'Community' actors took more ownership of characters after creator left: star

It started out a goofy little series about a community college. Four years later, "Community" has lost its leader and guiding force as well as one of its stars.

Nevertheless, if this is the last season, for many critics, it stands at the top of its class.

Certainly you won't get an argument about that from two of its lead actors, Danny Pudi and Alison Brie. The pair were in Toronto last month to promote the fourth season, airing Thursday nights at 8 p.m. ET on City and NBC.

Both credit departed creator/showrunner Dan Harmon with making "Community" special.

"I think from the very beginning working on this show it just quickly became clear that Dan Harmon was going to be pushing the boundaries of what's done on network television," said Brie. "And I think he did it on a regular basis."

Harmon pushed other boundaries with NBC executives, who fired him at the start of this season. He was offered a role as a consultant but refused to be involved if no longer had creative control.

He was replaced as showrunner at the start of this season by writers David Guarascio and Moses Port (who co-created the short-lived comedy "Aliens in America"). In November, NBC announced that Chevy Chase, who had a very public falling out with Harmon, would also leave the series.

Pudi and Brie are quick to point out that Chase will appear in the season finale. The original "Saturday Night Live" player will only be missing from the 11 and 12th of this season's 13 episodes.

"We shot the last few episodes out of order," says Brie. "So we didn't know what was happening with Chevy until it was done."

Adds Pudi: There was never like, 'Today's his last day' kind of thing."

Harmon's last day was just as much a surprise to the cast as it was to viewers.

"We all found out the same way he found out, which was through Twitter," says Brie.

Creator/showrunners have been replaced before. Aaron Sorkin departed "The West Wing" when NBC got fed up with scripts coming in at the last minute.

Frank Darabont bolted from "The Walking Dead" when AMC tightened budgets after the first season.

Both of those shows continued on and, in the case of "The Walking Dead," even thrived after the departure of their leaders.

Comedy, however, may rely even more heavily on a personal vision. When Amy Sherman-Palladino left "Gilmore Girls," that series seemed to lose its distinct voice and only lasted one more season.

Pudi says it was tough shooting episodes without Harmon this season but the cast simply had to soldier on. Were they looking over their shoulders a bit, wondering, ‘What Would Harmon Do'?

"I think we appreciated Dan, and I always will, because without Dan there wouldn't be Abed," says Pudi, who plays the study group's pop culture obsessed film student.

Still, actors have contracts and the show must go on.

"It was tough because there was not a lot of time to grieve," says Pudi. "You were kind of in motion with the production schedule and before you know it, you're six episodes in."

Brie says the actors all felt more inclined to take more ownership of their characters this season.

"We sort of wanted to help out the new guys," she says, adding that the cast "spoke out minds a little more" and "even added jokes in on set more than we used to."

As for fans who may be nit picking over lines and parsing jokes post-Harmon, Pudi says the series was always evolving even when the original team was all still in place.

"The 'My Dinner With Andre' episode wouldn't have happened —couldn't have happened — in Season One," says Pudi. "'Paintball' couldn't have happened in our pilot. I think our show is constantly evolving and our characters and their world are expanding. We needed all those things to happen in order to get to where we are now, and the audience is savvy enough now to be like, ‘We get what your show's about. It's self reflective.'"

Both say they hope the series continues (if just to keep working with Ken Jeong, who constantly cracks them up) but if they do graduate out of this "Community" college after four years they feel they'll have earned a Masters in comedy.

"I'm constantly learning from everyone on set," says Brie, back next month in the sixth season of "Mad Men." "It's like a comedy intensive working on this show, something that none of us as a cast wants to let go of. It's like, ‘Who knows if we'll find it again?’”

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Bill Brioux is a freelance TV columnist based in Brampton, Ont.