This month I'm looking at writing techniques in sitcoms. This week, Ted Lasso!
There's another big element to episode 106, written by Bill Wrubel, that very much begs a "How Did They Do That?" and that is the end sequence where everyone involved with the team puts a precious thing in a garbage can to be burnt, so as to remove the curse on the p.t. room.
It's one of my favorite moments in the season--which is saying something, because this season has a lot of great moments--and the reason is that it provides so many different characters with a chance to reveal something and develop further, including a number of characters that up until this point have been mostly in the background. Like, who is that guy with the sand from the beach where he first slept with a super model? I don't know, but after that scene I love him and need more of him.
We get the guys from Jamie's thug squad, who haven't had much to do otherwise up until this point, Rebecca and Higgins, Roy and Jamie themselves, and also cutaways to everyone else we've never met.
Here's the thing -- it's a scene that gets me all choked up repeatedly (even on rewatching). Jaime's story about his mum and dad is absolutely devastating on a number of levels. But so is Sam burning the picture of the 1994 Nigerian World Cup team, which he had promised to keep up until he made the team, or Higgins talking about a beloved cat, even Roy talking about his blanket, for God's sake.
But TED LASSO is not a drama, or even a dramedy. It's a sitcom. And so being able to get to an extended heartfelt moment and make it land is very much not guaranteed. On SEINFELD, this scene only works if Jerry and the others completely undermine it. On FRIENDS they can burn stuff but there's going to be a lot more ridiculous stuff than serious. Even on PARKS & REC, which has its own heartfelt streak, this scene does not play out the same way. (But it does involve everyone shaming Jerry.)
So why does it work on TED LASSO?
Obviously, just like "The New Kid", part of it is about fit. The pilot sets up the show as simultaneously funny and heart on your sleeve hopeful in a non-ironic way. That alone paves the way to do things like these kinds of character reveals, or the truly painful journeys of Rebecca and Ted with their exes/spouses. The pilot (and often the couple episodes that follow) are so important in establishing the rules of a show.
It's also worth noting that the sequence in 106 is really built out of a standard comedic sport story, the curse/superstitions. I have no idea how the TED LASSO writers' room began its work, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear that writers had sat down beforehand and brainstormed various funny stories that you often see in sports stories, with an eye toward how they could generate their own TED LASSO version. Even if the end result here is more serious than this conceit normally plays out, still inherent in the idea is a certain humor.
Rewatching the scene, you also see how Wrubel does a great job of injecting comedy in ways that you barely notice along the way. Roy calls his blanket "blankie" and freaks out when others comment on it. Sandman Richard's sand is inherently silly, and yet he weeps about it. (And we get a shot of Rebecca behind him rolling her eyes.) Nate's "Clive Owen" sunglasses work the same way; it's an absurd object, and yet he is so emotionally wrought by the idea of destroying them that he has to be encouraged by the others to go through with it.
Higgins' cat collar, which to me is a quietly poignant story, ends on the revelation that her name was Cindy Clawford. Likewise, Rebecca burning the paper is a pretty straightforwardly emotional thing, especially for us, who know what her ex is putting her through. But then she ends on "Fuck the haters," which while not exactly funny changes the tenor of the moment to something less sad and more positive.
Colin, who goes last, sees burning his car keys as a similarly meaningful sacrifice, except then, as Coach Beard says, "How are you getting home?" And the sequence ends with Ted saying let's burn this, then, only to be prevented from probably lighting the whole stadium on fire by Coach Beard, who says, anxiously, "Maybe we should do this part outside."
Truly, every single beat of that sequence has a set up/punchline structure--even if in some cases the punchline turn is not exactly (or in the case of Sam and Jaime even slightly) ha ha funny.
So even as the revelations are moving and character revealing there are tons of jokes sprinkled along the way, and the structure both as a whole and within its individual units is very much comedic. In a sense the real genius of its writing is in the fact that you neither question its place in the show, nor are aware of how much comedic work it's doing along the way.
