Laughing to Death ... and Beyond

[tv star collector]

According to A.C. Nielson Company, the average American watches
four hours of television a day. That's two months out of every
year. And if you live to be 72 years of age, that's a dozen
years of your life you'll spend watching OTHER people become
millionaires.

Zig Ziglar calls television "the income reducer and the morality
buster."

Dr. James Twitchell, author of Carnival Culture, says that in
our culture, by the time a person is six years old, the average
boy or girl will spend more time in front of the electronic
babysitter than they will in conversation with their fathers
- for the rest of their lives.

Gene Roddenberry, speaking at Indiana University, said,
"Television exists for one reason only."

Do you know what it is?

Not entertainment, education, or escape.

It's to SELL you something.

The rest of it is just a reason to get you to watch the
advertising.

I just recently found this out about television:
During situation comedy shows, the producers kick off a laugh
track every ten to fifteen seconds.

Do you know that people don't really laugh like that anymore?

Do you know where they recorded that laughter, by and large?
From people watching the Red Skelton Show live back in the
1950s. (There was no dialogue to interrupt their laughter.)

So, in other words, those people you hear laughing during those
sitcoms of today... they're dead!

~A MountainWings Original by Ted Janusz, Hilliard, Ohio~

From CrazyAboutTV.com:
"In the final comedy sketch of most episodes, Red Skelton would
perform mute. The only noises were sound effects and the
audience's laughter and applause. Only one guest star (Groucho
Marx) ever appeared during that sketch. For several decades,
the audio from those Red Skelton Show segments was used as the
laugh track for most other TV comedies and it is sometimes used
to this day!"

[AB]

Interesting article.