The shows where everyone knows your name

Picture: Paramount

In the history of television’s greatest shows reaching the end, there’s an accepted list of those that bowed out with the right mixture of pathos, completion and even a little intrigue. Leading this parade is The Sopranos - not only the best series ever to grace the small screen, but one which ended with brilliant, ambiguous flourish: mobster Tony Soprano, long-suffering wife Carmela and their children Meadow and Anthony Jr taking their seats in a New Jersey diner, its front door opens and Tony looks up, slightly pensively...before fading to black, and Journey’s Don’t Stop Believing cuts in to lower the curtain on a modern masterpiece.

Just as The Godfather is regarded as one of the greatest pieces of 20th Century film-making, with Goodfellas its rightful heir, The Sopranos dipped into the same gene pool, coming to be universally thought of as the catalyst of a golden era of cinematic storytelling in television, on a scale never previously achieved. Over six seasons, the epic HBO show coincided with the emergence of non-broadcast platforms and the artistic boldness that new players like Netflix would approach televised drama, giving us programming that was less formulaic gogglebox fodder as compelling novels in video form. 

Concurrent with The Sopranos, we had The West Wing, followed by the expansive arced narratives of The Wire, Breaking Bad and its spinoff Better Call Saul, the latter of which both ended with epic finales of their own. All are indebted to The Sopranos and, in particular, its 2007 finale. While such shows invariably carried a grim subtext (murder, drug dealing, violence, etc), they had a wit about them that television drama had rarely displayed before. Moreover, they could be compared to sitcoms for their depiction of strong, memorable and clearly defined characters. 

The best sitcoms are those with which we enjoy kindred familiarity (or aversion) with the cast, their on-screen personas and the situations they find themselves in. And the best sitcoms, too, concluded with a tear and a knowing look. It’s also why they have been televisual events. 

In 1983 105 million Americans tuned in to watch ‘Goodbye, Farewell And Amen’, the final episode of M*A*S*H, the series that had combined comedy with a moral conscience (having been spun out of Robert Altman’s anti-war film of the same name which, despite being set during the Korean conflict was clearly a statement on the contemporary battle raging in Vietnam). Over 11 seasons, viewers adhered to Hawkeye, BJ, Hotlips, Klinger, Colonel Potter and Charles Winchester with a sense of in-the-trenches camaraderie as they wisecracked their way through the horrors of an attritional war. The finale was as perfect an ending as those 11 years deserved. Obvious comparisons can be drawn with the ending of another war comedy, Blackadder Goes Forth, set amid the senseless slaughter of 1917 France, which signed off with that poignant ‘over-the-top’ order, before dissolving to a field of towering poppies.

Only Fools And Horses embedded itself in British national culture, with its cast, characters and their catchphrases acquiring a familiarity that made them extended members of our own households. Fools will forever be prefixed by the phrase “much loved”. No wonder its final episode, on Christmas Day 2003, attracted more than 24 million viewers - the highest recorded audience in the UK for a comedy, and roughly half the country’s viewing population at the time. The difference between Fools and American sitcoms is that it was written by just one person, John Sullivan. US shows tend to be written by squads of writers, but the effect is much the same, with the characters and their catchphrases becoming our own friends. Which inevitably leads me to Friends, which ended in 2004 with ‘The Last One’, concluding ten years of fun with the six New Yorkers who became, well, friends to all of us. In so many ways Friends was a spiritual successor to Seinfeld which, a few years earlier, had also focused on an equally dysfunctioning group of New York apartment-dwelling chums, their insecurities and mania, in a show that had prided itself on being about nothing at all. Over two episodes - the show’s 179th and 180th, respectively - ‘The Finale’  drew a US audience of 76 million.

Most of us will never be members of a New Jersey crime family, but many can identify with the ordinariness of suburban life at Casa Soprano (yeah, I know we don’t all have a stash of Uzis in the loft, but we have taken teenagers on tours of potential colleges, albeit without a rival being ‘whacked’ along the way). Ultimately, this affinity comes from the discernible gallery of individuals with whom we whom we might associate ourselves either partially or completely. Sitcoms, generally, bae this game easier to play: are you more Chandler than Joey? More Monica than Rachel? Del Boy or Rodney? George or Kramer?

Arguably the greatest example of sitcom ensemble casting reached its own finale 30 years ago today, when time was called on Cheers. I hold a particular affection for this show as, over its 11 series, it became the anchor of my Friday night viewing here in the UK, thanks to Channel 4. Even when I wouldn’t have been old enough to buy a pint in a British pub, let alone an American bar, Cheers was - and remains - the perfect half hour of gags and characters you couldn’t help love.

TV & Satellite Week, 18 May 1993

When it ended in 1993 I wrote a piece for TV & Satellite Week magazine in which I drew on Cheers’ status as the wittiest, most intelligent, most sophisticated television comedy of its time. And, possibly, since. This reverence, I argued, had much to do with the way it challenged the established order of sitcoms, being comprised of a group of somewhat disparate people linked by locale, not family. 

