Comedy Central Insider Blog

If you don't know who Alan Zweibel is, he was one of the founding writers on SNL, co-creator of It's Garry Shandling's Show and writer of North (a movie Roger Ebert "Hated hated hated hated hated"). Just in time for the new Shout Factory release of It's Garry Shandling's Show, Punchline interviewed Zweibel about the groundbreaking sitcom.

It's particularly interesting to read how Zweibel, a writer often associated with edgier or more post-modern comedy, started his career…

…when I started writing jokes for those comics in the Catskills, it was my entrée into the business. And, it was difficult for me to do it. I was 21, these guys were 40 or 50. They were my parents’ generation. When SNL came along, I was much more comfortable, because it was anti that. We were the sons and daughters of that generation that I’d been having trouble writing for, and I’d rather have been making fun of them or satirizing them.

The bulk of the interview focuses on It's Garry Shandling's Show. Often referred to as an "anti-sitcom," it was one of the first shows to break traditional sitcom structure.

So, whenever we would get to a point in any script or on the floor in rehearsal or even in editing, we would say, ‘Okay, an ordinary situation comedy would do it like this – they would dissolve from one scene to another – why don’t we just have a turkey there on the counter and then replace the turkey with a skeleton of a turkey and then say, ‘Okay, it’s two days later.’

I have to admit, I've never seen It's Garry Shandling's Show. My excuse is it came out in 1986, and at the time I was too busy being born. Yeah, you are reading a blog post written by a baby (special thanks to Matt Tobey for editing out all the "goo goo gaa gaa's").

Anyway, all I've read up on the show so far sounds amazing. You should read the Punchline interview because it is tres bien, very interesting!

After the jump, I've posted the trailer for the DVD set of It's Garry Shandling's Show.

Considering how brilliant The Larry Sanders Show is, I don't know why I'm surprised Garry Shandling had another great show right before it.