WRITE A SITCOM
CHARACTERS
The single most important ingredient in any sitcom is the characters.
This is what it’s all about. And not too many of them either. Think between 2-6. With 1 or 2 or 3 of them as main characters with the others supporting (think Fleabag. This Country. Absolutely Fabulous) or a much more even, ensemble set-up (Derry Girls. Dad’s Army.)
Very often big, lovable, unwieldy characters who mess up all the time, are who we love to relate to. Miranda, Rosanne, David Brent, Basil Fawlty, Homer Simpson, Jim Royle, Stath, Kerry Mucklowe, Alan Partridge, British culture would be poorer without them. We love them for making us feel a bit better, by seeing how bad things could be. We love them for being vulnerable, for getting it wrong, for being out of control. And we love them for making us laugh.
PLOT
Sitcom plots are best kept simple. And with a surprise ending.
A regular sit-com has two storylines which run concurrently. An A-plot and a B-plot.
The A – plot is the more detailed and interesting one and naturally takes up more minutes on screen. The relationship between your A and B plots can be any of the following:
SIT-SITUATION
Despite the prominence this element is given in the title of the genre you are writing ie “sit”com, the “sit” itself is really not too important. Physical location is, in itself, quite unimportant. Porridge would have worked just as well in the army. Cheers in a restaurant instead of a bar. Stath is an incompetent estate agent who works for his dad, but this could just as easily have been a café, or a garage or even a school (although the writer may not have been as inspired by these alternatives of course.) But it is Stath’s incompetence that makes the show. People who think they’ve come up with a great, new idea for a sitcom because it’s set in a motor cycle courier’s office or a trendy health club are missing the point, the location is purely a means to an end.