Cheers redefined the sitcom, abandoning the safe predictability of wholesome domesticity (i.e. The Cosby Show, Family Ties, et al), by abandoning the home to set itself in a downtown bar (the original concept was for the show to be set in a hotel as a US version of Fawlty Towers). 

In this setting, where punters went to escape their home life, Cheers presented a gallery of distinct personalities, generating laughs by exploiting these personas, either to prick the lasciviousness of Ted Danson’s Sam Malone, the pretentiousness of Shelly Long’s Diane Chambers, the slovenliness of George Wendt’s Norm Peterson, the dullness of John Ratzenberger’s Cliff Clavin, the naivety of Woody Harrelson’s Woody, the causticity of Rhea Perlmann’s Carla, the pomposity of Kelsey Grammer’s Dr. Frasier Crane, and latterly, the unfulfilled ambition of Kirstie Alley’s Rebecca Howe. But more than just being a platform for jokes about or from these characters, humour came from pitching their interactions - Sam’s pursuit of Diane, Norm’s bafflingly interdependent bromance with Cliff, Carla’s inverse bullying of everyone, Woody’s apprenticeship of adulthood with all of them, and so on.

Sexual and even social tension became a constant theme on Cheers, again in sharp contrast to the confected safety of American network television’s usual conservatism. The show also made much of the fact that it was set in a place of both work and recreation. Although many episodes featured scenes set away from the titular Boston bar, most were concentrated in the one set, giving the show a theatre-like environment. 

Not for nothing, Cheers won 28 Emmy Awards (and was nominated for a colossal 111). In its final episode, Sam would fix his final date; Carla would dish out her last barb; Cliff would regurgitate his one unused irrelevant fact; Woody would draw on his only remaining recollection of life “back in Hanover”; and Norm would down his last beer, though there is no record of him finally settling his bar tab (over 273 episodes he managed to avoid paying for a single drop of beer). 

That it got to that point after 11 years, growing to regularly commanding audiences of 83 million a week in the US, is testament to the perseverance by the US network NBC that ran it. Its first season, in 1982, suffered from poor ratings, but winning five Emmys, coupled with critical acclaim kept it going.

Picture: Netflix

What finished the show was Danson’s desire to concentrate on his film career, but also the intention to quit while Cheers was still at its peak (he was also earning a then-record $450,000 an episode). Most of the principle cast would go on to enjoy significant success elsewhere, though arguably it was ‘new boy’ Harrelson who would have the most critically successful career. Following Danson’s decision, the remaining cast members contemplated making a 12th series without him but they, too, concluded that Cheers would never be better.

Grammer, of course, would take his character Frasier Crane into his own eponymous sitcom which, for UK viewers, would also find a home in Channel 4’s Friday night fixture. It too - in its original run - enjoyed an 11-year run of ratings success, adopting both the traditional domestic formula with Cheers’ workplace setting. Frasier gave a somewhat lesser Cheers character a life of his own - in Seattle - creating with brother Niles, father Martin and his carer Daphne, radio producer Roz and standout star Eddie the dog another beloved ensemble (with Niles’ social-climbing but never seen wife Maris repeating the gag established by Norm’s Vera in Cheers).

‘Event’ finales like those of Friends, M*A*S*H and Cheers are unlikely to ever occur again. TV consumption has changed out of all recognition. 30 years ago, Cheers’ final episode became the 1983 season’s most watched show with over 93 million Americans watching it - some 40% of the entire US population. This had been partly engineered by clever marketing by NBC, which had promoted the episode as “the television event of a lifetime“ and television’s “greatest night”. Others got in on the act: Massachusetts governor William Weld (in the manner of The Simpsons’ publicity opportunity-seeking Mayor Quimby) declared 20 May 1993 the state’s ‘Cheers Day’. In the show’s fictional home, giant video screens were set up on Boston Common so crowds could watch the finale. Jay Leno even broadcast a live episode of his Tonight Show from the city’s Bull & Finch pub, the Cheers bar’s supposed location (the show was, of course, shot in Los Angeles). NBC devoted most of its programming that evening to Cheers, leading right up to the ‘One For The Road’ episode.

Just as the Friends finale would do a decade later, Cheers concluded with character closure. Woody entered public life as a Boston city councillor, getting Norm an accountancy job at City Hall in the process. Cliff got a promotion at the post office. Rebecca finally achieved her ambition of marrying a rich man. And TV’s greatest will-they, won’t-they romance, between Sam and Diane was revived…briefly, before calling last orders on one of the best sitcoms of all time by remaining, like that Sopranos ending, delightfully, ambiguously unresolved.

