The genesis of the television situation comedy goes back some 40 years to programs like My Little Margie, Our Miss Brooks, I Married Joan, Ozzie and Harriet and Amos and Andy. Many were retread radio shows with pictures.

There are still some small disputes concerning who did what first. But there is no argument over who were the Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig of the sit-com format. Lucille and Desi Arnez launched the I Love Lucy program during the early 1950s. If not the first, it was among the first multi-camera programs shot on film.

Lucy and Desi wanted to film their show in front of a live audience so they could feed off of the crowd's spontaneous reactions. They also wanted to edit it like a movie because in comedy, timing is everything. And they wanted production values because much of their humor was visual rather than verbal.

That's why they hired Karl Freund. Freund started his career in Germany during the 1920s. His credits included Metropolis, which is still considered a landmark in film art. Freund moved to the United States during the early 1930s and earned an Oscar in 1937 for The Good Earth, among many other accomplishments.

He was among the first of the major cinematographers to defect from features to television. Freund invented a classic technique for shooting sit-coms: Place the lights overhead so they don't block the view of the audience; shoot with three cameras. The middle camera was used for master shots. The two side cameras carried longer lenses, and they were used to record close-ups -- reaction shots -- from reverse angles. I Love Lucy is still paying dividends in syndication.

FAST-FORWARD TO TODAY: The cast and crew of Room for Two are getting ready for their second season on ABC Television. The comedy features Linda Lavin in the role of Edie Kurland, a TV program producer, and Patrica Heaton, who plays the part of her daughter and collaborator, Jill.

It's blocking day on Stage 7 at Warner Bros. in Burbank. The cast is going through a day-long rehearsal. Writer-producer Rick Kelland is seated in the grandstands, which will hold a live audience tomorrow. His ears are fine-tuned to the delivery of every line. There will be some last minute changes.

Director Will McKenzie is good-naturedly coaxing performances out of the regular cast and stand-ins. He huddles occasionally with director of photography George Spiro Dibie. They discuss variations in camera moves and coverage. As each move is determined, Dibie decides how it will affect lighting.

The crew is scrambling to keep up with a steady stream of instructions. "Lighting comes from the script and heart," Dibie says. "I can't tell you about my technique because I never know how I'm going to light until I read the script and see the characters on the set. You don't light for exposure. You light to tell a story."

All the while, the camera crew seems to be practicing steps for some sort of an intricate ballet. They move in flawless synchronization. It's almost like they are physically connected. There are four cameras. Each has an operator, a first assistant who pulls focus, and a dolly grip. The grips are wearing earphones which link them to technical coordinator Marge Mullen who prompts them to hit exact marks with precise timing. Everyone on the crew has a function which adds value to the show.

There are also a couple second assistants poised to change the 2,000 foot magazines on the four Panaflex-X cameras, but that's only part of their job. They are also responsible for keeping track of the 50,000 feet of film that rolls through the cameras each week as it winds its way through the lab, telecine transfer and finally electronic postproduction.

In the background, there are two technicians from Aaton and Panavision keeping a close eye on a black box, which is generating time-code that is simultaneously being written outside the perfs on the film and on the audiotape. They say it will trim some 20 to 30 percent of telecine transfer time by speeding up the process of synchronizing the sound track with the film cuts from the four cameras. At $400 an hour in the telecine suite, that's a lot of beans for the financial people to count.

"We don't shoot film on blocking day," says Dibie, "but today we are helping them test the time-code system. A lot of TV programs are hurting. Their budgets are being cut. There are ways for them to save money -- like this, without hurting the quality of the program."

In mid-sentence, Dibie motions for Wynn Bowers, from Panavision, and tells him how time-code is going to save the show more money. Dibie switched from Panavision PSR to Panaflex-X cameras to accommodate the time-code system. There is a plate which has to be installed in the camera. It has seven tiny LEDs which "encode" the time-code on the outer edges of the film.

The older PSR camera can't accommodate the plate. But there's a bonus. The PSR camera is limited to the use of 1,000 foot capacity magazines. The Panaflex-X cameras can handle 2,000 foot magazines. It gives Dibie the luxury of having capacity for longer takes. But that's another consideration.

"It's going to cut the number of magazines in half," he says. "Instead of 50, we'll have 25. That means we can cut the time it takes to load and unload telecines in half. They can save five to 10 minutes 25 times a week. That alone is a two to four hour savings in telecine suite time."

Freund died in 1970. What if he could come back now to see what he has wrought? Would he be amazed by what he saw happening on Stage 7? Practically everything has changed. The hard overhead light was so hot that breaks were scheduled to repair melting make-up, and to allow the audience and cast time to cool off.

In the early days of color, 300 to 400 footcandles of keylight was the standard for filming a sit-com. As recently as 10 years ago, it was commonplace to light a show with 150 to 200 footcandles of keylight.

