Parks and Recreation

Plot

The first season focuses on Leslie Knope, the deputy director of the Parks and Recreation Department in the fictional town of Pawnee, Indiana. Local nurse Ann Perkins demands the construction pit beside her house created by an abandoned condo development be filled in after her boyfriend, Andy Dwyer, fell in and broke both legs. Leslie promises to turn the pit into a park, despite resistance from the parks director Ron Swanson, an anti-government libertarian. City planner Mark Brendanawicz – for whom Leslie harbors romantic feelings – pragmatically insists the project is unrealistic due to government red tape, but nevertheless secretly convinces Ron to approve the project. Leslie and her staff, including her assistant Tom Haverford and intern April Ludgate, try encouraging community interest in the pit project, but meet resistance.

In the second season, the pit is eventually filled in because Leslie takes it upon herself to fill in the pit without permission, not realizing Andy was in the pit. Andy became injured and works with Leslie to threaten to sue the city of Pawnee unless the pit was filled. Mark leaves his city hall career for a private sector job. Meanwhile, a crippling budget deficit leads state auditors Chris Traeger and Ben Wyatt to shut down the Pawnee government temporarily.

The third season opens with the Pawnee government reopened, but with budget cuts frustrating Leslie's attempts to provide services. Leslie makes a deal with Chris and Ben to bring back the Pawnee Harvest Festival, but if the festival fails the Parks Department will be eliminated. After weeks of planning, the festival becomes a tremendous success through Leslie's efforts. Later, Chris returns from Indianapolis to become Pawnee's acting city manager, while Ben also takes a job in Pawnee. April and Andy start dating and, only a few weeks later, marry in a surprise ceremony. Tom quits his city hall job to form an entertainment company called Entertainment 720 with his friend, Jean-Ralphio. The business cannot maintain its lavish spending and quickly runs out of money, leaving Tom to return to the Parks Department. Leslie and Ben show romantic interest in each other; however, Chris has implemented a rule that would prevent a superior (Ben) from dating his employee (Leslie). In spite of this rule, Leslie and Ben begin secretly dating.

The fourth season deals with Leslie's campaign to run for city council. As Leslie begins preparing a campaign, she realizes she must break up with Ben to avoid scandal. Ben and Leslie restart their relationship and Ben sacrifices his job to save Leslie from losing hers, due to Chris' policy against romantic relationships in the workplace. The Parks Department volunteers to become her campaign staff, with Ben as Leslie's campaign manager. Leslie's campaign faces myriad setbacks against her main opponent, Bobby Newport, and his famous campaign manager Jennifer Barkley.

Cast and characters

The principal cast starting in season one included:

Amy Poehler as Leslie Knope, a mid-level bureaucrat with a strong love of her hometown of Pawnee, who has not let politics dampen her sense of optimism; her ultimate goal is to become President of the United States.

Rashida Jones as Ann Perkins, a nurse and political outsider who gradually becomes more involved in Pawnee government through her friendship with Leslie.

Paul Schneider as Mark Brendanawicz, a city planner who entered the field with a sense of optimism, but has since become jaded and disillusioned.

Aziz Ansari as Tom Haverford, Leslie's sarcastic and underachieving subordinate, who eventually considers leaving his city hall job to pursue his own entrepreneurial interests.

Nick Offerman as Ron Swanson, the parks and recreation director who, as a staunch libertarian, believes in as small a government as possible. His desire to make his department small and ineffective frequently clashes with his genuine esteem for his coworkers, particularly Leslie.

Aubrey Plaza as April Ludgate, initially a cynical and uninterested intern, who grows into the role of Ron's assistant.

Chris Pratt as Andy Dwyer, a goofy and dim-witted but lovable slacker and rock musician; Ann's ex-boyfriend, married to April. Goes on to become a children's entertainer, as "Johnny Karate".

Several cast members were introduced or developed after the first season:

Adam Scott as Ben Wyatt, a brilliant but socially awkward government official trying to redeem his past as a failed mayor in his youth.

