Television series

Soap

Name: Soap
Genre: Comedy
Released: 1977
Cast: Billy Crystal, Cathryn Damon, Katherine Helmond, Richard Mulligan, Rod Roddy

Soap is a prime-time sitcom disguised as an actual soap opera: a portentous narrator recaps last episode's absurdities before two families — the wealthy, unraveling Tates and the scrappier Campbells — barrel through adultery, kidnapping, possession, murder trials and, groundbreakingly for 1977, a gay son played with real tenderness. It's fast, silly, and best binged in order so the melodrama can properly compound.

TVMaze rating

8.0

If you liked this

Arrested Development2003

Same collapsing wealthy family, same delight in escalating lies and taboo jokes, same narrator commenting on the mess. Bluth family chaos is Soap's serialized-farce DNA rewired for the 2000s, faster and more self-aware.

But The joke density rewards rewatching more than casual viewing, and its irony runs cooler than Soap's warmer absurdity.

Desperate Housewives2004

Suburban secrets, murder, adultery and a wry narrator guiding you through it — this is prime-time soap parody dressed as an actual prime-time soap, precisely the trick Soap pulled off first.

But Runs eight seasons and leans harder into melodrama as it goes, gradually trading away outright silliness for genuine suspense.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia2005

Terrible people doing terrible things to each other with total commitment and zero lessons learned — the anarchic, faintly grim comic engine Soap was running on before anyone else dared.

But Nastier and more nihilistic than Soap ever got; the characters have almost none of Soap's underlying warmth.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Written on the Wind1956

Soap's storylines are lifted almost wholesale from 1950s Sirkian melodrama; watching the sincere original reveals just how faithfully the sitcom parodies its rhythms, right down to the doomed rich families.

Douglas Sirk's Technicolor melodrama plays every plot Soap mocks — adultery, possession by drink, sibling rivalry, family money as poison — completely straight, and it's gorgeous, overheated, and genuinely gripping.

But No jokes, deliberately slow by modern standards, and its lush excess can read as dated rather than delicious to a first-time viewer.

Married... with Children1987

A deliberately tasteless, defiantly unsentimental sitcom that treats family dysfunction as pure punchline rather than crisis — the same appetite for pushing network comedy past its comfort zone.

But Broader and cruder than Soap, with thinner plotting and a lot more repetition of the same handful of jokes.

Modern Family2009

Interlocking families, escalating misunderstandings, and a groundbreaking gay couple played for warmth rather than shock — the tangled-family formula Soap pioneered, softened for a gentler era.

But Considerably safer and sweeter throughout; little of Soap's willingness to get genuinely strange or dark.

Benson1979

The direct spinoff, following the Tates' unflappable butler into a governor's mansion. If you fell for this world, it's the obvious, cheerful next stop waiting for you.

But Abandons the ensemble soap structure entirely for a straight workplace sitcom — much gentler and far less bizarre.

All in the Family1971

Norman Lear's landmark sitcom proved network comedy could tackle real social terrain inside one chaotic household — the template Soap took and pushed even further into farce.

But More earnest social commentary than absurdist plot, and Archie Bunker's era-specific bigotry can be genuinely rough viewing now.

Dallas1978

The prime-time soap opera Soap was practically born to mock, played entirely straight — oil money, family betrayal, cliffhangers on purpose instead of for laughs.

But Zero comedy intended; if you came purely for Soap's jokes, the sincerity here might just make you miss them.

Empty Nest1988

Another Soap-universe spinoff, centred on Richard Mulligan's newly widowed doctor and his daughters — comfort food from the same creative family, gentler and far more conventional.

But Standard multi-camera sitcom rhythms replace Soap's serialized lunacy; it's easily the tamest thing on this list.

Noises Off...1992no page yet

Soap's plotting is essentially live farce structure — mistaken identities, doors, secrets stacking on secrets — and Noises Off strips that same architecture down to its bare, hilarious mechanics.

A backstage farce about a theatre troupe collapsing into affairs, slamming doors and physical chaos mid-performance — the mechanical, overlapping-secrets engine of soap-opera comedy exposed and sped up to breaking point.

But It's a film about theatre-making, meta and stagey by design, which can feel arch and airless rather than warm.

Yo soy Betty, la fea1999

Soap satirizes American soap-opera devices; this telenovela is the real, unironic, globally beloved version of that same DNA, proving the joke's target is still a thriving, sincere genre.

Amnesia, evil doubles, secret pregnancies, corporate scheming — everything Soap sends up, played with total sincerity in one of the most successful telenovelas ever made, and it's enormous fun.

But Subtitles, hundreds of episodes, and a wholehearted embrace of tropes that some viewers only enjoy through irony.