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Forester567 t1_j6bqt5x wrote

Community.

Between Dan Harmon and Chevy Chase I would have loved to see the clash of comedic egos go at it.

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smesch83 t1_j6br7lt wrote

The Other Two.

the show had a short aftershow, "The Other Show", and the showrunner duo (Sarah Schneider and Chris Kelly) seemed fun. before that (and for similar reasons) "Ugly Betty": fun, somewhat cosmopolitan shows where people want to make smart and often queer observations about contemporary culture.

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smesch83 t1_j6brj08 wrote

and it's weird how I imagine that if I was in the room for "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine", I'd be very "shut up and just learn and listen. what a privilege to be here!"

while in a room for "Star Trek: Voyager", I'd be very "hehe, they are limiting themselves SO much and I want to know what assholes and what fears are responsible for that."

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Rubbersoulrevolver t1_j6brzmc wrote

The obvious answer is Seinfeld. There’s not been another show with as much cultural impact and the ideas they came up with are still in use 30 years on (like double dipping)

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Hillz44 t1_j6bs7i3 wrote

Probably cliche’ but damn, The Office. Not only were comedy greats like Greg Daniels and Mike Schur on the team, but the object of making (UK)US office-based humor plausible and applicable would have been so fun. Skirting the line at every possible juncture…

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AlwaysOptimism t1_j6bs8vg wrote

The Good Place seemed like it would have been a really great room to be in. Super cerebral but also silly

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Latter_Feeling2656 t1_j6bv2qb wrote

Caesar's Hour: Mel Brooks, Mel Tolkin, Larry Gelbart, Gary Belkin, Carl Reiner, Selma Diamond, Neil Simon, Aaron Ruben.

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Jesse_graham t1_j6bvob4 wrote

Early season of the Simpson’s. Get to work with Conan, John Swartzwelder, Bill Oakley, Josh Weinstein, and Brent Forrester.

Also 30 Rock would be great.

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BrockSampsonite t1_j6bvsz5 wrote

Sarah Schneider worked at College Humor before her SNL days and I used to produce some of their shorts, it was one of the funniest offices I’ve ever seen, felt like what National lampoon must have been like early on, constant pranks, always some goofy sight gag thing, the whole place was laced with laughter and the smell of weed, that was a very fun place to be and Sarah is exceptionally hilarious

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ColwynBane t1_j6bvumu wrote

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I bet they have so much fun writing scripts.

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[deleted] t1_j6bwzzf wrote

Dan and Chevy always get the brunt of it, but Donald Glover and Alison Brie also have enormous egos. Ken Jeong’s is not particularly small either.

Honestly I think the fact that the cast and crew were all so full of themselves is part of what made Community work so well, given that most of the episodes are about the characters getting in fights with each other due to ego.

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Carbonauts t1_j6bx3xs wrote

Avatar or Korra, or whatever the next series is gonna be.

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goddamnjets_ t1_j6bxd7i wrote

Breaking Bad/BCS. It would’ve been an honor to be a part of those writing rooms and table reads

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AfricanRain t1_j6c03lg wrote

Buffy so I could assault Joss Whedon

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tagen t1_j6c0c7w wrote

Key and Peele

I like the idea of having lots of ideas for skits with wildly different premises, keeps things interesting, plus it would obviously be supremely funny and interesting

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tagen t1_j6c0ho0 wrote

Scrubs

I’ve seen the outtakes and it looks like they just had a ton of fun, plus getting a front row seat to Dr. Cox speeches and the improvisational lines Neil Flynn did as the janitor (he apparently had entire lines where it would just say “Neil says something funny here”)would be a great time

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maalbi t1_j6c134k wrote

Person of interest , so many interesting discussions

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JayPtl t1_j6c170t wrote

Breaking bad.

Bince seems like a good dude.

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ReflexImprov t1_j6c1d4b wrote

I don't know that they actually interacted all that much or clashed that often. From everything I've read, even though he was the boss, Dan usually kept to the writers room and let the Russos and directors run the set.

The clash was mostly over Dan being late with script pages and Chevy randomly going home early - and being an ass to everyone.

The big clash that the press writes about was when Chevy went home early and it was the last day of a shoot for the season, with sets scheduled to be struck later that day, so they couldn't pick an important shot up again like they usually did when Chevy pulled this crap.

The scene would have been a tag at the end of the video game episode with Abed rewriting the game so Pierce's father told him he was proud of him everytime he threw a pixel baseball at his floating head then cutting to irl Pierce giving Abed a hug.

Dan was pissed that the scene was lost and led a chant of "Fuck you Chevy" at the season wrap party with the cast and crew (which reportedly many joined in with - Chevy clearly wasn't beloved on that set).