Production

Development and casting

Immediately after Ben Silverman was named co-chairman of NBC's entertainment division in 2007, he asked Greg Daniels to create a spin-off of The Office. Daniels co-created Parks and Recreation with Michael Schur, who had been a writer on The Office. The two spent months considering ideas for the new series and debating whether to make it a stand-alone rather than a spin-off. According to Daniels, they eventually abandoned the original spin-off plan because they "couldn't find the right fit". They considered a series about a local government official trying to rebuild a political career following a humiliating public spectacle. They eventually abandoned the idea, though it did end up being incorporated into the backstory for Ben Wyatt late in the second season. After Amy Poehler agreed to play the lead, they decided the series would revolve around an optimistic bureaucrat in small-town government. Production was delayed to accommodate Poehler's pregnancy.

The idea was partly inspired by the portrayal of local politics on the HBO drama series The Wire, as well as the renewed interest in and optimism about politics stemming from the 2008 United States presidential election. The staff was also drawn to the idea of building a show around a female relationship, namely Leslie Knope and Ann Perkins. Reports that Daniels and Schur were developing a show together led to press speculation it would, in fact, be a spin-off of The Office. The producers insisted their new series would be entirely independent. Nevertheless, their concept for it shared several elements with The Office, particularly the mockumentary approach and the encouragement of improvisation among the cast, even though the episodes were scripted. The series was scheduled as a mid-season replacement, and was rushed to meet the premiere date of April 9, 2009. Before the title Parks and Recreation was chosen, the name Public Service was considered, but ultimately rejected because network officials did not want to be accused of mocking the idea.

Schur said at PaleyFest that he and Daniels approached casting with the idea of finding "the funniest people and we'll tailor the roles to them". Poehler departed from the NBC sketch comedy series Saturday Night Live, where she was a cast member for nearly seven years, to star in Parks and Recreation as Leslie Knope. It was only after she was cast that Daniels and Schur established the series' general concept and the script for the pilot was written. Rashida Jones was among the first to be cast by Daniels and Schur in 2008, when the series was still being considered as a spin-off to The Office, where Jones had played Jim Halpert's girlfriend Karen Filippelli, who formerly worked at the Stamford Branch but was soon transferred to the Scranton Branch in the third season. She departed in the middle of season six, and returned for a guest appearance later in the season. Jones returned in the series finale, along with the COVID-19 pandemic special.

Crew

Deedle-Dee Productions and Universal Media Studios produced Parks and Recreation starting with the first season; the production companies Fremulon and 3 Arts Entertainment also became involved with the show starting with the second season. The series was created by Greg Daniels and Michael Schur, who served as executive producers along with Howard Klein. Klein previously worked with Daniels and Schur on The Office, a half-hour NBC comedy Daniels adapted from the British comedy of the same name, created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. Schur served as the showrunner of Parks and Recreation, while Amy Poehler and Morgan Sackett worked as producers. Dean Holland, an editor on The Office, also worked as an editor on Parks and Recreation. Mike Scully, a former executive producer and showrunner for The Simpsons, joined Parks and Recreation as a consulting producer starting in the middle of the first season. Allison Jones, who worked as a casting director for The Office, served in the same capacity at the start of Parks and Recreation, along with Nancy Perkins, for whom the character Ann Perkins was named. Dorian Frankel became the casting director starting with the second season. Alan Yang, Harris Wittels, and Katie Dippold, all of whom were Parks and Recreation screenwriters, also worked as executive story editors.

The pilot episode was written by Daniels and Schur, and directed by Daniels. Daniels also directed the second-season episode "Hunting Trip", while Schur made his directorial debut with the first-season finale "Rock Show", and wrote or directed several other episodes including "Sister City", "The Master Plan", and "Time Capsule".

