The challenge to the hegemony of the Big Three, then, undoubtedly helped reinvigorate a tired genre like the situation comedy.
With Roseanne, viewers witnessed the return of the blue-collar family to their TV screens. The Conners, led by mother and father Roseanne and Dan Conner (played by Roseanne Barr and John Goodman), were subject to the stresses and strains of contemporary living. The small, midwestern town of Lanford—the sitcom's fictional setting—was recession-hit for much of the series and the family was unable to escape this context. In contrast to so many sitcoms, the domestic arena in Roseanne did not provide the Connors with a safe haven in a heartless world; rather, that harsh outside world frequentlythreatened to engulf the family as it staggered from one economic crisis to another. As a result of this, Roseanne's literate comedy often took on a clear socio-political dimension, attributable in large measure to the creative influence of the show's star, Roseanne Barr, a successful stand-up comedienne. The sassy humor of Barr's heavily autobiographical "trailer mom" monologues supplied the show's writers with a ready-made central character around which to build a variety of relationships. As the show's co-creator, Barr unquestionably stamped both her unique personality and her own agenda on the series that pointedly shared her name.
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