Comments on: Bulgarian married, with Bulgarian children, in Bulgarian

By: Sparg

Sparg — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 19:07:00 +0000

I watch Law & Order: UK now and again.

By: rrh

rrh — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 17:17:00 +0000

And now I’m wondering if they only do this with sitcoms, or if there’s a bunch of foreign CSI clones out there, yet.

By: PathogenAntifreeze

PathogenAntifreeze — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 06:01:00 +0000

I recall an episode of the original US version, where Kelly calls in sick to work or school with a “bad case of Bulgaria.”

By: caipirina

caipirina — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 01:28:00 +0000

As far as I recall they changed baseball references to soccer ( Fußball) to approach the audience better … but the pilot already was a big miss … I am not sure how many more eps they produced …. on the other hand ‘The Viersteins”, that was a similar approach to family life and always felt to me more like the German version of MwC

By: Ant

Ant — Sat, 31 Mar 2012 00:39:00 +0000

That introduction/intro. reminded me of House Improvement’s.

By: rrh

rrh — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 23:46:00 +0000

That seems odd to me that they would contractually require this level of adherence to the source material. If you pay me for the rights to the show, is it any skin off my nose if you don’t use the whole thing?

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 22:41:00 +0000

It's a fact little-known outside the Pentagon that during the Korean conflict, the Yanks deployed an entire battalion of morale-boosting Laugh Specialists, Rib Ticklers, and Knee Slappers. My Uncle Horace served with distinction in the 81st Gigglers, until he took an arrow to the head.

By: Sparg

Sparg — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 18:00:00 +0000

“Bud” is wearing a Duff Beer shirt. FOX out the ass v Bulgarii! At least they changed the dog’s name to Elmo.

By: zombiebob

zombiebob — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 17:41:00 +0000

thats true, the ones I saw looked less gleeful and more horrified

By: Preston Sturges

Preston Sturges — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 16:56:00 +0000

Was Peg using Bag Balm?

By: Preston Sturges

Preston Sturges — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 16:30:00 +0000

“It puts the lotion on its skin or it gets the hose again.”

By: Joe The Wizard

Joe The Wizard — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 14:51:00 +0000

Sam’s Club.

By: Nellie Nikolov

Nellie Nikolov — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 13:28:00 +0000

I am Bulgarian-American too, and I had a similar feeling. Why are these “Americans” speaking the same language my parents use to yell at me?

By: hadlockk

hadlockk — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 13:04:00 +0000

The reason the laugh track sounds familiar is because practically all shows not filmed in front of a live audience use laugh tracks from Red Skeleton. It’s also why people who don’t watch TV laugh differently from those who do. Social parroting, etc.

By: Bevatron Repairman

Bevatron Repairman — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 11:37:00 +0000

As long as the Trabant is called the Tsar Boris III, I’m in.

By: Jeremy Wilson

Jeremy Wilson — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 11:31:00 +0000

Agreed – “dreadful” is hardly the right word to use, it was a ground-breaking series when it started in the late 80′s. Back then Fox was an upstart network and was willing to take some risks, like cartoons in prime-time.

By: Marktech

Marktech — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 08:57:00 +0000

Where it gets weird is in shows like M*A*S*H

I grew up with M*A*S*H in the UK, and never heard it with a laugh track till I went to the States. Now, that was weird.

By: Katrina van Malksvig

Katrina van Malksvig — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 08:44:00 +0000

Dukes of Targovishte would be the most awesome TV show ever.
if only for jumping a Trabant across a broken bridge!

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 08:33:00 +0000

Are there other shows that have been remade everywhere? Is there a Dukes of Targovishte?

By: Keith Tyler

Keith Tyler — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 08:28:00 +0000

I watched the Bulgarian pilot next to the US pilot and they literally are the same episode. Well, I don’t speak Bulgarian, so the details probably differ a lot. But the storyline is i-freakin-dentical.

By: hamishmacdonald

hamishmacdonald — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 08:00:00 +0000

Their American script advisor for the show was John Vorhaus. His books on writing — Creativity Rules and The Comic Toolbox — are truly excellent guides to story structure.

Even when Vorhaus is talking specifically about comedy writing, his advice applies to novels, short stories — whatever. I found the books really helpful for getting me to dig deeper and answer important questions about my characters, scenes, theme, and plot when writing my novels, so I highly recommend them.

I guess the come-down for a comedy writer/script doctor is doing a job like “Married with Children in Bulgarian”. Or maybe that’s snooty of me.

By: petz79

petz79 — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:56:00 +0000

I don’t think german laws had anything to do with that. The american rights holders wanted to enforce these rules. It’s the same with other TV products, like Who Wants To Be The Millionaire. You are forced to use the same set deco, the same soundtrack, the same rules, etc. if you’re licensing the rights.

By: JhmL

JhmL — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:41:00 +0000

Mmm… reminded me of this for some reason (language warning) ;D http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA10ZsoTZ9A

By: zarray

zarray — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:28:00 +0000

German media laws seem like they’re a real bitch to work with.

By: zarray

zarray — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 06:19:00 +0000

Even as a little kid the Scooby-Doo laugh track bugged me. I think I’ve become more tolerant to that show as I’ve gotten older.

By: Mirena Rhee

Mirena Rhee — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 05:35:00 +0000

I am Bulgarian-American and it feels surreall to watch something very American.. with Bulgarian words coming out. Almost schizophrenic.

it’s just double funny to watch in Bulgarian ( have never seen the original.. do not own or watch tv )

By: teapot

teapot — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 05:28:00 +0000

If Kelly looked like her Russian double then the American version might have run that long too!

By: Calimecita

Calimecita — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 03:24:00 +0000

I haven’t watched the other versions, but our local (Argentina) one is awful. The characters are only loosely based on the originals (which I really enjoyed) and the stories are different and so boring. I’ve never watched an entire episode *yawn*

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 01:28:00 +0000

It doesn't bother me in actual multicamera sitcoms like I Love Lucy, Will & Grace, Seinfeld, All in the Family, or Married With Children. Those were actually shot in front of a live audience, and the laughs are mostly real (with occasional "fake" laughs added to cover sound edits and such, but as often as not the "canned" laughs were recorded from the same audience and just moved during the editorial process). Where it gets weird is in shows like M*A*S*H, or in old 70s cartoons like Scooby-Doo or The Groovie Goolies, where there was very obviously no live audience in attendance.

By: Donald Petersen

Donald Petersen — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 01:21:00 +0000

Their audiences seem a tad more civilized than ours, however.