Domcom: Character-Based Situation Comedies
by
Richard F. Taflinger
This
page has been accessed times
since 30 May 1996.
Characters
The characters in all types of domcom are more like human beings than those in actcoms. They are not so one-dimensional and stereotyped:
no scatter-brained conniving wives; no perpetually confused and angry husbands;
the neighbors are people, not s tooges or henchmen.
They experience real emotions: grief, not wailing; love, not panting desire.
In addition, all characters are important,
not just the star or main characters. The main character is not necessarily the
pivot point of every plot: the supporting characters are central to the plot
much more often than in an actcom. Also, soluti ons are not always
provided by the main character: they are sometimes provided by supporting
characters or even transients. For example, in an episode of THE BRADY BUNCH,
Jan's aunt, a transient character, proves that Jan is not ugly. In an episode
of EIGHT IS ENOUGH, David, a supporting character, pushes Mary into realizing
that she is trying too hard in medical school and is making everyone miserable
in the process.
Supporting characters are much more important
in their own rights. They are not strictly underlings to the main character.
They lead dramatic lives of their own away from the main character. They are
often involved in plots of their own.
The supporting characters in a domcom are the children, neighbors, friends, and the
parents' co-workers (In domcoms of the 50s and 60s
the wife rarely had a job that took her out of the house. However, as women
moved more and more into the workplace , so did the
wife in domcoms.)
The children are the characters that have
most of the problems, usually associated with learning about living in a social
world. The relationship between parent and child, and the children themselves,
is good and loving. Though there is sibling riv alry and hostility, there is even more love and support.
A major problem with television's series
programming is solved by having the children as the characters with most of the
problems. For a piece of drama to be gripping for the audience, it must take
place during the major event in the life of the pro tagonist.
For OEDIPUS REX to take place while Oedipus was on the road, rather than at the
moment when he discovers the truth about himself and his life, might be
interesting, but also might leave the audience asking, "So what?" For
E.T., THE EXTRATERRES TRIAL to be about E.T.'s trip
to Earth, rather than about his meeting and surviving his encounter with humans, would lack immediacy and tension. Hamlet's life at
school could be fascinating, but is nothing compared to the dramatic impact of
his desire to revenge his father's murder. Thus it is clear to see that
whatever happens to the character, the piece should be about the most important
thing to happen to him/her/it in his/her/its life.
What this means to series television is --
it's impossible. If what happens in this week's show is the most important
thing that can happen in the character's life, then next week's show is an
anticlimax, as is the next, and the next, and the next, if there is a next (if
the audience loses interest, the show loses its contract).
However, what if the characters with the
problems are children? Children are incomplete adults, still learning about the
world around them. Therefore, every problem they have is potentially the most
important event in their lives to that point. Ne xt
week's problem can be even more important. This solves a major problem with the
dramatic quality of series television. It is now possible to tell a story every
week that is the most important thing in a character's life without having to
change chara cters.
Other supporting characters in a domcom rarely have problems of their own for the family to
resolve, but merely act as comic intensification and foils for the main
characters. Though they rarely have problems of their own they are often
instrumental in the solution by either providing a sounding-board for another
character to discover the solution or by discovering the solution themselves. A
prime example is Tim Allen's next door neighbor on HOME IMPROVEMENT. Although
his face is never seen, he al ways has a perspective on Tim's problems that
gives Tim a new approach.
Transients are most often the cause of a plot
problem or complication, coming into the show for one episode to create a
problem for one of the main characters or children. They play roles ranging
from total stranger to rarely seen relative, and thei
r problem, often the most important event in their lives, is resolved through
their interaction with one or more members of the family.
The number of transients is kept to a
minimum: the interest is in the family's reactions to the problems, not the
transient's problem. For example, in an episode of ONE DAY AT A TIME, Schneider
is confronted with someone to whom he once said, "Keep in touch". The
man shows up, just out of prison. Schneider, Ann and Barbara are all
apprehensive about having him around, but as they get to know him they realize
they were prejudging him. He turns out to be a nice but socially unskilled person, havin g spent half his
life in jail. They get him a job, which solves his problem, although the next
moment the police come to take him back to prison for having left it without
the formality of being released. Schneider, Ann, and Barbara resolve to visit
him, having discovered something about themselves, that
they tend to be prejudiced and resolve to avoid it in future.
As can be seen from the above example, it was
not the convict's problems that were the focus of the episode: it was the
family's reactions to the problems. The resolution of the episode was not for
the convict, who ended up right where he started, in prison, but the effect on
the family and their new knowledge about themselves.