Chevy then left an angry voicemail about how he embarrassed him in front of his family which Dan played the following week for the crowd at his Harmontown show (not sure if it was a podcast yet at this point) and someone recorded that and leaked it to the press.

Both were on much friendlier terms with each other not long after. The whole incident isn't as dramatic, or as long-lasting as the press makes it out to be.

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ReflexImprov t1_j6c1yut wrote

Everything I've read, the cast got along really well behind the scenes, including Donald. Chevy obviously got harder to work with as the show progressed, but everyone else was (and still is) pretty tight knit with each other. They are actors, so yes, there is ego involved, but seemed to be a true ensemble and not any competition.

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2duhzen t1_j6c3m7b wrote

90's SNL cast, & King of Queens

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wtjones t1_j6c4dew wrote

Arrested Development. The joke was that they never threw a joke away they tried to get everyone of them in.

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dragonmp93 t1_j6c4s7j wrote

The CW's Supergirl.

There is no way that a show like that came to be just because the CW doesn't have enough budget for good writing.

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GingerMau t1_j6c5nju wrote

Their chemistry was insane.

I know they are both talented comedic performers who can work with anyone--but the way they brought the humor of their shared life experiences to life was just magical.

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Supernatt924 t1_j6c8axb wrote

South Park. Ever since I saw the 6 Days to Air documentary I’ve been desperate to be in that room!

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SomboSteel t1_j6c9c19 wrote

Dexter

They were like right on the cusp of an actual good show that didn’t devolve into stupidity and memes. With a little push in the right direction and a guiding hand down the line, im certain that show was very close to being remembered as an actually good all time drama

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HyperboleHelper t1_j6cey9y wrote

SNL There are certain casts that I would have loved to have worked with.

30 Rock. Tina Fey. There's your reason.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. That comedy was fire!

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MalpracticeMatt t1_j6cfyoi wrote

South Park, always sunny, the office.

I feel like they must be cracking each other up the whole time

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Y8ser t1_j6cnaix wrote

The Big Bang Theory!

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Fryceratops t1_j6cpij0 wrote

The Golden Girls had some seriously heavy hitters at the table.

Mr Show would be a close second

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Athragio t1_j6cqpxo wrote

it's the only show where I felt the need to pause and write down what they just said. The Jonah insults were brutal but so clever. I'd be afraid to enter this room because I feel like I would get roasted

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reb0014 t1_j6cs4ki wrote

Game of thrones. Someone should have prevented the last two seasons…

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OldSamVimes t1_j6cslnf wrote

Hill Street Blues.

It was groundbreaking.

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merelyadoptedthedark t1_j6cy9n2 wrote

Riverdale.

I'm genuinely curious to see how they were able to consistently come up with even fucking stupider ideas year after year. It's genuinely impressive that after they hit bottom they were able to keep digging for six more years.

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Shotgunsamurai42 t1_j6d0an9 wrote

Newsradio for sure. The after-parties must have been legendary.

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MeCritic t1_j6d0w25 wrote

BoJack Horseman. That was a sure crazy ride.

And The Crown. I would love to discuss all the historical topics they must know and trying to figure it out, how to tell them.

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nigevellie t1_j6d8iyu wrote

The West Wing. Because we wouldn't be in a room.

All the writing will be done as we endlessly walk various hallways and corridors.

Good exercise.

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bros402 t1_j6d9gfu wrote

Psych - that writers room must've been hilarious.

Or Person of Interest, a great show like that probably had a cool writers room

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Diestof t1_j6dgw5n wrote

Early seasons of The Office hands down.

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anasui1 t1_j6dhy5l wrote

The Day Today: Iannucci, Morris, Coogan and Schneider brainstorming genius comedy ideas and laughing their arses off

The Sopranos, with David Chase sleeping on the couch while everyone else writing like crazy only for him to wake up, grab a marker and outline the entire season beat by beat including crucial points in different episodes. Wanted to be there just to see the other writers' faces, lol

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Uptons_BJs t1_j6dilcv wrote

Do you want to write 30 Rock or do you want to write TGS?

30 Rock is a very demanding show with a very high level of quality. If I worked there, I'd probably be worked to death and my poor quality of ideas would probably result in all my dumb fart jokes getting rejected.

If you wrote for TGS, as far as I can tell the show is utterly terrible. Just recycle an old fart doctor sketch and call it a day. But then you gotta deal with Tracy who doesn't rehearse and Jenna who constantly locks herself into her dressing room

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TheThunderhawk t1_j6dka51 wrote

Except the part where you get to watch Dan just shit all over and belittle one of the best writers in the room Megan Ganz because of his weird little incel misogyny shit. He admitted to all of it and apologized in his podcast Harmontown.

I wouldn’t be able to put up with it. Or at least, I hope I wouldn’t.

