Yep. It's a very common practice for daytime talk shows and anything filmed before a "live studio audience".

FWIW, there are monitors that instruct the audience to laugh, gasp, etc.
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Hmmmm, I've thought that the audience was like a paying audience. I didn't know they were paid to go. Thats crazy.

How much do the tourists pay?
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Tapings are free. Some shows allow advance tickets, others require that you wait outside. If there's a big name musical act appearing on Leno, Lopez, Ellen, etc., fans arrive early in the morning. Otherwise, it's usually a two hour wait or so.

Shows that consistently struggle to maintain a live audience hire temps through temp agencies. No one wants a "dead" crowd and often times, the crowd is "coached up" before taping, especially in the case of the more confrontational shows like Springer, etc.
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I was offered free beer to be in the audience of The Man Show the last time I was in LA. I didn't really have time as it was going to take about 4 hours out of my day.
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Ziggy-socki ziggy-socki oi-oi-oi!!!!
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I feel like I should already have known this, but I didn't. Interesting.
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The wife and I have just started getting into this show and we really enjoy it. It is really funny and really pretty smart. Not just the jokes, but the actual content of the dialogue when Sheldon starts talking about physics and other assorted scientific facts and principles.
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Maybe it was her outfits, or my hatred for her, but Penny has gained a few pounds right?
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Hatred? How is that possible?

Maybe a few.

I'd still do wonderful things with her body.
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She's one of those girls in which a five pound swing is really noticeable on TV.

But all in all, she's tiny.
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Does she look as delicious IRL? :-)
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I used to love her on the show. Then a few things happened.

I read an interview with her in Watch magazine about her relationship with Johnny Gelecki (Leonard). Basically, he wanted to keep it a secret amongst the cast and crew and no one else. She wanted to be the brad and angelina. Pretty dumb, but I cant blame her for being one of those attention seeking dummies.

Then I read her Maxim spread, how she loved when guys notice her and hit on her blah blah blah. Which is fine, more power to her, except she has a story how she was pissed at the cast for getting mad at an extra that was hitting on her on set. Mind you, this is when she was dating Johnny and the cast knew, tried to put a stop to it and she made a scene of it. I could only imagine how humiliating that was for Johnny. Fuck her.

Big Bang theory becomes a hit. Everyone holds out. She takes the longest to get a deal done, which is dumb, because she is most replaceable on the cast. Insert, Olivia Munn into her spot, no one bats an eye. So she signs her deal finally, gets more money than God and promptly breaks her foot horseback riding. This causes rewrites and when the shows quality began to suffer. Penny is now a bartender at the cheescake factory.

I think the writers start to hate her too because this is when she dumps Leonard for no reason then becomes jealous he is banging the hot Indian. Its like they intentionally trying to make her unlikeable.

She is pretty dumb in her interviews, but what hot girl isnt?

.... So i have my reasons.
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I've never had the pleasure. :-)
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None of them are replaceable. Once any of them is gone the show is dead.
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I was saying back after season 2. Now? You are correct.


In other news, the cast now wants $500,000 per episode in the next seasons.
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