All language subtitles for The.Good.Place.S04E00.The Paley Center Salutes the Good Place.TBS

- Synced & corrected by MementMori -
-- www.addic7ed.com --

- Hi. I'm Ted Danson.
- And I'm Kristen Bell.

And tonight, we are on the
set of "The Good Place"

to share some of the
unforgettable times we had

while making this show.

I'm embarrassed to tell you I've
just seen three store names

that I hadn't seen before.
The Italian restaurant.

"Lasagne Come Out Tomorrow"?

- Yeah.
- It's a good one. It's a good one.

This one's great.
"Dr. Carl Emerson DDDS.

Dental Services. Just Kidding! Puppies!"

There are so many good jokes hidden

even in the set deck here.

I've loved working on
this show with you.

- Me too.
- I think...

- Me too.
- Me too!

When we started, I had
confidence it would be good

and that I would enjoy your company,

but I don't think I anticipated

how proud we'd be to tell this story

and how much of a
family we would become.

Yeah, yeah. I agree.

I feel like we're having a conversation

that's really important nowadays.

It's about decency.

It's about the consequences
to your actions,

and yet instead of
tasting like medicine,

they sprinkle it with
9-year-old fart humor

and lots of visual magic.

- Yeah.
- It's really special.

It's special. It's special.

And as we get ready for our
fourth and final season,

we hope you enjoy the
behind-the-scenes stories

and some of our favorite clips
from the first three seasons.

Welcome to The Good Place.

Everything's fine.

B mark.

With the fourth and final season

of "The Good Place" on the way,

it's time to celebrate the
critically acclaimed series.

How do you pump your fists again?

- Is this it?
- So let's go back to the beginning...

They were looking for an overly tall,

annoying Pakistani Englishwoman,
which is basically me.

... share some of the
secrets from set...

Barely any work happens here.

Cobblestones suck!

It's mostly just snacking and playing.

- ... make a few immature jokes...
- Ball test!

- Yes!
- This is my bud hole.

It's just like a hole where
me and my buds can hang out.

... and explain once and for all
what happens in the afterlife.

Whoo!

Welcome to "The Paley Center
Salutes 'The Good Place.'"

_

You, Eleanor Shellstrop, are dead.

Your life on Earth has
ended, and you are now

in the next phase of your
existence in the universe.

Cool. Cool. I have some questions.

I love all the questions the show poses.

I love just being able
to ask those questions.

How do we all share Earth?

How are we supposed to live
together? Are there rules?

Are there always consequences
to your actions or not?

During your time on Earth,
every one of your actions

had a positive or a negative value

depending on how much good or bad

that action put into the universe.

Every sandwich you ate,

every time you bought a magazine,

every single thing you did

had an effect that rippled out over time

and ultimately created some
amount of good or bad.

Only the people with the
very highest scores,

the true cream of the crop,

get to come here, to The Good Place.

What happens to everyone else, you ask?

Don't worry about it.

It's designed so that everything

they could possibly want is right there,

and they're all perfectly
matched soul mates

so that everybody, when they
come there, has a soul mate.

Come on in!

Eleanor, I'm Chidi Anagonye,

and you are my soul mate.

Cool! Bring it in, man!

Chidi, the ethics professor

who his entire life has
tried to do the right thing

and find the right answer
to literally everything,

upon meeting his soul mate,

she confesses that she's really
not supposed to be there.

Somebody royally forked up.

Somebody forked up.

Why can't I say "fork"?

If you're trying to
curse, you can't here.

I guess a lot of people in this
neighborhood don't like it,

- so it's prohibited.
- That's bull-shirt.

There is no profanity in The Good Place,

which I have my own
personal issues with,

but people in The Good Place

don't want to be offended. I get it.

Things only started getting crazy

after I was an ash-hole
to everyone at the party.

Ugh! You know I'm trying
to say "ash-hole"

and not "ash-hole," right?

I really passionately love
cursing, 'cause I'm English,

and so to have found a way to curse

so prolifically on NBC prime
time is so thrilling.

And, also, it's allowed the
show to then be something

that can be watched by the whole family.

Where the fork are we?

Fork.

Shirt. Ash-hole.

Holy forking shirt balls.

We're in The Good Place.

_

When I was trying to think
about what the afterlife,

what "heaven" would actually mean,

one of the things that you would want

is to be able to answer any question

you could ever have about
anything that's ever happened.

