A gift I’ll be buying for my younger brother Adam.  We watched this show together growing up.  To me this was the show that put Showtime on the map.  I’m sure it still holds up today and it was one of those shows that was a spring board for so many great new comedians.   To me, this is the kind of show Jerry Seinfeld should be doing now.  Not a copy of the format, just something that could be a platform for great unknown comics to get a consistent break. Its also was some of the first breakthrough ‘meta’ comedy; a show about a show within a show that is done to such great effect on Entourage still. via paulscheer: The 16-DVD set will include all 72 episodes from the 1986-90 series, which ran four seasons on Showtime.  The show starred Shandling basically playing himself, portraying the daily life of a stand-up comedian, years before “Seinfeld.” “It’s Garry Shandling’s Show” broke from sitcom conventions and often spoofed them, in that the characters regularly acknowledged the fact that they were on a sitcom. Shandling would often speak directly to the camera and even interact with the studio audience. The theme song even explicitly referenced that it was all a show.Guest stars over the years included Tom Petty, Rob Reiner, Carl Reiner, Vanna White, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Mull, Chevy Chase, Red Buttons, Jeff Goldblum, former L.A. mayor Tom Bradley and Gilda Radner (in her last TV performance).

A gift I’ll be buying for my younger brother Adam.  We watched this show together growing up.  To me this was the show that put Showtime on the map.  I’m sure it still holds up today and it was one of those shows that was a spring board for so many great new comedians.   To me, this is the kind of show Jerry Seinfeld should be doing now.  Not a copy of the format, just something that could be a platform for great unknown comics to get a consistent break.

Its also was some of the first breakthrough ‘meta’ comedy; a show about a show within a show that is done to such great effect on Entourage still.

via paulscheer:

The 16-DVD set will include all 72 episodes from the 1986-90 series, which ran four seasons on Showtime.  The show starred Shandling basically playing himself, portraying the daily life of a stand-up comedian, years before “Seinfeld.” “It’s Garry Shandling’s Show” broke from sitcom conventions and often spoofed them, in that the characters regularly acknowledged the fact that they were on a sitcom. Shandling would often speak directly to the camera and even interact with the studio audience. The theme song even explicitly referenced that it was all a show.

Guest stars over the years included Tom Petty, Rob Reiner, Carl Reiner, Vanna White, Dan Aykroyd, Martin Mull, Chevy Chase, Red Buttons, Jeff Goldblum, former L.A. mayor Tom Bradley and Gilda Radner (in her last TV performance).