"Roseanne" -- Most Realistic Sitcom Ever?

Cafe Society
1

“Roseanne” for me is the highmark of realism in TV comedy. (There might be more realistic dramas, but I’m not as familiar with as many of them.) Even other supposedly realistic sitcoms before it – the Norman Lear ones like “All in the Family,” for example – seem pretty contrived in comparison. The vast majority of sitcoms are incredibly unrealistic: a shoe salesman can afford a huge house in the suburbs? (Married with Children); 20-somethings can afford to live it up in big apartments in Manhattan? (Friends and God knows how many knock-offs). Suburban families are photogenic and polite and cheerful? (just about every family sitcom ever made).

“Roseanne,” in contrast, got it pitch perfect more often than not – the surly kids, the money troubles, the messy house, the neighbors. The parents were fat; one of the kids was a trouble-maker and semi-goth; one was bright but whiny. The basket case sister-in-law. The midwest setting. The blue collar friends and coworkers.

Which is not to say that gritty=realism. For example, while most people write it off as unrealistic, I always thought that “The Cosby Show” was a fairly spot-on depiction of people of that social class and education level. Similarly, “Roseanne” was just an extremely accurate portrayal of a certain type of blue collar family.

I wasn’t able to see the last couple of seasons of the show, but I read that it became increasingly bizarre – that the family won the lottery, or something like that. So my opinion is based on the earlier seasons of the show.

Anyways, any concurring/dissenting opinions?

2

You may be right, and that may be why no force on earth could convince me to watch another minute of that godawful show.

I’ve never seen it, but what about “Maude,” or “My Mother the Car”)? Okay, I’m joking with that second one, but the first one seems to be talked about as if it attempted realism?

3

I agree. Roseanne Barr tends to grate on the sensibilities, but you have to give her, and the rest of the cast, their due. I’ve been enjoying the show in late night reruns. Some of the episodes, especially the ones about winning the lottery, are not so good, but I enjoyed the show up to that point.

4

I saw a few episodes of Maude back when it aired on Nick at Nite; not enough to make a really solid opinion, but it struck me as being about as realistic as most of Norman Lear’s stuff – which is better (or, at any rate, more realistic) than most shows, but still, as I said before, a bit too contrived for my tastes.

5

I agree the show was remarkably realistic in its firts several seasons. In the last couple of years it started to go completely off the rails, though, with one ludicrus development after another (winning the lottery, Roseanne’s mother coming out as a lesbian, etc).

6

After the first couple of seasons, MWC willingly gave up any claim it had ever made (not that it had ever really made them to begin with) that it was depicting anything approaching realism. It was a live-action cartoon, and it had the same sort of reset button that The Simpsons has.

I neer found that show the slightest bit realistic, if for no other reason than there’s just no way that a doctor and a lawyer in New York City would have five kids and no help. And when exactly did Claire work? Any hour of the day or night, she was home. Same with Cliff, but at least he had the excuse of having his office in the basement.

In the series finale, it was revealed that the events of the final season were stories written by Roseanne Connor after Dan’s death of a heart attack. They never won the lottery, she never battled terrorists, her mother wasn’t really a lesbian (but her sister was), etc.

7

Wow, I never heard about that plotline! Was that pre-Ellen coming out? IIRC one of the first lesbian kisses on TV was on Roseanne; there was a big stink about it, and they actually put a parental warning before the show.

8

Well hell, if DtC’s gonna unspoil my spoilers…

Roseanne’s mother came out during the season 7 Thanksgiving episode. She started in on some diatribe about sex and men that culminated in “and I had to buy a Playboy before I could even let your father touch me!” or words to that effect. This would’ve been 1996, and Ellen came out IRL and on the show in 1997.

Of course, we find out in the series finale that the entire last season of Roseanne was all stories made up by Roseanne Conner after Dan died of the heart attack he had at Darlene and David’s wedding. So Mom was never really gay (although it turned out that Jackie was and Roseanne Conner made her straight in the stories for some reason…it was kind of confusing).

