Imagine that you’re the creator and show runner of the newest comedy show on television. Only it isn’t so popular yet, and your live Studio audience isn’t giving you the big laughs the show deserves. Do you film the show all over again, hoping that this time the audience will laugh? Or is there another option for making a joke sound funnier than it was received?

Sweeten(改善) the sound by adding a laugh track! “Sweetening,” or the addition of sound effects such as laughs, screams, and other audience-produced noises to the audio track of a TV show, has been used since the 1940s to produce the appearance, or rather the sound, of an engaged and entertained response to a show’s comedy. Laugh tracks came into existence as not only a solution, and sometimes replacement, for an unengaged live audience but also as a way to engage an at-home audience into a more-traditional, public, and theaterlike experience. Adding a laugh track to a television show makes the viewers at home feel much less like they’re sitting on a couch staring at the television screen and much more like they’re in a room full of laughing happy people to varying degrees of success.

Though the art of sweetening has risen and fallen in popularity over the past 60 years, credit for its creation and continued use is owed to laugh-track pioneer and sound engineer Charles Douglass. Douglass was the first to develop, in 1953, a machine for producing “canned laughter”, accessible at the push of a button or pull of a lever (操纵杆). Despite being artificial, sensibly edited laugh tracks are found by television studios to bring about a positive audience response, as their use is usually accompanied by higher ratings and increased audience memory. Though some television audiences may disagree with the value of the laugh track, the cheerful and repetitive sound holds a permanent place in the history and future of television comedy.

While most TV stations try to attract viewers by producing reality shows, Henan TV has become famous by promoting (推广) traditional culture through Chinese dance.

Henan TV produced seven dance pieces introducing traditional culture for traditional festivals, such as “Rhapsody on the Luo River Goddess (《洛神水赋》)”, a two-minute underwater dance for the Dragon Boat Festival. “Guardian Warriors of Longmen (《龙门金刚》)”, a dance piece supported by AR technology against the backdrop of the Longmen Grottoes (石窟).

“These pieces have gotten nearly 30 billion hits,” said Yao Wei, director of the TV station. “It’s a huge success for Henan TV.”

On Nov 1, 2021, Yao was invited to talk about how the TV station had produced the hit dance pieces at a three-day forum(论坛) centering on the research of Chinese dance.

The pieces were popular with audiences, most of whom are members of Gen Z, (people born between 1995 and 2009), Yao said.

“It’s been over forty years since the country’s reform (改革) and opening-up and the younger generations have grown up with open minds. They love Chinese culture and are proud of it,” said Yao. “What we need to do is present Chinese culture and tradition in interesting ways for those young people.”

Yao added that Henan TV has been producing shows promoting traditional culture, such as traditional operas and kung fu, for nearly 30 years.

“To allure younger audiences, we are also changing our shows. One of the keys is to produce them with creativity,” Yao said. “For example, the latest technology and special stage settings, like underwater scenes, have become our new ways of telling stories about traditional Chinese culture.”

Another key to successfully reaching younger audiences is using social media to promote their shows.

“Social media is being shaped and driven by young people. It’s a powerful form of communication. When they watch short videos, they easily become interested in an eye-catching video,” Yao said.