Popular Culture Review Vol. 3, No. 2, August 1992 | Page 81

J|\A2||ereEve2|bod^Knov^^

77

My analysis of the employees and regulars of "Cheers," of
this microcosm of seemingly typical Americans, will illustrate that
these characters are types rather than individuals. As types they
are predictable, thus establishing the safety necessary for comedy.
And as comic types they invite us to laugh at their flaws. As James
Burrows, one of the show's creators (along with Glen Charles and Les
Charles) has said in an interview, "comedy is [about] losers."^ While
the flaws of losers are the subject of jokes, comedy serves as a means of
concealing pain rather than reinforcing it. Although insiders are free
to exploit each other's shortcomings, outsiders, who constantly
threaten this safe haven, are barred by the protagonists' comraderie
from doing so. The apparently easy mingling of characters from
diverse social, educational, and economic backgrounds is closed off
and at best partial.
In the show's early years the characters working at "Cheers"
are its owner Sam Malone, the quick-witted and quick-tongued
waitress Carla Tortelli, the graduate-student-tumed-waitress Diane
Chambers, and the bartender Ernie Pantuso, alias Coach, Sam's
fatherly former baseball coach. When Coach leaves, he is replaced
by the naive country bumpkin Woody Boyd and after Diane's
departure and the bar's change of ownership a new manager, the
ambitious Rebecca Howe, appears on the scene. These employees are
joined by a small number of regulars as well as some patrons in the
background. Pronunent among the regulars are the bragging mailman
Cliff Claven, the chronically unemployed Norman Peterson, and the
psychiatrist Frasier Crane, accompani^ occasionally by his wife and
colleague Lilith and recently by their baby. Together, the bar's
employees and regulars constitute an extended closely-knit family
whose members compensate each other's lack of fulfilling ties to their
actual families. By virtue of their intimate knowledge of the main
characters the show's spectators are invited to become a further
extension of the Cheers family.
The leading figure in Cheers is Sam Malone (portrayed by
Ted Danson). He is a simple-nunded former relief pitcher for the
Boston Red Sox, who bought the bar when he was still an alcoholic.
But after separating from his fianc^ Diane on the evening for which
their wedding had been scheduled, he sells "Cheers" to a corporation
in order to be able to sail around the world. When his boat sinks, Sam
returns to the bar as a bartender. But in the show's 1990/91 season