On Stage 7, none of the lights are directly overhead. Some have come down along the edges of the walls of the various sets. Most are on pipes or the green beds above the sets, because the walls move to accommodate changes in settings. A show like Room for Two has six to eight standing sets and one or two swing sets that are constructed every week.

"It gives the producers and writers more freedom to develop storylines," says Dibie. "Instead of Linda talking about visiting a doctor's office, we build a set and stage a scene or two there. We can also make the program more visually interesting. You need to do that. Today's audiences are more sophisticated. They expect to see more complex stories with better production values. It means we have to be able to move faster without sacrificing quality."

Just a few years ago, network gurus and engineers were unanimous in insisting that all sit-coms required high keylight. There was no room for moody or dramatic lighting. It was like a cue for the audience that a show was a comedy. It made for a lot of single dimensional stories and characters. It's hard to find someone who can tell you why they did it. Where have those people gone?

On contemporary TV, a good sit-com is usually seen as a small drama which evokes laughs. The characters ring truer. The lighting has to accommodate that shift in thinking. The result is that Dibie's foreground keylight on Room For Two is never more than 40 footcandles. In different scenes it might be 10 or 20. His lighting scheme is intricate.

Look at old sit-coms and you see a lot of talking heads. On Room for Two, the actors are almost always moving. There's a small ensemble cast with six regulars, and usually as many guests. The energy they create is tactile. You can feel it. The cameras move with them, either physically or by adjusting the focal length on the 10:1 zoom lenses. "It's as if we have 10 flat lenses on each camera," says Dibie. "We only zoom if that's what the script requires."

Dibie lights the background to create a sense of depth, and to give texture to the walls. It's more "gutsy" or contrasty. The foreground light is kinder and gentler. "The audience wants the cast to look attractive," Dibie says. The contrasting lighting styles help to create a feeling of dimensionality. There's no hint of being on a stage. It could just as well be a one-camera drama filmed at a practical location.

Dibie manipulates the image in various ways. D-B Net has practically become a metaphor for behind-the-lens diffusion guaranteed to make anyone over 18 look better on film, or tape for that matter. It's a special kind of silk with uniquely sized and shaped oval holes that diffuse the light just right. Dibie gets it from a supplier in France.

This just begins to describe his approach to lighting sit-coms. For example, Dibie uses back cross-light on every character in each episode. That creates a richer tonality which takes advantage of the superb imaging characteristics of contemporary film stocks.

Room for Two is photographed on the 500-speed, tungsten-balanced Eastman EXR 5296 film. Dibie describes it as fast and flexible with a "wide range of contrast." "Film is kinder to the cast," he says, and that means something coming from him. Dibie has earned five Emmys and eight nominations for taping sit-coms.

MORE ON LIGHTING: There are also Obie lights on cameras, which can be used to put a sparkle into someone's eyes, or it can soften their visage a bit. But sometimes that isn't practical because of the intricate juxtapositioning of cameras and the cast on moving shots.

No problem. Dibie simply uses a small light, maybe a 2 K or 4 K with an egg crate extending 18 inches in front of it, to add a touch of light to a face. The soft light is linked to a dimmer control.

Look around the sets. Dibie is freely mixing different tungsten and daylight lamps. Every lamp seems to have a gel altering the color, diffusion, or a snood controlling its beam. Every light is motivated by a window, lamp or some other believable source.

OTHER TACTICS: This season Dibie had a painter make the living room wall three or four shades darker with some black spackle in it. "It used to look a little too contrasty with the mahogany wood," he explains. "Now, the room looks more lived in."

Sit-com production took a radical turn during the early 1970s with the success of All in the Family and cost-saving video postproduction techniques pioneering by Norman Lear. Some people thought it was the end of the film genre. In fact, by the start of the 1985-86 season, Newhart and Cheers were the only two film sit-coms remaining. That's not the case today.

Dibie points out that all four Warner Bros. sit-coms are on film. Part of it is the look, though Dibie notes that with CCD cameras and proper lighting most video shows could be made to look a lot better. Another factor is that the perceived gap in production costs between film and video is closing with the development of hybrid imaging technologies -- such as the time-code system from Panavision being used on Room for Two.

The film for Room for Two is processed at Technicolor. It's transferred to tape, and sound is also synched at Unitel. Off-line video editing is done at United Video. The postproduction house can provide an edit decision list that corresponds to Eastman Keykode numbers -- a machine-addressable bar code -- on the original negative. That makes it comparatively easy and very efficient for the producer to conform the original negative to the video edit.

"That's a big reason why you are seeing so much interest in film," Dibie says. He believes producers are thinking ahead to future markets when HDTV is finally a reality. "They are finally understanding that 35 mm film will be compatible with every HDTV transmission standard or aspect ratio. NTSC tapes won't be compatible with any HDTV transmission standards. Programs produced on NTSC or PAL tape formats probably won't have any value in future syndication. If you think you have a show that will have some future value in syndication, it better be produced on 35 mm film."