Poehler wrote three episodes: "Telethon" in season 2, "The Fight" in season 3, and "The Debate" in season 4 (for which she was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series). She also co-wrote "Second Chunce" in season 6, the series' 100th episode, and "One Last Ride", the series finale, with Schur. Poehler also directed three episodes, "The Debate" in season 4, "Article Two" in season 5, and "Gryzzlbox" in season 7. Other cast members that wrote or directed episodes include Nick Offerman, who wrote "Lucky" in season 4, and directed season 5's "Correspondents' Lunch" and season 6's "Flu Season 2"; while Adam Scott directed season 6's "Farmers Market".

Holland also directed about thirty episodes of the series. Norm Hiscock, a consulting producer, wrote a number of episodes, including the first-season finale "Rock Show" and second-season premiere "Pawnee Zoo". Other regular screenwriters included Katie Dippold, Dan Goor, Aisha Muharrar, Harris Wittels, and Alan Yang. Frequent Parks and Recreation directors include Dean Holland, Randall Einhorn, Troy Miller, and Jason Woliner, with several others guest-directing one or two episodes such as Jeffrey Blitz, Paul Feig, Tucker Gates, Seth Gordon, Nicole Holofcener, Beth McCarthy-Miller, Michael McCullers, and Charles McDougall.

Writing

The writers spent time researching local California politics and attending Los Angeles City Council meetings. Schur said they observed many community hearings were attended only by those opposed, often angrily, to the proposals under consideration. This fact became a major component of town hall scenes and was the basis for the "Canvassing" episode. The writers consulted with real-life government officials such as urban planners and elected officials. Scott Albright, a California city planner, provided direct feedback for the Mark Brendanawicz character, and the inspiration for Ron Swanson's anti-government convictions came from a real-life encounter Schur had in Burbank with a libertarian government official who admitted, "I don't really believe in the mission of my job." The concept of turning a construction pit into a park was seen as a device to bring all the characters together working toward a common goal. The writers originally envisioned the pit becoming a park only in the series finale, although those plans were later changed and the pit was filled in during the second season. While researching whether such a project could realistically last several months or longer, Schur spoke to urban planners in Claremont, California, who said it was entirely plausible because they had recently broken ground on a park that had been in various planning stages for 18 years.

Daniels and Schur wrote the script for the pilot episode in mid-2008. The original script portrayed Leslie and Mark as slightly less likable than they appeared in the final draft, and they were changed to be more appealing in response to feedback the episode received from focus groups and press tour screenings. For example, while an early draft of the pilot script had Mark saying he didn't care about Leslie or the pit but would support her plan because he liked Ann Perkins and wanted an excuse to spend more time with her, the finished pilot had Mark backing Leslie because he admired her passion and drive. Schur said the writing staff strove to avoid the type of cynical humor prevalent in most television comedies at the time and wanted the characters to have a genuine appreciation for each other. Schur said of this, "I've never liked mean-spirited comedy. The characters on our show make fun of each other, but not in a biting, angry way. And there's no shortage of conflict in the world of government." The first-season episodes were written and developed relatively quickly after each other, and Schur said the staff was treating the entire six-episode season as if it were a single television pilot. Daniels felt due to pre-expectations from viewers familiar with The Office, the first-season episodes were "just about trying to tell people what we weren't", and that the writers had a better understanding of the characters by season two and could better write to their strengths.

Filming

Like The Office, Parks and Recreation was filmed with a single-camera setup in a cinéma vérité style simulating the look of an actual documentary, with no studio audience or laugh track. Within the context of the show, the characters are being filmed by a documentary crew, the members of which are never seen or heard from on-screen. The actors occasionally look at and directly address the cameras, and in some scenes directly engage the cameras in one-on-one interviews with the documentary crew members. The episodes were scripted, but the production encouraged the cast to improvise, and dialogue or performances the actors made up during filming often made the final cut of the episodes. Schur said he believes the mockumentary style is particularly fitting for a show about city government because "it's a device for showing the ways people act and behave differently when they're in public and private [and] the difference between what goes on behind closed doors and what people present to the public is a huge issue".