9

I’m getting more and more glad that I missed the last couple seasons of this show. I remember hearing that the show took a big turn when Tom Arnold decided to get involved in the writing and producing; maybe that coincides with the last couple years. At least John Goodman had the good sense to get out before things got too bad.

Anyways, sounds like a bad way for a good show to end, and not at all in keeping with the groundedness of the earlier seasons.

The parent’s work schedules were admittedly the least realistic part of the show, but the family relationships came across as very realistic, and I can see them getting by with no help.

10

Not exactly. He was still in the last season (though for a handful of episodes he was not there because he was visiting his sick mother in California). The last season still has him in it, because it is not revealed that he had actually died until the final episode. So he’s there, but it’s Roseanne Connor’s stories that he is in, in “reality”, he had passed away. I remember reading something about that final episode being Roseanne’s (Barr/Arnold/whoever she is at this point) way of reclaiming her show as her own, something about it being run not in the way she’d wanted it toward the final seasons, and her final episode was hers, and her way of saying “fuck you” to the people who ruined her show. I don’t have a cite for this however, as it is just a vague memory of mine and may not be true. Anyone else heard this?

And I’m a huge, huge baby. I’ve been watching the reruns on Nick at Nite, and every single time I see that final episode, and the camera pans over Dan smiling at the table… and then pans back to the empty chair, I start bawling. I’m such a wuss.

Dan was always my favourite, though. He made the show tolerable (and often funny) when Roseanne went off on one of her tirades. Darlene was another one for clever (but dark) comic relief. And the show strikes a chord with me - most of the people from my hometown are exactly like these people. But exactly. It’s creepy. And it doesn’t make me homesick; it reminds me of why I left. :smiley:

11

Well actually…it wasn’t just the last season. It was an unraveling of the (almost)whole show. Going back to Becky going out with Mark…since Becky didn’t really go out with Mark. And Dan didn’t die at Darleneand David’s wedding because they didn’t go out either.

If it had been just the last season since Dan died and the whole lottery thing it would have made sense. As it was it was just adding insult to injury. Bah!
However, I came here to praise Roseanne not to bury her. It got worse as it went along and ended badly but the first several seasons were great television. And wonderfully realistic, amoung other reasons, because they didn’t do that sitcom reset button thing. If there was a situation in one episode it was still there in the next one. Or at least refered to. In that it was like a drama while being a sitcom.

It ended up just being a sitcom.

Oh but I’m supposed to be praising, well, it gets a ton of credit for being just about the only sitcom to deal with teenagers (girls even!) having sex realisticly. And for having the best anti-drug (actually “only good anti-drug episode”) in sitcoms…is there a better way to keep kids off drugs then having them imagine their parents getting stoned?

12

It wouldn’t surprise me if Tom Arnold had something to do w/ the show’s downfall. I can’t stand that jackass. How the hell does he still get parts? To this day I will avoid any show that he appears in. Roseanne must have been pretty desparate to marry that schmuck.

13

Actually…I think he still gets parts because he’s been good in some of them. Suprisingly.

And now he’s made his own movie (The Kid and I) which sounds interesting and Ebert, anyway, gave a good review. Maybe he’s not such a schmuck.

And I hate to say it (since she was responsible for the show existing in the first place) but it seem to me it got worse the more Roseanne had singular control over it.

14
  • Roseanne * really jumped the shark in the last couple of seasons, and it was largely Roseanne’s fault. It was another case of a star’s ego running out of control.

I really liked the show right up until it became a vehicle for gay rights propaganda, and I agree that for at least the first several seasons it was much more realistic than any other sitcom. Add some Southern accents, throw in a lot of fundamentalist religion, and have the family go through several serious stretches of poverty, and this would have been my family.

15

As a kid watching the show (I’m Darlene’s age, I think), I was impressed by the realism of the embarrassment the parents put the kids through. Ohmigawd, they were SOOOOO embarrassing and dorky, just like my folks! As an adult, I’m impressed by the realism of the parents’ love for the kids, even while they’re exasperated, annoyed and even angry at them.

It rings true from both sides, which I find encouraging.

And can I just mention that Joss Whedon was a writer for Roseanne? During 1988 when it was still great? Thank you.