- Hey, Janet?
- Hi, there!

- Ah!
- How can I help you?

What the fork?! Who are you?

I'm Janet.

I'm the informational assistant
here in The Good Place.

She's like this walking database.

You can ask her about the creation

of the universe or history or...

Oh, there was a guy who lived

in Avondale, Arizona, around 2002.

His name was Kevin Paltonic. Is he gay?

- No.
- Really? Huh.

I guess he just didn't
want to have sex with me.

- That's correct.
- Well, that's fine.

- I wasn't that into him anyway.
- Yes, you were.

Before they had fully
written the script,

they were thinking that Janet
would just be like an...

almost like a kiosk or,
like, an ATM or a computer,

but then they thought
it might be more fun

to have an actual human attached to it.

And to Janet, the best robot.

- Not a robot.
- Girl.

- Not a girl.
- And straight-up hottie.

I am attractive, yes.

_

The four humans all died
in very different ways

and largely in ways

that sort of, in a comedic
way, reflect who they were.

Tahani, for example, died when
she was so jealous of her sister

being inducted into the
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

that she snuck into the
party the night before,

had a fight with her sister,

threw a rope around a giant
golden statue of her sister

to try to yank it over,

and it fell over and crushed her.

Aah!

She died crushed by a giant
golden statue of her sister,

who she lived in the shadow of

and felt jealous of her whole life,

and it kind of dictated her personality

and is the driving force

behind what made her
so forking annoying.

Chidi on Earth was incredibly smart,

incredibly indecisive.

Thirty minutes, Chidi?!

What's the harm in taking
a few extra minutes

to find the perfect...

Chidi?

The air conditioner comes down
and whacks him in the head,

and that's a wrap.

So, apparently Jason died, you know,

in the most normal way possible.

He locked himself inside a safe

because he wanted to rob
a Mexican restaurant.

What if it doesn't work?

Hey, we thought of everything

except for an alibi and an escape route,

but we'll figure it out as we go.

We don't want to overthink these things.

You can call him basically
a criminal but a lovable

and, you know, I think,
an innocent criminal.

Jason's dead. He
suffocated in that safe.

There were no air holes.

Plus, he did a bunch of whippets

while he was in there, which
couldn't have helped.

At least he died doing what he loved...

a bunch of whippets.

Those were the three deaths that
we conceived of after the pilot,

and they all were obviously
very specifically designed

to reflect the life that each
of those three people led.

Eleanor's death is a
little less metaphorical.

How did I die? I-I don't remember.

The day Eleanor died, she
was at the grocery store

buying herself a bottle
of Lonely Gal Tequila,

her favorite drink,

and a do-gooder in the
parking lot made her angry.

Hi, there! You have a second
to talk about the environment?

No. Buzz off, whale humper.

And the bottle slipped out of her hand.

She reached down to pick it up.

Look what you made me do, jagoff.

Oh, my God. Look out!

Uh-oh.

A group of shopping
carts knocked her over.

- That's how I died.
- No. Sorry. There's more.

You were able to grab onto the front

of the column of shopping carts,

but it swept you right
out into the street

where you were struck and killed
by a mobile billboard truck

advertising an erectile-dysfunction pill

called Engorgilate.

Funnily enough, the first EMT to arrive

was an ex-boyfriend of yours.

Okay, that's... I get it. Thank you.

Okay.

Coming up...

Edward Bridge Danson,

you can't tell everyone the plot twist!

All of us felt genuinely a
need to reevaluate our lives

from what happens at the
very end of the series.

Fore!

... when "The Paley Center Salutes
'The Good Place'" returns.

This is the almighty judge
on high of all beings

living and dead for all eternity.

My name's Shawn. I'm a naughty bitch.

Who taught you how to
turn a human inside out

by reaching down their throat
and grabbing their butt

- from the inside?
- You did.

Just in the middle of
torturing William Shakespeare

by describing the plot to
the "Entourage" movie.

Eat butt, you ding-dongs.

Welcome to The Good Place.

I'm Marc Evan Jackson. I play Shawn.

Why don't we take a
look behind the scenes

at some stuff people rarely get to see?

This is Kirston Mann,

the costume designer
for "The Good Place."

- Hello.
- Hello.

- Where are we right now?
- We're in our costume trailer.

In season three, we saw Kristen

wearing a lot of stripy
things as Eleanor.

