The Secret Literature of the Sitcom Vanity Card
One of Chuck Lorre's vanity cards
Have you ever noticed the very quick (1 1/2 seconds) at the end of a tv show there is a logo shown. In showbiz speak, that’s a vanity card. It’s called that because thats where the shows creator and executive producer gets to put his corporate logo. Chuck Lorre is a sitcom producer. A producer who also writes occasional episodes and who is available to help during filming if there are problems is called a “show runner”. A more technical description is that the show runner is a combination writer and producer.
Chuck Lorre has been producing sitcoms for years. Dharma and Greg was one of his creations. For reasons unknown to anyone but Mr. Lorre, he decided to fill his second-and-a-half of fame at the end of each show with an original, and sometimes very funny essay. DVR’s weren’t available in the Dharma and Gregg days, so if you wanted to read these essays, you had to tape the show and then “pause” when the vanity card appeared. The type was small and the image jittered. Nonetheless, Mr. Lorre convinced himself that people were reading.
As technology improved, more and more people discovered these semi-literate gems. The content varies. Frequently they reveal struggles between Mr. Lorre and CBS censors. Occasionally, the censors refuse to let him run a vanity card. On those occasions, the card reads, “Censored”. People who know, go to his web site where the censored vanity card is available to read. This web site chucklorre.com is the repository of all of Lorre’s vanity cards.
It is even more interesting that Lorre’s concept hasn’t caught on. No other network show has made use of this valuable opportunity to communicate with its audience. Lorre has written more than 250 essays on topics ranging from Zen philosophy to rants against network censors. Ironically, the network censors read his vanity cards and on occasion, have suppressed them as well. Granted, this isn’t a major trend and whether or not you read these often amusing essays won’t change your life. But consider, Chuck Lorre has created a new, underground art form. That deserves recognition.