The Parks and Recreation producers approached each episode as if filming a real documentary. They typically shot enough for a 35 or 40-minute episode, then cut it down to 22 minutes, using the best material. Due to the improvisational acting and hand-held camerawork, a great deal of extra footage was shot that had to be discarded for the final cut; for example, the original cut of the 22-minute pilot was 48 minutes long. The producers filmed about nine pages of the script each day, a large amount by U.S. television standards.

Despite the similarities in the mockumentary style with The Office, Daniels and Schur sought to establish a slightly different tone in the camerawork of the pilot episode. The one-on-one interviews, for example, sometimes feature two separate camera angles on the same person; the footage is intercut to create the final version of the scene. This technique was inspired by The Five Obstructions, a 2003 experimental documentary directed by Lars von Trier and Jørgen Leth, which Daniels watched at the suggestion of actor Paul Schneider. Another distinction from The Office is while almost all footage from that show is filmed in a workplace setting, the documentary crew on Parks and Recreation regularly follows the characters into more intimate, non-work settings, such as on dates or at their homes. Parks and Recreation also makes frequent use of the jump cut technique. For instance, one scene in the pilot episode repeatedly jump cuts between brief clips in which Leslie seeks permission from Ron to pursue the pit project. Early in the season, editor Dean Holland developed a technique that would be used throughout the series. During a scene in "The Reporter" in which Leslie reacts to quotes read to her by the journalist, Poehler improvised several jokes, many of which were ultimately going to be cut from the episode. Holland thought they were all funny, so he created a brief montage intercutting several of the lines.

Music

The producers hired BMI as music consultants to find a theme song. With less than three weeks until the show first aired, BMI sent out a mass e-mail to a slew of composers, giving them five days to submit an entry. According to the terms of the submission request, the only compensated composer would be the winner, who would receive $7,500 in exchange for the release of all rights to NBC. The winning entry was written by Gaby Moreno and Vincent Jones. Michael Schur said this theme song was chosen because producers wanted something that would immediately make the viewer associate the music with the series and the characters. He said Moreno and Jones' song "does a really good job of explaining what the town is like. (The) credits do a really good job of establishing it's just sort of a normal, every-day town in the middle of the country." Due to its realistic mockumentary-style cinematography technique, Parks and Recreation does not use composed background music.

Several songs were written for the show to be performed by Chris Pratt's character, Andy Dwyer, and his band within the show, Mouse Rat. Pratt sings and plays guitar in the band himself, while the drums are played by Mark Rivers, the guitar by Andrew Burlinson, and the bass guitar by Alan Yang, a screenwriter with the show. Rivers also wrote most of the music performed by Mouse Rat.

Pratt and the other band members played live during filming of the episode, rather than being pre-recorded and dubbed later. One song featured in "Rock Show", called "The Pit", chronicles Andy's experience falling into a construction pit and breaking his legs. Pratt wrote "Ann", a ballad about Ann Perkins, featured in the episode "Boys' Club". Schur wrote the lyrics to "November", a song featured in "The Master Plan" about April Ludgate. In the episode "Woman of the Year", Andy claims every song he writes includes either the lyrics, "Spread your wings and fly", or "You deserve to be a champion." As a result of that joke, every Mouse Rat song featured in the series since then has included one of those two lyrics. In the episode "Telethon", Andy plays the song "Sex Hair", about how one can tell whether someone has had sex because their hair is matted. In "Li'l Sebastian", Andy performs a tribute song called "5,000 Candles in the Wind", so-called because Leslie asks him to write a song like "Candle in the Wind" by Elton John, only 5,000 times better. The song was performed by the show's cast in the 2020 reunion special.

