I've tried watching this srvetsl timrs, and each time, it's been a painful experience. I noticed Hunt won multiple Emmys for this, which was the main reason I gave this a shot. She should return each of them. Not only are she and Reiser lacking in the chemistry department, they're both unfunny and annoying. Even thegueststars (esp. multiple winner Mel Brooks) suck.
shareSorry, typing on a phone. Should say "several times"
shareWhich seasons did you watch? Mel Brooks starts in season 5.
watch the earlier seasons. they have better chemistry. I dislike the show after beginning of season 5. story lines weren't all that great
Strongly disagree. It's in my top 10 favorite shows of all time. The 2 main characters are SUPPOSED to be flawed; that's one of the things that makes the show funny. The characters in Seinfeld go way beyond annoying to being really unlikeable human beings, yet viewers ate it up. I like that this show did it more subtly.
And the supporting cast is amazing, especially Anne Ramsay as Lisa, Hank Azaria as the dog walker, and Burt & Sylvia Buchman. And pretty much any scene with Paul's co-workers (Steven Wright et al) in the editing room is hilarious.
Yes, it's about NYC yuppies, so there's a certain amount of annoyingness built in. But looking beyond that, this show is one of the most intelligently written sitcoms ever.
While other shows recycle the same plots, MAY came up with:
- Your purse controls your life: episode where Jamie & Lisa accidentally exchange purses, and over the course of the day, their personalities change.
- Cab ride home from a party: the evening's events recapped from each spouse's point of view. Yes, something SIMILAR has been done before, going way back to the old Dick Van Dyke show. But in those renditions, each spouse's version of the events would be different, because they exaggerated to justify their own actions. But has any other show done it the way MAY did: both spouses' recalled the events accurately, but since they were in different parts of the room, they missed parts of each other's conversations, culminating in a big faux pas. That means every scene had to be filmed twice, each time from a different angle, overhearing different comments. Brilliantly executed, and brilliantly funny.
- Episode where Paul has been asked to film 15 minutes of their daily lives for a piece on up & comping filmmakers, and they wrestle with trying to be "real". That one includes the ultimate Anne Ramsay scene of the series.
- Episode where 4 of them have to quickly register Jamie for her college courses before she arrives
- Lisa Kudrow as Ursula the waitress: I'd love to see a montage of just all the Ursula scenes from the whole series.
And many more.
I guess it's good news for those of you who did not like the show, because there is any number of sitcoms that you can watch which are nothing like this fresh & funny show.
Even thegueststars (esp. multiple winner Mel Brooks) suck.
I agree, OP.
I was actually looking up Kim Hunter, as I am watching a Bette Davis film in which she co-starred ("Storm Center"), and saw that she worked on an episode of "Mad About You", a series that I always found HIGHLY annoying, due to its lead co-costars. Their "banter" was so unfunny, a little "snippy", unrealistic, and very unfunny.
Katharine Hepburn urn and Carry Grant, or Hepburn and Tracy, or Grant and Rose Russell worked that type of dialog brilliantly (and, their scripts were obviously far superior to those of this show). However, by the 1990's, I think Risers a d Hunts banter SUCKED because of how f'ing annoying they were. And, I'm sorry, but I think Helen Hunts character was usually a controlling little bitch to him. I was hoping his character would walk out on her after Season 2. I absolutely hated the show, yet I usually watched it through about Season 3, just to "hate on it", and see if it would improve.
It never did.
Sorry for the typos. My android has a mind of its own, and it too is extremely annoying.
Also, I am Helen Hunt's age, so,it's not as if I were born during the Golden Age of Hollywood and only appreciate that style. I just think that "Mad About You" was completely over-rated.
Somebody on TVTropes deleted my entry of Mad About You in the Deader than Disco: Live-Action Television page:
* ''Series/MadAboutYou'' won a Golden Globe Award, a Peabody Award, a Genesis Award, received five Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Comedy Series, and was chosen Best Quality Comedy by the Viewers for Quality Television. Helen Hunt won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress – Comedy Series four years in a row (1996–1999). And yet, out of its seven seasons, only five have to date been released to DVD due to music licensing issues. The show in itself has pretty much been largely forgotten in comparison to its NBC contemporaries ''Series/{{Seinfeld****'', ''Series/{{Friends****'', and ''Series/{{Frasier****''. Arguably one major factor working against ''Mad About You'' is that seemingly captured a very specific time in the '90s. But with the real world New Yorkers no longer being against that backdrop, the characters on ''Mad About You'' (Paul and Jamie Buchman could, in essence, be regarded as the ultimate ’90s yuppie couple) just seem irrelevant and self absorbed. Complex.com suggested that ''Mad About You'' defined 'dry, white sitcom' and came off as very poor man's ''Seinfeld'' (albeit far less engaging).
I could not disagree more (and please check spelling before posting). I keep returning to view this series precisely because of Helen Hunt's delightful performance. Paul Reiser isn't bad, but Hunt steals the show. There are some classic comedy episodes, "Two Tickets to Paradise" is my personal favourite. Give it a shot. I do agree that season one was a little awkward to begin with and that, from season five, things started to head downhill, but I can't understand how anybody could not find laughs in series 2 through 4. Have to say, I thoroughly loathe the theme song ;)
shareOne of my favorite series. I loved this much better than Sienfeld which I really didn't care for much at all.
shareI completely agree. I was always stunned by the success of this show because I find Paul Reiser ALWAYS annoying, and not very funny. He oversell his lines, and he's just not that intelligent of an observer or comedian.
And HELEN HUNT sucked eggs in this show. She had to be one of the most whining, disgusted, angry, bitching wives in sitcom history....but was somehow found "adorable" in the process? No, I thought she whined in almost every episode, and I am surprised the series didn't end with their divorce after about 3 years. I just found them both to be incredibly annoying....in their acting, and in their characters.
My wife and I loved this show in the first seasons. Then they had the kid and we didn't care for it as much. The comedy seemed diluted somehow. Shortly after the series ended, we had our first child and our lives have been diluted ever since.
shareNow that's funny.
My mom thought the same thing about the series as you did (distinctly better before the baby), but the big picture is that she watched almost no sitcoms in her 60s and 70s, but she did watch this one. So overall, she was a fan, and for her that was a big deal. Rare, in her case.
As for me, I don't see why people find it annoying, ever. I wonder if it just has to do with the fact that some people are just not going to like the whole New York / Manhattanite / Jewish humor / girl from Connecticut who has sarcastic humor herself thing. I know people who didn't like the series, and to a person they were all the kind who thought some combination of these factors in other series and/or films were irritating as well. (I think Mark was definitely a barometer. Even for me he was a stretch, a little overbaked and theatrically ridiculous at times.)
I just loved it. I grew up in the big city, and maybe I'm just more tuned into a kind of rapid-fire verbal-humor thing. But even beyond that, I thought their relationship seemed real, with a lot of the same kinds of strains and annoyances real people have. The better episodes avoided too much glibness and cleverness, I'll say that.
Different strokes, I guess.
i like watching the genius of paul and his brother and his dad and mark the neighbour but the women are terrible annoying and too over the top to be likeable.
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