PARKS & REC WEEK: FIND YOUR SAMMY SKOBELS

This month I'm looking at writing techniques in sitcoms. This week, PARKS & REC!

When I was growing up in the NW suburbs of Chicago, there was this hot dog place in my town that everybody went to. You pretty much had go to there, in fact, because it was run by a local hero, a legally blind roller derby champion named Sammy Skobel. 

He was basically our town's version of Stan Lee. You'd go in and there he'd be, this old grandpa figure making hot dogs and talking. He rode his bike to work, some people said he'd also played professional hockey...he was a legend. 

I rewatched PARKS & REC over the pandemic -- and thank God for it, that show is like an injection of joy. And one of the first things that hit me is just how much material the writers produce just from thinking about the kinds of stuff that goes on in towns. 

A very very partial list: empty lots; fall festival; town movie night; park clean up; Cub Scouts/Brownies; time capsules; local zoo; local news; taxes; elections; local businesses; pollution; farmer's markets; town slogan; murals; flu season; competition with the town next door; town hall meetings; town history; flouride in the water; high school issues and events (like Model U.N.).

Some of these ideas provide material for a single episode. A lot of them prove to be a never-ending wellspring -- and not always the ones you would think. The pilot episode talks about what to do with an ugly empty pit, and then spends almost the entire life of the show fighting step by step for it to finally become a park. 

The show also offers a clever variation on this kind of brainstorming, taking national issues like gay marriage, the amount of sugar allowed in fast food, election dynamics or the carte blanche given to tech companies, and then playing them out on the local stage--as of course they do play out. 

A lot of the Daniels/Schur/Goorverse shows seem to work like this. THE OFFICE is filled with stuff that actually happens in offices, BROOKLYN 99 with police stations (-ish), and THE GOOD PLACE with notions of the afterlife. 

But you could say the same with FRIENDS in terms of stuff that people do or talk about or get wrapped up in in friendships (like going to your friend's open mics, or the friend who loves his job so much and it is so boring to listen to, or the weird dude at the coffee shop), or MODERN FAMILY about family hijinks, etc. etc. And in the best cases the ideas are super specific, just like the events of our own towns or families. 

So when you get on a show -- when, not if! -- take some time to brainstorm. We may not know it, but we are each in our own life experience a gold mine of stories and ideas.