Musings on the Future of Sitcoms
I know the days of M*A*S*H, Happy Days, and The Mary Tyler Moore Show are behind us. Even the greats, like Cheers, Seinfeld, and Friends, are falling out of fashion. I wonder if the same can be said about Modern Family, Parks & Recreation, and New Girl…
Have we already watched the last great sitcom?
I’ve been toying with this question for about a year now because it was a year ago that I first tried to write a sitcom pilot. Is there still an audience for traditional half-hour comedies? Will anyone actually tune into network television to watch? Is it worth trying, or should we collectively hang up the sitcom hat? At this moment, as an idealistic twenty-two-year-old girl, I believe in the former. I’m usually in favor of trying. Perhaps I will be proven wrong one day, but today is not that day. Today, I want to imagine a new wave of sitcoms that brings people back to network programming, back to a simpler, more grounded way to make TV.
There was a period there — after all my favorite shows went off air and streaming services were shiny and new — that I could’ve sworn network TV was dead. At one point, my mother was the only person I knew who still tuned in weekly for her crime procedurals. Even my grandma traded in her cable for streaming subscriptions. Within a handful of years, network TV was made obsolete.
At least, it was in my circles. What I have learned from the recent WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes is that that is exactly what the streaming services want you to think. They bombard you with promotions and press showcasing their big budgets and star-studded content to make you believe everyone is watching these things. Everyone has Netflix. Everyone has seen Succession. Not true. Many of those numbers — how many people are actually subscribed or how many watched a particular show — are kept secret. This is intentional, so the executives of HBO Max, Netflix, and Disney+ don’t have to pay their cast and crew sufficiently and can crush their competition: network television. Nonetheless, there is a portion of this country (a rather large portion) that has and will continue to flip to their favorite channel every week, completely unaware of or unbothered by the streaming wars.
One of the statistics I was able to find revealed just how many more people are still watching network TV than anything on a streaming service. Young Sheldon (2017-2024), a show I can never claim to have watched, averaged about 7.5 million viewers every week this year on CBS, whereas the series finale of Succession brought in a record-breaking 2.9 million viewers on HBO. I couldn’t even find the average viewership of Succession probably because it’s near impossible to uncover. Anyway, from what I gathered on social media and those around me, it seemed like everyone and their dog was watching Succession. On the other hand, I don’t know a single person who watches Young Sheldon…but apparently there are roughly 7.5 million of them. This network sitcom sustained itself for seven seasons with a seemingly silent yet fiercely loyal fanbase. That is incredible.
Another show that gives me hope is Abbott Elementary (2021-), created by the mastermind Quinta Brunson, which is now on its third season at ABC. Everything about it is brilliant. Set in a Philadelphia public elementary school, Abbott Elementary is a new take on the workplace mockumentary made so popular by The Office. It’s hilarious and refreshing but remains anchored in our current moment. The cherry on top is that Tyler James Williams (of Everybody Hates Chris fame) plays the Jim to Quinta Brunson’s Pam. This is all to say that Abbott Elementary has single-handedly gotten me back on network television. I tune in every Wednesday night like clockwork.
My current idea for a sitcom is about a girl who gets a job at a theme park (because it’s the only job she can get) and the antics she gets up to with her strange yet endearing co-workers and theme park regulars. I’m enamored with friend-group sitcoms, like Friends, How I Met Your Mother, and New Girl, but I find it quite hard to write and sustain. The workplace sitcoms seem more functional to me — there’s immediately more to work with and laugh at. So, I guess I’m going for something like Superstore or Abbott Elementary. But who knows! I’ve written several drafts that are all horrible, though that hasn’t stopped me yet.
One thing I know for sure is, if a sitcom of mine ever comes to fruition, it will be for network television.