Brooklyn Nine-Nine Might Do a #MeToo Episode After Moving to NBC

Celebrities

Brooklyn Nine-Nine might have been resuscitated by NBC after its cancellation by Fox in May, but dont expect any major changes when the show returns early next year. Season 6 will be “more of the same—and better,” executive producer Dan Goor promised at the Television Critics Associations summer press tour on Wednesday. “The mandate from NBC all along was, We know this show, we love this show . . . Please keep making the same show.”

That means Brooklyn Nine-Nine will continue to come up with “more topical, issue-oriented episodes,” Goor said, though he admitted that “theyre really, really hard to do. We want them to feel funny but also give weight to the issue and explore it in a fair way.”

One of the topics the crew is hoping to touch on next season is, not surprisingly, #MeToo. One of the shows stars, Terry Crews, has been very vocal about his own experience of being sexually assaulted, even testifying in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee that WME talent agent Adam Venit groped him during a party. (Venit issued a denial, calling the groping “horseplay.”) Crews also made a P.S.A. about the topic with Samantha Bee.

“I like to call it the summer of freedom,” Crews said of his #MeToo reckoning during the press tour. “We can now tell our truth.”

He attributed some of his candor to his experience on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. “Feeling safe and having friends and family on [the show], I felt secure enough I could tell my truth and still go to work,” he said. Crews added that he told his castmates about the incident the day before he went public with it on Twitter. Those colleagues “gave me the strength, along with all of the women who came forward in the #MeToo movement.”

Crews said, “I feel like this is just the beginning . . . the town will be safer for my wife, my son, and my daughter.” He also noted that Brooklyn Nine-Nine itself had taken on serious issues in previous episodes like Season 4s “Moo Moo,” which “confronted a lot of incidents regarding race and the police.”

“These guys just have a gift for translating a serious subject matter in a comedic way,” his castmate Andre Braugher pointed out. Braugher reeled off more examples, like the episode about an active shooter, and the one in which bisexual cop Rosa (played by Stephanie Beatriz) comes out to her parents. “These are all episodes that have a dramatic depth to them,” he said.

Goor said that the writers “are actively talking” about doing a #MeToo story line, but Brooklyn Nine-Nine star and producer Andy Samberg cautioned that it may be a while before such a story line appears on air. Samberg noted that the “Moo Moo” episode “took a long time to be written in a way where everyone agreed this was the way the show should do this.” The writers plan to tread just as carefully when it comes to this sensitive topic. “Were not going to do it,” he said, “unless . . . its the right take.”

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Brooklyn Nine-Nine Might Do a #MeToo Episode After Moving to NBC

Celebrities

Brooklyn Nine-Nine might have been resuscitated by NBC after its cancellation by Fox in May, but dont expect any major changes when the show returns early next year. Season 6 will be “more of the same—and better,” executive producer Dan Goor promised at the Television Critics Associations summer press tour on Wednesday. “The mandate from NBC all along was, We know this show, we love this show . . . Please keep making the same show.”

That means Brooklyn Nine-Nine will continue to come up with “more topical, issue-oriented episodes,” Goor said, though he admitted that “theyre really, really hard to do. We want them to feel funny but also give weight to the issue and explore it in a fair way.”

One of the topics the crew is hoping to touch on next season is, not surprisingly, #MeToo. One of the shows stars, Terry Crews, has been very vocal about his own experience of being sexually assaulted, even testifying in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee that WME talent agent Adam Venit groped him during a party. (Venit issued a denial, calling the groping “horseplay.”) Crews also made a P.S.A. about the topic with Samantha Bee.

“I like to call it the summer of freedom,” Crews said of his #MeToo reckoning during the press tour. “We can now tell our truth.”

He attributed some of his candor to his experience on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. “Feeling safe and having friends and family on [the show], I felt secure enough I could tell my truth and still go to work,” he said. Crews added that he told his castmates about the incident the day before he went public with it on Twitter. Those colleagues “gave me the strength, along with all of the women who came forward in the #MeToo movement.”

Crews said, “I feel like this is just the beginning . . . the town will be safer for my wife, my son, and my daughter.” He also noted that Brooklyn Nine-Nine itself had taken on serious issues in previous episodes like Season 4s “Moo Moo,” which “confronted a lot of incidents regarding race and the police.”

“These guys just have a gift for translating a serious subject matter in a comedic way,” his castmate Andre Braugher pointed out. Braugher reeled off more examples, like the episode about an active shooter, and the one in which bisexual cop Rosa (played by Stephanie Beatriz) comes out to her parents. “These are all episodes that have a dramatic depth to them,” he said.

Goor said that the writers “are actively talking” about doing a #MeToo story line, but Brooklyn Nine-Nine star and producer Andy Samberg cautioned that it may be a while before such a story line appears on air. Samberg noted that the “Moo Moo” episode “took a long time to be written in a way where everyone agreed this was the way the show should do this.” The writers plan to tread just as carefully when it comes to this sensitive topic. “Were not going to do it,” he said, “unless . . . its the right take.”

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