scenes—the one where Ross can’t get his leather pants back on, and Ross and Rachel’s break-up, to name just a couple—and reflect on how and why A-list guest performances sometimes fell short of the standards set by the ensemble cast. Also considered are the iconic look of Monica’s apartment as well as the programme’s much discussed politics of representation and the critical backlash it has received in recent years. An exploration of Joey, the infamous spin-off, and several attempts to adapt Friends’ successful formula across the globe, round out the discussion, with insights into mistranslated jokes and much more. For students, scholars, creative industry practitioners and fans alike, this is a compelling read that lets us glimpse behind the scenes of what has become a cultural phenomenon and semi-permanent fixture in many of our homes.
Download or read book A National Joke written by Andy Medhurst and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-09-18 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comedy is crucial to how the English see themselves. This book considers that proposition through a series of case studies of popular English comedies and comedians in the twentieth century, ranging from the Carry On films to the work of Mike Leigh and contemporary sitcoms such as The Royle Family, and from George Formby to Alan Bennett and Roy 'Chubby' Brown. Relating comic traditions to questions of class, gender, sexuality and geography, A National Joke looks at how comedy is a cultural thermometer, taking the temperature of its times. It asks why vulgarity has always delighted English audiences, why camp is such a strong thread in English humour, why class influences what we laugh at and why comedy has been so neglected in most theoretical writing about cultural identity. Part history and part polemic, it argues that the English urgently need to reflect on who they are, who they have been and who they might become, and insists that comedy offers a particularly illuminating location for undertaking those reflections.
Download or read book A State of Arrested Development written by Kristin M. Barton and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-03-16 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the most critically-acclaimed television series of all time, Arrested Development is widely hailed as a cutting-edge comedy that broke the traditional sitcom mold. The winner of six Emmys, the series was canceled by Fox in 2006, only to be revived in 2013 via Netflix's streaming service. Beyond its innovative approach to storytelling, the series lampooned contemporary American culture, holding up an unflattering mirror to modern society. This collection of new essays explores how the show addressed issues such as wealth and poverty, race, environmentalism and family relationships. Focusing on the show's iconic characters, the essays also consider Arrested Development as it stands next to such works of fiction as Hamlet, The Godfather and the writings of Kafka. Also covered is the show's reinvention of the sitcom genre, and what its revival on Netflix means for the future of television.
Download or read book Hanna Barbera written by Jared Bahir Browsh and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2021-12-28 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With careers spanning eight decades, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera were two of the most prolific animation producers in American history. In 1940, the two met at MGM and created Tom and Jerry, who would earn 14 Academy Award nominations and seven wins. The growth of television led to the founding of Hanna-Barbera's legendary studio that produced countless hours of cartoons, with beloved characters from Fred Flintstone, George Jetson and Scooby-Doo to the Super Friends and the Smurfs. Prime-time animated sitcoms, Saturday morning cartoons, and Cartoon Network's cable animation are some of the many areas of television revolutionized by the team. Their productions are critical to our cultural history, reflecting ideologies and trends in both media and society. This book offers a complete company history and examines its productions' influences, changing technologies, and enduring cultural legacy, with careful attention to Hanna-Barbera's problematic record of racial and gender representation.
Download or read book Popular TV Series written by Marcus Tesla and published by Publifye AS. This book was released on 2024-10-15 with total page 167 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: ""Popular TV Series"" explores the fascinating world of globally successful television shows, delving into the key factors that contribute to their international appeal. This comprehensive guide examines the intricate balance between narrative structure, cultural resonance, and technological distribution that enables certain series to captivate audiences across diverse cultures and continents. The book traces television's evolution from a local medium to a global entertainment powerhouse, highlighting the impact of streaming platforms and changing viewer habits on the industry. At its core, the book argues that the most successful TV series achieve a delicate equilibrium between universal themes and culturally specific elements, making them relatable to a wide audience while offering unique perspectives. Through case studies of iconic shows, interviews with industry insiders, and analysis of viewer engagement data, readers gain valuable insights into the creation and promotion of popular TV series. The book's global perspective challenges the notion of a homogenized TV culture, instead celebrating how successful shows embrace cultural differences. Written in an accessible yet informative style, ""Popular TV Series"" offers a thorough exploration of what makes certain TV shows resonate worldwide. It progresses from introducing the concept of ""global appeal"" to examining future trends in TV entertainment, providing practical insights for media students, industry professionals, and avid TV fans alike. By examining the interplay between storytelling, cultural exchange, and technological innovation, this book serves as both a celebration of television's unifying power and a thoughtful analysis of its evolving role in global popular culture.
Download or read book Television Program Master Index written by Charles V. Dintrone and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2014-02-11 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This work indexes books, dissertations and journal articles that mention television shows. Memoirs, autobiographies, biographies, and some popular works meant for fans are also indexed. The major focus is on service to researchers in the history of television. Listings are keyed to an annotated bibliography. Appendices include a list of websites; an index of groups or classes of people on television; and a list of programs by genre. Changes from the second edition include more than 300 new shows, airing on a wider variety of networks; 2000-plus references (more than double the second edition); and a large increase in scholarly articles. The book provides access to materials on almost 2300 shows, including groundbreaking ones like All in the Family (almost 200 entries); cult favorites like Buffy: The Vampire Slayer (200-plus entries); and a classic franchise, Star Trek (more than 400 entries for all the shows). The shows covered range from the late 1940s to 2010 (The Walking Dead). References range from 1956 to 2013.
Download or read book Performing Live Comedy written by Chris Ritchie and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-12-02 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comedy is a global multibillion dollar industry and it is also one of the easiest ones to get into. Performing Live Comedy is for anyone who has ever thought about getting up onstage and being funny or for those who have already started. It offers a breakdown of the process of live comedy and provides a basic toolbox for the student and aspirant comedian, covering all aspects of live comedy such as stand-up, music, double acts, ventriloquists and magicians. Gender, sexuality, ethnicity and disability are also covered in this book as well as ethical considerations on what we should or should not joke about. The book breaks down the entire process of live comedy from writing a simple one-liner to creating a complete act, from organising an open spot at the local comedy club to getting into the Edinburgh Festival and running your own venue. Performing Live Comedy is full of advice and original interviews with comedians and writers currently involved in the comedy industry such as Rob Grant (Red Dwarf), Shazia Merza, Henning Wehn, Ed Aczel, Paul Zerdin and Lucy Greaves.
