Critically reviled. Hopelessly dated. Forever near extinction. Yet in a TV landscape full of brutally realistic hits, sitcoms with background laughter are not only still popular, but have become ...

In the 75 years since it was introduced, the laugh track has conditioned viewers to know when and how much to laugh Some audiences love it, and some audiences hate it, but the laugh track—which ...

For decades, sitcoms ruled mainstream television. Situational comedies appealed to the masses, and using laugh tracks to signal when a punchline was delivered was the norm. In the last 25 years, ...

I ran into an old episode of Hogan’s Heroes the other day that stuck me as odd. It didn’t have a laugh track. Ironically, the show was one where two pilots were shown, one with and one without a laugh ...