American Television Sitcoms (Film Guide) - Parks and Recreation, the Office (U.S. TV Series), the Simpsons, South Park, 30 Rock, Friends, Two and a Hal (Paperback)

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Pages: 193. Chapters: Parks and Recreation, The Office (U.S. TV series), The Simpsons, South Park, 30 Rock, Friends, Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory, M*A*S*H (TV series), Cheers, How I Met Your Mother, Scrubs (TV series), I Love Lucy, Seinfeld, Cybill, All in the Family, The Suite Life on Deck, Leave It to Beaver, The Honeymooners, Hogan's Heroes, Arrested Development (TV series). Excerpt: Parks and Recreation is an American comedy television series on the NBC television network, led by Amy Poehler, who stars as Leslie Knope, a perky, mid-level bureaucrat in the parks department of Pawnee, a fictional town in Indiana. It was conceived by Greg Daniels and Michael Schur and debuted on April 9, 2009. The show has run for four seasons and a fifth has been commissioned for the 2012/13 season. It uses a single-camera, mockumentary filming style, with the implication being that a documentary crew is filming everyone. More recently, the Parks and Recreation staff has tried to differentiate their show from The Office through differences in filming technique, and decided in favor of multiple camera angles and frequent jump cuts. The writers researched local California politics for the show, and consulted with urban planners and elected officials. The Leslie Knope character underwent minor changes after the first season in response to audience feedback that she seemed unintelligent and "ditzy." The writing staff tried to incorporate current events into their episodes, such as a government shutdown in Pawnee inspired by the real-life global financial crisis. Several guest stars have been featured in the show, and these characters often appear in multiple episodes. Parks and Recreation received generally mixed to negative reviews during its first season; many critics saw it as too similar to The Office. However, after a reapproach to its...