Were those symbolic?

Kristen did wear a lot of kind
of rainbow-type clothing,

but it's also collegiate.

Season three really is about
her being back in school,

and I know that you're hoping that I say

- it's a stripe for each character.
- I don't need you to say that.

- But I'm going to say it.
- I know it's true.

It's a stripe for each character.

- What's in this sacred...
- What?!

This is the magical bow
tie that started it all.

When we were in Ted's first fitting,

we had this bow tie,
and once we put it on,

we knew exactly where we were
going with his character.

In the afterlife, there's a Good Place,

and there's a Bad Place.

You're in The Good Place.

It's made of peacock
feathers, which we felt like

was sort of heavenly and beautiful.

And it turned out all to be a lie.

Well, thank you so much.

- Thank you so much.
- This has been delightful.

- I adore you.
- I adore you.

Cut!

_

When I first had the idea,

I thought, "Well, this
is not an easy sell."

Dead people who read moral
philosophy isn't a good pitch

for a network TV show,
so I sort of felt like

I owed it to the studio and the network

to really understand what
I was about to embark on.

We have to start somewhere.

- So how about Socrates?
- All right.

All right. Let me just get
into the mind-set of a human.

Ohh!

Ohh. I'm a human!

And my breathing tube is
next to my eating tube!

Oh, and look! My arms end
in stupid little sticks!

Okay. Proceed.

So, before I pitched it to
anyone at NBC or Universal,

I knew what the entire
season, first season, was,

and I think that really helped
in terms of having them

understand the idea and get on board.

The other thing that
really helped was getting

Ted Danson and Kristen Bell to sign on

because once you have Ted Danson
and Kristen Bell in your show,

you can do whatever you want.

Thank you for being a friend.
You're a pal and a confidant.

After you watched "Friends,"
did you also watch

- "Golden Girls"?
- Yes, I did!

They love cheesecake, and one
of them loves intercourse.

I went into his office,
sat down for a...

what was supposed to
be a one-hour meeting,

and we must have talked
for almost three hours.

Every bit of my being wanted to say yes.

And Ted was just icing on the cake.

I know it sounds crazy,
but if it weren't crazy,

they wouldn't call it a leap of faith!

They would call it... a sit of doubting.

So, I met Mike on another project,

and then it didn't really work out.

I asked him if he had anything else,

and about a week later,

he came in and pitched "The Good Place."

And I knew that Kristen
Bell was interested,

so literally off of
that one-hour meeting,

never saw a script, I said yes.

- We're in.
- We're... All right. You go.

- We're in!
- We're in!

- We're just so excited!
- We're in.

It was a weird audition process

because this show was so secretive.

I didn't really know who was
going to be a part of it

or who was going to star in it,
which is probably a good thing

because that would have probably
put a lot more pressure.

The audition piece that we
had, it was a fake piece.

It wasn't about "The Good Place."

Mine was about a hotline operator

for broken dolls.

We recommend that you give

the one-eyed doll to your daughter

and use it to teach her
an important lesson

about tolerance and superficial beauty.

- Nope, that's insane.
- Okay.

Eleanor, I swear I am your friend,

and I will never cause you any harm.

You can hear Mike just giggling

in the background
throughout these auditions,

but you never really know
until you get on set

and you start shooting and
actually see the result, right?

You just don't really know.

They were looking for an overly tall,

annoying Pakistani Englishwoman,
which is basically me.

We've decided to have a
silly-hat competition,

so whoever makes the
silliest hat wins a prize,

but the prize is an even sillier hat!

I didn't have any acting experience,

so it felt really ridiculous
to come to the king of comedy

and act in front of him.

I can't imagine anything
more mortifying.

But I was told I had to go,
and so I went, and I thought,

"Well, at least I get to meet
Mike Schur, one of my heroes."

Something has come to my attention,

and I have to accuse you
with an accusation,

but you know I wouldn't
do that unless I was,

like, 150% sure that I had to.

There's a line in the
scene where Jason says,

"Do you think this is a good idea?"

And the other character off-camera says,

"Yes, of course I do,"
and Manny's response is,

"Then why you got to talk bad about it?"

And all of the guys we saw,
who were all funny and good,

said it the way that we'd sort
of imagined you would say it,

and when Manny did that scene,

Manny, like, started
crying a little bit.

I have yet to see it.

Are we going to air that in
this, like, special thing?

