Raunch meter rises for CBS Monday comedies

PASADENA, Calif. — A recent Monday seemed typical for CBS' sitcoms on that night, television's most popular — and raunchy — night of comedy.

There was a strip club visit on "How I Met Your Mother," lap dance included. The stars of "2 Broke Girls" mistakenly believed an upstairs neighbor ran a brothel. "Two and a Half Men" included jokes about masturbation, oral sex, sex with moms, trading cigarettes for sex and two scenes with loud noises of passion from behind closed doors.

A quick count found 53 sex jokes on the network's four comedies, which includes "Mike & Molly." There were also nine jokes about flatulence or bowel movements, and two scenes where marijuana use was clearly implied — one with a teen-age boy and the other with an older woman.

The subject matter leaves some viewers queasy, such as Amanda St. Amand, mother of two college students from St. Louis. She said the shows go past raunchy fun to just plain raunchy. She rarely watches them anymore.

CBS and producers of the comedies strongly defend their work and point to the shows' success as evidence they're doing something right. "Two and a Half Men" is TV's favorite comedy, "How I Met Your Mother" has its best ratings ever in its seventh year and "2 Broke Girls" is a breakout freshman hit. The four shows are among the seven most popular comedies on prime-time television this season, the Nielsen ratings company said.

CBS Entertainment President Nina Tassler said the comedies are "a little risque," but that the characters are living truthfully within their particular circumstances.

"The fact that there is such strong ratings growth for all of them means that those shows are resonating," Tassler said. "It means that the characters are resonating. It means that their dialogue is really landing with audiences. The shows are laugh-out-loud funny."

"Mike & Molly" has the least amount of sexual content of the four shows last week, although it did include jokes about a flasher, breasts, prostitution and erections.

"2 Broke Girls" opened its episode with the two lead characters trading four raunchy jokes with the leering cook in the diner where they work.

Show creator Michael Patrick King reacted strongly earlier this month when he was questioned at a meeting of the Television Critics Association about some particularly edgy jokes in his show.

"It's 8:30 on Monday on CBS in 2012," said King, former producer of "Sex and the City" for HBO.