Comedy-drama

Comedy-drama, sometimes contracted to dramedy, is a genre of television, theatre, and film in which there is an equal or nearly equal balance of humor and serious content.

History

Theatre

Early television

By the early 1960s, television companies commonly presented half-hour long "comedy" series, or one hour long "dramas." Half-hour series were mostly restricted to situation comedy or family comedy, and were usually aired with either a live or overdubbed laugh track. One hour dramas included genre series such as police and detective series, westerns, science fiction, and, later, serialized prime time soap operas. Programs today still overwhelmingly conform to these half-hour and one hour guidelines.

While sitcoms would occasionally balance their humor with more dramatic and humanistic moments, these remained the exception to the rule as the 1960s progressed. Beginning around 1969 in the US, however, there was a brief spate of half-hour shows that purposely alternated between comedy and drama and aired without a laugh track, as well as some hour-long shows such as CHiPs in the late 70s to early 80s. At the time, these were known as "comedy-dramas." The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, which aired from 1987-1991, was another good example. These early experiments also influenced general TV comedy, and later series (especially family themed sitcoms) often included brief dramatic interludes and more serious subject matter. A very good example of a tremendously and highly successful Comedy-drama series that help cemented and make the genre distinct in television was the television series Moonlighting having garnered an immense amount critical acclaim as well as being a highly rated series worldwide. Another example of a successful Comedy-drama was the television series Eight is Enough the reason that makes it distinct was that it wasn't a Comedy-drama in the traditional sense but, that it was an hour-long series that utilized a laugh track which is very unusual but, is still considered a Comedy-drama in that it alternated between Drama and Comedy.

Comedy-drama television series have been strongly associated with the single-camera production format, although not all single-camera comedy shows are necessarily comedy-dramas.

Attributes of comedy-dramas on TV

See also

References

Drama Category:Drama genres Category:Television genres Category:Film genres