Hopefully I get to see it if we ever do.

I love "Double Trouble."

You know that. I've always
said it was genius.

Then why you got to talk bad about it?

When you see Manny Jacinto do it

and he has that sort of vulnerability

and that sweetness to him,

he taught me what my own character was.

We essentially cast him
from that one line.

Jason Mendoza.

A failed deejay from
Jacksonville, Florida.

I wasn't a failed deejay.
I was pre-successful.

Hopefully none of you is claustrophobic.

Claustrophobic?

Who would ever be scared of Santa Claus?

Oh, the Jewish.

You from Florida?

- Jacksonville.
- Yeah.

Fore!

Well done!

_

I knew it was going to
be something special

from the first shot, quite honestly.

The first thing we shot was Ted Danson

introducing Eleanor and
Chidi to Tahani and Jianyu.

I got to walk on with Ted Danson,

and that was so intimidating.

That's my first time
ever properly acting.

Ted was wonderful. He kept on,

I think, pretending to fart
on me just to relax me

'cause he could tell that
I was very in awe of him.

The second they all walked
out in their costumes

and we saw Ted Danson
introduce everyone,

I thought, "Look, there's our family."

Eleanor, Chidi, I would like
you to meet Tahani and Jianyu.

They are soul mates and
your next-door neighbors.

I felt chills go up the back of my neck.

Like, I just knew. I knew
we had something special.

This is a really special group.

I think that we're all spoiled rotten.

Truly, barely any work happens here.

- Oh, my God.
- I mean, barely any work.

It's mostly just snacking and playing.

I've come to work for
four years with people

that I genuinely love and
want to hang out with.

Yeah, we can't be bought!

- ... just barely giving yourself the...
- Yes.

Today, on the set, I was
playing Bad Michael,

and they said,

"Please pronounce 'Eleanor'
the way you do in real life,

which is 'El-a-nur.'"

And I went, "Wait. What?"

The entire three seasons,

I've been mispronouncing "Eleanor"

by calling her "El-a-nur."

Eleanor. Eleanor. Eleanor.

I was trying something,
Eleanor. Give me a break.

- Coming up...
- Hollywood, baby.

You know me. Janet!

Everyone was behaving very strangely.

Yeah, I just wasn't sure
what we were going to hear.

Ohh!

... when "The Paley Center Salutes
'The Good Place'" returns.

_

Mike told the twist to
obviously the writers

and Kristen Bell and myself.

Probably, that was it.

I'm a very good secret keeper.
I didn't tell anyone.

I didn't even tell my husband.

I had a real ironically moral dilemma

about whether I should tell
the other four actors.

It is so easy to live with a lie!

I once pretended to have a
terminal illness to meet

Scott Wolf at a Sunglass Hut.

A victimless crime.

"If they didn't know about the twist,"

I reasoned, "They would give a
completely honest performance."

I was playing the secret.

I had to be Michael, who was supposedly

running The Good Place and
was a bit high-strung

because everything was falling apart,

and he wanted to make everything perfect

for his humans that he loved so much.

It's my duty to be calm and in control,

- and I'm falling apart.
- No!

Michael, you are a paragon of fortitude.

You're a mountain of strength.

I'm not a mountain of strength.

I'm a canyon.

Full of poo-poo.

I was a demon torturing them,
but that couldn't come out

until the, you know, end
of season one, so...

How well did you keep that secret, Ted?

Uh, I'll get to that.

- Okay.
- I'll get to that.

Not well, to answer her question.

I was hearing from mutual friends,

"Heard about the show
you and Ted are doing.

Such a cool twist at the end."

And I was like, "Edward Bridge Danson,

you can't tell everyone the plot twist."

But he's chatty. What can you do?

I can't keep a secret,
is basically the truth.

Holy mother-forking shirt balls.

What?

Wow!

Will and Manny and Jameela and I,

the babies, we didn't know the twist,

and Mike wanted to kind of keep
it a secret from everybody.

It was a tough call, but I
decided not to tell them.

I'm very glad I didn't because
when we actually did tell them,

it was really fun.

I think it was after a table read.

He asked the four of us
to join him in a room,

which was a little intimidating.

I think we were all sort of concerned

that maybe we were getting the
news that the show was over.

Yeah, I just wasn't sure
what we were going to hear.

So I thought we were going to
get some sort of promotion

or something, but, no,
that wasn't the case.

