Corona Daily 178: Grey’s Pandemic Anatomy

Prime time TV shows now face a huge dilemma. Should the scripts reflect pandemic reality? Should the characters wear masks? Or should the covid-fatigued viewers be treated to fantasy life by creating content without coronavirus?

Grey’s Anatomy, a globally well-known show, decided it carried a responsibility to include the pandemic, the story of a lifetime for most people. It spent the entire season battling the pandemic, with several lead characters, including Ellen Pompeo’s Meredith Grey getting ill with covid. Many indoor scenes were moved to a lawn outside the writers’ bungalow, which now doubled up as Meredith Grey’s backyard.

Masks are another serious problem for actors. To deliver facial expressions and lines in close-ups is a challenge. Grey’s Anatomy gave its doctors clear plastic coverings to talk to the patients. Through the plastic face shields, the actors’ faces were completely visible.

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There is a significant time lag between scriptwriting, shooting and the show going on air. Scripts written in winter may appear the next summer or autumn. That has been another challenge showrunners have confronted. When writing stories for a long season, generally scriptwriters know what the world is going to look like in the future. But in 2020, particularly before the announcement of the vaccines, scriptwriters didn’t know the shape of the future. Shows had three choices: make pandemic the theme, give it a background role, or ignore it.

Most sitcoms, particularly the new series, went for the third option, because they are hopeful of re-runs in future. Chuck Lorre, the creator of The Big Bang Theory, said he has always been a believer in making comedies that do not carry a heavy time stamp. That is why he would avoid pandemics and bell bottoms.

Mr Mayor, a show that premiered on NBC last month decided to include a punchline: “Dolly Parton bought everybody a vaccine.”

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Last Man Standing, a family sitcom, decided to skip ahead and show the events happening from 2023 onwards. Kevin Abbott, its showrunner, felt most decent pandemic jokes would have been told by then. Anyway, the script was not particularly suited to include pandemic references.

The Good Doctor went for a compromise. It showed two episodes focused on the coronavirus and then jumped ahead a few years to a normal world.

Superstore takes place in a store. The producers felt it would be odd to show business as usual. It’s a sitcom, so they handle the pandemic lightly. They shifted many scenes to a huge airy warehouse set so the characters could observe social distance.

Some writers have been creative. They show seaside fantasy sequences, or dreams or flashbacks to allow romance and passionate hugging and kissing without masks.

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This Is Us had completed its fourth season just before the lockdown last spring. Episodes of the fifth season were already written. Considerable rewriting was needed to include the pandemic. Family members casually flying here and there were suddenly stopped from travelling and sometimes couldn’t see one another. Stories of pregnancy and adoption underwent adjustments.

In general, currently there are more outdoor scenes and fewer interior location shoots. Courtroom dramas include fewer jury trials. Crowd scenes are limited, extras in the background are reduced or reused.

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With India’s strict prolonged lockdown, many Hindi serials were cancelled and taken off air for good. Family dramas now often actively propagate masks, sanitisers and social distancing. In Yeh Rishta Kya Kahlata Hai (What does this relationship stand for) characters interact while wearing masks. In one episode, the husband offers his wife a sanitizer bottle, and then helps her wear gloves and a face shield. That is the scriptwriter’s way to show intimacy in corona times.

Ravi