Dibie is uniquely qualified to talk about the future of sit-coms. He has shot some 1,500 episodes on film and tape. In fact, he has been a trailblazer in drawing the two mediums closer.

HIS BACKGROUND: Dibie was born in Jerusalem. One parent was Greek and the other Lebanese. In his late teens, Dibie earned a U.S.I.A. scholarship. He used it to earn a bachelor's degree in theatre arts at the Pasadena Playhouse.

After graduation, Dibie directed one play, but he had fallen in love with film. He shot many film documentaries. Then he and Roger Dash formed a company which produced and rented training films. Their business was successful and Dibie collected various film festival awards for his camerawork. But that didn't satisfy his appetite for shooting film.

Finally, after several years of persistently trying, Dibie found an opening. He became a gaffer's best boy. In a short time, he was working as a gaffer with some of Hollywood's top cinematographers including James Wong Howe, ASC; Jack Marta, ASC; Harry Stradling, ASC; and Billy Daniels, ASC.

"They were all different," Dibie says. "I learned something from everyone I worked with. Working as a gaffer was an important part of my education."

His next break came from a totally unexpected source. Producer Danny Arnold asked Dibie to shoot The Barney Miller Show, a multi-camera video sit-com. "The pilot was shot on film," says Dibie. "Most people don't know that." At that time, video sit-coms were shot like stage plays. A technical director in a control booth watched the levels of light on the stage by monitoring an oscilloscope. Not Dibie. He controlled lighting from the floor like it was a film show.

His work on Barney Miller resulted in his entry into the International Photographers Guild. At first, he was accepted in a unique category as video cameraman. However, that category disappeared after Dibie shot Buffalo Bill and Nothing In Common on film. His Emmys are for Night Court, Mr. Belvedere, Growing Pains, Just The 10 of Us and F.Y.I. In addition to his episodic series credits, Dibie has filmed most of the film pilots which have come out of Warner Bros. during recent years, including My Sister Sam, The Ellen Bursten Show, Nothing in Common, Murphy Brown, Room for Two and Driving Miss Daisy.

Let's delve a little deeper into his approach to lighting Room for Two. "That's a control box for switching lights," he points out. "When Jill comes into a room at night, it's dark and all we see is moonlight coming through windows with some ambient light bouncing around. The second she turns on the lights, someone in the crew flips a switch that turns on lamps and other practicals and the units we use to augment those lights."

More than lighting goes into the making of contemporary sit-coms. Most directors of photography shooting sit-coms opt for 5:1 or 6:1 zoom lenses. Dibie uses 10:1 Cook zoom lenses because they give him a little bit more flexibility. Maybe a close-up reaction shot is needed. The zoom allows the camera to come in tight enough to get a great close-up while avoiding a move.

"Every move requires logistics," he says. "If you can avoid it, you save two minutes. Then maybe you can save four minutes on something else, and six minutes on something else. At the end of the day, you've saved 30 or 60 minutes, and maybe that gives you the time to do something special."

Dibie points to a set that will be used later in the day. "We have 30 footcandles here in the foreground, and maybe 40 to 50 on the back cross-lights in this scene," he explains. "People are moving around a lot on this set. You want to keep them covered. So I'm giving the assistant cameramen about a half-a-stop of play for depth-of-field. I don't want the focus to go soft. That draws attention to the camera. You have to protect the assistants. It's a difficult job. Pulling focus on a show like this requires a lot of skill and judgement."

MORE ON LIGHTING: "You have to take the attitude that it's like lighting a feature," he says. Does someone have deep-set eyes? I have to get some light in there so they don't go black. I prefer not to use bounce light. I'll use it where I need it. But I would rather control the ambience. There's a 2K ZIP light up there with egg crates... they look like little doors. That's how we'll control the ambience in this situation. We'll use some controlled soft light. I'm using the ZIP light like an Obie because the camera is too far away. If we use the Obie on the camera, it's going to cause a shadow because that sound boom is in the way. And if I move the camera, it's going to mess up my cross back-light."

Very often you can add to your lighting by a process of subtraction. "Just bring the light level down," he says in plotting another shot. "Make the room darker. Now add a little moonlight. Isn't that a more romantic setting for this scene?"

ON SIT-COMS: "Tempo and pacing is critical," Dibie says. "You have to keep the energy level high. Everything has to be moving. It's a pleasure working with directors like Will McKenzie. He was an actor, so he knows what it's about. When we shot the pilot for Driving Miss Daisy we missed a close-up. We both knew it. But he didn't interrupt the flow. We kept shooting. He realized we could do a pick-up shot later."

