Dramedy, a portmanteau of drama and comedy, is a genre of movies and television in which the lines between these very different genres were blurred. A portmanteau (plural: portmanteaux or portmanteaus) is a word that is formed by combining both sounds and meanings from two or more words. ... Drama is a term generally used to refer to a literary form involving parts written for actors to perform. ... Comedy is the use of humour in the performing arts. ... A genre is any of the traditional divisions of art forms from a single field of activity into various kinds according to criteria particular to that form. ... Film refers to the celluloid media on which movies are printed Film is a term that encompasses motion pictures as individual projects, as well as the field in general. ...

For a few years beginning about 1969 in the US, there was a brief spate of half-hour shows that purposely alternated between comedy and drama and aired without a laugh track. At the time, these were known as "comedy-dramas." Perhaps the best known was Room 222. Later, the approach of these early shows influenced better-known series such as M*A*S*H, One Day at a Time, and Eight Is Enough. However, the term "dramedy" was not invented until a few years after all these series had ended their respective runs. The term first came into vogue in the mid-1980s to describe a new wave of similarly genre-blurring series such as Moonlighting, The Wonder Years, and Hooperman. It appears in an early Usenet post [1] in January 1990. 1969 was a common year starting on Wednesday (the link is to a full 1969 calendar). ... Wikiquote has a collection of quotations by or about: United States Wikinews has news related to this article: United States United States government CIA World Factbook Entry for United States House. ... A laugh track or canned laughter is a separate soundtrack with the sound of audience laughter, made to be inserted into TV comedy shows and sitcoms. ... Room 222 was an ABC situation comedy/drama TV series that aired from September 17, 1969 to January 11, 1974. ... M*A*S*H at the Internet Movie Database Finest Kind - Fan Site w/ News, Episode Guides, Video Clips U.K. Fan Site w/ Interviews, Episode Guides Best Care Anywhere - Fan Site w/ Episode Guides, Memorable Moments TV Tome Yahoo Groups M*A*S*H email discussion group Categories: Comedy... Opening titles from 1976. ... Eight is Enough was a popular television drama series which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1981. ... // Events and trends The 1980s marked an abrupt shift towards more conservative lifestyles after the momentous cultural revolutions which took place in the 60s and 70s and the definition of the AIDS virus in 1981. ... Moonlighting is a television series that first aired on ABC in the United States from 1985 to 1989 with a total of 67 episodes. ... The cast of The Wonder Years in an early promo shot. ... Hooperman was an ABC television series starring John Ritter, 1987-1988 two year season run. ... Usenet is a distributed Internet discussion system that evolved from a general purpose UUCP network of the same name. ... 1990 is a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

A dramedy may be either an hour-long dramatic series with very strong comedic elements, such as Moonlighting, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Freaks and Geeks, and Ally McBeal, or a half-hour sitcom with more subtle humour, shot on a closed set or on location instead of in front of an audience, and without the usual laugh track, such as M*A*S*H, Hooperman, Sports Night, and The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a U.S. television series loosely based on the 1992 movie of the same name. ... // Introduction Freaks and Geeks was a U.S. television series that aired on NBC during the 1999–2000 TV season. ... Time magazine, June 29, 1998. ... A sitcom or situation comedy is a genre of comedy performance originally devised for radio but today typically found on television. ... A laugh track or canned laughter is a separate soundtrack with the sound of audience laughter, made to be inserted into TV comedy shows and sitcoms. ... M*A*S*H at the Internet Movie Database Finest Kind - Fan Site w/ News, Episode Guides, Video Clips U.K. Fan Site w/ Interviews, Episode Guides Best Care Anywhere - Fan Site w/ Episode Guides, Memorable Moments TV Tome Yahoo Groups M*A*S*H email discussion group Categories: Comedy... Hooperman was an ABC television series starring John Ritter, 1987-1988 two year season run. ... Sports Night was an American television series about a fictional sports news show (also named Sports Night). ... The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd was an NBC dramedy in the 1980s, which starred Blair Brown as Molly Dodd. ...

However, hour-long comedic dramas have usually proven more successful in the ratings than half-hour dramatic comedies.

See also

• List of dramedies