Everyone was behaving very strangely,

and we hadn't been given any information

about what was happening,
and then we walked in,

and Kristen pulled up her mobile
phone and started filming us,

and she had this really
devious grin on her face,

and it was terrifying,

and Mike then broke down to us
how the show was going to end.

"They're never going to call a train

to send us to The Bad Place.

They can't. Because we're already here.

This is The Bad Place."

Oh!

Once we found out, it was, like,

mind-blowing for all of us.

We're not stupid people,

but we never saw that ending coming,

and to be honest, nor did anyone else.

I think there was one person
on Reddit who figured it out

in the whole world, but no one else,

and I think that's really cool.

And then it hit me.

They're never going to call a train

to take us to The Bad Place.

They can't.

Because we're already here.

A lot of people didn't
know, until the very...

they got that last script,
what was going to happen,

and even then, we didn't really
know until we were on set,

and Ted Danson does that laugh.

This is The Bad Place.

Oh, man!

I can't believe you figured it out.

Oh, gah!

You ruined everything. You know that?

_

I did teach Ted Danson how to floss.

He needed to know for an episode,

and he was trying his hardest
to do it on his own,

but he couldn't help but
thrust his hips forward

in a very provocative manner,
and I had to, like, you know,

sort of make it a little
bit more G-rated for him,

and he would just, you
know, lateral movement,

just sort of, like, guide
him into that and...

Coming up...

Don't put me behind a bar, please.

I ate stage blood and some foam.

Some of the parts of the fake
people flew into my mouth!

... when "The Paley Center Salutes
'The Good Place'" returns.

Why don't we take a look at some things

that most people don't get to see?

Each and every morning, we start
in the hair and makeup trailer.

- Oh, look, it's D'Arcy Carden...
- Oh, hello!

- ... in the makeup trailer.
- Marc Evan Jackson.

- How are you?
- My, my, my.

- My, my, my. Hi.
- Hi.

Let's talk about the hair and
makeup trailer a little bit.

It's probably the first place
that you'll meet a guest star.

It's the first place I met you.

- It's about friendship.
- True.

It's about running your lines,
getting ready for the day,

preparing as an actor.

Hearing any hot gossip from yesterday...

Gossip, oh. And the day before.

It's hair and makeup that are the ones,

makeup specifically, that
will come to you and say,

"You have a booger in your nose,
and we can see it on camera.

I'm going to use this Q-tip
to get it from you."

- Never happened to me.
- Never happened to me!

- But it is...
- I've read about it.

One time, Autumn, our makeup,
she put a mask on me, like,

a nice cleansing mask, and it was white,

and she... and there was...

When we walked out of the trailer,

there just happened to be
the entire studio audience

of "Family Feud" out there,
just in line, waiting to go in.

- Because Hollywood is weird.
- Right. Hollywood is weird.

- You drove home in a mask?
- Yeah.

- What if you got pulled over?
- I would just be like,

"Hollywood, baby. You know me. Janet!"

What takes longer? Becoming
Janet or becoming Bad Janet?

- Oh, that's a great question.
- Thank you.

Becoming Bad Janet takes longer.

Bad Janet, uh, where
is the nearest café?

Oh, um, that's a good question.

It's up your mom's butt, you fat dink.

The hair and makeup
trailer is very special,

a big part of being an actor
in television or movies.

And thank you for visiting.

- Thank you, D'Arcy.
- Thank you, Marc.

And now there's nothing you don't know

about hair and makeup.

_

Sounds like you had a pretty crazy year.

- Hmm.
- Want to talk about it?

When I did "Cheers," it took me a while

to be comfortable playing that part.

You know, never hang out in bars.

If a woman kissed me, we got married.

You know, I was that guy.

That is the plot to the
movie "Kangaroo Jack."

- Why did I tell you that?
- It's unclear.

So going back, standing behind
a bar, is my nightmare.

It was like... I was all
thumbs and sweaty and nervous.

And don't put me behind a bar, please.

- What do I owe ya?
- The real question, Eleanor,

is, what do we owe to each other?

What? Did I sell you a drink?

Am I a bartender?

Drinks are on me.

_

If you're doing a TV show
about moral philosophy,

it's kind of like you got
to go all-in, right?

Who died and left Aristotle
in charge of ethics?

Plato.

