The Munsters is a 1960s American television sitcom depicting the home life of a family of monsters. The show was a satire of both traditional monster movies and popular family entertainment of the era, such as Leave It to Beaver. It ran concurrently with the The Addams Family. Although the Addamses were well-to-do, the Munsters were a more blue-collar family. The Munsters also had higher Nielsen ratings than The Addams Family.

The idea of a family of funny monsters was first suggested to Universal Studios in the late 1940s by animator Bob Clampett, who wanted to do a series of cartoons. He never got a reply.

In the early 1960s, a treatment or 'format' for a similar idea was submitted to Universal Studios by Rocky & Bullwinkle writers, Allan Burns and Chris Hayward. This format was later handed to writers Norm Liebman and Ed Haas who wrote a pilot script Love Thy Monster. For some time, there were executives who believed the series should be made as a cartoon and others who wanted to see it made using live action. Finally, a presentation was filmed by MCA Television for CBS, using live action.