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How can you take a great cast, give them a funny plot and still see your show crash and burn? This is the question I was asking myself while I watched Fox’s newest show, “Sit Down, Shut Up.”
It’s disappointing to see such a failure from a comedy powerhouse like Fox. The network is best known for its animated shows “The Simpsons” and “Family Guy,” but they also produced the classic “Arrested Development,” which starred many of the same actors as “Sit Down, Shut Up.” Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Henry Winkler, who all shined in “Arrested Development,” fail to lead “Sit Down, Shut Up” to comedic fruition.
It set me thinking: What makes a good comedy? There are shows like “The Office” and “30 Rock” that throw us in incredibly unrealistic, awkward situations, shows like “Family Guy” that are intended to shock us and sitcoms like “Friends” and “Seinfeld” that riff on situations we have all been in and understand.
Is a teacher reading porn magazines really funny if you’re old enough to read porn? Are trannies really that shocking? Far be it from me to judge, since I can hardly be considered the master of comedy, but since I’ve nothing better to do, I’ll say it: Such over-the-top, yet not unexpected situations are simply not funny. Shows like “Family Guy” succeed because of completely unrealistic scenarios and a heavy reliance on the law of repetition, which says a situation is funny the first three times, unfunny the next four times and then funny again the seventh time.
Not to read too much into it, but a pseudo-scientific study on comedy found the best jokes to be either racist or xenophobic. Words with letters like K and Q are funny, as are platypuses (platypi?). Ultimately, the study found that there’s no universal joke, except that a joke almost always has to be shocking.
Somehow, every time Peter Griffin chops off a limb or runs over a baby seal with his yacht, it’s unexpected and shocking. Somehow, a man taking birth control pills and growing breasts and an unseemly teacher buying “filthies” just isn’t, which is why “Sit Down, Shut Up” is just not funny.
It’s not that the acting is lacking, just that a deadpan delivery means less when every line is delivered deadpan; such is the curse of animation. It’s less shocking to put breasts on an animated man than a real one.
SNL and other long-running shows have settled into a complacent groove as well. Despite everybody’s objections, you can’t tell me Fred Armisen’s impression of New York Gov. David Patterson wasn’t funny, though it certainly was also offensive. Unfortunately, such moments are few and far between nowadays, when you’re more likely to see skits with actors who play a far too similar role from skit to skit. It can’t be said that “Sit Down, Shut Up” falls into a groove. Instead, the creators never deliver in the first place.
