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I have been letdown by television lately to a point where my DVR hovers around 95% capacity and is stockpiled with shows that I try to watch, but end up falling asleep to. What happened to the great TV comedies?
Remember those shows that you look forward to throughout the week – the ones that would force you to say “yadda yadda yadda” uncontrollably around the water cooler the next day? Think back to when we had “Office” parties, where we would innocently dress up as Dwight Schrute and say quotes about YODO and Muckduck? Those have all been replaced by Game of Thrones parties where dudes dress as Jaime Lannister and creepily ask women if they will be their sister for the night.
As a craft beer drinker and a man of comedy living in Los Angeles, I can appreciate the new comedy web series, LA Beer, as a show that combines two of my biggest passions.
I sat down with the creator and producer, Sam Miller, at the LA Beer premier party during the start of Craft Beer Week. Sam grew up in Atlanta and he went to college in Nashville, so he was no stranger to craft beer. He moved out to LA in 2007 and started working in comedy at ABC. His first gig with them was as a writer’s assistant on Desperate Housewives, which didn’t involve beer, but would have been way better if all the wives constantly had a craft brew in hand.
Sam got the desire to create a multi-camera web series to experience a collaborative creative energy that is only obtained through a comedy writers’ room. He went on to nail a job with Mom, on CBS (no he didn’t nail a mom, pervert) where he was able to further develop his idea in his free time.
LA Beer started as “On the Rocks” which was set at a liquor distributing company. But the Kickstarter campaign didn’t catch fire, so Sam used his love of craft beer and the exploding craft scene in LA to help shape his web series into the product that can now be caught online.
Sam wanted to create something out of passion instead of using the same formulaic swill that’s flashed in front of your eyeholes or crammed into your bottle. He drew a parallel between the beer industry and the entertainment industry in that big corporations make bland products that people are tired of.
LA Beer follows a struggling brewery in Los Angeles conveniently named Silver Screen Brewing. The workplace comedy features homebrewer and founder David (Sam Daly), his college friend and brewmaster Ryan (James Lontayao), a sassy marketing manager Andrea (Alicia Ying), a wealthy craft beer noob investor Patrick (Kevin High), his hard-drinking assistant Michelle (Adrianna Ortiz), and the brewery’s new quirky intern Sally (Sarah Stoecker).
The storyline loosely follows Sally’s endeavors and takes on everything from labels that appeal to kids, and dealing with Kickstarter campaigns, to fasting with beer (okay, maybe not the last premise, but it should be something that every brewery has to deal with).
LA Beer is not your typical web series in that it closely resembles a show that you would see on CBS except with much more beer.
Christopher James Burke, one of the directors of LA Beer, also worked on Mom with Sam and really helped nail down the multi-camera sitcom look. The five minute episodes have a live studio audience – which is a first for a web-based comedy.
Some craft beer drinkers may ask if this show is authentic, but it’s as authentic as ER was to medical professionals or House was to British guys trying to fake an American accent. If you’re upset about this then you have to ask yourself a question: do you really want to watch five minutes of dude with a giant beard and waders raking out milled grain from a mash tun? That doesn’t sound like fun unless you have grain raking fetish. Here’s a little insight into comedies on television: The Office was not about paper and Cheers was not about a bar. Good comedy shows are about the characters who occupy these areas and their relationships. This is also the philosophy that LA Beer goes by.
LA Beer took on the challenge of modeling their show like a TV series and they succeeded. The show has good characters, great relationships, and after the conclusion of a few of their webisodes, I was left wishing that they were a full 22 minutes.
Local LA breweries such as Hangar 24 and Fireman’s Brew donated beer posters which are proudly displayed in almost every camera shot. It’s great exposure for area breweries, helping to shine a spotlight on LA’s growing craft beer scene.
You can watch the first five episodes by clicking these pretty colored words and the last five episodes will be available online during LA Beer Week, the last week of June. Unfortunately Sam has no current plans to do a second season because LA Beer is more expensive than your average web series and YouTube ad revenue is barely enough to cover the crafty table.
We wish LA Beer all the best and hope it finds the audience it deserves. There needs to be more mediums where craft beer and comedy can merge because ACB can’t carry the craft beer comedy world on its back forever.
