Aside from ALL reality TV shows...
- The Nanny, due to Fran Drescher, also tops my list as annoying.
- Bob Newhart is another actor that I simply cannot force myself to suffer through.
Most live-action shows that I dislike are from the 1970s and early 1980s. Something about the era had writers filling casts with obnoxious caricatures, instead of quality characters.
Some shows were simply awful, I thought:
- The Cosby Show
- Full House
- Silver Spoons
- Charles in Charge
- Who's the Boss?
- Growing Pains
- Facts of Life
On those shows, it was no one character, but most/all of them. They were so fake, often so goodie-goodie, that I wanted to puke.
Some of it, I think, was influenced by the actors -- not just the characters. Kirk Cameron, for example, is a complete ******bag in real life (a bigoted religious zealot). There's a lot of actors and actresses on those shows that turned out to be weird (possibly excluding the Cosby Show), and I think it shows in their portrayals of the characters. Thespians leave their mark on characters just as much as the characters fill their resumes.
It really comes as no surprise that I watched so many cartoons in the 80s and 90s and early 2000s, even though I was often told that I was "too old" to be watching "kid's stuff". As far as I was concerned, the alternative was far more unrealistic. Only in the past 10 years have I started to watch more current live-action shows. Prior to about 2003, everything I liked that was non-animated was from the 1950s-1960s.
Great topic.