All characters, with minor exceptions, are
sympathetic. The plots do not arise out of a protagonist/antagonist conflict,
but a mental and/or emotional conflict within a character, and attempts by the
character and his family to eliminate the conflic t.
At most, a character, usually a transient, will be a personalized
representation of the conflict, and thus appear unsympathetic. However, with
the resolution of the conflict, any antipathy toward this character will
disappear as it is realized that e ither his
motivations were misunderstood or he is to be pitied rather than despised.
One thing that distinguishes a domcom from an actcom is the
competency of the characters to cope with problems. The parent does not always
have the answer but does always have some explanation by the end of an episode.
The children have an amazing degree of understanding of human nature and the
problems of children and parents.
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The following sections discuss the
differences in the characters in the three types of domcom:
standard, single-parent, and pseudo-domcom.
Standard Domcom
The standard domcom
is one which uses a complete family as the basic unit. That is, there is a
father, a mother, and children.
The main characters in a standard domcom are the parents. The father is the head of the
family, in keeping with the idealized middle-class American family. He is a
fount of wisdom, firm but gentle, and the final decisions rest with him on all
matte rs financial, the general running of the
household, and discipline. In other words, he is a benevolent dictator, the
breadwinner and provider for the family. He may be occasionally unsure of what
to do but he is always willing to try and do his best.
The mother is the father's right hand. She
runs the home, handling the details of cleaning, shopping, cooking, etc. She
maintains order in the home, deferring to the father in most matters of
discipline, providing the emotional facets of all proble
ms, leaving most of the logistics to the logical and rational mind of the
father. As Mrs. Brady says on THE BRADY BUNCH, "I don't have to be
logical--I'm a mother." The mother is the wellspring of comfort and mother
love, and attends to the emotional we ll-being of the family.
In recent years, as women have become more
individual and independent, the wife has occasionally assumed the traditional
"husband" characteristics, contributing more to the financial and
disciplinary well-being of the family. At the same time, the husba nd has contributed more to
the emotional aspects. On THE COSBY SHOW we often see Claire Huxtable handling discipline, while Cliff Huxtable provides comfort and emotional support to the
children. Nonetheless, the standard characteristics of husband and w
Primary among the supporting characters are
the children, who range in age from about six to about seventeen.
At least one child will be very young, rher
innocence and lack of experience providing many plot problems and complications
as rhe learns about the world around rher. For examples, there is Kathy on
FATHER KNOWS BEST, Nick on EIGHT IS ENOUGH, Patty on
THE DONNA REED SHOW, Cindy and Bobby on THE BRADY BUNCH, and Rudy on THE COSBY
SHOW.
At least one child will be old enough to
experience problems with growing up in society. This child is learning not only
about the world but the people in it, and experiences problems with friends,
the opposite sex, money, egotism and snobbishness. For example, there is Bud on
FATHER KNOWS BEST, Tom and
The other children, if any, will be older,
beginning to cope with adult problems. The parents will guide rather than
dictate solutions to these children, and the character will most often discover
rher own solutions. In addition, this character wil l
help with the raising of younger children, providing
examples, good or bad. For example, there is Betty on FATHER KNOWS BEST, Nancy,
Susan, Joanie, Mary, and David on EIGHT IS ENOUGH, Mary on THE DONNA REED SHOW,
Marcia and Greg on THE BRADY BUNCH, and Theo and Denise on THE COSBY SHOW.
If a show has a long enough run, four or more
years, you will often see a new child added to the family in order to maintain
the age spread as the original children (read, the actors playing them) grow
older and move into new slots. For example, FAMILY TIES had the age spread the
first few seasons with Jennifer, Mallory and Alex. However, as these three
characters aged, a new child, Andy, was added. Andy provided the youngest,
Jennifer moved from the youngest to the second slot, Mallory moved to the o lder teenage slot, and Alex became a new slot, the young
adult.
Other supporting characters are most often
the parents' friends or family. They are often professional people (doctors,
especially). They will aid in the raising of the children by offering advise and encouragement. Rarely do they provide anything in
the way of plot problems and complications. On those shows in which the main
characters are the children rather than the parents, such as FAMILY TIES, other
supporting characters are often the children's, rather than the parents',
friends.
There is extensive use of transient characters,
portraying in particular friends of the children. Through these friends the
children can explore various ways of learning about life: peer pressure,
success and failure, other families.
Single-parent Domcom
A single-parent domcom
has a family broken for some reason, such as the death of one parent, or a
divorce. Thus, the basic unit is that of having either a father or mother, but
not both, and one or more children that the single parent must raise.
