Carroll Pratt: Difference between revisions

Carroll Holmes Pratt (April 19, 1921 – November 11, 2010) was an Emmy Award winning American sound engineer who, along with laugh track inventor Charley Douglass, pioneered the use of prerecorded laughter on a variety of television shows.

Carroll Pratt was born April 19, 1921, in Hollywood, Calfornia, to Carroll, Sr., a sound engineer during the early years of sound in films and television — and Edith Pratt (nee Holmes), a housewife and homemaker. The Pratt family relocated to Syndey, Australia for a few years, where Pratt's father worked on the audio for Australia's first film with sound, before relocating back to Hollywood, where the senior Pratt continued to work in audio. Although he was not initially interested in pursuing a career in audio, the junior Pratt began to dabble in it, as well as production, while still in college, and soon developed an interest in it.^[1]

Eventually, Pratt got caught up in World War II, and went into the United States Air Force in 1942 to 1947. During this time, Pratt also did time as a prisoner of war. After peace time broke up, Pratt got into sound engineering and mixing, professionally, working in motion pictures for MGM Studios until 1955 when he shifted to working in audio for various different television production studios, as well as working for MGM again when they began producing for television until 1957.^[1]

While still working at MGM, Pratt met Charley Douglass, inventor of the laugh track. The machine was bulky and heavy; Pratt would offer to help Douglass transport the device upstairs. During this time, the two engineers became friends, and because Douglass' services were soon spreading so much for one individual to handle, he asked Pratt to join his company, Northridge Electronics; initially, Pratt had to decline, because he was about to accept a permanent contract job with another sound studio, but as fate would have it, the head of said studio met an untimely death while on vacation. Now freed up, Pratt accepted Douglass' offer, of which he remarked, "Never regretted it."^[1]

Douglass trained Pratt in his methods and techniques of laying laughs into programming. Pratt spent his first two years under Douglass' guidance, laughing up the integretated commercials that television programs used to include, in which the actors of the shows would promote the products of the shows' sponsors; afterwards, Pratt was assigned to laughing entire programs, when Northridge Electronics began to laugh up a string of new sitcoms that were being produced by Screen Gems, such as Bachelor Father (CBS, 1957-59; NBC, 1959-61; ABC, 1961-62), Leave it to Beaver (CBS, 1957-58; ABC, 1958-63), and Dennis the Menace (CBS, 1959-63), among others. By this time, because business was booming even more, and more editors were needed to supply the laughs for different programs from different studios, Douglass also hired Pratt's brother John, who was also a sound engineer. Because different editors would react differently to certain jokes and situations, different producers would put in bids for different editors to laugh their shows; next to Charley Douglass himself, the Pratt brothers were perhaps the most prolific editors working for Northridge Electronics, Carroll in particular.^[1]

In addition to editing the audience track for different sitcoms, the Pratt brothers also spent a great deal of time working in Douglass' workshop during summer hiatuses, building machines and rebuilding machines, "Charley was a great machinist", Carroll commented, "we were sort of the nuts-and-bolts guys." Carroll and John worked faithfully and devotedly for Douglass up through the 1970s, however, by this time, advances were made in production technology, Douglass' technique was falling behind. Pratt commented that after years of constant use, Douglass' tapes were beginning to wear out; as a result, hissing sounds were audible, and they knew a laugh was about to be heard by the increase of the hiss. Despite both Carroll and John's continued efforts to convince Douglass to advance his own technology, Douglass himself, while not stubborn, was so fond of his methods and techniques that he felt no urgency to advance his technology. Because of this, the Pratt brothers felt a need to offer producers a more up-to-date way to offer audience reactions for their shows, and eventually, met a fellow engineer who helped them construct a new computerized "laff box"; the innovative new machine was smaller, simpler to use, and had a much greater capacity that could hold recordings of laughter on cassette tapes, as opposed to Douglass' 32 magnetic tape loops.^[1]

As agonizing as it was for them, by 1977, the Pratt brothers parted ways with Douglass, and formed a new company, Sound One, which soon began to offer Douglass competition in the laugh business; soon enough, word of the Pratts' new Laff Box were spreading, and as a result, more and more producers began to choose Sound One over Northridge Electronics to laugh and/or sweeten their programs; especially with the advent of stereo television, Pratt's stereo recordings matched the sound quality of television shows being filmed or taped in stereo, whereas Douglass tried to convert all of his previous mono analog recordings to stereo, with mediocre results.^[1]

