Happy Endings is not as easy to pull off as they seem. Narrators can’t just give the audience what they want and call it one day; They must ensure that their characters serve the uplifting; They must Show the work They have done to get there; They must build importance in the last moments so that everyone can share in the good vibes.
Just look at “A man on the inside.” At the beginning of the first season, Charles Nieuwendyk has (Ted Danson) is a mourning widower that is so lonely that he comes out of pension to take on a new job as a spy for a private investigator. Charles is just looking to fill the days, maybe by doing a little good, but mainly because the gig sounds fun and exciting – two qualities that are missing in his quiet, empty house. Previously, he was an engineering professor. Now he has to pretend to be George Smiley.
But at the end of season 1, Charles remains with much more than his own John Le Carré story to tell you at dinner parties. He actually has friends who would show up if he cooked them a meal.
“The theme for the whole show is that Charles Nieuwendyk thinks that life really has nothing left to offer him,” Creator Mike Schur Told IndieWire as part of a new USG university panel. “He takes this job on a whim, he gets embedded in this retirement home, and it completely saves him. It transforms him from a person whose life is very small into a person who has all these new friends and these new experiences.”
Schur knew that the end of season 1 needed to admit as much, which is why it was taking place at the nursing home where Charles worked. Two inhabitants, Elliott (John Getz) and Virginia (Sally Struthers), marry – a staple in happy sitcom ends – and their reception is located in the Pacific View pension society. Didi (Stephanie Beatriz), the CEO, monitors the whole thing, as different other characters receive their own happy mailings.
“It had to end with that set with these people,” Schur said. “There are many happy finishes based on the people that Charles met and became friends with.”
But even the happy ending is based on the ultimate win: Charles reunion with Calbert, his best friend at the facility, played by Stephen McKinley Henderson.
“The real thing that happens, however, is that the real love story of the season – which is what we talked about in the author’s room from the beginning – is between Charles and Calbert,” Schur said. “(It is) what Charles needed more than anything in the world, which is just a good friend; a person who understood him and who could be his trust and his partner in crime. So we knew the end would always be the two lonely who played backgammon and was just happy and enjoy themselves.”
For Danson, the end was two -time and it started with the perfect song.
“First of all, you play” an enchanted evening “(of the temptations) and I’m gone,” Danson said. “It is such a beautiful, nostalgic piece, especially for the age group we portrayed – not portrayed, are. “
The other ingredient was Henderson himself.
“The relationship with Calbert is simple,” Danson said. “You just go and sit next to Steven McKinley Henderson. He is such a nice actor, and his level of truth and honesty and simplicity is so powerful. He just sucks you into it. From the moment we met and began to act, there was never anyone, who, in preparation. Where, “they say and fall into them” – literally. I think we found each other as actors and kept each other and loved each other as the character did, “falling into them” – I think we found each other as actors and preserved each other and loved each other as the character made. and falls into them ” – literally. I think we found each other as actors and adverse each other and loved each other who was as the character did.
After being tied over Backgammon during Season 1, Charles and Calbert’s friendship when Charles must tell him that he has lied about his identity as part of his undercover work. But they find their way back to each other, and the final scene see the two-in classic Rome-com-fashion-locking eyes from the whole room, know exactly what the other is thinking.
“I love the little moment: the subtlest nod (from Charles) and then Calbert Subtilt, and they both know what it means, which is let’s play a little backgammon,” Schur said. “So it was a real Rome-com Wrap-up, but romance is not a real romance like Elliot and Virginia. Romance is a friendship between Charles and Calbert. That was the design of it.”
For more about the craft that went into “A man on the inside‘S “Perfect Ending, see IndieWire’s full video interview with Schur, Danson, Stephanie Beatriz, production designer Ian Phillips and Kinematographer David J. Miller above.
“A man on the inside” flows on Netflix.
Indiewire collaborated with Universal Studio Group for USG University, a series of virtual panels celebrating the best in TV art from 2024-2025 TV Season over NBC Universal’s portfolio of shows. USG University (a Universal Studio Group program) is presented in collaboration with Roybal Film & TV Magnet and IndieWire’s Film Framtime. Catch up on Latest USG University videos here Or directly at the USG University site.
