David Angell helped make ensemble comedies worth listening to closely. We rate Cheers and Frasier highly for their writing and performances, though repeated quarrels and prolonged misunderstandings sometimes wear out their welcome.
Fi1m perspective
In Frasier (1993), the actors know how long to wait. Kelsey Grammer and David Hyde Pierce can make a pause part of the joke, helped by writing precise enough to leave them time for it. We laughed at that patience: being made to wait for a reply can be as funny as the reply itself. That timing is central to the family comedy Angell co-created and wrote, and it is a large part of why we recommend it.
Cheers (1982), which he joined as a staff writer in 1983, shows why an argument can be worth staying for. A bruised ego gives its cast as much to work with as a good insult. We enjoy the exchanges because the actors find humour in being wounded, rather than relying only on the next sharp line. That is a useful foundation for an ensemble programme: the person listening needs to be worth watching too.
The move from staff writer to series creator came through a continuing partnership with Peter Casey and David Lee. Angell became a supervising producer and writer on Cheers with them in 1985; together they went on to create Wings (1990) and Frasier. This is collaborative work, and we cannot sensibly assign every successful exchange to one of the three. But Frasier, their Cheers spin-off, gives us good reason to value that partnership: the writing is assured and the cast have the timing to do it justice.
The reservations are specific, and similar across the two programmes. Cheers sometimes repeats a quarrel until there is too little left for the writing to do, while Frasier lets certain misunderstandings run beyond the last good joke. Familiarity helps us enjoy these people, but it can also make the scripts too willing to keep them in the same disagreement. Start with Frasier for Grammer and Pierce, provided the occasional conversation that takes too long to resolve will not spoil the evening.
Biography
David Lawrence Angell was an American television writer and producer. He graduated from Providence College with a degree in English literature and served in the United States Army at the Pentagon from 1971 to 1972 before moving to Los Angeles in 1977 to pursue writing.
Angell joined the staff of Cheers (1982) as a writer in 1983 and later became a supervising producer alongside Peter Casey and David Lee. The trio created Wings (1990) and Frasier (1993), on which Angell served as executive producer and writer. He received multiple Emmy Awards for his work on these series.
Angell and his wife Lynn were killed on 11 September 2001 aboard American Airlines Flight 11, the first plane to strike the World Trade Center.