While Douglass' laugh track had been boiterous and hearty, Pratt's laugh track was more subtle and a little more subdued, reflecting a shift in mindset of audiences watching television comedies; "A joke is a joke, but I've noticed that the public is more sophisticated now. They don't seem to be hand-fed as they were in the early days. Now, we take the light approach as far as trying to drive home a joke with audience reaction. I think that it's okay to back off a little bit especially on a live-audience show. Go with the show and let them tell you." Pratt continued to carry on the audience reaction legacy that had previously been pioneered by Charley Douglass on not just television comedies, but also sweetening live programs such as award shows, sports programs, specials and pageants, during 1980s and into the 1990s. Much like his mentor's company before his, Sound One was a mostly family business; John continued working with Carroll up until 1980, while his wife served as the company's accountant.^[1]

Like Douglass before him, Pratt also hired additional editors, mentoring and training them on laugh machines, and how to edit the audience reaction tracks on programs. One day, while serving as an editor for a show, Pratt overheard the writers whispering to one another, "Isn't he too old to understand today's humor?", which made him realize that writers and producers were getting steadily younger, and as such, the production industry as a whole was also in the hands of younger professionals; because of this, Pratt decided that it was time for him to turn Sound One over to the hands of his younger proteges. Pratt officially retired from managing and presiding over Sound One in 1989, but continued to consult with other editors, and occasionally laugh up programs himself up until his full and complete retirement in 1995.^[1]

Pratt died of natural causes on November 11, 2010 in Santa Rosa, California at age 89.^[2]

Below is a partial list of programs Carroll Pratt supplied a laugh track for; this includes both while working under Charley Douglass, and after the formation of Sound One. Years indicate the time period Northridge Electronics and/or Sound One worked on the corrsponding show.

• I Love Lucy (CBS, 1951-57)
• The Steve Allen Show (NBC, 1956-60; ABC, 1961; Syndication, 1962-64)
• Bachelor Father (CBS, 1957-59; NBC, 1959-61; ABC, 1961-62)
• Leave it to Beaver (CBS, 1957-58; ABC, 1958-63)
• Kraft Music Hall (NBC, 1958-71)
• Dennis the Menace (CBS, 1959-63)
• My Three Sons (ABC, 1960-65; CBS, 1965-72)
• The Flintstones (ABC, 1960-66)
• The Andy Griffith Show (CBS, 1960-68) (previously laughed by Douglass)
• The Dick Van Dyke Show (CBS, 1961-66)
• The Jetsons (ABC, 1962-63)
• The Beverly Hillbillies (CBS, 1962-71)
• My Favorite Martian (CBS, 1963-65)
• Bewitched (ABC, 1964-72)
• Green Acres (CBS, 1965-71)
• Hogan's Heroes (CBS, 1965-71)
• I Dream of Jeannie (NBC, 1965-70)
• The Carol Burnett Show (CBS, 1967-1978) (Writers Guild strike specials only)
• The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour (CBS, 1967-69)
• The Banana Splits Adventure Hour (NBC, 1968-70)
• Scooby Doo, Where Are You! (CBS, 1969-71)
• The Brady Bunch (ABC, 1969-74) (only when Douglass was unavailable)
• The Mary Tyler Moore Show (CBS, 1970-77)
• Josie and the Pussycats (CBS, 1970-71)
• The Odd Couple (ABC, 1970-75)
• The Partridge Family (ABC, 1970-74)
• The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour (CBS, 1971-74)

• The Pink Panther Show (Northridge Electronics, 1969-78; Sound One, 1978-80)
• The Bob Newhart Show (CBS, 1972-78)
• M*A*S*H (Northridge Electronics, 1972-77; Sound One, 1977-83)
• Happy Days (Northridge Electronics, 1974-77; Sound One, 1977-84)
• Rhoda (CBS, 1974-78)
• The Jeffersons (CBS, 1975-85)
• Barney Miller (ABC, 1975-82)
• Laverne & Shirley (ABC, 1976-1983)
• Eight is Enough (ABC, 1977-81)
• The Love Boat (ABC, 1977-86)

• What's Happening!! (ABC, 1976-79)
• Soap (ABC, 1977-81) [not for entire run]
• Taxi (ABC, 1978-82; NBC, 1982-83)
• The All New Pink Panther Show (ABC, 1978-80)
• Mork & Mindy (ABC, 1978-82)
• Benson (ABC, 1979-86)
• You Can't Do That on Television (1979-82) [not for entire run]
• Harper Valley PTA (NBC, 1981-82)
• The Great Space Coaster (syndicated, 1981-86)
• Family Ties (NBC, 1982-89)
• Newhart (CBS, 1982-90)
• Kate & Allie (CBS, 1984-89)
• The Cosby Show (NBC, 1984-92)
• Mama's Family (NBC, 1983-84; syndicated, 1986-90)
• ALF (NBC, 1986-90)
• The Red Green Show (CBC Television, 1991-2006) [not for entire run]

• Laugh track
• Charles Douglass

• Carroll Pratt at IMDb

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