-- James Taylor
Inside Joke: It’s Garry Shandling’s hair!
Hollywood’s Inside-Out Peepshow:
Studio Setups and Cheap Props
by Jamie Jobb
Magicians Penn and Teller make a living “showing the tell”, meaning they let us in on the trick while they’re doing it. But then they trick us again before we know it! That little peek backstage – the quick look “behind the trick” is a feint, it sets up the magic duo’s true trick, the one that matters. The one that “gets us going”. The one we can’t see coming: their punchline!
Story magicians often work very much the same way. On stage and on screen, it’s called “tearing down the fourth wall” between the performers and the audience.
Perhaps that’s why so many tv viewers get hooked on these shows offering backstage peeks into the process of making actual programs like the very one we’re watching?
Here’s a short list of such self-reflective shows in recent years on mainstream cable tv: “Episodes,” “Entourage,” “Fat Actress,” “The Comeback,” “Smash,” “Glee” (more on these shows below). The hard scripts for these programs allow us backstage for glimpses into the lives of the performers, or rather the characters these performers play … as actual actors. It gets a little confusing, like a fun-house mirror. DIY celebrity-stalking without having to leave the sofa.
Perhaps that’s the primary appeal for many who watch these sitcoms? Who wouldn’t want an insider’s look, a view from the entourage: Save us a seat in the limo, bro!
If a show is called “Entourage”, we can bet the budget calls for a limousine. Which is exactly what we got in the pilot of that show. Along with the promise that we’ll be spending lots of backstage time with this group of guys prowling Hollywood.
But it takes more than just turning the camera around to show the studio crew for these shows to work. Much of the success of a program is based on how it’s narrated, if at all. Again that leads back to the writers’ room.
Setting a story in a large studio certainly makes it easier to shoot. Cast and crew are already assembled. Any part of the studio can make a suitable background, with little need for permits or traffic control or any of the other burdens of location shooting. Lights and cameras, normally left out of the shot, are necessarily included in camera angles for these shows because such background clearly indicates “working studio”. Cheap and available props with enough hands to handle them, what more do we want? A bigger budget!?!
It’s The Garry Shandling Show
Garry Shandling “tore down the fourth wall” with “It’s the Garry Shandling Show” which was obviously shot in a tv studio with visible cameras before a live audience that participated to the point of “walking out on the show” in one episode. Garry had to go over to their “apartment” (the audience bleachers dressed to look like one big happy family, with lamps, wallpaper, wall photos and a door) to talk them into coming back home to the show!
Himself a quite funny fellow, Shandling didn’t hide the fact that it was all a show – his tv show – because he was drawing on his inner Ernie Kovacs. Kovacs was keenly aware of the magical fact of television: Everything gets squeezed into a box (the tv) and pushed out through the frame (the screen). We could see Kovacs in a skit biting the tongue in his cheek because he had the audacity to do live routines.
“It’s the Garry Shandling Show” (1986-1990) was indeed a unique program created by head writers Shandling and Alan Zweibel, who covered their inability to write dialogue and exposition by making the show seem like a stand-up act with its opening monologue, odd theme song and co-stars to help Garry turn jokes into scenes. Tom Gammill, Max Pross, Al Jean, Mike Reiss and Ed Solomon also worked in that writers' room.
Shandling played a version of himself, a stand-up comic who lived in a Sherman Oaks condo and lived with a bunch of characters who understood they were part of his television program which had a visible active audience and lots of cameras, microphones and crew hanging around the condo. Kinda the obverse of “reality tv”!
The cast was unique in that every actor seemed chosen for looks, all filling “next-door-neighbor” roles. None of them seemed to be stars or celebrities. Molly Cheek played Garry’s platonic mate, Nancy Bancroft. Pete Schumaker (Michael Tucci) was Garry’s best friend/neighbor and father of Grant Schumaker (Scott Nemes). Often stealing the show was Garry’s clueless mom Ruth Shandling (Barbara Cason). Just for fun Tom Petty played himself and happened to pop in usually at the right moments. In condos, everyone is a neighbor.
The show was full of mundane events turned extraordinary: Garry moves in and gets cable, Garry babysits Grant, Garry gives his Mom a surprise birthday party that almost kills her, Garry takes some Cub Scouts to a ball game, Mrs. Robinson hits on Garry who’s only interested in her daughter, Garry marries his maid so she can stay in the country, Garry chaperones Grant’s first date, Pete has an affair, Garry visits a psychic, Garry hosts a party, his ex-girlfriend comes back to town, Garry finds Lassie, Garry sets up his Mom with a doctor and Garry gets an acting job. And those were just “the plots” for the first season!
Anyone who appreciates absurdist humor should love this show. Fortunately every episode is now available on Netflix (see below).
The Larry Sanders Show
Not to be outdone by himself, Shandling followed up his first surreal sitcom with another backstage comedy, his award-winning “The Larry Sanders Show”, which was less absurd and more focused on characters than the previous “Shandling Show”. The backstage talk show was fast-paced and more acerbic.
