Here's an interview that Zooey Deschanel and the creator of New Girl, Elizabeth Meriwether, did with Entertainment Weekly's Jeff Jensen. In the interview, Deschanel and Meriwether talk about the Jess and Nick kiss in last week's episode (episode 2x15 "Cooler), the writers' creative process for the show, and Meriwether also talks about how there isn't a master plan for New Girl's storylines. Here's an excerpt from the article.:
If fans of the New Girl thought that the kiss between Jess and Nick was somewhat inevitable — given the growing, palpable rapport between actors Zooey Deschanel and Jake Johnson — well, now you understand why the writers of the show decided to let it happen. “I think people were seeing the chemistry growing between these characters, and at some point you want some kind of payoff,” says Deschanel. “And this was the perfect time for it.”
New Girl creator Elizabeth Meriwether says the kiss flowed organically out of a creative process that prizes improvisation and writes to the cast’s individual strengths and group dynamics. That doesn’t mean the writers room doesn’t drive the storytelling or plotting, though. For example, the Halloween episode, in which Jess dresses up a zombie Woody Allen. Says Meriwether: “I did dress up as a young, slutty Woody Allen at a Halloween party, which is where that idea came from. Whatever the opposite of getting laid was, that’s what happened that night. It was the biggest turn off to everybody.”
“You wanted me to be as unattractive as possible. And we went almost all the way there [in the script,]” recalls Deschanel during a joint interview with Meriwether on the set of New Girl last month. “And then I thought: I have a surprise for Liz! And the surprise was, I had glued fake beard material onto my eyebrows, and I was like, ‘This is going to make Liz so happy that I have fake beard glued to my eyebrows.’ That whole episode, with the absurd costumes and carnival, was this fun, Fellini-esque direction to go in.”
“Yes,” says Meriwether with a wry smile. “That’s what I was going for. Fellini.”
But New Girl’s approach to storytelling does mean that there is no master plan for the show, and Meriwether says the Nick-Jess relationship is a great example of why that can be a good thing. “We went where we needed to go in that specific episode. We felt our way through until we got to what we felt was a true thing. And then we were faced with the next one, and so on. So instead of having a plan, and then treading water and building to a specific episode, we’re pushing ourselves, painting ourselves into a corner and having to get out of it in the next episode. I think that’s pushed us to get things going a little bit quicker. I have been really surprised and happy. Having them kiss in episode 15 didn’t take anything out of their relationship. It has only built from there.”
Meriwether adds: “I am trying to make it sound perfect. Part of not having a master pan is constantly being under deadlines. But also, I’m not a big plan person.”
“Neither am I,” says Deschanel.
Link to the full article:Zooey Deschanel, 'New Girl' creator discuss the kiss, and the lack of a master plan for the show | Inside TV | EW.com
My thoughts: I have to say that I think it's very interesting that Elizabeth Meriwether doesn't believe in having a master plan for New Girl. I've always thought that the writing for Jess and Nick's relationship was very well done with a sense of direction that I always liked. The evolution of their relationship has always felt very well paced to me. I never would have guessed that Elizabeth Meriwether didn't have a master plan for the show. Sometimes I think not following a master plan is a good thing for a writer to do when they are writing a story, because it can help the story evolve and take on a life of its own where the story goes in a direction that the writer never would have thought of.
On the other hand, I think not having a master plan can be a bad thing at times and cause a story to get off track and suffer as a whole. For now, I think that Elizabeth Meriwether has done a pretty good job of allowing the show to evolve on its own without having New Girl go off the rails like some shows have this year, such as Revenge. Based on all of the season two episodes of New Girl that have aired at the moment, I would say that I love season two even more than I loved the first season, and I loved, loved, loved season one.
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