A Mouse Rat album, The Awesome Album, was released by Dualtone Records and Entertainment 720 (a fictional company within the show, created by Tom Haverford) on vinyl, CD, cassette, and digital download on August 27, 2021. The album was announced with the release of two singles: "The Pit" (from the season 1 finale, "Rock Show") and "Two Birds Holding Hands" (from the season 3 episode, "Andy and April's Fancy Party"). The album features guest vocals from Nick Offerman as Ron Swanson and Jeff Tweedy as Scott Tanner. Pratt stated on Rob Lowe's podcast Parks and Recollection that he was not involved with the project or its promotion. On the weekly Billboard charts, The Awesome Album debuted at number 2 on Comedy Albums, number 11 on Heatseekers Albums, and number 17 on Top Album Sales.

Broadcast

Parks and Recreation was broadcast in the 8:30 pm timeslot Thursdays on NBC, in the United States, during its first two seasons, as part of the network's Comedy Night Done Right line-up. It was moved to a 9:30 pm timeslot during its third season, where it premiered as a mid-season replacement. In September 2011, the show returned to its original 8:30 pm timeslot for the fourth season. In 2012, the fifth season moved back to 9:30 pm on Thursdays.

International

In Australia, Parks and Recreation aired on Channel Seven's digital channel, 7mate. In Canada, the series was simsubbed in most areas on City. In India, it airs on Zee Café. In the Philippines, it airs on Jack TV. In South Africa, the show airs on Pay-TV operator M-Net. In the UK, the show began airing on BBC Four in 2013. The first three seasons aired on this channel before moving to Dave in the summer of 2015, starting with season 4.

Syndication

In March 2011, Universal Media Studios announced its intentions to sell the syndication rights to Parks and Recreation. Comedy Central, FX, and Spike were all described as possible contenders to buy the syndication rights.

Syndicated episodes have aired on multiple cable networks including NBCUniversal owned Esquire Network (after relaunching from Style) and WGN America. The pilot episode also served as the first official broadcast of FX sister network, FXX, when it launched on September 2, 2013, followed by an all-day marathon, marking the first time the NBC comedy appeared off-network. The series debuted on Comedy Central in the United States on January 21, 2019, and select episodes were available to stream on their website and app. Comedy Central has the rights to air Parks and Recreation through 2024. In June 2020, the show also began airing on IFC in the United States, which they had the rights to until 2024.

Streaming

By 2018, Parks and Recreation was available for streaming on Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video. Viewership on Hulu increased by 32% in 2017 over the previous year. According to Nielsen data, Parks and Recreation was one of the ten most-streamed shows on Netflix in 2018 based on time spent watching. Analytics from Jumpshot measured Parks and Recreation as the show with the third most views for 2018.

In September 2019, it was announced that Parks and Recreation would leave those services for Peacock, NBCUniversal's then-forthcoming streaming service, in October 2020. Variety reported the streaming deal was worth nine figures. A limited number of rotating episodes were also available through the Comedy Central app and website.

2020 special episode

In April 2020, amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, NBC announced they would air a new, special episode of the series, centered on Leslie trying to stay connected with the other current and former residents of Pawnee during social distancing. The series' cast returned for the special, which benefited Feeding America's COVID-19 response. The special episode aired on April 30, 2020.

According to Schur, the special took about three weeks to complete. Morgan Sackett, who previously directed episodes of the series, was asked to direct, and many of the original writers on the series (including Megan Amram, Dave King, Joe Mande, Aisha Muharrar, Matt Murray, and Jen Statsky) created the script in three days. The cast members were sent camera rigs and iPhones to record their parts, taking four days to do so. The visual effects team from the series The Good Place (also created by Schur) provided visual effects on the special to help "make it look like not everyone was just sitting alone in their houses staring at their computers".

Reception

Critical response

The first season of Parks and Recreation started to receive criticism before the premiere episode aired. According to a March 18, 2009, report that was leaked to writer Nikki Finke, focus groups responded poorly to a rough-cut version of the pilot. Many focus group members felt the show was a "carbon copy" of The Office. Some found it predictable, slow-paced, and lacking in character development; others said the show lacked strong male characters, particularly a "datable" lead. Schur insisted the pilot had been completely re-edited at least four times since the focus groups described in the report were held. Nevertheless, the early feedback left many critics and industry observers skeptical about the show's chances of success.

