why do american audiences...
 

...cheer and clap so much at nothing? you know what i mean? when someone walks onto the set of a tv show everyone cheers and laughs etc.

it puzzles me.

The only time I've heard an audience cheer and clap at the cinema was when I went to see Reservoir Dogs. I think people were so overwhelmed, they had to respond in some way.

Are you having a sly dig at American audiences? Or does this happen on UK shows these days?

I don't mind for as long as they don't do it at my own funeral.

i am not having a dig just asking really. i think it does happen more now on uk tv but whenever i see us shows they clap at every available moment.

Clearly you've never seen any ITV programming, ever. We're just as guilty of televisual idiocy as the rest of them.

Are you talking about the canned laughter that's used on sitcoms? I think it's used to remind the audience that the show they're watching is funny (even though it isn't), because they wouldn't have known otherwise.

true itv does park some massivly stinking turds on the televisual world.

example: freinds, phoebe sings a song about a smelly cat and everyone cheers for 10 seconds.

i know the producers do urge people on etc but its mental.

apparently even the members of sonic youth clap, whoop & holler at the television when a woman on jerry springer says that she's proud to be a mother

how dare she the bitch.

This is why The Simpsons is the only American comedy I watch.

whats with the stories of americans clapping and cheering at the movies

all sounds a bit odd to me

I've always found the convention of cheering popular sit-com characters as they enter the set quite strange. I think the first time I became aware of it was watching Happy Days as a kid, although I'm sure there are earlier examples of it. Odder still is the way actors will often pause in delivering their lines to allow the cheering to calm down.

you must not know how television shows are made

before any show is filmed, the ones with live studio audiences, there is a run through where the director primes the crowd. They tell them what kind of laughter and clapping is allowed and what kind is niot, such as hooting, whistling, etc. They also tell them to make sure and clap very enthusiastically when the "star" comes out, whether that is Oprah, or letterman, or Joey on Friends. They also have a lrge sign, actually several, with giant flashing lights that reads "APPLAUSE" which they flash when they want the audience to aplaud.

shows filemd before alive audience are done so for the sake of the viewer at hom sitting alone or with a few people. having the audience "in on it" is part of making the show feel and sound fun and lively and exciting. Just imagine watching a show like, oh, Two and a Half men without the laugh track/audience laughs.

you guys can make fun of US tv but I've seen the BBC morning show

people in glass houses...

Is that a reference to David Copperfield?

yeh your right about two and a half men, if they didnt organise the audience we would never hear the actors with the roaring laughter in the background

I meant no one would find it funny! ha ha! I do not like that show!

i have some knowledge as i studied tv, video and film production at university, i worked in tv for a while and i have been in the audience to a few us tv shows. it still puzzles me as even though we were promted to applaud we didnt cheer and whoop etc.

it happens after a show gets a big breakout star

like on happy days, originally the Fonz was a peripheral character, but everyone liked him so much they would whoop and clap when he entered the scenes, and the producrrs decided to write bigger roles for him.
I too remember the awkward pauses as a kid, thinking, what the fuck?