The main character in a single-parent domcom is usually the parent, such as Andy Taylor on THE
ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW. Occasionally, however, it is the parent and the child. Tom
Corbett and his son, Eddie, on THE COURTSHIP OF EDDIE'S FATHER, is an exam ple of this.
Most shows of this kind use a widower. This
appears to be due to an assumed effect on the audience, that men are less
competent to raise children and thus there is a greater poignancy in a father
trying to be a mother as well.
The supporting characters include the
children, the surrogate parent, and friends. The children are usually young
(six to twelve years of age). If the show has a long run the children naturally
grow up, and new young children are brought in. For e xample,
on MY THREE SONS, which ran for 18 seasons, the oldest son grew up, got
married, and moved out, so they adopted a new youngest son. This maintained the
age range for interesting plots (and incidentally insured that the title
remained applicable).
The surrogate parent is a member of the cast
that fulfills the role of the other, non-biological, parent. There are, of
course, two types of surrogate parents: surrogate fathers and surrogate
mothers. Surrogate fathers are usually well-intentioned but bumbling.
Schneider, on ONE DAY AT A TIME, is constantly offering advise
and assistance to Ann on the raising of her two daughters. The advise is often
inapplicable and the assistance obstructive. Nonetheless, it is obvious that he
believes that what he says and does is for the best. Bub,
and later Uncle Charlie, on MY THREE SONS, played the wife to Steven Douglas'
husband. Bub/Uncle Charlie did the cooking and
housework, and provided some of the emotional support for the children.
Surrogate mothers are warm and loving, stable
and dependable. When they are not it is for the purpose of plot complication or
problem. For example, Mrs. Livingston on THE COURTSHIP OF EDDIE'S FATHER is
always there, warm, smiling, gentle. On one e pisode she was in danger of deportation to her native
Occasionally there is a hybrid form of
single-parent domcom, in which there is a parent and
a surrogate parent of the same sex. KATE & ALLIE and MY TWO DADS are
example. In this case the role of parent and surrogate parent
trade off. In some episodes K ate is the surrogate father to Allie's
mother, in other episodes vice versa.
The parent's friends are often bumbling but
well-intentioned, providing a foil for the parent's level-headed competence.
Barney Fife on THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW and "Uncle"
Friends are almost exclusively of the same
sex as the parent. The parent will rarely have a friend of the opposite sex.
Anyone of the opposite sex turns out to be an employee, an employer, a
co-worker, or a love interest.
Transients brought into a single-parent domcom are usually important. For the parent they are
either a love interest or a family complication for the parent, the child, or
the surrogate parent. For the child the transients are brought in to introdu ce
questions or problems for the parent to answer or solve. For example, on JULIA,
Earl introduces the problem "Is Santa Claus black or white?". On an episode of THE COURTSHIP OF EDDIE'S FATHER,
Eddie wants to marry his babysitter, who in turn wants to marry Tom. This is a
problem for Tom to solve.
Pseudo-domcom
The characters on a pseudo-domcom are a set of adults who bear relationships to one
another that are analogous to those in a regular domcom.
An example is THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW, in which Mary, Lou,
Occasionally an actcom
will mature into a pseudo-domcom, as why the
characters do what they becomes more important than
the mere fact that they do it. A prime example is CHEERS.
CHEERS, a pure actcom
for the first few seasons, matured as the characters began examining why they
did things. Sam, an inveterate, egotistical skirt-chaser has tried everything
he can think of to get Rebecca into bed. He sees his opportunity when Rebe cca has lost the love of her
life and is vulnerable. He moves in, then suddenly stops as his conscience
(something he never had the first few seasons) bothers him: how can he take
advantage of someone who needs a friend to talk to, not a roll in the hay ? Sam bolts from the room and calls Rebecca from the
lobby of her apartment house, knowing he can't be a friend while in the same
room with her -- his old reflexes are too strong. Sam's examination of his own
character, realization of a moral dilemma, a nd decision to do something different from his normal
behavior patterns, are factors that make this episode a domcom
rather than an actcom.
Although most episodes of CHEERS are actcom, many are domcom, with the
characters in the bar taking the roles of parents and children, swapping the
roles around according to the dictates of individual episodes.
The only difference between a regular domcom and a pseudo-domcom, once
the concept of the pseudo-domcom is understood, is
that the character of parent, surrogate parent and child(ren) in a pseudo-domcom will
often rotate between the characters.
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Copyright © 1996 Richard F. Taflinger.
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