Laugh tracks are the deathly shrieks that bellow in the background of television sitcoms in an attempt to turn a malignant punch line into something a little more benign.
They are false advertisements, telling the people, “This is good,” when what’s hidden underneath is bad.
Sitcoms with laugh tracks are like teenagers with marijuana. Sure, it seems good at the time — you’re laughing and enjoying yourself. But it’s probably burning brain cells and making you dumber in the long run.
The laugh track, or canned laughter, can be traced back to the 1940s, when radio was the main medium for entertainment and still had its place inside the family room.
Laugh tracks were first used during post-production on radio shows such as “The Cosby Show,” and by the 1950s the laugh track had infected our televisions and the medium has never been the same.
Sure, at the time, the laugh track had its place. TV was just beginning to take off, a live studio audience wasn’t cost effective and networks thought it was necessary to brand a comedy show.
But, like the human brain, television comedy has evolved, and the laugh track is no longer a necessity.
Now, the laugh track acts as less of a complement to a funny quirk or silly punch line and more like an overbearing father-in-law at the dinner table, retelling the story on how he met your mother until it gets syndicated.
The laugh track takes something that is supposed to be as complex as the Big Bang Theory, and turns it into a TV show with dumb jokes for dumb people who think they’re watching smart comedy.
“Have you ever seen ‘The Big Bang Theory’ without the laugh track,” actor and comedian Joe Rogan said. “It’s f — ing confusing, this makes more sense at least, you know when you listen to people not laughing, and you go, well OK, that’s much more likely.”
In today’s TV comedies, the sole purpose of the laugh track is to make poor writing, mixed with lackluster punch lines and mediocre acting into something that is somewhat palatable.
“Nothing drives me crazier, than hearing (laugh tracks.) Even if it’s a live studio audience, I don’t want to hear people laugh. Don’t tell me when to laugh,” Tony Hinchcliffe, writer and stand up comedian, said.
Don’t get me wrong, there are some shows that still use laugh tracks that don’t deserve to get thrown under the bus with the aforementioned sitcom. But many of today’s well-written comedies have unshackled themselves from the primitive chains of an awkwardly placed chuckle and crowd reaction.
Shows like, “The Office” and “Scrubs” have proven over the years that needing a laugh track is laughable, letting the writing speak for itself.
Newer shows like “Parks and Recreation,” “Community” and “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” also follow in their footsteps, stepping away from the laugh track and letting the viewer choose to laugh at what they deem funny. And shouldn’t that be the case?
Times have changed, and so have the people who watch television, for the most part. I don’t need someone’s generic laugh, snickering in the background as if it validates what I’m watching on TV. If I think it’s funny, I assure you it will pull, without much effort, a genuine giggle out of me.
Laugh track, it is time for you to go the way of “The Johnny Carson Show,” peacefully into the night, never to be seen again.
You are no longer needed to make jokes funnier, awkward stares more awkward and uncomfortable timing any more uncomfortable.
Jen • Oct 8, 2020 at 8:30 pm
Wow, someone finally understands the pathetic laugh track. Clutching, grabbing, straining to make the unfunny acceptable. And all the poor snowflakes defending it! Poor dears, needing big brother to define what’s funny for them,
vinothirty • May 2, 2016 at 10:29 pm
thank you for validating my feelings! i have many good friends that watch tbbt and i find i am reaching for earplugs to block the annoying canned laughter….although i want to ask them isn’t that laugh track driving YOU crazy too, i would never want to take away their enjoyment (power of suggestion). i know they use laugh tracks with other shows, but for some reason the one on tbbt is the MOST annoying to me. i think i would not mind the show (except for the blond with squealy baby voice) if at least 50% of the laughter was removed.
Atlas • Feb 1, 2016 at 5:16 am
I cannot stand laugh tracks. Besides everything already said, they completely ruin the immersive effect.
They don’t just break the fourth wall, oh no, it’s worse. I’m talking about a glowing pink Jar-Jar Binks crashing though the fourth wall, saying “That was funny. Ha, Ha. Laugh. Look at me. I’m ridiculous!”
