“A Night in the Writer’s Room”: Variety’s 2012 Comedy Writer’s panel, featuring Mike Schur (Parks and Recreation), Steven Molaro (The Big Bang Theory), Jeff Schaffer and Jackie Schaffer (The League) and Laura Dern and Mike White (Enlightened).
A great quote from Schur on how they keep their show fresh (and if you haven’t seen last season’s finale, you should only read the first two sentences):
Our show is always almost getting canceled, so what happens — and this is not a joke, I’m serious — every year, we’re like, well, this could be it and we just decide to just go for broke and tell the biggest stories. The season finale may be a series finale. This last season, Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) ran for office in her town and at the end, we had to decide whether she won or lost and ultimately, it was like, “She’s gotta win, ‘cause this could be the last time anyone sees this show and it would be too sad if we said “she came super-close, bye!”