Larry Sanders (Shandling) is forever seeking support from his gonzo producer Arthur (Rip Torn) and/or his hapless sidekick Hank Kingsley (fantastic Jeffrey Tambor) as his office prepares for each night’s show and celebrity guests, who play themselves and wander in and out of scenes.
Again the strength of the show was in the writers' room. Co-creators Shandling and Dennis Klein were joined by Peter Tolan, Paul Simms, Maya Forbes, John Riggi and Judd Apatow as mainstays. Fittingly a lot of the dysfunctional action on “Larry Sanders” happened on the talk-show’s fictional writers' room!
During its run (1992-1998), Larry Sanders Show fictional celebrity-guest slots were as coveted among celebrities as were actual talk show slots from Carson or Letterman. It’s curious to note that although this program was about as “backstage” as you can get, characters were never winking at the camera to comment on the action as occurs in programs made during the “reality tv” era. “Larry Sanders” is a classic sendup of all things Hollywood, and it too has been collected for streaming (see below).
Backstage trompe-l'œil at the Folies Bergère in Paris (photo by Brassai)
More Tinseltown Peepshows
Recent tv shows set in studios with ratings and links:
“Episodes” (2011) A British-American production about a hit show called Pucks, an American-British production in Hollywood with Matt LeBlanc as himself (how can he not being great at that, huh!?!) He’s an actor stringing along his British writers Beverly (Tamsin Greig) and Shawn Lincoln (Stephen Mangan). Show is assisted greatly by solid support from three actors all playing utterly wacko Tinsletown nitwits: Kathleen Rose Perkins as Carol Rance, Chris Diamantopoulos as Castor Sotto, and John Pankow as Merc Lapidus. TV characters seldom get to be this nuts on camera
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/Episodes/70175670?trkid=385063
“Entourage” (2004-2011) Tales of actor Vincent Chase, a young indecisive Hollywood A-lister and his pushy childhood chums from Queens. Based on executive producer Mark Wahlberg’s experiences growing up in the same situation.
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/Entourage/70155583
“Fat Actress” (2005) A short-lived poorly-named overwrought vanity project for Kirstie Alley as Brenda Hampton, an overweight washed up tv starlet and tabloid chopped liver who can no longer command the celebrity she once held. One Season, seven episodes.
http://www.avclub.com/article/dignity-always-dignity-case-file-21ifat-actressii--83473
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/Fat-Actress/70172461
“The Comeback” (2005) with Lisa Kudrow as Valerie Cherish. A satirical look inside the entertainment industry, shot by a two-camera crew to create a doc-within-a-doc fake cinéma vérité.Cherish is washed-up star who created a reality tv show about herself offering hair-brained advice. Sometimes she wonders if she needs the attention.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/11/17/return-repressed
“Smash” (2012-2013) How could we miss if it if wouldn’t go away? But it did, after only two seasons. Megan Hilty is terrific as the Marilyn Monroe wannabe in this sendup of Broadway and Off Broadway. Solid cast and rare modern backstage look at theater in New York.
http://storyline-entertainment.com/smash-2012/
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/Smash/70196148?trkid=222336
“Glee” (2009-2015) No more New Directions, William McKinley High School’s glee club finally got kicked out of school this year after six seasons on the air. No show ever kept “jumping the shark” so much as this one!
http://www.hulu.com/watch/767493
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/Glee/70143843
Garry Shandling Links:
How they got the “talk to the audience idea”
http://www.avclub.com/review/its-garry-shandlings-show-the-complete-series-34348
http://genius.com/Bill-lynch-its-garry-shandlings-show-theme-song-annotated
http://dvd.netflix.com/Movie/It-s-Garry-Shandling-s-Show/70157380
https://www.amazon.com/The-Larry-Sanders-Show/dp/B007FNZA6Y
Ernie Kovacs Links:
https://www.shoutfactory.com/film/film-comedy/the-ernie-kovacs-collection
http://www.erniekovacs.com/bio.php
Movies Set On Sets
Some backstage films set on sets: Medium Cool Fellini’s 8 ½ Day for Night Contempt Fanny & Alexander The Bank Dick Sunset Boulevard Singin’ in the Rain The Stand-In Sullivan’s Travels The Bad and The Beautiful World’s Greatest Lover Bowfinger And God Spoke The Player Postcards from the Edge State and Main Stardust Memories Movie Crazy Merton at the Movies Make Me A Star After the Fox | The Truman Show Final Cut Tootsie Soap Dish Lisbon Story White Price Hollywood Series Seven Backstage films ofplays/musicals: This So-Called Disaster Bullets Over Broadway Summer Stock Stage Fright Twentieth Century Bombshell To Be or Not To Be Gold Diggers of 1933, 1935, 1937 Footlight Parade 42nd Street Hi-De-Ho The Duke is Tops Stormy Weather |
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