10 Favourite Sitcoms

I think that my favourite television format is the half-hour sitcom. There are plenty of examples of other shows that I think are amazing, but I always return to the sitcom for comfort. I love looking back at old sitcoms that I missed or were before my time. I love checking out the new crops of shows as they appear each year.

It is indeed that time. Watching new shows makes me think about shows that I already love and in the spirit of this blog I thought a list of my 10 favourite sitcoms would be a nice diversion.

As ever, in no particular order:

The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (1976-1979)

This is perfect 70s satire. It begins with what was billed as the perfect life - Reggie, married to his adoring wife, lives in a lovely suburb, his children all grown up. He goes to his nice upper-middle management job and looks forward to a comfortable retirement. Except, no. The show, in its first season (I'll adopt the American lingo), demonstrates the emptiness of such a life - showing the hidden fears and anxieties that are obscured by such an existence. The second season adopts even bigger targets; capitalism, consumerism, value. And the third, the idea of fulfilment itself. In all, Perrin, perfectly played by Leonard Rossiter, attempts to dismiss these ideals only to fail upwards.

It is absurd, stupid and incredibly clever. In truth, it's probably the 'cleverest' show on the list.

The Office (US) (2004-2013)

No disrespect meant to Ricky Gervais' original, which I think is very good, but I just don't find it nearly so satisfying as the US remark. Ignore the very dodgy first season - it is plain that they can't quite find their way from under the original's shadow. Early in the second season they find it; they abandon the devastating cynicism of Gervais, and allow the characters room to breathe and grow and crucially, tell jokes. The US remake is much much funnier than the original.

It is also warmer. While it never quite lets go of the cringey qualities that characterise its origins, it is also unafraid of letting us unironically love Michael Scott (Steve Carell) and see the human side of Dwight and even learn to love the mundanity and the emotional vacuum that is the office itself. Even after Carell goes, and the show does dip a little in quality, it nonetheless maintains enough heart and jokes to not outstay its welcome until its 9th season.

Black Books (2000-2004)

A tiny, small and stupid show about an alcoholic bookshop owner (Dylan Moran), his hapless employee (Bill Bailey) and neighbour (Tamsin Greig). Very little happens over three short seasons. The three leads get drunk a lot, do stupid stuff, fall out a bit. And yet, it makes me laugh a lot.

An awful lot relies upon the cruelty and haphazardness of Bernard Black (Moran). He is another character (this list features a few of these) that is somehow sympathetic despite being quite unpleasant.

The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970-1977)

This is a new addition to the list and time will tell whether it stays a firm favourite or not. But right now I am coming towards the end of the sixth season and am enjoying it a great deal. So we'll see...

It concerns Mary Richards (Moore), a newly single thirty something who comes to Minneapolis and stumbles into a job as a TV producer. The show revolves around her private life, in particular her friendship with Rhoda Morgenstein (Valerie Harper), and her developing career with her boss, Lou Grant (Ed Asner).

This show appeals, I think, because its general sense of warmth. No characters are totally cynical (apart from possibly Betty White's Sue Ann Nivens) - everyone, even hapless newscaster, Ted Baxter (Ted Knight), tries their best. What the show does best is show the ever growing and evolving relationships within the cast. I could say a lot more and perhaps will again elsewhere*, but in the final assessment, The MTM Show is just a world that feels good to live in, and sometimes that is exactly what you want.

Malcolm in the Middle (2000-2006)

Perhaps I’m wrong, but I never felt that Malcolm in the Middle got the acclaim it deserves. Despite running for seven seasons, I get the feeling that it is steadily fading away in our collective cultural memories (unlike other sitcoms that seem to maintain a very healthy afterlife - Friends, obviously, but also the wildly inferior Scrubs, HIMYM and others). I’m genuinely not sure why. Even though it did lag towards the end of its run - they ran out of ideas for Frances, for instance - it remained consistently funny and inventive. It also boasted a pretty impressive adult cast: most obviously Bryan Cranston, but also Jane Kaczmarek and the eternal Cloris Leachman.

