Why Uncool Is Cool: An Interview with Paul Feig

Paul Feig: I know, the saddest day ever was when Happy Days went from a single-camera show to a multi-camera show. The first two seasons, when it was a single-camera show, I mean, it was great! You watch those episodes and they’re really, really good. And then, all of sudden, yeah, you know, “Whoo! It’s Potsie! Whoo!”

Popshifter: (laughs)

Paul Feig: I always noticed that the audience could barely muster up a “Whoo!” when Joanie walked on.

Popshifter: (laughs harder)

Paul Feig: They kinda knew they had to? (laughs)

So I always try to figure out what’s the best way to do comedy on TV and right now, it does feel like the sorta live camera thing works the best. 30 Rock does the same thing; that’s shot very much. . . it’s a little more standard, but if you notice it’s just kind of a handheld camera and the camera will swing around from person to person. I don’t know; it creates a more live feeling. I think part of it is that if you don’t have a laugh track, then you kinda need that, because it puts you into the “play” more.

It makes it more immediate to you. The good thing about a multi-camera sitcom is you’re there with an audience. I think that’s so great if you’re at home alone: suddenly you’re in a room with a bunch of people having a great time.

I actually really like the way that the Brits do it. They’ll shoot a lot without an audience—more like a movie—then they’ll show it in an auditorium with an audience and record the laughs.

Popshifter: I didn’t know that!

Paul: Yeah, that’s why I never get bothered by the laugh track in a British sitcom because it just feels real. Because it is. I find that very fascinating.

I’m not down on laugh tracks. It’s always been such a thing (groans), “Oh, the laugh track.” I hate the fake laugh track. I grew up with The Jetsons, which always had a laugh track, and then for some reason somebody “classed it up” and took off the laugh track. So I was sitting down to watch it one day and I was so upset.

Popshifter: I don’t even remember it even having one or not, and I watched it a lot. Now I want to go back and watch it again.

Paul Feig: The Flintstones always had that. It always drove us crazy as kids, like, “Wait, are people standing there watching them draw it?”

Popshifter: (laughs)

Paul Feig: I had this whole scenario in my head, like the animators sat on a stage and people were laughing as they were drawing in real time.

Popshifter: Oh, I wish; that would be really funny!

Exciting and new. . .

Paul Feig: My favorite bad laugh track ever was always on the The Love Boat. It was like, literally, they’d only remember to do it once every twenty minutes.

Popshifter: I was so, so into that show. And watching it later, it was like, “Why did I like this?” It was just so awkward.

Paul Feig: (laughs) Do you remember that, though?

Popshifter: Yes.

Paul Feig: You wouldn’t hear a laugh track for like, twenty minutes and then somebody’d say something and it would be like (unenthused), “Ahhhhhh.”

Popshifter: (laughs)

Paul Feig: What was the plan there? I always liked M*A*S*H because there would be laughs in the operating room.

Popshifter: I think M*A*S*H was the first show where I consciously realized there was a laugh track.

Paul Feig: Well, because they yank it out on you in half the scenes.

Click to read more from Paul Feig on. . .

Directing Freaks and Geeks
Directing Arrested Development
His obsessive knowledge of laugh tracks
More on laugh tracks, plus the “comedy of innocence”
Dealing with Internet jerks
The outsider, plus embarrassing fanboy encounters
“If it’s fun, it’s fun.”
Music of today vs. music of yesterday
The Hollywood version of funny
What’s cool and uncool
Listening to “the notes”
Where television is today
The fallout from Unaccompanied Minors
His new show Kath and Kim and his upcoming book

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