The revival of the acclaimed comedy series Reno 911! has certainly been full of twists and turns behind the scenes. After a successful seventh season revival on the mobile streaming service Quibi, the digital platform shut down months after officially renewing Reno 911! for an eighth season. Along with much of Quibi's original library, Reno 911! Season 8 is now coming to The Roku Channel, with full 30-minute episodes and a bevy of new guest stars as the Reno Police Department deals with contemporary issues, facing heightened scrutiny over their methodology, budget, and military-grade gear.
In an exclusive interview with CBR, series creators and stars Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon, and Kerri Kenney-Silver shared how production shifted quickly as the show changed outlets. The group also explained how current events informed the writing of Reno 911! Season 8 and teased what fans can expect from the comedy series' return.
CBR: How was it getting up close and personal with Jamie Lee Curtis this season?
Kerri Kenney-Silver: The best! It is exactly how you would hope. Her breath smells great, she looks good, she gives great hugs, she's funny, and she brought us candy -- these are all the basics. I'm not kidding! She brought See's Candies for the entire crew and laid it out on a table. For future guest stars, I'm just saying it's not required but...
Robert Ben Garant: ... Jamie Lee Curtis did it!
Thomas Lennon: Four hours after she arrived on set, in a great mood and wonderful, I'm in my tiny, little underwear on her back getting a semi-nude piggyback ride around...
Kenney-Silver: ... for the TV show!
Lennon: I can't really remember why that scene happened but it was a delight to do and she's amazing.
You've always had great guest stars on Reno 911!. How was it working with "Weird Al" Yankovic again this season?
Lennon: My favorite thing about Al is that, because of who he is, the most precise person in the world, he always comes to set two or three hours early. [laughs] He's just so organized. You get there and are like, "Who's car is that? Oh, wait, Al has been here since long before the sun came."
Kenney-Silver: He's always incredible and I'm always surprised he wants to come.
Garant: He takes it super seriously, which is amazing.
Kenney-Silver: I feel like he shows up on set taking it as seriously as he would if he were doing any major project.
Coming off the Quibi years, was it hard writing for full, 30-minute episodes again going into Reno 911! Season 8?
Garant: No, it's basically a sketch show. It's really short little blasts in the editing room.
Lennon: Yeah, our stories never really take more than six or seven minutes of a show. Maybe once in a while, they do, but usually, it's a mix because we always got bored. [laughs] We're sketch people and it was always a sketch show.
Kenney-Silver: It is interesting that our show has gone, within a year, [from] us writing six-minute episodes [to] 30-minute episodes -- and we wrote a feature-length movie. I feel like the hardest is the film and the sweet spot for us is these 30-minute episodes. That's where we grew up, in 30- or 22-minute television.
Garant: We had a 12-day shoot, and Quibi went under on Day 3 of the shoot. We were all tense, but Viacom said they'd give us the money to keep going. I do think the cast lightened up a little bit when they realized these episodes might not be six minutes but full episodes. I feel like me, on set, took a little bit more time and people felt a bit less like they were going to be on a phone. You could kind of feel it.
Lennon: [We got the call about Quibi's shutdown] during Dangle's retirement scene. There was a big huddle where you guys were talking and I was sitting on a bucket with my pants off pretending to poop on camera. I noticed there was some hubbub between the two of you. [laughs]
Garant: We were looking around and every single person on the crew was reading their phones. We wondered what happened and then we realized Quibi had gone under.
Lennon: It didn't exist anymore! The thing I was filming myself pooping in a bucket for did not exist.
Kenney-Silver: We were on the phone asking if Tom should keep pooping in a bucket!
Reno 911! has always ridden the rollercoaster of public sentiment towards policy and, though it's awkward to put it in these terms, I feel like you had a lot of material to draw from for this season.
Lennon: We did! [laughs]
Garant: Unfortunately, yes! I think we did some things this year that we wouldn't have ever done before, which is we took some things off of social media and just did them. Wiegel on the phone talking about her food order getting messed up or Dangle's Angels -- the Miami Police Department just has that so we did it!
Lennon: It's weird because we've never written something so roundabout, but the Miami Police Department's Riot Quick Response Bicycle Team went viral one day and people started tagging it with #Reno911. We started watching it and were like, "Wow, this is some stupid shit!" There's a bunch of people wiping out on bicycles, so we got eleven stunt people with Dangle and we spent almost half a day wiping out on bikes. It was a really glorious time.
Garant: It was a combination of stuff where we really had to be careful and stick the landing, a lot of the jokes you had to make just right. There's also a lot of stuff, like Tom goofing off on a bike, which is pretty easy and fun. [laughs]
Kenney-Silver: Us goofing off in riots I don't think would've happened during any other season. We did one big wash in riot gear [with] a ton of jokes, and we broke it into pieces. People can watch this season for free -- you don't have to have a Roku [player]. You can watch it online, you can watch it on your smart TV or computer!
Created by Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon, and Kerri Kenney-Silver, Reno 911! Season 8 premieres Feb. 25 on The Roku Channel.