Commentary : You’ll Never Laugh Alone

Big sitcom night tonight, with laughs aplenty. Maybe even yours.

But the folks who create sitcoms like “Seinfeld” and “Mad About You” aren’t taking any chances. Why not? Consider the two laws of sitcoms:

-- Laughter is contagious.

-- Lack of it is deadly.

Enter the laugh track, which, next to a living room couch, is the most important component of the typical sitcom.

Maybe the sitcom laugh track you hear on your TV contains the recorded sounds of a studio audience that, after hours of stops and starts in the staging of that sitcom, are rendered sufficiently giddy to laugh at almost anything.

Or maybe a laugh track consists of canned audience responses dubbed in after filming is complete.

Usually, it’s some of both.

In any case, the laugh track is the Wonderbra of mirth. It transforms comedy that, au natural, would play as thin as Kate Moss into something that purports to be voluptuously funny.

But remember, the laugh track is not there to make you laugh, or make you think what it’s applied to is genuinely funny. It’s there to mark each place where the writers meant for laughs to be. Just so you know.

Here, for example, is a bona fide example of sitcom give-and-take. The laugh track (shown here graphically) indicates the punchline:

“Miss me?” “As much as I miss my acne!” HAHAHAHAHA.

Meanwhile, you’re out in the kitchen looking for a snack. Not to worry if you miss an exchange such as, “I handle small, fragile antiquities;” “Please, I’d rather not discuss your bathing rituals.” The laugh track (HAHAHAHAHAHAHA) acts as your proxy.

But where does that leave you when the TV is switched off? As the Bard wrote, all the world’s a stage. As you go about your business away from the tube, you’re just as much an actor as Jerry Van Dyke or those women on “The Mommies” (maybe more). In this comedy you call life, you deserve a little backup, too.

If instant, push-button, never-mind-there’s-nothing-funny-going-on-here laughter is good enough for the likes of “Full House” and “Muscle,” why shouldn’t it be available to you?

So get yourself a Laugh-Pak, and, wherever you go, you’ll have audience responses at your command with the all-purpose, portable, personal laugh track.

S here you are trying to impress a date with your cleverness and your joke falls flat. No matter: You press a button on the Laugh-Pak. Instantly, her ears are ringing from the laughter of amused multitudes.

Or maybe you hurl a zinger at your husband, something about not only does he have a spare tire around his waist but it needs a retread.

Never mind that your wisecrack doesn’t make any sense. Just push the “Gotcha” button on your Laugh-Pak, and out comes a resounding “Woooooooooo!” You’ve scored a bull’s-eye.

You say something tender and loving to your child. But of course, he’s not listening. Who cares? With the press of a button, the Laugh-Pak emits an appreciative “Awwwwwwwww.”

For the cost of a Laugh-Pak, you are spared the obligation to be truly clever and engaging --and spared that sense of failure when you’re not. Meanwhile, the people with whom you come in contact are spared the obligation to listen and react to you.

It’s a good deal all around. Sort of like watching the typical TV sitcom.

With Laugh-Pak, you get the last laugh, at last.

Batteries and bad jokes not included.