When I was just barely out of the womb, Garry Shandling was starring in one of the most quirky, creative TV shows ever to grace the airwaves. His eponymous It’s Garry Shandling’s Show was both hilarious as a sitcom and completely unlike anything that had ever fit in that genre before. I have many, many fond childhood memories of laughing at and with the show from start to finish, so I was excited to see that Shout! Factory – perhaps the most quality name in TV on DVD – had begun to release it for home viewing. In October 2009, they brought us The Complete Series (although individual seasons are still being released). It’s my pleasure to share with you one of my favorite comedies.
The Show
Even almost 25 years later, I still find myself laughing at It’s Garry Shandling’s Show, possibly because the show is also laughing at itself. For those of you who missed it, here’s a primer – Shandling more or less plays himself, a neurotic and somewhat self-obsessed stand-up comic. Where this show is different from all the semi-autobiographical sitcoms is that Garry, his friends and even the guest stars are all very aware that this is a sitcom and they’re characters. They routinely break the fourth wall, bend the conventions of the genre (and time), and even involve the audience in plots. Even the show’s theme is conscious of the fact, with lyrics like “Garry called me up and asked if I would write his theme song.” It’s self-deprecating, color-outside-of-the-lines fun. Kudos to Showtime for taking a gamble on it (yes, Showtime was breaking original programming ground well before this became the norm in premium cable).
It’s impossible not to be amused by how funny and sometimes absurd the show can be. One of my favorite openings is where Garry says, “There’s more to life than watching television. [due pause] You can read about it, too.” Or there’s another episode where he invites the audience to make themselves at home, leaves the scene, and then finds out the audience has thrown a wild party while he was gone. I feel comfortable in saying that while other shows may have used similar elements (fourth-wall breaking has become more mainstream now), no show has since played with what a sitcom is or is not as much and as well as It’s Garry Shandling’s Show did. Even if you’re not a Shandling fan, you have to appreciate how innovative the show was for television. After all, it was produced by two future execs of The Simpsons (Al Jean and Mike Reiss).
There are also some perfectly cast guest stars, including Gilda Radner, Rob Reiner, Bruno Kirby, Tom Petty (yes, the musician) and Martin Mull. Radner delivers a perfect example of the show’s self-mocking hilarity when she appears during her fight with ovarian cancer; Shandling asks her why she hasn’t been on TV in awhile, and she says, “Oh, I had cancer. What did you have?”
I miss the days when sitcoms were this good.
The DVDs
There are sixteen DVDs of goodness here (four per season), and the packaging itself is also off-the-wall. The cardboard slipcase actually lifts off to reveal another one with all the discs inside. It’s actually kind of neat, in that you don’t have to worry about picking the cardboard box up on the wrong side and dumping the discs all over when you do. I know I’ve done that with some series (like season one of Third Watch) before, and it’s annoying. No such problems here.
There are two discs in each of eight cases, one on each side of the case, so there’s no messy packaging involved. On the back of each case you’ll see a list of episodes and corresponding special features, which is always handy.
Once you fire up the discs and bypass the forced trailers, I adore the menus for this release, which are looks at the sets for Garry’s fictional apartment (I love the camera that says “It’s Garry Shandling’s Camera” on it). The menus are easy to navigate, with the special features for a particular episode listed directly underneath – no hunting through menus to find a commentary track here! (However, should you need it, there’s a separate bonus features menu that will give you the same information.) There’s a “play all” episodes function, but no scene selection, which is less important when you’re only dealing with a half-hour program.
The video presentation here reflects the fact that this is a program from well before home DVD release: it’s full-frame, but it also looks exactly like I remember it when I watched it years ago in syndication. The show has really held up well, all things considered. There are not, however, closed captions available on any episodes that I can find, nor an audio set-up menu, so as far as sound goes, you’re pretty much on one track here.
The Special Features
I’ve always been thrilled with Shout! Factory’s thoroughness when it comes to DVDs; they have some of the best special features I’ve ever seen on DVD. (I still worship them for their tenth-anniversary re-release of Sports Night, which finally gave that great show the version it deserved.) This set is no exception, as it comes almost loaded with commentaries, outtakes and other features.
The commentaries with Shandling and co-creator/writer Alan Zweibel are hilarious throughout (“There are people with guns out there, so we can’t leave,” Garry says in just the opening minutes of the pilot commentary), not to mention they tell you just about everything you’d want to know about how the show got made, including how even the audience didn’t initially have a clue about what they were trying to do. Other producers offer commentaries of their own (including Jean and Reiss), but there’s nothing funnier than Shandling and Zweibel riffing on their brainchild.
There’s a total of eighteen commentaries and six featurettes on this release. That’s a commentary for every four episodes and a featurette for every twelve. You’ll get a cast retrospective, a writers/crew retrospective, a ton of outtakes, original promos and even the two original sketches from another series that led to the idea of It’s Garry Shandling’s Show. In other words, you get pretty much everything you could’ve wanted from this box set.
The Bottom Line
Wow. It’s been a long time since I’ve enjoyed It’s Garry Shandling’s Show, and I’m pleased to say that it’s just as funny now as it was when I watched it as a child. Furthermore, Shout! Factory has once again taken pains to stock their releases with as many special features as they can manage. I can’t recommend this release enough.
Amazon currently has it for $142.99 ($34.75 a season), or you can order direct from Shout! for $139.99 (with free shipping as of right now). Either way, you’re definitely getting your money’s worth.
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