Liz Meriwether & New Girl

During the summer of 2016, I spent a week working out of an upscale fish restaurant in Cleveland during the RNC. I was on the events team at The Atlantic and we were hosting a series of programs throughout the week, before traveling to Philadelphia to do the same thing at the DNC. One evening, I was standing outside of the restaurant to check attendees in before they entered our event. It was incredibly hot out, and I'd been working long 12-hour days. That's my excuse for fumbling what could have been a beautiful moment. A several people walk by the restaurant, and I stared at a woman in the group because she looked incredibly familiar to me. Who was this person? She was talking to someone next to her and said she had to head back to the convention center and couldn't come into our event. As she passed me, it all clicked together in my head. It was Liz Meriwether, the brilliant writer and creator of one of my all-time favorite shows, New Girl. She was in town writing satirical pieces for New York Magazine about the convention, and my brain was 10 seconds behind. I debating yelling after her or running up to her to tell her I loved her show, but both options seemed creepy and I was in the middle of working and didn't want to abandon my post to embarrass myself. But this moment will always haunt me, as I passed up the opportunity to talk with Liz in-person.

Liz Meriwether initially aspired to be an actor but began writing plays in the mid-2000s. She hosted a showcase of some of her pieces and then-new girl Emma Stone helped her out by acting in the performances. Liz credits Emma with helping to kick-start her career. Liz began flying between coasts to work on her play Oliver Parker! in New York and film No Strings Attached, a movie she wrote starring Ashton Kutcher and Natalie Portman, in California. During all of this, she was hanging out with a group of other female screenwriters, a gathering they jokingly called "The Fempire." Liz wrote a pilot that was filmed but never picked up about a group of women in their early 20s. But after seeing her work on Strings, 20th Century Fox asked her to work on another network show. She pitched New Girl and the rest was history! I gush endlessly about the show below, but here I'd like to credit Liz for the magic of this comedy series. Her voice and humor are present throughout; it's well-written, clever and filled with love, and each character has gone through a true journey over the last seven years, a testament to Liz's masterful storytelling. I'd also like to thank her for writing a comedy where the female characters are just as goofy, confused and ridiculous as the men on the show. Next up on Liz's radar, she's co-writing a pilot for Fox titled Bless This Mess with Lake Bell and co-executive producing an ABC comedy titled Single Parents. With New Girl coming to a close next month, I'm excited to see Liz's voice elsewhere in the TV world and maybe even back on-stage or on the big screen too.
 

As Seen on TV

With the exception of Friends, I think New Girl is the best buddy hangout show created. I'm just going to let this bold statement sit with you for a minute. Ready to hear why? When New Girl first premiered in the fall of 2011 on Fox, I remember watching a free download version of the pilot episode on my laptop during my freshman year of college. It was an incredibly rocky start, with the show completely leaning in to its premise: An "adorkable" woman (yes, this phrase was used in ALL of the marketing), Jess (Zooey Deschanel), moves into a loft apartment with three men, Schmidt (Max Greenfield), Nick (Jake Johnson) and Coach (Damon Wayans Jr.), who have to learn to embrace Jess and all her quirky ways. The first episode ends with the three men rushing to Jess, who is about to be stood up in a restaurant. To cheer her up, they sing Time of My Life from Dirty Dancing loudly for all to hear. Something about this moment made me decide to keep watching the show, which finally found its footing about halfway through season one. The writers wisely made the decision to stop pretending that Jess was the only outsider in the loft environment and instead rounded out everyone's personalities. It transformed from a story about an “adorkable” woman to an ensemble comedy about five adults figuring things out — all a little quirky in their own ways. I should also mention the casting changes: Damon Wayans Jr. appears in the pilot episode, but was unable to commit to the rest of the series, so he pops in for guest appearances and longer series arcs as the show goes on. Taking over his room in the apartment is Lamorne Morris as Winston. The Winston character struggled for many years on New Girl, as the writers couldn't figure out what they wanted to do with him, so he was sidelined for a while with C-plot stories. Eventually, Winston transformed into an awkward, cat loving, police officer, who is only able to smooth talk via the phone and gets his own really sweet romantic arc. I think this speaks to the reason New Girl is such a great show. The writers aren't afraid to make big changes to characters and explore what happened next. Another big shift in the show is the character of CeCe, played by Hannah Simone. She's Jess' best friend from childhood and Schmidt's main romantic interest, but she's also given her own stories, about struggles with fertility, difficulty pleasing her mom and career changes. Her friendship with Jess is an incredibly real portrayal of what lifelong best friends look like in real life.