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doveball t1_j6dnhfm wrote

Larry Sanders Newsradio Seinfeld

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jules1726 t1_j6dnur9 wrote

It’s all good, man!

Better call Saul, but honestly any vince gilligan’s show

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JurassicFloof t1_j6docb1 wrote

Succession! Would love to see how the script develops and how they come up with funny oneliners like tomlette or slime puppy 🤣 Can only imagine what scenes or dialogue they end up not using in the final cut

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cbbuntz t1_j6doptu wrote

The Sopranos. It's secretly a comedy, so give me something funny to do.

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cld1984 t1_j6dpxur wrote

DS9. I would love to know if some of my theories are correct!

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bros402 t1_j6dran8 wrote

...no, they didn't. Double dipping was around and not approved of loooong before Seinfeld. One of the uses was double dipping in terms of people collecting a public sector pension and working a second job in the public sector.

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cbbuntz t1_j6e5wjr wrote

I heard they would pretend like the guest actors weren't even there and that they were kinda full of themselves. I kinda refuse to believe Julia could be a jerk though

Look up "armin shimerman seinfeld"

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SohRaBE t1_j6eehkc wrote

Dark, The leftovers or any other complex shows.

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violue t1_j6emg9l wrote

Legends of Tomorrow, assuming they shared whatever drugs they were taking.

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violue t1_j6emnsx wrote

My other answer is Supernatural, because that show really could have used an obsessive fangirl on their staff yelling at them to keep their characters and canon consistent. I could have helped you, SPN.

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inkista t1_j6f6p7f wrote

'80s Twilight Zone S1-S2: George R.R. Martin, Alan Brennert, Harlan Ellison, Rockne S. O'Bannon, Michael Cassutt, Richard Matheson, etc.

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Gabagool1987 t1_j6f9y8t wrote

Rings of power. Just what they were thinking and comprehending how they thought it was a good idea

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TheTrotters t1_j6fclzp wrote

I imagine I'd work my ass off and bring a draft of a one-minute scene with, say, 15 jokes sprinkled throughout – they'd probably tell me to just quit if I'm not going to be serious about my job: we can't have so few jokes in such a timespan.

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yoaver t1_j6fg9s0 wrote

Worth noting that Community notoriously had a much more demanding and late-hour shoots than even normal tv shows which are already demanding. Chevy Chase was in his 60s, and unused to such an environment. I get him wanting to go home "early".

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Darmok47 t1_j6fo5wo wrote

If you were an adult in the late 80s through mid 90s, you could have been a part of the writer's room. They had an open submissions policy; they would take scripts from anyone. Ronald D. Moore, who ended up as a TNG and DS9 producer, was some random guy working a dead end job when he submitted a script to Paramount.

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b1ame_me t1_j6fol93 wrote

They walked away because of “creative differences” I mean I think Netflix already announced that Katara is now older than Sokka which changes a lot about their characters so there’s something right there. They probably just made too many changes and the OG creators were just done

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inkista t1_j6frzdi wrote

Not credited like that. I don't think there are other showrunners "like Sorkin".

Most showrunners don't take the "written by" credit on every episode. Those who do generally aren't using a room (e.g., Hugo Blick), or do their pass uncredited (e.g., Joss Whedon on Buffy).

And there are some showrunners who are the exact opposite; e.g., Jerry Juhl insisted on Fraggle Rock that every word that ended up on screen be written by whoever had their name on the writer's credit. If that meant they had to keep rewriting it themselves until he was happy with it, so be it.

Every writers' rooms breaks a story together as a group. But most aren't working for only one of the writers to pump out all the scripts, or for everyone to be heavily rewritten by that one writer every episode.

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res30stupid t1_j6fttsx wrote

CSI, where they discuss and research some highly weird and unusual murder methods. They had an on-call medical examiner to help with research and to determine if it was possible. In fact, the assistant medical examiner was played by the show's main consultant because they liked him and offered him the role as a good way to keep him on-set.

Everything on the show is plausible and fatal - even the ludicrously overpowered gun that shoots a hundred bullets at once to liquify the victim in Miami. That's a real gun design.

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sofakingclassic t1_j6gaful wrote

SNL early 90s for sure. Conan, Odenkirk, Rob Smigel just to name a few that aren’t even the cast. Plus you’d get to hobnob with celebs and see acts like Nirvana, Whitney Houston, David Bowie etc etc etc

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Lucky-Carrot t1_j6huvch wrote

My guess is it’s a combo. They were frustrated with having less creative control than they had before and then got a much better offer. For the record I think avatar live action is a bad idea

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ArchDucky t1_j6ik6b6 wrote

Conan talks about those days sometimes on his podcast. It was so loaded with talent that everyday people just as good as you were pitching jokes at nearly the same level. Sounds like a pretty intense environment.

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