Don’t Hold Your Breathe For More ‘Parks And Recreation,’ Unless One Thing Happens

The cast of Parks and Recreation, a show I miss every day, reunited for PaleyFest on Thursday night. It sounded delightful, with topics ranging from the Entertainment 720 banner in Hulu’s Fyre Fraud documentary (“They could have gotten Ja Rule,” creator Michael Schur said about Tom and Jean-Ralphio), Leslie Knope being the “the Spider-Man of public service” (Amy Poehler joked, “We’re looking up to the sky, saying, ‘Where are you?’ We need her now”), and Chris Pratt’s prediction that he would become a huge movie star (“I’ll have to get back to you about Jurassic Park 4,” he fake-texted Steven Spielberg in a promotional clip for Parks… years before he was cast in Jurassic World).

Of course, there was also plenty of talk about a revival, and the one thing that Schur needs for it to happen. “Everyone on this stage — and like six other people — would have to feel like there was a story that needed to be told,” he said, referring to Poehler, Pratt, Nick Offerman, Adam Scott, Rashida Jones, Aziz Ansari, Aubrey Plaza, Jim O’Heir, and Rob Lowe, who were all in attendance, and Ethel Beavers, Orin, Bjorn Lerpiss, Crazy Ira and the Douche (it’s a package deal), Barney Varmn, and Champion, who should have been.

That being said, Schur doesn’t see a revival as necessary:

“The show had an argument to make. The argument was about teamwork and friendship and positivity, being optimistic and not getting cynical and believing that people can do good and believing in the power of public service and believing that if you work hard and you put your head down and believe in the people around you who are part of your team, that good things are possible. That you’ll achieve the things you want to achieve, and I don’t feel like we left anything on the table. I feel like the show sort of made its argument. And we also — maybe this was like a preventative measure or something — we did jump ahead to the year, like, 2074.”

Based on Schur’s comments about positivity and “the power of public service,” if Parks and Recreation were to come back, with the mega-star cast somehow finding time in their packed schedules, there’s no way Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez doesn’t make a cameo. Hey, they got Michelle Obama — and AOC already has comedy cred. But really, bring back Parks for more Ethel Beavers.

(Via Hollywood Reporter)