Brooklyn Nine-Nine star Andre Braugher has appeared on EW’s The Awardist podcast to discuss the hugely popular comedy as well as the explaining the “new challenge” that comes with the show’s upcoming eighth season.
Braugher, who plays the deadpan Captain Holt in the series, said that due to recent events in the real world, such as the death of George Floyd and the resulting backlash against police, writers have now been tasked with working a reflection of these events into the sitcom.
“It was promised to me that this would be a show that acknowledges the world as it is, that we would hold the mirror up to life,” Braugher explained.
“And now we’re going into an eighth season with a new challenge, which is that everyone’s knowledge and feelings about police have been profoundly affected. What we have from [writer and co-creator Daniel Goor] is a commitment to write a smart show that will not attempt to hide itself in a fantasy. So the Nine-Nine is going to have to deal with what we know about the New York Police Department.”
While he’s confident the show will portray such events in a “smart and funny” way, he admitted that he’s unsure of how they’ll go about approaching the subject matter.
“It’s a very complicated subject, but I think they have to be portrayed much more realistically, in terms of this: The convention… that police breaking the law is okay because somehow it’s in the service of some greater good, is a myth that needs to be destroyed,”
Last month, Andy Samberg spoke to People about the changes, saying: “We’re taking a step back, and the writers are all rethinking how we’re going to move forward, as well as the cast.”
“We’re all in touch and kind of discussing how you make a comedy show about police right now, and if we can find a way of doing that that we all feel morally okay about.”