I of course want to heap praise on Schmidt, Nick and Jess, who have been the most solid characters throughout the series. Max Greenfield's portrayal of Schmidt has been one of the funniest I've seen on TV in a long time. His line delivery, pronunciation of words (see: youths, chutney, wolf) and physical humor is incredible, but he's also able to bring a lot of emotional depth to Schmidt, the confident womanizer. His love for CeCe and friendship with Nick allow us to see that what Schmidt really craves is companionship. Jake Johnson plays the lazy, yet lovable, Nick Miller, and is able to convincingly play Nick as both a leading man and mess all at the same time. So it's no wonder that he and Jess enjoy a delightful will-they, won't-they romance throughout the first two seasons. The buildup for their relationship is one of my favorites, making the second half of season two, one of New Girl's shining moments. The first kiss between them is truly magical. While the show struggled when they did begin to date, they also successfully and convincingly broke them up and kept them broken up for the rest of the show (until now), which is no easy feat. And finally, there's Zooey Deschanel's Jess. An often under-appreciated part of the series, this whole thing wouldn't work without her. She has her quirks, but she's also incredibly grounded in real challenges. She struggles on her path as a teacher, has many romantic highs and lows and finds herself along the way. She's girly (listening to Taylor Swift while drinking Rose, wearing cute dresses and knitting), but she's strong -- a combo you sometimes don't see on TV. When Zooey left the show for a few episodes on maternity leave, it became even more obvious than ever that she's the glue holding it all together.

If you've never seen New Girl in full, I encourage you to revisit the entire series on Netflix. It's truly one of the best comedy ensembles on TV and gives you the perfect mixture of laugh-out-loud hilarity and touching moments. In addition to the show's incredible ensemble, the writing throughout has many funny and smart touches. The characters play a hilarious politics-themed drinking game called True American (the floor is lava!), and no one seems to know how the rules work. There's an episode where Jess and CeCe get fabulous blow-outs and are infused with too much confidence when approaching men later that night. These two also perfectly encapsulate the passive-aggressive fighting tactics sometimes employed by friends. The show features flashbacks in key moments that provide incredible insight into the character's lives, used in the best possible way in the season two episode Virgins. In another episode, Nick and Schmidt celebrate their 10-year anniversary of living together with the most elaborate party for a not-so-elaborate occasion. And Schmidt would love Nick's help with the planning. Nick backwards moonwalks whenever things get awkward. A running joke is the insane amount of yarn and ribbons Jess has in her room. As I think back to past seasons, I could go on forever about my favorite moments, big and small. The show begins airing its final eight episodes tonight, and I'm so sad to see it coming to an end. I'm glad it was given the ability to wrap-up on its own terms, and I'm sure the seventh season will be filled with clever jokes, ridiculous moments and plenty of love.

Bonus Pick: In a season three episode of the show, Prince makes a guest appearance, as he was a huge fan of New Girl. This New York Magazine piece goes step-by-step through the making of the very special post-Super Bowl episode, including his ideas to improve one of the scenes.

Haven't You Heard?

Last weekend, NBC aired a live concert staging of Jesus Christ Superstar, with John Legend (Jesus), Sara Bareilles (Mary Magdalene), Brandon Victor Dixon (Judas) and Alice Cooper (King Herod). It was my favorite of the TV musical productions we've gotten of-late, with one set used throughout the whole show, no costume changes, but plenty of amazing choreography, star-power and energy from the live audience. On Friday, NBC released the cast album from the production, and I've been enjoying re-listening to the show's music, composed by Andrew Lloyd Weber. The show was incredibly well cast. Sara Bareilles has the sweetest voice, and she effortlessly hits all the right marks on I Don't Know How to Love Him, Everything's Alright and Could We Start Again, Please (a tune from the Broadway show, not the original musical). John Legend's singing is angelic, of course, so his parts on the soundtrack are especially enjoyable. In the actual production, his acting leaves a bit to be desired, but he's doing his best. Brandon Victor Dixon was the true-standout. He nailed all of his big moments and puts in the work on every song. The only downside to the soundtrack is you don't get to re-experience the brilliant staging and choreography, which added a lot to the entire production. I hope future TV musicals will follow this course, instead of investing the time and money in set changes and stunt casting. Jesus Christ Superstar got it right with a simple premise that allowed the actors and energy to explode in the room.

Required Reading

New York Magazine pulled together the script descriptions of leading women in 50 films, including Breakfast at Tiffany's, The Wolf of Wall Street, When Harry Met Sally and The Hunger Games. In the introduction, they write: "The women are young and old, heroine and foe, star and supporting character, but they were all born on the page. Some interesting, sometimes frustrating trends emerge in the details; you may not be shocked to learn that most of these writers spend far more time describing the female character’s level of beauty than they do her male counterpart’s. But whether the descriptions are well-written or problematic, they offer plenty of insight into how Hollywood views women and creates roles for them."

Speaking of female film characters, my friend Devan wrote a retrospective of the brilliant Bend it Like Beckham for Entertainment Weekly's Untold Stories section. She spoke with Gurinder Chadha, the director and co-writer of the movie, Parminder Nagra, who stared as Jess, and Archie Panjabi, who played her sister. They talk about creating the film, its box office success and the importance of telling stories about diverse women.