After it aired, the first season received mixed-to-positive reviews; it holds a Metacritic score of 58 out of 100. Many critics said the series was too similar to The Office, and several commentators said Knope too closely resembled Michael Scott, the dimwitted protagonist of The Office. Some critics said the show's characters and overall tone were too mean-spirited in the early episodes, and although reviewers praised various cast members in individual episodes, some said the supporting characters in general needed to be more fully developed and provided with better material. The season finale "Rock Show" received far better reviews, with several commentators declaring that Parks and Recreation had finally found the right tone both generally and for the Leslie Knope character in particular.

Season two was better received and holds a Metacritic score of 71 out 100, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Several publications declared it among the best shows of 2009 including the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, Time, Entertainment Weekly, GQ, New York magazine, The Star-Ledger, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Paste magazine, IGN, and TV Squad. Several reviewers called the second season one of the most impressive comebacks in television history. Some reviewers said the supporting cast was now working with better material and that Amy Poehler's character had improved and become less over-the-top and more human than in the first season. Others praised the decision to drop subplots from season one that risked becoming stale, like Leslie's long-standing crush on Mark, as well as the decision to fill in the pit during the second season, which some commentators said freed the show up for more stories and better scripts.

Positive reception continued into the third season, which holds a Metacritic score of 83 out of 100, indicating "universal acclaim". Steve Heisler of The A.V. Club said although he considered Parks and Recreation the funniest sitcom on television during its second season, "it somehow got even better" during the third. Henry Hanks of CNN called it "a near-flawless season". In TIME magazine's 2012 year-end top 10 lists, Parks and Recreation was named the top TV series.

Cultural and political impact

In 2019, Parks and Recreation was ranked 54th on The Guardian's list of the 100 best TV shows of the 21st century. Vox and the Rolling Stone both named Parks and Recreation as the television show that "defined" the cultural zeitgeist of the Obama Presidency.

Alan Sepinwall wrote in Rolling Stone:

Few series in recent memory have been as clearly tied to a moment—and, specifically, a presidential administration—as Parks and Rec. The show's belief in the power of government to make people's lives better—and, more broadly, in the obligation members of a community (be they friends, family, or, as Ron Swanson once put it, "workplace proximity associates") have to help one another in times of need—made it the standard-bearer for the hopefulness of the Obama era.

The conservative political magazine National Review argued:

Even television shows that are legitimately funny, such as NBC's Parks and Recreation, are designed to flatter the sensibilities of those in charge. In Parks and Rec, self-proclaimed nerds and wonks have adopted liberal bureaucratic functionary and occasional elected official Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) as one of their own. Her overeager chirpiness and her constant ability to one-up her hyper-libertarian boss mark her as a role model for those who believe that government is a force for good rather than a necessary evil.

U.S. News & World Report commented on the series finale:

Parks and Recreation never lost the Obama-like belief in government powered by goodwill and consensus. But the obstructionism of the Obama years made this vision seem fantastical, stoking a desire for hardheaded partisans who would get things done.

Time magazine's television critic James Poniewozik argued:

Parks became network TV's best and brightest sitcom by embodying the slogan that all politics is local....But there's a big idea in Parks' small-scale vision. In the frame of today's politics, it might be a liberal notion, but it's one that for much of the 20th century was centrist, and even championed by Republicans like park lover Teddy Roosevelt: that we need government to do things the private sector can't or won't, like preserving public spaces.... Parks argues not only that we need our neighbors' help but that helping makes us better ourselves; it's in the small-town, populist tradition of Friday Night Lights and It's a Wonderful Life.