Perhaps the reason it is fading from view is that it was not iconic (as say, Cosby or Roseanne). I think another reason is that it is a member of slightly derided class of sitcoms, the family sitcom. All the sitcoms that have sustained acclaim have typically featured predominantly folk in the 20s. This is a shame as there are some great family sitcoms. Anyway, MITM captures the anarchic rivalries of brotherhood and the stresses and strains of parenthood, as well as the underlying love and loyalty that is often obscured. A great show.

Father Ted (1995-1998)

A more unenthralling premise could not be pitched: three failed priests exiled to a remote island off the coast of Ireland. Yet perfectly pitched performances from the three leads, especially the late Dermot Morgan, along with awesome scripts from Graham Linehan (also Black Books!) and Arthur Matthews. The gradual expansion of the central characters to include locals, priests and more priests kept the ideas fresh and developing. I also enjoy that it has a good dollop of being clever ('that would be an ecumenical matter') but it never gets in the way of rank stupidity (the tunnel of goats!).

Cheers (1982-1993)

I am not sure that I need say very much here. Cheers marks the total arrival of the modern sitcom and as such it has it all. It has warmth (we really learn to care for Sam, and who didn't feel sad when Coach passed away), cynicism (Carla's barbs), cleverness (we meet Frasier and Lillith), stupidity (Woody) and good old fashioned romance (Sam and Diane). Cheers, of course, defined the on-again-off-again relationship. 

I'd concede that the format begins to get weary once we hit the Kirsty Alley era, but even then, it remains funny and there is plenty of growth for the more peripheral characters. It's a classic for a reason.

The Good Life (1975-1978)

Part of the pleasure of The Good Life is the warmth and the downright pleasantness of the show. Everyone is nice and it is just nice to be part of the gentle, indeed, genial world that is shown. All sorts of things are nice, of course, but that doesn't make it a great sitcom. Funny lines and great performances do that, and it is harder to imagine a better comic team than the cast. All four leads are giants in the field of comic acting and all four have made the marks in more than one classic sitcom (Briers - Ever Decreasing Circles; Eddington - Yes, (Prime) Minister; Keith - To The Manor Born; Kendall - Carla Lane's Solo).

Married.. With Children (1986-1997)

OK, let's be honest. While it lasted 11 seasons in total, only the first few were really very good. After a while, it increasingly became a pastiche of itself, recycling the same tired jokes. But for a while, at least four seasons, it offered the exact opposite of what most sitcoms had been up to that time - specifically, it was the anti-family sitcom. Here were four people who hated each other - it was unfortunate that they also happened to be family.

What drove it and made it so good were the leads of Ed O'Neil and Katey Sagal as Al and Peggy Bundy. O'Neil, in particular, pours so much pathos into the dismal, relentlessly empty existence of Al Bundy, shoe salesman. The show predates and offers direct inspiration to so many shows that ultimately followed (including a few on this list): The Simpsons, Roseanne, Seinfeld, Malcolm, It's Only Sunny in Philadelphia. It was the first sitcom to revel in the gallows humour of the socially and economically desperate.

Seinfeld (1989-1998)

Again, like Cheers, what is there to say? For me (and others, I think), it is a show that one learns to love. The first episode I watched I recall thinking that it was OK; the second, pretty good; third, no - good!; and after a few more, I'd decided that it was comic gold. Here, I think that it is the writing that takes centre stage - it is SO sharp, so perfectly framed, even when read aloud, it's hilarious. The performances of the leads (perhaps excluding Jerry) are genius. And again, the ever-increasing cast of peripheral characters steadily create a world that one can immerse oneself in. And no show has done so much to add to the quotia of catch-phrases that have entered my world. I'll never grow tired of this show.

And so, there we have it...

Two final things!

1) I do not claim that these are the BEST sitcoms, only that they are my favourites.

2) I could have called about another 10-15 shows my favourites and had I compiled this list on another day, it might well have included some of those and not these. Just in case you are wondering, these were:

• Curb Your Enthusiasm
• Black-ish
• Spaced
• Blackadder
• 30 Rock
• Parks and Rec
• Frasier
• Community
• Porridge
• Rising Damp
• M*A*S*H
• Phoenix Nights
• The Good Place
• Fawlty Towers
• Yes, Minister

* This was not the blog post I intended to write. I intended to write about sitcoms I found interesting for one reason or another and MTM was on that list. Anyway, I got sidetracked by this post so maybe I'll write the other one on another occasion.