My fellow Americans, I hereby propose the Bring Back Real Humor Act, which will make laugh tracks a criminal offense, punishable by Life Imprisonment without Possibility of Parole! Who’s with me?
Entire House: “Bravo!”
Entire Senate: “Bravo!”
President Donald Trump: “Wait, how does this law help me bully Hispanic Americans? VETO!”
Ed Gill • Nov 16, 2015 at 1:52 am
Laugh tracks cause bipolar disease & depression. Because it drive you into stupid.
Arthor Wright • Oct 2, 2015 at 9:55 am
I agree with the author of this article. I have never liked laugh tracks, and I grow to dislike them more and more with time. I find laugh tracks insulting to the intelligence of the viewer.
I recently watched a little part of Friends without the laugh track. Ross goes into a self defense studio after class has just broken up, and he asks the teacher for advice on attacking women. Without the laugh track it is perverse. With the laugh track, it is not funny; I have seen it with the laugh track. Either way, Ross is creepy, and I don’t laugh at creepy, even if others do laugh at it. I can think for myself, thank you very much, producers of sitcoms.
I like to watch Columbo because it does not have a laugh track, even during those moments that I find hilarious. I have watched Curb Your Enthusiasm, and have enjoyed laughing on my own, and I do really outwardly laugh at some of the stuff.
And another thing about humor, comedy and sitcoms: Every peculiar or amusing moment does not have to be “funny” haha, lol! It’s okay to be merely amusing. It’s okay to not be always funny. In fact, truly funny moments are even funnier and more deeply felt when they can stand on their own in a real moment of humor.
Finally, something someone finds funny, which I do not, is okay, and visa versa. That’s life, and that is something that is interesting and even funny on it’s own. If I laugh at something that someone finds not funny, and we look at each other, I might find that moment funny. So, comedy goes beyond what is happening on the screen; it involves people laugh and not laughing together. I recently blurted an uncensored laugh in group when no one else laughed. I’m not sure why, but I found something funny. My ridiculous laugh make someone else laugh, to which someone asked, “What are you laughing about,” to which she replied, “His laugh!”
Bob Bunsen • Sep 13, 2015 at 11:22 pm
“The Cosby Show” was not a radio show during the ’40s, it was a TV show that began broadcasting in the ’80s. Please pay a little more attention when writing these articles.
Alice Henley • Mar 16, 2015 at 6:29 pm
So here I am in the computer room while hubby is flicking through the few channels we get by antenna- Two things that will make you crazy if you are just having to listen ( by proximity) to a tv and not watching it—First: someone flicking channels spending about three minutes each channel deciding not to watch that and then going slowly backward ( sometime he will learn that after that channel 50 it goes back to channel three
Second: anything with laugh tracks. They sound absurd if just listening to anything with laugh tracks . Now in the case of the Big Bang theory – which I have learned to dislike after having to just listen to it and not watch.. Big Bang Theory is a clever show with clever jokes sometimes about things like quantum physics or speed of light or evolution or other things that many of us do not really understand anyway – So in the case of the Big Bang Theory the laugh track serves to let all the shaved gorillas in the room know that that was a joke.
robin • Nov 17, 2014 at 1:53 pm
Wondering if you have the same objection with the laughter used on The Jon Stewart Show & Colbert? Both use live studio audiences, just like “The Big Bang Theory.”
I’d argue that “Parks & Rec,” “Community” and “Brooklyn 9-9” rely on camera angles and editing to make things that aren’t funny, funny. (How many times do they cut to a blank look from an actor for a reaction?? Countless.)
“The Big Bang Theory” is more like a live play – it’s just a different form of comedy, and still valid and smart in its own right.
Brian • Dec 3, 2014 at 2:38 pm
Big Bang Theory uses a laugh track which is very different from a live studio audience. Equating camera angles with canned laughter is a really astute observation (insert laughter).