The Laughter in a Sitcom Was Often Recorded in 1950
A sitcom is a comedy series with recurring characters. For decades the laughter you heard came from a machine holding decades-old recordings.
A sitcom is a situation comedy: a series in which the same characters meet the same setting week after week. The canned laughter had a strange afterlife. Charley Douglass built a laugh machine in the early 1950s, and because he guarded it closely, shows for years reused the same recorded audiences — so viewers were hearing people who had laughed decades earlier, some of them long dead.
- A situation comedy. *A workplace sitcom.*
- Laugh track — recorded laughter added afterwards. *Without a laugh track.*
- Studio audience — real people laughing live. *Filmed before a studio audience.*
- Sitcom format — self-contained episodes, stable cast. *A classic sitcom format.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | sitcom | A new sitcom. |
| Plural | sitcoms | Old sitcoms. |
| Full form | situation comedy | A situation comedy. |
| Related | dramedy | A gentle dramedy. |
| Related | mockumentary | Shot as a mockumentary. |
- The sitcom ran for eleven seasons.Television.
- Modern sitcoms often drop the laugh track.A shift since the 2000s.
- It plays like a sitcom episode.Figurative, of real life.
What makes a sitcom a sitcom
- A fixed situation — a flat, an office, a pub
- Recurring characters — the same people, week after week
- Reset at the end — the status quo usually returns
- Half-hour format — inherited from radio scheduling
- Character comedy — the humour comes from who they are, not what happens
A blend of *situation* and *comedy*, first recorded in American English in the 1960s. The form itself is older and came to television from radio.
Who invented the laugh track?
Charley Douglass, a sound engineer, built the first laugh machine in the early 1950s. He kept its workings secret for years.
Why are sitcoms half an hour?
The format was inherited from radio comedy scheduling and became the standard commercial slot on television.