fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2274 ]

[ SECRET POST #2274 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2274 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Brought this up with friends and most of them seem to like them?

Personally, I hate them and feel like they don't contribute at all to a show. I know when I find a joke funny, I don't need canned laughter to tell me to laugh.

canned laughter is a huge turn off for me. it says to me that the show's writing is so weak that the audience has to be told "we said something funny just now"

trying to think of a show i actually enjoy with a laugh track and i'm coming up blank

Actually, the reason is that the studio execs think viewers are so dumb that they won't know when to laugh at any show ever, no matter what the writing is like. Until a few years ago (and still a lot of the time nowadays), the only way a sitcom could weasel out of a laugh track was if the writers somehow managed to convince the producers that the format of the show just couldn't work with a laugh track (e.g., Scrubs).

What about Red Dwarf? I remember reading some kind of interview or something where the actors said that they like having the studio audience there, because they got feedback and could either extend a joke to make it funnier or move on if it wasn't working.

I can see the value of laugh tracks there, less in that they have actual value for the show and more that they have value and are recorded at the same time.

ETA: Whoops, should have read further down before posting. Ah well.

Edited 2013-03-26 02:38 (UTC)

I feel the same with you. When it's canned laughter, which is always obvious, my brain switches to, "Oh, you will not laugh and anything here" mode. And I don't.

I usually tune them out, tbh.

I didn't mind them at all (aside from wondering why there'd be laughter at a given moment that didn't seem funny), until I downloaded one of my favorite series...without the laugh track. It was weird at first, to expect the canned laughter and never hear it, and then it was the most awesome thing in the world.

Part of that might be the fact that shows are really timed for a laugh track; if you remove it there's definitely a very noticeable pause while they wait to say the next thing.

I don't mind studio audiences, but canned laughter makes me twitch like crazy until I get so desensitized to it that it stops registering.

this

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:31 (UTC) - Expand

I am very much pro-laugh track and I think the problem is unfunny shows that use laugh tracks poorly, NOT laugh tracks in themselves. I mean, Seinfeld had a laugh track, and it's arguably the greatest sitcom of all time. Newsradio had a laugh track and it's my favorite sitcom ever, and the laugh track is an integral part of the show that really contributes to its stagy, improvised feel.

I think the dislike of laugh tracks is a reaction to the shitty laugh track comedies of the last ten years. I think it's a little snobbish. And I think the attitude that a laugh track is telling you when to laugh - that's not true in a well designed show with a laugh track that's used well. It's laughing along with you, it's making it easier for you to laugh, but the very fact that it's so jarring when you have a laugh track in a funny show implies that it can't tell you when to laugh - or at least it's totally ineffectual at doing so.

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:25 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:27 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-26 01:04 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

intrigueing - 2013-03-25 23:27 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:28 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:36 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:38 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:46 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-25 23:48 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

inkdust - 2013-03-26 01:01 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-26 02:12 (UTC) - Expand

HATE.

Annoying, distracting, insults the audience's intelligence, completely ruins jokes that are actually funny.

A real audience if fine by me. But when it's just recorded laughter? I. Hate. It. So very much. To me it makes everything less funny, it makes me feel like I'm being talked down to (Laughed down to? Whatever, I feel like they think I'm stupid.), and its worst crime is that it takes me out of whatever I'm watching. I get tripped up and am no longer zoned in. I don't like shows snapping me out of their flow unless it's done for a reason. A stupid laugh track isn't a reason.

I don't like 'em, but I do manage to ignore them most of the time. To the extent that I couldn't tell you which shows I watch got laugh tracks and which do not.

Sometimes I'm annoyed, sometimes they somehow complement the scene. I'm a little 50-50 about the whole thing, mostly due to me only watching the Nanny religiously and rarely watch the other comedy shows.

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

sootyowl - 2013-03-26 00:38 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

al28894 - 2013-03-26 00:41 (UTC) - Expand

When I was a little kid and I heard laugh tracks on my parents' shows I thought it was because the whole world was watching the show at the same time and their combined laughter was so loud I could hear it at my house. /coolstorysis

But yeah I think laugh tracks are obnoxious, especially when they put them after something that's not funny at all.

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

jaydestarlight - 2013-03-26 05:00 (UTC) - Expand

I honestly don't even notice them. I've had several conversations with my brother where I was telling him about a new comedy I liked and he asked if it had a laugh track and I couldn't even tell him since I've gotten so good at tuning them out.

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

aubry - 2013-03-26 00:14 (UTC) - Expand

Replying to myself

aubry - 2013-03-26 00:17 (UTC) - Expand

I used to not really notice them or care either way, but after a bunch of Parks and Rec, Community, and other shows that don't use them, I've found them to be a lot more noticeable. If they're done well, it's not too bad, but mediocre ones now grate on me like no tomorrow.

Most of the shows I find genuinely funny have absolutely no laughter, canned or otherwise. (Pushing Daisies, Community, My Name is Earl--those are the ones that come to mind.) The ones that have laughter in them that I DO still find funny are ones that I'm pretty sure had a live audience, like Seinfeld or I Love Lucy.

Honestly, the more I watch multi-camera comedies and animated comedies (Japanese or western), the more hearing laughter that sounds even the slightest ungenuine makes me find the show LESS funny.

Re: Laugh tracks, how do you feel about them?

(Anonymous) - 2013-03-26 01:42 (UTC) - Expand

I don't watch that many shows with laugh tracks (and they seem to be getting less common? or maybe they're less common in uk shows which is what I tend to watch more?) but I had a really jarring moment a while ago when I caught an episode of M*A*S*H on TV, and it had a laugh track! It was so offputting and unfunny, I couldn't even watch it. I've been watching the DVD versions for years, and they don't have the laugh track. It's so much better without, but I didn't realise until that moment that they bothered me so much.

It prevents me from getting into a show, honestly. Like, I watch TV to be lost in stories, and canned laughter forever reminds me that I am watching a story. Completely ruins it for me. :/

Titus would be a hell of a lot darker without a laugh track. I don't know if that's a good thing or not.

I dislike them on principle for the reasons given in this thread, but I tend to tune them out while watching.

HATE.

I used to didn't mind them, but after getting used to shows like "The Office" (both UK and US), "Extras", "Sex and the City", and "Modern Family" I really hate laugh tracks. It's like the show is saying, "Hey audience, we're not sure if you'll get our jokes so we'll have a laugh track tell you when we're telling the joke." URGH!! Also, sometimes, it's so much funnier when there is no laugh track but that terrible awkward silence the characters have to endure. Or the awkward small talk they have to make.

But I don't mind rewatching old shows that have laugh tracks, most times.

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