As far as philosophy and ethics,

the writers usually call
me into the writers' room

and just say, like, "Tell
us everything you know,"

and I teach them all about it.

I will try to help you.

I am going to need some
time to read every book

ever written about human psychotherapy.

And now I've done that, so let's begin.

Okay. So I haven't
read any of the books,

or I don't really know who
all the philosophers are.

I did try to read one
book, and it was hard.

This is the Mike Schur part that I love.

They have, like, three ethics
professors on speed dial.

I am here to learn about ethnics.

Well, Mike Schur had
specifically asked me

to come and speak to them
about the trolley problem

that intuitively makes people realize

that their own moral sense or intuitions

are in conflict with one another.

We are going to tackle

one of the most famous ethical dilemmas:

the trolley problem.

Is this a game?!
I go first! I call blue!

There's no... No. This is... No.

This is a thought
experiment first introduced

by British philosopher
Philippa Foot in 1967.

You're on a trolley.

You're headed for a group
of, say, five people.

If you can pull the lever,
you only hit one person.

I'm trying to explain this to the class.

Michael thinks it would be funny

to actually make it
very real and visceral.

Maybe there's a more concrete approach.

Here. Let's try this.

Oh, God! Michael, what did you do?!

I made the trolley problem real

so we could see how the ethics
would actually play out!

There are five workers on this
track and one over there.

Here are the levers to switch
the tracks. Make a choice.

The thing is, I mean,
ethically speaking...

No time, dude! Make a decision!

Well, it's tricky! I mean,
on the one hand,

if you ascribe to a purely
utilitarian world, you...

Okay. So... what did we learn?

To shoot this, we had a trolley,

and it was attached to a truck

upon which was mounted a blood cannon.

Wait! Ohh! Oh, my God!

The blood came out of the
cannon with such velocity

that I ate stage blood and some foam.

It's just a simulation.

I would never make you kill real people.

Oh, well, that's reassuring
because some of the parts

of the fake people flew into my mouth!

I think that these ideas
from philosophy give us

a very clear, very academic,
very quantifiable backbone

on which to sort of base our
comedy and our arguments.

The basis of this whole
show is this points system,

and eventually, in season
three, it's revealed,

like, it's screwed up
in a very specific way.

Life now is so complicated.

It's impossible for anyone to be
good enough for The Good Place.

Your big revelation is
"Life is complicated"?

That's not a revelation.

That's a divorced woman's throw pillow.

What else you got?

_

It had so many guest stars
who were so phenomenal.

Like, we had Stephen Merchant,

who, in England,
is our national treasure.

Gotta run. We're having a little thing

in the break room for
Marisol's birthday.

She's turning 39 million. Again.

Don't think I've ever
been creepier with anyone

than I was with Maya Rudolph.
Just followed her around set

just trying to absorb her genius.

Your Honor, please hear our case.

You frankly wouldn't believe

what we've been through
just to be here today.

I mean, I would because

I just learned everything
about you, but keep talking.

I am, like, obsessed with your accent.

We have made so much progress,

and all we ask is an audience
with you to prove it.

- Say "aluminum."
- Aluminium.

"Nium"! I love that!

Every single take of hers
is different and unique.

- Idiot says "what."
- What?

Idiot says "hmm."

Hmm?

You heard me. Did I st-st-stutter?

You stuttered the second time, yeah.

The guest stars are amazing.

Mike really chose people who had
chemistry on and off-screen.

We got to get back for "The Bachelor."

I'm going to be pissed if
I miss the rose ceremony.

And what's the significance
of the key chain?

Nothing. I just like frogs.
I'm a frog guy.

Hi, snail. I don't name them in case

they already have a name they prefer.

- Huh.
- Ah! Good-bob!

I hope we same place again very now.

- His brain is wrong.
- Ha-ha!

- Coming up...
- The visual effects

on this show is, like,
a huge part of the world.

It really was like on the show.

It devastated me.

It's devastating. You're
devastated right now.

... when "The Paley Center Salutes
'The Good Place'" returns.

_

One of the writers on the show,

the genius Jen Statsky, who
also is one of my best friends,

we went to a Beyoncé concert.

It was during the writing
process of season one,

and we were enjoying ourselves,

and so was everybody else in the stadium

except for the one guy next to us,

who was really not having a good time,

and we sort of gently said, "You know,

if you're not enjoying yourself,
you should just, like, go.

Just go." And he looked at me,
and he really took me in.