If you get it wrong you'll get it right next time

Picture: Getty Images

I start the year on a negative note. Now, I accept that after all the merde that passed our way in 2016, commencing 2017 with the triviality of a lost football match doesn't seem all that bad, and truly it isn't. But, like most Chelsea fans, I would sincerely hope, last night's defeat to Spurs will stick in the craw for a long time. Why? Because it simply should. This is Tottenham we're talking about, after all.

Why one team should be considered the one to beat over any other with whom you've had history - and Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United come immediately to mind - is not immediately clear, and is really just a symptom of the irrationality that is football fandom. Every opponent should be the one to beat, which is surely the logical objective of the game. But like Jerry Seinfeld and his postman neighbour Newman, Chelsea fans have a simmering dislike of Tottenham, going back to who-knows-when, and for no reason whatsoever other than Spurs are simply a rival worthy of our dislike.

But let's not get caught up in all that. Tottenham are, so far this season, looking more resilient, more potent and more disciplined than the side that collapsed in the final stages of last season. That contemptuous draw at Stamford Bridge on May 2 marked not only the end of Spurs' serious challenge to Leicester City for the league title, but also the inexplicable moment that Eden Hazard finally switched on the Eden Hazard we once knew, and had been absent without leave since the beginning of the season. Luckily for Chelsea, that Hazard is still with them. 

Just not last night. First off the bat, Chelsea weren't bad. Spurs' 2-0 win may have ended Chelsea's remarkable 13-match unbeaten run, but that may have been almost inevitable. Yes, perhaps if things had gone differently last night, and César Azpilicueta and Victor Moses had not missed their marked man not once but twice and in identical circumstances, the game might have had a different outcome. But let's not ignore the fact that Tottenham were the better composed side last night. Their MO wasn't that dissimilar to the start they made in May and indeed the way they took the lead at Stamford Bridge in November. In Dele Alli, Tottenham have a true gem, and in Wanyama they had a solid object in midfield to disrupt Chelsea's counter-attacking play. And, perhaps, if Diego Costa had been a little sharper, or if Pedro had run into the space that caused the visible ire between him and Costa, or Hazard himself had been more accurate when he had a shooting chance, then Chelsea may have extended the record to 14 unbeaten.

But it wasn't to be. As Gary Cahill, eloquent in his post-match interviews, said, "we are not robots". An important point. In the previous 13 games Chelsea had been imperious, whether winning emphatically over Manchester United and Everton, or grinding out more modest victories over West Brom, Sunderland and Crystal Palace. It became too easy to think that Antonio Conte had simply found the switch to turn this form on after those early season disasters against Liverpool and Arsenal, the latter of which prompting his change to the 3-4-3 formation that unlocked the success that followed.

This morning Chelsea are still top of the league and five points clear. Last night's defeat may have opened things up a little for the chasing pack, but the Premier League is still in Chelsea's hands if they want it. For us fans, we'll deal with wounded pride (which is, frankly, the biggest casualty). Conte's men will want to reflect, as they watch the video replay at Cobham today, on why they were unable to find the gears to really counter Tottenham and repeat that life-affirming reversal in May. Conte himself - a breath of fresh air at Chelsea following the rank negativity of Mourinho - will want to look at whether he put Cesc Fàbregas on too late to make a difference (his link-up play with Costa was evident from the moment he came on) and whether he should have replaced N'Golo Kanté earlier when it was obvious that his passing and positioning had been uncharacteristically off-kilter.

Football, as I've often quoted Danny Baker, "is chaos". There is no logic to it, no rhyme or reason. Chelsea can start a season poorly, then go on a record-seeking run, and then end it with an off night. That's why we love the game, warts and all. No team is infallible, just as there is no such thing as a perfect 10. Sometimes irresistible forces encounter immovable objects, and they tussle until one is the victor. That wasn't exactly the case last night. Chelsea weren't bad, it's just that Tottenham were better. 

The job now for Antonio Conte is to pick his players up. They won't have lost their mojo in a single, tough encounter (though the mystery is still unsolved as to how this same team lost it in the weeks between winning the league and restarting their campaign a season ago) but they will need to think about what didn't go right for them against one of the toughest opponents they will face this season, and build on it. There's the matter of an FA Cup 3rd Round tie against Peterborough on Sunday to think about - and think hard about (their 2015 4th Round exit to Bradford City should still be fresh in their memories...), followed by the resumption of Premier League hostilities that will see Chelsea play Liverpool (away) and Arsenal (home) in the space of five days at the end of this month. And we are only at the half-way stage of the season, anyway. 

Mental discipline and mindset were the reasons Chelsea fared so poorly last season. Antonio Conte has reversed that. There is confidence oozing through the side. Last night was an aberration. This morning, as the players file into the meeting room at the Cobham training ground, my hope is that someone on the staff is a fan of the late Scottish folk-rocker Gerry Rafferty, and as a musical pick-me-up, plays them his 1979 it Get It Right Next Time. Because if you get it wrong...