Timing is the essence of comedy. Freund knew it. So does Dibie. "I have the best operators, the best crews in the business," he says. "I try to keep them intact. They're a team. You can't do it without them. Sometimes you'll get a producer who is trying to cut corners so he or she hires a less experienced crew. Maybe that less experienced crew won't do anything wrong that you notice. It's just that the show isn't as funny as you thought it was going to be. Maybe the timing is off slightly. That can make all of the difference in the world."

Dibie points to an area on another set. "Every place someone in the cast stops, we have back cross-light," he says. "But that's not how we figure the T-stop. It's a combination of the ambient light and back cross-light. That's the secret. You always want to pull a deep enough stop to give the audience a sense of depth. That's why the 500-speed film is important."

By the time he's finished blocking, his gaffer, Ray Wickman, has hung or positioned another 10-to-15 lights.

"Everyone just works a little harder to give the show a better, more realistic look," Dibie says.

Sometimes small details make a big difference. "I want to put a silk on it (pointing to a Baby) because that guy (an actor) is going to be standing real close to it on this scene with Linda," he says. "I don't want to burn him up."

On TV, the actor will pass by the light in the time it takes to blink. Maybe the audience will miss it, or perhaps they won't care. But Dibie cares. He'll know something is wrong. He believes the audience will also notice if only on a subliminal level.

What's his procedure for shooting Room for Two? "I start with the script," he says. "I get it about a week before the show. On the first reading, I'm asking myself is it winter, fall or summer? What kind of light is coming through the windows? Where is it coming from? The angle of light can help establish the time of day. What kind of gels do we need? Is it white light, warm light, or what? If it's snowing maybe we'll use a blue gel and make it whitish. Or maybe there's a sunset. I also work with the art director to make sure sets are shootable. I protect sound boom movements, check colors of the sets so they don't clash with the actors and wardrobe, and I work closely with the makeup and wardrobe departments."

Meanwhile Wickman and Barry Wexler, his key grip, are doing the same thing. The next day, they discuss what needs to be done for that show. It's like plotting a military campaign. Dibie checks the sources on every set to make certain they are sufficient to motivate lighting planned for this episode. Maybe something needs to be added.

This week, he's planning to use the back cross-light in one set-up to do a little extra modeling to make a particular character seem more attractive. That sends a strong message to the audience without a word of dialogue. In another situation, a character will walk by a window. It's a sunny day, so Dibie plans to "kiss" her with a touch of warmer light as she passes by.

Dibie plots lighting for each scene from the front to the back. First he establishes the level of ambient light in the foreground. Next, he lights the middle of the set, and last, the background. "You do the windows first for sources of exterior light, and doors if they are going to open, and then you do your back walls. Never light from the back of the set forward, because believe it or not, light leaks. Instead of 30 footcandles in the foreground (ambience), it can become 50."

Once the ambient light is controlled on a sector of the set, he sets the back cross-light according to the moves the cast will be making. There are all sorts of niceties each week depending on the script. In one show there's a Senior coming through a window to put a little ambience on some back walls. In another episode, there's a hard light with a special frosted cloth material from the Great American Market used for diffusion.

A basic rule: "Never, never box in an actor so if they move a few inches one way or another, there will be an unattractive shadow on their face," he says. "You can do it so that if they move, the light will clear their shoulder. You have to give them room to breath."

SHOOTING DAY: There's a final rehearsal; a shoot at 5 p.m. without an audience; and another at 7 p.m. after dinner with a live audience. For the latter, a single live video camera feeds images to TV monitors which are strategically placed to allow the audience to see what is happening on sets further down stage.

After the film is processed, Dibie is at the telecine house with the colorist as he transfers film to video.

"This is one of the most important functions a cinematographer does. I must be there to be sure the transfer is true to what I shot.

"I just check the look and "moods", making sure he gets it right," Dibie says. "Every show is different. Each episode has its own mood. Everyone works very hard to get it right. Linda Lavin is a wonderful actress -- a beautiful person. She's the star, and she's also the executive producer. Her company, Big Deal., Inc., is partners with Warner Bros. on this show. She gives us a lot of support; she and the studio. They deserve to get the best we can give them."
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The camera crew for Room for Two included director of photography, George Spiro Dibie; camera operators, Brian Brockway, Doug Knapp, Doug Scott and Steve Silver; first assistants, Leonard Alex, Mitchell Block, Ken Hale and Kieran Mulgrew; second assistants, Joe Branigan and Alfredo Sepulveda; video camera operator, Mike Keeler; video camera utility, Mike Griffin; key grip, Barry Wexler; best boy grip, Melinda Gordon; dolly grips, Joe Tappia, Terry Harker, Mike King and Chuck Lish; Gaffer Ray Wickman; best boy, John Cappilla; and dimmer board operator, Tom Havener.