He looked me up and down and
just went, "You're basic."

And it really was like on the show.

It devastated me.

Face it, dude! I'm the best thing
that ever happened to you.

Because guess what, Chidi. Ya basic!

- Eleanor.
- Yeah, I know.

You want to do that thing where
we're arguing and fighting,

but then suddenly it's
like, "Whoa, this is hot,"

and we start making out.

Dream on! Or whatever.
Fine. Let's just do it.

Eleanor likes to get to
the point real quick.

She likes to cut to the chase,

and she likes to cut hard and deep.

And "ya basic" just
sums up Eleanor's way

of saying, "I'm better than you,"

which is a feeling that she has
to hang onto in order to survive

before she starts to evolve as a person.

I am not basic. Ya basic!

No, Mom. Ya basic.

Luckily, we had the last laugh,

and Jen put it in the show,
and now it's a thing

that has been said many times
on this show, which I love.

In the words of one of my
actual friends, ya basic.

It's a human insult. It's devastating.

You're devastated right now.

_

The visual effects on the show is,
like, a huge part of the world.

The world itself is magical.

- Anything can happen.
- Whoo!

And so you need to actually
have that represented.

We hired this guy named David Niednagel,

who has been our sort
of in-house effects guy

supervisor designer everything.

The first episode was very difficult

because you didn't know what it
was supposed to be, you know?

Like, you're just kind of handed
a script, and you didn't know

what the whole vibe of
the whole show was.

Pretty much everything was very bizarre.

You had flying shrimp and a giant frog

eating shrimp out of the sky.

And a giant ladybug cruising
through the neighborhood,

and people were jumping out of the way.

Kicking a puppy into the sun.

There were so many weird,
bizarre things that,

after doing the pilot, it
became very obvious, like,

"Oh, this is what 'The Good Place' is."

For every episode, we'd try
to put things into the plot

that could not be in any other show,

whether that's a giant ladybug or, like,

a sinkhole opening up magically
in the middle of dinner.

We wanted to, like, fully take advantage

of everything the world
we'd set it in offered.

Nuts. Thank you. Oh!

David Niednagel is our guy
who is a one-man band.

He literally does 95% of
everything that we shoot,

and he practices at home.

You'll have to get him to show...

Oh, I hope you can include it.

His kids are his, like, you know,

stand-ins for the real thing.

He'll show us the renderings
of the visual-effects moments,

and his kids will be
doing it, and it's...

They're... And they're adorable.

So he always comes in and
says to the actors and says,

"Here's what it's going to look like.

I know you're just going to
open your mouth right now

and pretend pennies are coming out,

but this is what it'll look like."

It's just astounding.

Ahh...

I think this show is
pretty demanding for me,

and so it's nice that I
can kind of combine that

with my family life and
just have my kids,

you know, helping me out,

and it's something that I think
we'll look back at for years,

and it's nice to see the
clip of what we did,

you know, as a family next
to what was on the show.

All right. Good.

My favorite joke in the visual effects?

I really like the lava monster.

We're goin' streaking!

Aaah!

It wasn't planned in the script.
We kind of showed up,

and Mike and Drew Goddard,

they're like, "Hey, we got an idea.

We want this lava monster to come in."

And I'm like, "All right. Well,
that's a little bit bigger

than what we were planning,
but we'll see what we can do."

- Got a light?
- Uh, yeah, obviously, I have a light.

You know, you guys aren't
supposed to be smoking.

You're supposed to keep
your human suit on.

Those suits are really itchy for us.

And Joe Mande was on set that day,

so we had Joe Mande dress
in the green-screen suit.

Hey, Todd, got a light?

Uh, yeah, obviously, I have a light.

You know, you guys aren't
supposed to be smoking.

It was completely unnecessary,

and so it was fun just
to see him do that,

and we got him to do it another time,

but I think after that, he figured out

that he didn't need to
wear the green suit.

Uh. Oh, sorry.

I thought we reserved
the conference room.

No, Todd. We have it until 3:00.

Sorry. Sorry, everyone.

It wasn't necessary.

Niednagel is just constantly
making our imaginations

come to life over and over again,

and we genuinely cannot
make the show without him.

- Coming up...
- Season four is just lovely.

I had a lot of fun directing.
I had more fun than I thought.

- So you're in my shot.
- Then they'll have to use mine.

... when "The Paley Center Salutes
'The Good Place'" returns.