16

They also deserve kudos for showing a family that had ugly, even painful conflicts and still loved each other.

17

I agree with the OP. I’m reminded of a very angry and unintentionally humerous interview I read with Jay Tarses, the creator and producer of a show called “The Days and Night of Molly Dodd,” which ran at the same time as Roseanne but had only a fraction of Roseanne’s popularity.

To quote the IMDB: "Molly Dodd was a mid-30s, divorced woman living in New York and facing the comedy and drama of a widely changing career, difficulties of apartment living, love life and its consequences, and so on. "

In his interview, Jay Tarses complained bitterly that people were watching Roseanne rather than Molly Dodd, because Molly Dodd was so much more realistic. After all, everyone he knew was exactly like Molly, living in their chic New York apartments, and worrying about their high-level New York careers and the hot New York dating scene, while he’d never met anyone whose life resembled what was depicted on Roseanne.

I laughed and laughed, and to this day, whenever someone talks about the difference between the coastal mentality depicted in movies and on television, and the reality of life in the flyover states, I think of Jay Tarses and how completely out-of-touch he was. I have lived my whole life in California, and yet to me, Roseanne was a fairly accurate portrayal of the way I grew up. (Don’t tell my mother, though, she hates Roseanne and doesn’t see any similarity between our family and hers).

I agree that Roseanne lost its focus late in its run, but I’ve always loved the final episode, because I felt that it did do what Roseanne wanted, which was to bring the story back to its core reality. While I couldn’t believe some of the stuff that happened in the later seasons, I think that if you accept the premise of the final episode, the show as a whole can be seen as a realistic depiction of a midwestern family. I can even believe Roseanne writing all of the wacky later stuff herself – her desire to write was an element of the show almost from the beginning.

18

SpoilerVirgin I agree. I grew up in Suburban Long Island and had no problem connecting in with the show’s basic human truthfulness.

And what is all this talk about some mysterious last season with the Connors winning the lottery, and lesbian mom? I know not of its existence.

I’ll agree that show was certainly one of the most, if not the most, realistic sitcoms I know of. There are just so many moments in the course of that show, particularly the middle years from when Marc first entered the picture, to the peak David/Darlene years, that are funny yet profoundly emotional and truthful at the same time.

One of my favorite episodes exemplifying its emotional power:

Becky first comes home after eloping with Marc. Dan refuses to even face her and escapes to the garage to work on the bike. Becky goes into the garage to try and confront her father.

Becky: Dad, I was just an extra mouth to feed. I was doing you a favor
Dan: (without even looking at her) Don’t do me no favors Becky.

My god that was a powerful moment. Also that same episode when Marc tries to confront him in the kitchen.

Marc: Dan I think we should talk about this.
Dan: You’re in my way. Are you going to move or do you want me to move you.

I’m welling up just thinking about it. I can see my dad in there.

19

Or the episode where Dan finds out that Jackie’s boyfriend hit her. He walks out of the house. Comes in later on with his fist bleeding.

20

Darlene was my favorite character and seemed the most realistic. Unlike most sitcom characters, she went through recognizable phases, ones that I could relate to because she’s around my age. And she still remained likable throughout all of them, even when she was dark and depressed .

Becky was the least realistic, however. She was too bratty and full of back-sass to be the product of a working class household, I think. I always wanted Roseanne to pop her one (or at least threaten to) but dammit, she never did. Not realistic. Even Cliff Huxtable made threats of violence. And the most realistic thing about Clair Huxtable was that she always on the verge of cussing out Vanessa (I liked mad Clair much better than nice Clair). Whenever Roseanne got angry, you knew a joke was near to diffuse the tension. Which makes sense, this not being a drama and all.

Also realistic were the way Dan and Roseanne were constantly changing jobs, looking for jobs, being laid off of jobs, creating jobs, etc. I remember the episode when Roseanne, after a long stint of unemployment, went in for an interview at a business office. She charmed the interviewer and got the job, only to have it revoked from her at the end of the show when it was revealed she had no computer skills. No cheesy happy ending or lesson learned–the same can’t be said for Norman Lear shows.