THE GOOD PLACE at TCA: Live-Blog
August 8, 2019 by Marisa Roffman
With THE GOOD PLACE signing off at the end of season 4, the cast and creator Michael Schur are talking to TCA to talk about what’s to come.
Follow along for what they have to say…
12:13 PM: We’re starting off with the first scene of THE GOOD PLACE season 4 premiere.
12:15 PM: Kristen Bell found out the show was ending by a call from Schur. She made him promise he would write another show for her, and he agreed.
“I think we were all a little surprised and full of respect,” Ted Danson says. “I’m grateful it ended with as much integrity as it started.”
12:17 PM: “Jason has a very goldfish memory,” Manny Jacinto says of why he can be trusted that about the Chidi secret. “For the most part, I think he’s growing and learning.”
12:18 PM: “From the moment I pitched the show…baked into it was we’re going to move really fast,” Schur says. He likens it to BREAKING BAD, which was on for a long time, but really only had 60-ish episodes. He knew THE GOOD PLACE would be better as a shorter episode run. And he also knew that in order to have big moves and stick to them, it needed to be shorter seasons. “I’m very grateful to both the studio and network that every time I pitched an aspect of the show that was [out there] they rolled with it every time.”
12:20 PM: What are they going to take from the experience? “The cash,” William Jackson Harper jokes. But, seriously, he notes that Danson and Bell set the tone for them.
“This was my first-ever audition,” Jameela Jamil says. “I got to learn from the most talented people I’ve ever met.” She also jokes she doesn’t want to ever make a show without Schur, so she might be retiring.
“We got the best possible leader,” D’Arcy Carden says, as Bell starts to cry. (She tried to use her dress as a tissue, but got a tissue.)
Jacinto jokes he questions how useful of a human is after working with this team. “Everyone is the best,” Carden adds.
“I can’t count the times Ted has literally skipped around the set of THE GOOD PLACE, saying, ‘Aren’t we so lucky to be doing this?” Jamil says.
12:26 PM: “I pitched this show as an investigation of what it’s like to be a good person…that’s an even more complicated question than I thought it was,” Schur says. “I don’t know, at the end of the day, that objective kind of shifted a little. What we found as we discussed it, wrote it, and executed it, is some very smart people…have had a lot of different opinions about that question. So then the mission of the show became to give you a lot of options.”
“I would describe this as a show that says we have to try harder than we are,” he adds. “And as long as you’re trying, you’re on the right path.”
12:28 PM: Who is most likely to make them crack? Jacinto, they all agree. “Our blooper reel for season 4 is ten minutes long, and three and a half minutes is one line Manny delivered,” Schur says. Jamil points out the read made Danson cried.
12:31 PM: Episodes they loved? Bell says them going back down to Earth and being the Soul Squad. Jamil points to the season 1 finale.
12:32 PM: “I think the idea, frankly, that networks don’t make challenging TV shows is a disappearing notion,” Schur says. “When I was conceiving of this show, I was, like, I don’t know if NBC would do a show like this.” He points to Fox’s LAST MAN ON EARTH, which was also a big risk, as an inspiration for what can go on network: “If Fox can make a show like this, I can make this show.”
The biggest difference between network and streaming, is run time. He pitched the whole first season to NBC and didn’t flinch. (Though he admits having Bell and Danson on-board helped.)
12:34 PM: Favorite Janet? Jamil says the Janet fans will meet in season 4.
12:36 PM: Did they know from the start the system wouldn’t work? “It’s incredibly problematic” to view everything as points, Schur says. He jokes he realized he created a religion, albeit a terrible one.
12:38 PM: What is Bell’s diva side? Danson says if you get in the way of her putting her kids to bed because you’re late or don’t know your lines “she turns.”
12:40 PM: Post-season 1, the cast often wondered where it was going to go next. They were always invited to go into the writers’ room—”it was incredibly empowering to work in that kind of community,” Bell says—and writers would often come to set and tell them hints of what was to come.
“Our focus when we drive through the gates is to live up to the material…please don’t let me mess this amazing thing up,” Danson says.
12:42 PM: “Usually, you’re informed by a network that the show is over,” Danson says. “This time we all got to be a part of…going here, here’s the gift of this show.” (He got emotional with that.)
12:43 PM: “I’ve tried to avoid fan theories, partially because I’m afraid someone would come up with a better ending,” Schur says of fan theories. But he mentions a fan on Reddit guessed the season 1 twist very early.
12:45 PM: “We, especially whenever we’re seen together, we get a lot of love from a lot of the fans and families,” Jacinto says. “Hopefully people keep watching.”
THE GOOD PLACE, Season Premiere, Thursday, September 26, 9/8c, NBC
RELATED:
- D’Arcy Carden on Saying a Prolonged ‘Bittersweet’ Farewell to THE GOOD PLACE
- Watch THE GOOD PLACE Season 3 Blooper Reel!
- THE GOOD PLACE Season 3 Finale: ‘Pandemonium’ Photos
- THE GOOD PLACE: ‘Chidi See the Time-Knife’ Photos
- THE GOOD PLACE: ‘The Book of Dougs’ Photos
- THE GOOD PLACE: D’Arcy Carden on Kicking Butt as Janet
- THE GOOD PLACE’s Michael Schur and D’Arcy Carden on the Ambitious Reveals in ‘Janet(s)’
- NBC Renews THE GOOD PLACE
- THE GOOD PLACE’s D’Arcy Carden: ‘Nothing Could Prepare Us’ For the Final Episodes of Season 3
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