And now we're inside the actual engine

of any motion-picture operation.
We're at Craft Service.

This is the first team
PA, Johnathon Johnson.

- "First Team" is code for what?
- Cast.

That's right.
You babysit us, I feel like?

I would say it's more like
shepherding and corralling.

- Babysitting. Got it.
- Babysitting is a bit demeaning.

Sure. Yeah. But accurate?

- Eh.
- A little bit.

What's available on this table?

- And the answer is everything?
- I mean,

this table specifically, on this show,

literally everything.

This is Craft Services.
This is my happy place.

- This is the true Good Place.
- This is Max Cohen.

He is the Sustainability PA.

We realized in season three
that we used a shocking

and sad number of water bottles.
How many was that?

Yes. We used 30,000 water bottles.

That's too many. How many
are we using this year?

- Zero.
- How do we do that?

We have set up water dispensers,

and we've issued everybody
their own bottle.

They can reuse this,
refill it all season,

and it cuts down on the waste.

30,000 bottles.

"The Good Place" is a very good place.

Are there specific cast members
that have favorite snacks?

- I do know Jameela likes chips.
- Jameela likes chips?

She does like to stop and
grab a bag of chips.

Mm-hmm. Jameela likes snacks.

I'll say it. And I don't
think she'd be...

I don't think she'd argue with me.

These are pancakes stuffed
with meat and cheese

that we then pour oil over,

so, um, at some point, my heart
will probably stop beating,

and it will be because
of "The Good Place,"

but when I die, I hope to
end up right back here,

in "The Good Place" Craft Services.

Now that you have the munchies,

this has been Craft Service.

Thanks for doing this.

_

It feels harder to wrap this
show than most shows I've done

because of...

the family that we've created here

wasn't just a work family.

It was like a family that felt

that we were actually doing
something important.

We're obviously not saving lives,

but I think we are affecting people.

Eleanor, Chidi, Tahani, and
Jason all look at each other

as the clock ticks down,
and we end the show.

You know, I'm sad to be
wrapping up the show,

but it feels right.

We've run out of track,
you know? This is...

You know, this is the story
that we wanted to tell.

It's a very rare thing to be
able to do it exactly the way

you wanted to and end it
exactly the way you wanted to,

so I'm trying to focus on the rare joy

of that experience
instead of the sadness

that I feel from the
fact that it's ending.

We have signed up to be
part of Mike Schur's brain,

and I so respect that
he decided to stop it

when he finished the story,
that he didn't pad it

and all of a sudden start
writing, you know,

"And the gang get caught in a snowstorm

and sing a musical," you know?

That there's none of
that, that there is,

"Here is my morality tale.

This is how I think the universe works,

and now it's over."

I hate to see you go,

but I love to watch you walk away.

I really needed to hear that. Thanks.

Kristen Bell directed
an episode this season,

and I think people are going
to be really impressed

when they see what she did.

One of the things that
she does as an actor

that is remarkable is, she...

I've never seen any other actor do this.

She corrects her own camera blocking.

- Don't lean so far forward.
- Why?

Because I have a camera right there.

- So?
- So you're in my shot.

Then they'll have to use mine.

I had a lot of fun directing.

I had more fun than I thought
I was going to have.

I was also really grateful that
I was able to direct this cast

because they're all so perfect

and unique and wonderful
in their own right.

There's something very special
about this particular show,

this particular set,
the crew, the writers,

Mike Schur. It's like a perfect
mix, a perfect little...

It's too dreamy. It's
too good to be true.

It's The Good Place.

All of us felt genuinely a need

to reevaluate our lives
from what happens

at the very end of this
series, and so I'm sorry.

That's a frustrating answer
'cause you don't know

what happens, but you will.

The cast and I joke
about it all the time.

It's like, "Does it really
get any better than this?"

It's just such a great family of people

and such a great story to be a part of.

We're planting seeds in people's brains.

We're planting conversations
at dinner tables.

There's a huge demographic

of young people that watch our show.

There's 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12-year-olds

that are watching the show and
digesting philosophy lessons.

But we are talking about decency.

We are talking about what it means

to lead a good life,

that there are consequences
to our actions.

There are ripple effects, and
you put out a certain amount

of good or a certain amount
of bad into the universe,

and someone is watching.

I love that.

- Synced & corrected by MementMori -
-- www.addic7ed.com --