New Girl creator Elizabeth Meriwether encountered a number of censorship rules and is reflecting on how they impacted the show. The Fox sitcom centered on Jessica Day, an eccentric elementary school teacher who is forced to move into a loft in Los Angeles with three men after finding her boyfriend cheating on her. New Girl explores the lives of Jess and her roommates Nick, Schmidt, Winston and Coach as they navigate their relationships and career change.
Zooey Deschanel led the cast of New Girl as Jess, also executive producing the series, alongside Jake Johnson as Nick, Max Greenfield as Schmidt, Lamorne Morris as Winston, Damon Wayans Jr. as Coach and Hannah Simone as Jess' best friend Cece. First premiering in late 2011, the sitcom scored rave reviews from critics and audiences alike, being nominated for five Golden Globe Awards and five Primetime Emmy Awards, including Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for Deschanel. New Girl would also be a consistent performer in the ratings across its seven seasons, though it wasn't without a few hiccups throughout its development.
In a recent roundtable discussion held by The Hollywood Reporter, Elizabeth Meriwether reflected on her time working on New Girl. The series creator compared the Fox sitcom with Hulu's The Dropout in regards to dealing with lawyers, reflecting on how frustrating censorship rules impacted both shows. See what Meriwether explained below:
"It was challenging [dealing with lawyers]. I compare it to standards and practices when I was working on New Girl. They are so intense, and they were worse back then. We were finally allowed to say the word 'd--k' in the last couple of seasons, and that was a game-changer. Those external rules can sometimes really help you, though. I learned to love the process of running things by the lawyers because they kept me honest in a lot of ways."
Given its original home on Fox, it's understandable New Girl would have encountered a variety of frustrating censorship rules throughout its run, as primetime networks were under far more scrutiny with their content than cable channels. Supernatural was a rare holdout with its characters throwing out "d--k" at various points in the show's run while sitcoms such as New Girl and Brooklyn Nine-Nine notably kept their language relatively tame. As Meriwether notes, New Girl did finally see the reins loosened in its final couple of seasons, which came at a time in which many networks were willing to test their boundaries a little further, such as NBC allowing R-rated language in the David Duchovny-led Aquarius.
Though it may have encountered frustrating censorship rules in its early run, New Girl's legacy wasn't affected in the long run as it quickly became a hit upon its release. The series is largely credited with helping launch its main cast into stardom, namely Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse's Jake Johnson and Game Night's Lamorne Morris, while also becoming one of the most popular shows on Netflix upon its streaming premiere. Audiences can revisit the beloved sitcom in its entirety on Netflix as well as Meriwether's latest show The Dropout on Hulu now.
Source: THR