As is common for all genres, precisely defining sitcom is a problematic task. Analyses of the genre usually take a textual approach, attempting to delineate those characteristics which recur across those programs assumed to belong to that category. This is primarily to try and distinguish it from other, related genres: “On the genre dial it [sitcom] sits somewhere between ‘sketch comedy’ and ‘situation drama’” (Hartley, 2008: 78). Yet it is hard to precisely delineate the boundaries between these forms and it is possible to see a program such as The League of Gentlemen (BBC2, 1999-2002) as both a sketch show and a sitcom, as it contains both episodic and series-long narratives, yet individual scenes function equally well as stand-alone sketches. A starting definition of the sitcom might be “a short narrative-series comedy, generally between twenty-four and thirty minutes long, with regular characters and setting” (Neale and Krutnik, 1990: 233). The serial nature of the genre responds to the specifics of television broadcasting, according to which audiences return to situations and characters they know week after week, meaning that the pleasures of sitcom (like much television) can respond to the knowledge audiences have from previous episodes. Series such as Linda Green (BBC1, 2001-2) and Gavin & Stacey (BBC3/1, 2007-10) would fit the definitions outlined above but might also be categorized as ‘comedy drama’. Therefore there remains “much disagreement over exactly which programmes are sitcoms and which aren’t” (Mills, 2005: 25), and more recent genre analysis has instead been more interested in how genres function and how the situation in which “we all agree upon a basic understanding of what a sitcom is” (Mittell, 2004: 1) comes into being. It is precisely the assumed obviousness of sitcom as a genre, aligned with the perceived naturalness of the humor they contain, that means they are a ripe site for unpicking highly constructed social norms because it is often wrongly assumed that such straightforward entertainment “doesn’t require us to think” (Mills, 2009: 5). This means that exploring sitcom can be a fruitful task as it is assumed that

humor, which is itself culturally and historically specific, is “rooted in social processes” (Billig, 2005: 32). National broadcasting systems usually exist within regulations that proscribe television’s particular social functions, such as the BBC’s remit to “create content … for all ages and communities” (BBC, 2013: 26). This means that the kinds of comedy transmitted via those systems point towards some kind of intended collective consciousness. Furthermore, this suggests that as societies

change, so does the kind of comedy seen on television. Sociological analyses of comedy can therefore be used in exploring the sitcom and the debate recurs about whether comedy arises from a “defiant tradition” (Jenkins, 1994: 2) or upholds social inequalities as it is “ill-natured, scornful, and full of contempt” (Wickberg, 1998: 54). Comedy can be seen as “a prime testing ground for ideas about belonging and exclusion” (Medhurst, 2007: 39) because it invites audiences to laugh at those who are different, thus reasserting hegemonic norms. Yet it might also be a space within which atypical, progressive behavior is celebrated and accepted via laughter and, according to Freud (1997/1905), is a necessary process for cultures and individuals to vent the repressions societies place upon them. This is explored in more detail in the section on ‘representation’ below. Sitcom’s history is traced back to forms of comedy that preceded television and

its roots lie in the movement of comedians from theatre and stand-up to radio and then into television (Murray, 2005: 1-39). Prior to broadcasting, comedians in music halls in Britain and vaudeville in the United States were able to tour a single routine for many years, safe in the knowledge that having performed their jokes to a local audience in a theatre in one town did not prevent them from doing the same in another town to a different audience. When broadcasting began, radio (and, later, television) looked to the music hall and vaudeville for ready-made comedy stars whose performances could be transported wholesale to the new medium, and whose skill and success were already apparent (Neale and Krutnik, 1990: 212). Such a shift, though, caused two problems. First, this meant a single performer could no longer maintain a career with only one routine, as once a nationwide audience had encountered it via broadcasting it could not be reused. Second, the serial nature of broadcasting required a significantly larger amount of material, over a longer period of time, than music hall and vaudeville performers were used to generating. In order to accommodate these challenges, programers quickly developed situations and regular characters from which stories could be generated, moving away from the individual performer in the process and developing the “structuring principles of situation comedy” (Neale and Krutnik, 1990: 215) which persist today. The mutable nature of genre is evident in the difficulty in identifying the ‘first’

sitcom. In America radio programs featuring Jack Benny – including The Canada Dry Program (NBC/CBS, 1932-33) and The Jell-O Program Starring Jack Benny (NBC, 1934-42) – are seen as significant steps in the genre’s evolution, while in the UK Mr Muddlecombe, JP (BBC, 1937) has a claim as “the first sit-com [that] appeared on British radio” (Neale and Krutnik, 1990: 221) and Pinwright’s Progress (BBC, 1946-47) has been seen as “British television’s first authentic half-hour situation comedy series” (Lewisohn, 2003: 626). Key in the genre’s television development was the inauguration of a particular shooting style which remains core to sitcom’s aesthetic: the ‘three-headed monster’. This was a “three-camera set-up with studio audience format that freed television situation comedy from its stiff stage restraints” (Putterman, 1995: 15), which was developed for I Love Lucy (CBS, 1951-57). Rather than performing outwards to the studio audience, the three-headed monster instead captured a wide shot of two characters talking and then trained a close-up on each of those performers. By cutting to a close-up of a character as they say something funny and then cutting to a close-up of the other character as they respond, programs are able

to get two laughs from one joke and the reaction shot thereby becomes central to the comic moment in the sitcom. As will be shown below, there are many sitcoms that now no longer use this shooting style but it is still the case that the most popular recent British sitcoms such as My Family (BBC1, 2000-2011), Miranda (BBC2/1, 2009-present) and Mrs Brown’s Boys (RTÉ1/BBC1, 2011-present) continue to employ a sitcom aesthetic developed over five decades ago. While the sitcom can be defined by its comic content and its serial narrative structure, its visual style and aesthetic are also defining components.