Understanding Genre in Mr. Burns: Blending Sitcom and Apocalypse on Stage
The History of Sitcom
With the emergence of television as a new and innovative medium for entertainment, situation comedy grew popular as a genre to cater to a family-friendly audience. As the genre evolved throughout the decades, sitcoms began to explore and discuss social and familial problems within each series.
Beginning in the 1950s, the genre secured the ideal views of a "normal family" within American society in a postwar world. Audiences found a sense of comfort and security in consuming this form of entertainment, watching a narrative return to a sense of stability and security in the episodic nature of this form. Audiences were also intrigued by the medium of television itself, an innovative pursuit towards the technology of the future, and brought entertainment to a private setting.
Sitcom Gallery
This collection explores a range of sitcoms with domestic families at their centers, and the social expectations for these family members. Many of these examples were gleaned from my research sources. Click on an image to discover more.
The Rise of Sitcom
The sitcom structure maintains a system of order and control, with every episode returning to the sense of "normal". These domestic-centered sitcoms also set up expectations as to how families should behave and seek to define what is socially accepted and rejected in mainstream culture. These sitcoms also explore domesticity, especially the woman's "place" in a home, and how that ideology has shifted over the years. These views have grown and changed over time, but they give audiences a reference point for social behavior in their respective era.
How does Sitcom connect to Mr. Burns?
Sitcom as a genre follows a rigid structure of rules in an episodic nature. Meaning, characters may face a challenge or new opportunity for personal growth and development, but in the end they return to the state they had begun, limited to the resources of their reality. This maintains the fictional world with a limited amount of room for growth. In the world of the play, the characters' overall goal is to obtain this sense of structure and order among themselves. They strive to fully recount an episode of The Simpsons, but in the first two acts, they get hung up on the details of the show, hitting the limits to their knowledge and resources, or the reminder of other outside forces. They never fully reach self-fulfillment and struggle to find purpose in life amidst adapting to their new surroundings in the apocalypse.
Sitcoms often show a new chapter or storyline within each episode, rarely picking up where they left off in the last episode. The structure of the play is episodic in nature too. Each act opens on a different scene and jumps a period of time. Act One takes place "in the very near future" (Washburn 7). Act Two begins "7 years after that" and Act Three "75 years after that" (7). The acts in this play have a similar format to the episodes of a sitcom.
Sitcoms also take place in the same location and involve a main cast of characters. Washburn's play adheres to these conventions, since we see a similarity in the main group of characters and the landscape they are stuck in. Due to the limits of their world, these characters are restricted to obtaining change or finding a perfect answer. Every act, they try to achieve a sense of "normal life" by working on the story they are trying to tell, however, they are restrained to the landscape of their location, their resources, and the current situation of their world.
Another aspect of the Sitcom genre involves catered content. Early sitcoms were created with families in mind, and wanted to draw in a large audience. The characters in the play also try and cater their material so it is relatable for their audiences. In Act Two, these characters discuss the perfect drink to reference in their show so audiences could remember and relate to the story (53).
The Rise of The Simpsons
As sitcom grew and evolved throughout the decades, The Simpsons emerged from the 90s and has broken records for TV. Whether or not you have seen the series, the show has in some form become a household name due to its popularity and longevity. The series began to redefine the genre of situation comedy, becoming self-aware of its own format and in some sense a parody of itself. As entertainment continuously shifted and grew, The Simpsons discussed more controversial issues within its episodes, even exploring why America is obsessed with specific genres of entertainment.
How does The Simpsons connect to Mr. Burns?
The TV show is brought up in Act One since this is a body of knowledge they all have in common with each other, and is brought up to lighten the discussion. The series gives the characters something else to focus on and distract them from living post-apocalypse.
The rise in popularity of The Simpsons has made the show a household name. Not only is the series is recognizable for the characters onstage, but audiences watching this play can easily recognize the show whether or not they have watched the TV show themselves.
The TV series is very self-aware of its own purpose and form, so it is fitting that Washburn would use it for the structure of her play too. Washburn's play is about a group of people attempting to put on a play, a very meta story about theatre continuing into the setting of a dystopian apocalypse. Maybe The Simpsons is a good fit not only because it is easily recognizable, but the meta play involves a meta show. The Simpsons challenges the form and logic of the sitcom structure, and Washburn's play reflects this style too, bending the rules of realism in theatre, making the play more presentational and self-aware.
The cast requirements for Mr. Burns are also worth mentioning. In a classic post-war era sitcom, the cast of characters revolves around the idealized nuclear family image. In The Simpsons, we see this idea of a nuclear family, but the standards and expectations are often broken within the show. The Simpsons attempts to break the stereotypes of gender roles, especially women's roles in a home setting. Mr. Burns can potentially do this as well. There are no character descriptions/requirements for any of the characters, meaning the cast could be of any gender identity, race, age, and ethnicity. Without any parameters on the cast, artistic choices could definitely reshape this idea of the main group of characters, that learn to become a family together.