The Great British Sitcom: Fawlty Towers

[Mel O'Drama]

I find the joy of sitcoms in the re-watch. More than any other genre or form of entertainment, the sitcom lends itself to repeat viewing. Most people seem to have their favorite comfort shows they default to and, I think for most, those comfort shows are sitcoms.

This is very true.

Still, though, it's nice to see you already revisiting episodes that aren't as familiar, and even ones you didn't initially enjoy, which might seem like more work than revisiting an episode you know you'll love.

Perhaps what impressed me the most about the first six episodes is that they all felt very distinct.

The guest residents help give each episode a distinct tone, I think, but even without accounting for that I'd say it's still true that the focus does shift with each episode.

Since I know you aren't familiar, I'll briefly hype my own favorite classic sitcom I LOVE LUCY.

I'm always glad of a little hype.

The first four seasons, a staggering 127 episodes, were written by two people. That always blows my mind. Some of those episodes are still considered among the all time greats, 70+ years later.

That sounds very unusual for American TV where some sitcoms seem to be written by a committee.

Do you feel this helped with continuity and consistency when it came to the way the characters behaved and details such as their likes/dislikes?



The longest running sitcom, Last Of The Summer Wine, had just one writer for all of its 295 episodes, but that was stretched over almost 38 years, and it wasn't as densely scripted as Fawlty.