Ratings

Parks and Recreation struggled in the Nielsen ratings throughout its entire run on NBC. The series premiere was seen by 6.88 million viewers, which media outlets described as a strong opening, comparable to the average Nielsen ratings for 30 Rock, another Thursday-night show on NBC. Viewership declined every week over the rest of the season, culminating in a season low of 4.29 million viewers for the final episode. Parks and Recreation ended the first season with an overall average rating of 5.97 million viewers, ranking 94th in a list of 193 network shows for the 2008–09 television season. Low viewership presented a greater challenge for Parks and Recreation because NBC now trailed CBS, ABC, and Fox in the ratings, and the move of comedian Jay Leno from The Tonight Show to a variety show in NBC's 10:00 pm weeknight slot left less room on the network's primetime schedule. At the end of the season, members of the cast and crew were stressed because they did not know whether the show would be renewed.

Although Parks and Recreation achieved critical success during the second season, the show continued to suffer in the ratings. By December 2009, the average episode viewership was 5.3 million viewers, which was lower than the average ratings for other Thursday-night NBC comedy shows like Community's 6.5 million viewers, 30 Rock's 7.3 million, and The Office's 10.1 million. For the overall second season, Parks and Recreation had an overall average viewership of 4.6 million viewers, making it the 108th ranked network series for the 2009–10 season. The poor ratings continued into the third season, which ended with an overall average rating of 5.1 million viewers, the 116th ranked network series of the 2010–11 television season. Michael Schur partially attributed the continually low viewership to a decline in ratings for NBC in general, as well as changing viewer trends due to a large number of available channels.

Despite the generally low ratings, Parks and Recreation was renewed for a sixth season on May 9, 2013. NBC had a financial incentive to continue the series, as it owns the distribution rights via its NBCUniversal Television Distribution company: the sixth season put the series over the 100 episodes milestone, making it more viable for syndication.

Accolades

In 2010, Amy Poehler was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for her work in the second season. Also that year, Parks and Recreation was nominated for the Television Critics Association Award for Outstanding Achievement in Comedy and Individual Achievement in Comedy for Nick Offerman for his work in the second season. The second-season premiere episode, "Pawnee Zoo", won the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Individual Episode (in a Series without a Regular LGBT Character). Also in 2010, Parks and Recreation received two nominations from Entertainment Weekly's EWwy Awards: Best Comedy Series and Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for Offerman.

In 2011, Parks and Recreation was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series and Amy Poehler received her second Emmy nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series. In June 2011, Parks and Recreation was nominated for three awards for the inaugural Critics' Choice Television Awards: Best Comedy Series, Best Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for Poehler, and Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for Nick Offerman. Also that month, Parks and Recreation was nominated for four TCA Awards: Program of the Year, Outstanding Achievement in Comedy, and Individual Achievement in Comedy for Offerman and Poehler. Offerman hosted the TCA Awards ceremony that year. In 2012, the series received a Peabody Award. In January 2014, Poehler won her first Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Television Series Comedy.

Home media

The first season of Parks and Recreation was released on DVD in region 1 on September 8, 2009. The DVD included all six episodes, as well as an "Extended Producer's Cut" of the season finale, "Rock Show". The disc also included cast and crew commentary tracks for each episode, as well as about 30 minutes of deleted scenes. The second season was released in a four-disc set in region 1 on November 30, 2010. They included extended episodes for "The Master Plan" and "Freddy Spaghetti", as well as two-and-a-half hours of deleted scenes, a third season preview, and additional video clips. Audio commentaries were recorded for the episodes "Sister City", "Ron and Tammy", "Hunting Trip", "Woman of the Year", "The Master Plan" and "Freddy Spaghetti". The Blu-ray version of the complete series was released from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment on June 15, 2021.

Potential revival

In March 2019, during the tenth anniversary reunion at PaleyFest, the cast confirmed they would return for a revival of the series, if series creator Michael Schur "came up with an original, new idea". Schur stated, "I would never ever say never. The chance to do it again, should it arise, would be incredible, but we would only do it if we all felt like there was something compelling us to do it. If one single person said no, we wouldn't do it."

Special

In April 2020, the cast reprised their roles for a special episode that was created during the COVID-19 pandemic. It first aired on NBC and raised funds for Feeding America.