Word: sitcoms
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Maybe it was silly to expect that we'd turn on our modems and suddenly rediscover the joy of good talk. When is the last time you participated in or even overheard a thrillingly deep conversation? On TV, sitcom families have little to say beyond one-line put-downs, and the braying of pundits passes for political debate. In the movies, a few cliches and grunts, punctuated by gunshots, suffices for a two-hour screenplay. Maybe cybertechnology just came along too late, after we had already entered what postmodernists call the postword era. Which would mean that we have...
After the comedy bust in the late '80s, only an elite of televised comedians survived. Poundstone is among that elite and endures the downside--five-minute spots on Letterman and failed sitcom pilots...
...strength of 'Something to Talk About' lies in its reality. This movie asks questions that people face everyday. It doesn't allow the characters to take the easy way out, and its wry humor strikes an eerily familiar note. This is not a movie with slapstick comedy or old sitcom jokes--its comic moments are all natural, springing from painfully real situations. This movie is a must...
...complete about-face, starting at a satirist's typical distance from his creations and finishing besotted with them. In Therapy (Viking; 321 pages; $22.95) he describes a classic case of postmodern depression. Laurence ("Tubby") Passmore is 58, securely married, the chief writer on a hit TV sitcom. But he quickly finds he has a trick knee, a fed-up wife and a bad threat...
...surfing the TV and newspaper reviews and get a hint of Silverstone's blithe luster by watching mtv's relentless promotions. Taking this Cliffs Notes route, moreover, saves you from sitting through several slow stretches of plot sludge. During these scenes, Clueless has the feel of some mild sitcom purring in a far corner of the living room. You don't watch it so much as notice it, from time to time, in a genial miasma...