What is the benefit of doing a sitcom in a mockumentary format?

[TMC]

You know, shows like The Office, Arrested Development, Modern Family, Parks & Recreation, and more recently, Abbott Elementary.



Can the longer a show goes on, the more its credibility is strained? I mean, in the case of something like the American version of The Office, why would a crew still be shooting for years and years? And in the case of something like Modern Family, how do you explain the logistics of it all. Such as, where are all these cameramen when the in one episode, the Dunphy children catch their parents having sex?

At the end of the day, should the mockumentary device only be used if there’s an organic reason for why a series needs to tell stories through it? Otherwise, what added value does it serve when it's certainly no longer fresh?

To give up a better idea of the limitations behind the device, how intimate can characters’ conversations be when they know they’re being filmed? And when you watch these shows, sometimes the characters know and react to being filmed and other times they act as if they’re oblivious to it.

[PracTz]

I agree! IMO, if they're going to do that at all, it's best that it would a self-contained one-shot than a continuing or constant deal. AFAIK, the first one-shot 'documentary' on a sitcom was the pilot episode of 'Green Acres' in which the newsman (John Daly) framed it as the bio of the NYC lawyer Oliver Wendell Douglas about to fulfill his lifelong dream of being a farm up to moving into the Haney Place. Later on 'M*A*S*H' did two interviews with the regulars about their views of the Korean War. However, these were not ongoing deals but just taking small breaks from the regular sitcom format.

[icecream]

Mockumentaries suck. The Office, Modern Family, and Abbott Elementary are all horrible shows.