The Good Place: The Inspiration Behind the Show and More Things We Learned at San Diego Comic-Con

San Diego Comic-Con brought the comedy with the showrunners and cast of The Good Place as they talked about the ins and outs of the show, fun moments, and deep admiration for one another.

Kristen Bell, Ted Danson, D’Arcy Carden, William Jackson Harper, Jameela Jamil, and Manny Jacinto, along with executive producers, Michael Schur, Morgan Sackett, and Drew Goddard were in attendance for the panel.

Marc Evan Jackson, who plays Shawn, joined the crew as the moderator.

Here are 5 things we learned from their panel:

1. What Attracted the Cast Members to the Show

At the beginning of the panel, Kristen Bell was asked what the biggest selling point was for her to snag The Good Place, where she told a story of her and Ted Danson.

“Ted and I met on a movie about seven years ago and became fast friends, despite the fact that I went super fandom when I met him because I had just binge-watched the first season of Damages and I was obsessed with Arthur Frobisher, which was his character and I told him in the lobby when I first met him, this might sound weird, I am checked into this hotel as Holly Frobisher, the character name of your wife,” Bell recalled before Danson chimed in.

“I actually moved rooms,” Danson said.

“Well, we became friends and you were a huge selling point. Hearing Ted was involved sealed my deal,” Bell said.

Toward the end of the panel, the same question was asked, but this time by a fan and it was directed towards the whole cast.

“You are definitely what attracted me to this,” Bell said, speaking to Michael Schur.

“I have watched Mike’s work, as we all have, for years and years just going ‘wow, this is comedy. This is so great.’ And then also knowing people who have worked with him and for him because I only knew you peripherally, like I knew you were not a murderer. I knew people who worked for you and said ‘it’s just the best time of all times’ and truly that’s what I want in my life.”

“At this age, I find that I will pick projects based on what my day-to-day is. I want fans to like it and people to love it, but my experience on set is of the utmost importance to me because I don’t want to be miserable. I want to make something that’s happy, joyful, and that I have a good time doing,” Bell continued.

“So, knowing I was working for you [Schur] I knew I was getting quality, this will be fun, and then you told me my number one dude Ted Danson over here would be involved. Everything was positive and the script was the icing on the cake, I’m like ‘and it’s good! Oh my god, I got so lucky,’” she said.

D’Arcy Carden and Manny Jacinto chimed in next, Jacinto being as honest as we all can be.

“I was broke,” Jacinto said with a laugh.

“As a struggling actor you take whatever job you can get, so it’s a weird thing where I would’ve taken anything, but this was my literal dream job. For years and years when I was trying so hard to get work and anyone would ask ‘well what do you want to do?’ I would almost be embarrassed to say because it felt too big. And I was so broke,” Carden said, as she ended it with a laugh as well.

2. Ethics Inspired the Idea of The Good Place

When asked what inspired Schur to come up with The Good Place he admitted it came from something as small as a hobby.

“A very basic hobby level interests in ethics and thinking that it would make a good show. The search for an ethical truth would make a funny TV show. It sounds weird to say it, but think about it,” Schur said.

“Combined with a daily game that I would play with myself where I would mill around Los Angeles assigning negative and positive point values to various good or bad things people did. So, if someone cut me off in traffic I would think, and I’ve done this for years, ‘you just lost 25 points man. Joke’s on you, ’cause you’re going to hell.’ Low-level wishful thinking I guess, but it was a slow burn of those two things combined and it lead to this.”

3. The Shrimp on the Show is Fake

A fan asked, according to Bell, the best question of the entire panel, the question being if Bell is really a vegetarian and if the shrimp is real.

“Best question of the day. I have been a vegetarian since I was eleven. I have never actually had seafood of any kind because I grew up in Michigan, which is not exactly the fresh fish capital of the world because we’ve got Lake Erie and those fish have three heads. You don’t eat them.”

“Our prop department, who is lovely and amazing and always checks with you what you want to eat because they think about your wants and needs, they make these little vegetarian shrimp that are essentially these little rubber nuggets. They’re in the shape of a shrimp,” Bell said before Morgan Sackett also chimed in.

“They are disgusting. They’re soy, and we had to paint them to look more like shrimp. You’ve eaten bushels of those things,” Sackett said.

“I have eaten bushels of those things. They’re fake, vegetarian shrimp and they’re completely rubber and if you dangle them they — they’re not tasty,” Bell explained.

4. Admiration for the Showrunners

“The job of writing TV is very hard, essentially impossible. Can’t be done. Can be done in concert with 40 other people. Morgan [Sackett] was the producer of Parks and Recreation. The reason this show works and is allowed to be as ambitious as it is and we’re allowed to do the kind of stories we do and the insane things we do, have giraffes running around with giant shrimp in the air and whatever else, it’s because of this guy [Morgan Sackett]. So, if you enjoy this TV show, thank him.”

Danson also had some sweet words about the showrunners, Schur in particular, when asked about taking credit.

“Really, what we do is we show up. We say these astounding words in these astounding locations with our bow ties, and you let the words play on you and out comes a performance. I don’t know how to take credit for anything on this show other than to say I am hitting my marks and I am saying Michael’s words and it is magic,” Danson said.

5. Working With Fake Blood Can Be a Disaster

Harper said that he wasn’t given a proper warning about the fake blood spray in “The Trolley Problem,” which caused a shocking moment on set.

“One take, in particular, there’s a lot of blood in my teeth because I had my mouth wide open as soon as it went off and a piece of foam went directly down my esophagus and into my being. That was a special day,” Harper said when asked about on-set memories.

This is when Drew Goddard, Executive Producer, stepped in to tell his experience with fake blood.

“I’ve sprayed a lot of actors with blood in my day and I’ve learned, don’t tell them what’s about to happen because then they might say no. So, we said ‘don’t tell [Harper] what’s about to happen. Maybe we’ll get some chunks in his esophagus.’ It could happen to any of you and I’d like for you to look alive,” Goddard said with laughs erupting all around.

Other Things Learned:

• Jamil and Jacinto were each other’s seventh kiss, ever.
• Veronica Mars would get into The Good Place.
• Ron Swanson’s, from Parks and Recreation, absolute hatred of telling people what his birthday is was inspired by Sackett.
• One time Schur and friends lit a birthday cake at work because they figured out Sackett’s birthday, and he tackled them, cake included, so nobody would know.

The Good Place Season 3 premieres September 27th on NBC.

Check out all of our coverage of San Diego Comic-Con here. There is a lot more to come!

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