I enjoy the TV shows Legit, Maron, Curb your Enthusaism and Louie. Louie is my favorite but the other 3 shows are good also.
Are there any other shows worth watching that fall along these plot lines?
I know there are a lot of other TV series that revolve around the lives of comedians (Seinfeld, Jeff Foxworthy, Ray Romano, etc) but aside from Seinfeld I don’t know if I like them as much. Besides Seinfeld isn’t really miserable or dysfunctional.
It’s Garry Shandling’s Show or The Larry Sanders Show, perhaps?
You might like Inside Amy Shumer, although it’s format is dysfunctional/miserable skits rather than the standard sitcom format.
If you instead want miserable and dysfunctional shows revolving around the lives of comedians, there’s Mulaney.
There was one back in the mid 90s? Tall, skinnyish, white guy. Lasted only a season or two. Based on his family life I believe.
Titus?
There’s a new series called “The Comedians” on FX, starring Billy Crystal and Josh Gad as themselves starring in a fake documentary about the two of them creating a new sitcom. Two episodes in and I can’t figure out if I’m going to continue. Gad does that man-child shtick, which has gotten pretty trite after years of Will Ferrell and Jonah Hill wearing it thin.
The Comedians is based on a Swedish series with the same premise (older and younger comedians working together). And they’re not making a sitcom, but a sketch comedy show.
Titus definitely fits the category.
Roseanne probably qualifies as well.
See, I told you it was barely holding my interest.
In the case of the three shows mentioned in the OP, the main characters are stand-up comedians; basically, they’re playing themselves. I don’t think that’s true for Titus or Roseanne, but I don’t know if the OP meant to limit it in that way.
I like the show Roseanne, but I wouldn’t call her miserable the way I’d call Marc Maron or Louis CK miserable. Like I said, Ray Romano has a show built around him but its not along the lines of what I mean.
I remember watching Titus, but I haven’t seen it in a while. I like Titus’s comedy specials though.
Sure he was. Superficial, anal retentive, a neat freak, apathetic to the suffering of those around him, narcissistic, unwilling to commit to a woman (or willing to break it off for the most trivial reasons), etc.
But certainly funny.
He wasn’t miserable though. George was miserable.
Hence my ellipsis.
There was Dabney Coleman’s series Buffalo Bill, which only lasted for two seasons. I’m not sure though that Coleman is the type of actor you’re looking for. He’s a comic actor but he isn’t a stand-up comedian.
Good thread, Wesley. Very interesting.
Titus does not exactly fit the OP. It was mostly autobiographical and based on his stand up act at the time which was filmed as Norman Rockwell is Bleeding (one of my favorite stand up specials of all time BTW). However, in the show he is not a stand up comedian, he owns a custom car shop.
I recall the ep. where Jerry was dating “himself” in his current girlfriend. He broke it off because, as he put it, he hated himself.
Though, yeah, Dabney Coleman’s character isn’t a comedian, the episode of Buffalo Bill with the Jerry Lewis impersonators is one of the funniest sitcom half hours ever. (P.S.: Pre-fame Geena Davis is in this tv show’s cast. She’d later be in Tootsie along with Coleman.)