Parks And Rec Behind The Scenes SECRETS!

Parks and Recreation, the Office-flavored spinoff that followed Leslie Knope and her team of Parks

Department employees in Pawnee, Indiana. Its stellar cast and a winning pedigree from creators

Greg Daniels and Mike Schur made it one of the most beloved modern sitcoms in history. What

happened behind the scenes of the show made it even more impressive. Round up the subcommittee

because here are seven behind-the-scenes secrets from the set of Parks and Recreation

The Office formula worked so well that NBC wanted Parks and Recreation to be a full-fledged

spinoff of The Office, and there were even plans to have Michael Scott from The Office visit Pawnee

in the show's pilot episode. No! God, please, no! No! The plans didn't last long. If you watch the

pilot, you'll see Michael Scott never did take that road trip west of Pawnee, Indiana. Co-creator

Greg Daniels was insistent that Parks and Rec be a totally unrelated show to its Scranton cousin

but still keep The Office feel. According to Vulture, it took some arguing, but Greg Daniels

and the vision his team had for the series ultimately convinced the Peacocks at NBC to

change their minds about The Office 2.0 and let Parks and Recreation stand on its own

Working on a network comedy show might sound like a dream job, but in reality, acting involves repetitive takes of the same jokes over and over. Eventually

those jokes will feel stale, and you might even see it in the actor's performance. Parks and Rec had the perfect solution to joke fatigue. Each scene had an extra five scheduled

minutes that allowed the cast to improvise whatever they liked. These five-minute free-for-alls

were called fun runs, and they even helped generate some of the show's funniest moments

In fact, at the Parks reunion in 2019, Chris Pratt's best joke, according to co-creator

Mike Schur, came from an improvised fun run. In the scene, Leslie is feeling flu-like symptoms

and Andy offers to look up her symptoms on the computer what resulted as pure Pratt magic Leslie I typed your symptoms into the thing up here and it says you could have network connectivity problems The budding friendship between Ann Perkins and Leslie Knope

was one of the main storylines in the show's earlier seasons, the two first meet in the pilot episode

when Ann shows up to a city council meeting about the abandoned pit next door to her house

The pit becomes the main goal for Leslie and Ann, and the show's creators expected this dynamic

to be the central focus of the series. However, just like her character Ann Perkins

Rashida Jones wanted to get out of the world of small-town sitcoms and move to bigger and better roles

But leaving the show would prove to be sad, because Amy Poehler and Rashida Jones had actually become real best friends in real life

Amy even called Rashida my wife on Jimmy Fallon's late-night show. But not all love affairs last forever

Rashida decided to leave the show in the sixth season to pursue other projects. According to Mike Schur, the saddest day ever on set was Rashida Jones' final day as Ann Perkins

Don't worry, Rashida's decision to leave didn't put a damper on their relationship

In 2020, Amy and Rashida have been close as ever. They took part in Vanity Fair's Lie Detector video series

But Rashida admitted truthfully, she'd rather have Leslie Knope for a boss than Michael Scott

Who is the better boss? Leslie Knope. You can't go anywhere on the internet

without recognizing this iconic gif of a drunk Ron Swanson dancing without a care in the world

It inspired countless remixes to different songs, and even a 4-minute, 33-second boogie marathon loop

It's become the universal response for Let's Party. But did you know this dance sequence

from the episode The Fight was actually the cast's best effort to get a laugh out of Amy Poehler

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The scene involved the Parks Department visiting Tom and John

Ralphio's snake hole lounge. Each actor had total freedom when it came to filming

their drunken snake juice scenes. The cast did have one directive in common though make Amy Poehler laugh She wrote and directed The Fight and the cast wanted to make it memorable Since they wanted these drunken sequences to be the best they could for Amy they insisted they film their own sequences without other cast members present

This allowed them to get as loose and goofy as possible. If you take a look at the scene, you can see the extra work was totally worth it

Baba boy. According to Amy Poehler, filming everyone's drunk dances was the most fun I've ever had

No other character in the Parks Department hated their job in government more than Leslie's boss

Ron Swanson. He worked as hard as he could to do as little work as possible. The cantankerous

libertarian anti-bureaucrat brought to life by Nick Offerman quickly became a favorite among the

writers and fans. Could a small-town government official really hate their job as much as Ron

Swanson? Well, yes. Ron Swanson was based on a real city employee. When developing the show

Mike Schur and Greg Daniels spent time with various government officials in Southern California

including the folks at Burbank City Hall. Just like Pawnee, Burbank is a small town full of charm and interesting characters

The creators figured it would be the perfect place to learn what life in city government was really like

One employee in particular caught their attention. Greg Daniels said in an interview that a woman in charge of a department told him

I'm a libertarian, so I don't really believe in the mission of my job. Sounds familiar

They loved her attitude and used her as an inspiration for the Ron Swanson we know and love

And I'll have the number 8. That's a party platter. It serves 12 people

I know what I'm about, son. The Parks and Recreation theme song

is one of those tunes that finds its way into your brain and stays there for a few weeks

The plucky instrumental ditty helps set the tone for the lighthearted antics of the Pawnee City Hill employees

But did you know that the theme song was chosen via an online contest? Parks and Rec was weeks away from its premiere

and it was missing something all network sitcoms have a theme song So producers decided to put a call out online in the hopes that someone out there had the right tune to attach to the show opening credits They hired a music company to run a contest sending out a mass email to their composers and producers asking for theme songs for the show

The one rule? You had five days to submit. The winner would have received $7,500 for the release of the song rights to NBC and some serious bragging rights

The winners were Gabby Moreno and Vincent Jones, who were later nominated for an Emmy Award for their work

Unfortunately, the contest stipulated they sign away the full song rights for the $7,500 prize

Welcome to Hollywood. Go f*** yourself. No, we don't negotiate with composers

Don't worry. After their Emmy-winning Parks and Rec moment, Gabby continues to write and perform music for movies and TV

while co-writer Vincent Jones continues to play music professionally, and most recently played on tour with Sarah McLachlan

Chris Pratt has won over mainstream audiences with his lovable everyman humor. Andy Dwyer was supposed to be written off the show after season one

but the writers loved him so much, they wanted to make him a main character on the series

One incident, however, nearly got this everyman fired from the show entirely

Pratt explained on The Graham Norton Show that they were about four takes into a scene, and it was a late night

Everyone was tired, and he didn't feel like he was getting a big enough reaction out of Amy Poehler

The script called for Andy to be standing naked in Anne's front door. He was given a pair of flesh-colored briefs

to cover up his private brats for the scene. However, Chris had another idea

He decided to strip down and play this take totally in the nude. Well, it worked

Amy Poehler's reaction and confusion was totally genuine, and it certainly made for a hilarious take

The bosses at NBC didn't think his joke was quite as funny, and they sent Chris a formal warning saying he would be fired immediately if he did that again

Chris said he took the warning seriously, and even has the reprimand letter framed in his office at home

The End