Last FQ’s of August. Get ‘em while you can.
Chris Dahl starts us off:
I'm watching a ball game on MLB tv tonight and I've seen between inning ads for Applebee's that use the Cheers theme song.
Do you know how music rights work? It must have come up in your TV career and it seems a bit blasphemous to have Applebee's co-opt the good will built up by Cheers.
I’m sure Paramount, Charles-Burrows-Charles, and Gary Portnoy & Judy Hart Angelo (writers of the theme) all had to sign-off on it. And I’m sure they were all handsomely compensated.
I seem to recall the CHEERS theme used for a State Farm campaign as well. And an InnovAge commercial.
So this is not the first.
From 71dude:
What are your favorite emotional sitcom scenes that you didn't write that you think are well-earned?
The final moments of THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW. And my favorite of all time -- the Father Mulcahy speech in the “Interview” episode of MASH.
Cedricstudio asks:
I was just listening to a podcast with a college instructor talking about a lecture he gave on comedy and joke structure. He said he played a six-minute scene for the class featuring Sam and Diane from the first season of Cheers. While the students enjoyed It and saw value in it, they felt the scene went on far too long and that you couldn't get away with that today. The consensus was that if today's young audiences (who are being conditioned by Snapchat, TikTok, etc.) had to sit through a six minute scene of nothing but two people talking, no matter how good the writing was eventually they would start to squirm. Do you agree? Any thoughts?
I’ve heard that too. It’s certainly true for some people. But I think you have to consider the context. If the students had followed the show and really were into the Sam & Diane relationship I suspect the scene would have seemed more compelling.
I also wonder if those college students would have the same reaction if the characters were their contemporaries instead of OK Boomers. Would they be more apt to listen and follow if they related more on a personal level?
So it’s not necessarily the pace.
Younger audiences do have a shorter attention span, or at least the need to multi-task when something isn’t hugely riveting, but I’m finding (especially during this pandemic) that lots of young people are discovering CHEERS and really connecting with it. Obviously, some episodes hold up better than others, but I’m quite proud of the work some thirty years later and still feel the series works, even at its less-than-frenetic pace.
And finally, Rory Wohl has a question about my long-time partnership with David Isaacs.
Even though you both are off doing things individually, do you still consider yourselves partners?
If CBS called today and said, "Ken, baby, the zeitgeist is ready for a reboot of 'Big Wave Dave's,'" would you immediately be on the phone to David with "David, dust off the ol' typewriter, we're back!"?
We do still consider ourselves partners and have reunited to do some pilots together over the last few years.
Despite our current schedules, we’re always on the lookout to find projects we could write and produce together.
Interestingly, when we do sit down to write a script, even after some time has passed since our last one, we fall back into our familiar rhythm and shorthand almost immediately. It’s like we just finished our previous script the night before. There’s no awkward “getting back into the swing” period.
If you know anyone at CBS, we have some great ideas for the BIG WAVE DAVE’S reboot.
What’s your Friday Question?
from By Ken Levine
Chris Dahl starts us off:
I'm watching a ball game on MLB tv tonight and I've seen between inning ads for Applebee's that use the Cheers theme song.
Do you know how music rights work? It must have come up in your TV career and it seems a bit blasphemous to have Applebee's co-opt the good will built up by Cheers.
I’m sure Paramount, Charles-Burrows-Charles, and Gary Portnoy & Judy Hart Angelo (writers of the theme) all had to sign-off on it. And I’m sure they were all handsomely compensated.
I seem to recall the CHEERS theme used for a State Farm campaign as well. And an InnovAge commercial.
So this is not the first.
From 71dude:
What are your favorite emotional sitcom scenes that you didn't write that you think are well-earned?
The final moments of THE MARY TYLER MOORE SHOW. And my favorite of all time -- the Father Mulcahy speech in the “Interview” episode of MASH.
Cedricstudio asks:
I was just listening to a podcast with a college instructor talking about a lecture he gave on comedy and joke structure. He said he played a six-minute scene for the class featuring Sam and Diane from the first season of Cheers. While the students enjoyed It and saw value in it, they felt the scene went on far too long and that you couldn't get away with that today. The consensus was that if today's young audiences (who are being conditioned by Snapchat, TikTok, etc.) had to sit through a six minute scene of nothing but two people talking, no matter how good the writing was eventually they would start to squirm. Do you agree? Any thoughts?
I’ve heard that too. It’s certainly true for some people. But I think you have to consider the context. If the students had followed the show and really were into the Sam & Diane relationship I suspect the scene would have seemed more compelling.
I also wonder if those college students would have the same reaction if the characters were their contemporaries instead of OK Boomers. Would they be more apt to listen and follow if they related more on a personal level?
So it’s not necessarily the pace.
Younger audiences do have a shorter attention span, or at least the need to multi-task when something isn’t hugely riveting, but I’m finding (especially during this pandemic) that lots of young people are discovering CHEERS and really connecting with it. Obviously, some episodes hold up better than others, but I’m quite proud of the work some thirty years later and still feel the series works, even at its less-than-frenetic pace.
And finally, Rory Wohl has a question about my long-time partnership with David Isaacs.
Even though you both are off doing things individually, do you still consider yourselves partners?
If CBS called today and said, "Ken, baby, the zeitgeist is ready for a reboot of 'Big Wave Dave's,'" would you immediately be on the phone to David with "David, dust off the ol' typewriter, we're back!"?
We do still consider ourselves partners and have reunited to do some pilots together over the last few years.
Despite our current schedules, we’re always on the lookout to find projects we could write and produce together.
Interestingly, when we do sit down to write a script, even after some time has passed since our last one, we fall back into our familiar rhythm and shorthand almost immediately. It’s like we just finished our previous script the night before. There’s no awkward “getting back into the swing” period.
If you know anyone at CBS, we have some great ideas for the BIG WAVE DAVE’S reboot.
What’s your Friday Question?
from By Ken Levine
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