Michael Herbert^[1] Schur (born October 29, 1975) is an American television producer and writer, best known for his work on the NBC comedy series The Office and Parks and Recreation, the latter of which he co-created along with Greg Daniels. Schur is also known for his small role on The Office as Mose Schrute, the cousin of Dwight Schrute, who is played by Rainn Wilson.

Biography[link]

Michael Schur said he first became interested in comedy when he was 11 years old, when he read Without Feathers, a 1975 collection of humorous essays by Woody Allen. Schur said he found the book on his father's bookshelf and stayed up reading it until 4 a.m.^[2]

Schur wrote for six seasons on NBC's Saturday Night Live until 2004. Soon after, he became producer and writer for The Office on NBC, for which he has written ten episodes so far. He is a graduate of William H. Hall High School in West Hartford, Connecticut and of Harvard University (class of 1997) where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa and was a member of the Harvard Lampoon. He is married to Jennifer Philbin, who was formerly a writer on The O.C. and is television star Regis Philbin's daughter. Their first child, son William Xavier Schur, was born on Feb 18, 2008. His middle name, Xavier, is in honor of Regis Philbin's confirmation name. At 7:54 p.m., on July 14, 2010, Jennifer Philbin gave birth to a daughter, Ivy Elizabeth, in California. Schur appeared on The Office as Dwight's cousin Mose in the episodes "Initiation," in which Dwight takes Ryan to his beet farm, "Money," in which Jim and Pam spend a night at the farm, "The Deposition", "Koi Pond", and "Counseling." He also co-wrote The Office: The Accountants webisodes with Paul Lieberstein.

Schur also wrote for "Fire Joe Morgan", a sports journalism blog, under the pseudonym "Ken Tremendous."^[3] Schur resurrected the pen name on March 31, 2011, when he began writing for SBNation's Baseball Nation site. Ken Tremendous is also Schur's Twitter username.

In April 2008, Schur and Greg Daniels started working on a pilot for Parks and Recreation as a proposed spin off of The Office. Over time, Schur realized Parks and Recreation would work better as a show if they made it separate from The Office. While Parks and Recreation received negative reviews in its first season, it received critical acclaim in the second much like The Office.^{[citation needed]}

Schur collaborated with The Decemberists on their music video for Calamity Song from the album The King Is Dead.^[4]

Episodes written[link]

[edit] The Office

1. "The Alliance" (April 12, 2005) – Season 1
2. "Office Olympics" (October 4, 2005) – Season 2
3. "Christmas Party" (December 6, 2005) – Season 2
4. "Valentine's Day" (February 9, 2006) – Season 2
5. "Branch Closing" (November 9, 2006) – Season 3
6. "Traveling Salesmen" co-written with Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky (January 11, 2007) – Season 3
7. "The Return" co-written with Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky (January 18, 2007) – Season 3
8. "The Negotiation" (April 5, 2007) – Season 3
9. "The Job" co-written with Paul Lieberstein (May 17, 2007) – Season 3
10. "Dunder Mifflin Infinity" (October 4, 2007) – Season 4

[edit] Parks and Recreation

• "Pilot" – Season 1
• "Greg Pikitis" – Season 2
• "Christmas Scandal" – Season 2
• "Galentine's Day" – Season 2
• "The Master Plan" – Season 2
• "Time Capsule" – Season 3
• "End of the World" – Season 4

Episodes directed[link]

[edit] Parks and Recreation

• "Rock Show" – Season 1
• "Sister City" – Season 2
• "Time Capsule" – Season 3

References[link]

1. ^ "Jennifer Philbin and Michael Schur". The New York Times. The New York Times Company. 2005-10-09. http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/09/fashion/weddings/09phil.html. Retrieved 2008-09-15. 
2. ^ Martin, Denise (2009-11-18). "Making bureaucracy work: How NBC's "Parks and Recreation" overcame bad buzz". Los Angeles Times (Los Angeles, California). http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2009/11/parks-and-recreation.html. Retrieved 2009-12-06. 
3. ^ Fire Joe Morgan: About Us
4. ^ Carlin, Shannon (2011-08-22). "First Watch: The Decemberists, 'Calamity Song'". NPR. https://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/2011/08/22/139033489/first-watch-the-decemberists-calamity-song. Retrieved 2011-08-23. 

External links[link]

• Michael Schur at the Internet Movie Database
• Michael Schur on Twitter
• Fire Joe Morgan
• Interview with Michael Schur
• Where are they now? Interview About His Public Schooling

April Ludgate-Dwyer (formerly April Roberta Ludgate)^[1][2] is a fictional character in the NBC comedy Parks and Recreation. She is an apathetic college student employed by the Pawnee Department of Parks and Recreation as Ron Swanson's assistant. She is married to Andy Dwyer. She is portrayed by Aubrey Plaza. The character has gained popularity for her deadpan-style comedy and witty one-liners.

Background[link]

April Ludgate is a college student who starts out working as an intern in the Pawnee parks and recreation department. April is extremely uninterested in the job, regularly napping at her desk and texting constantly, and acts very dry and sarcastic around her co-workers. She was assigned the internship because she overslept on intern sign-up date, which she blamed on her sister Natalie for not waking her up. ^[3][4] April is of mixed English and Puerto Rican descent, and she speaks and understands Spanish fairly well as a result. April claims of her Puerto Rican heritage, "That's why I'm so lively and colorful." ^[5]

April was responsible for uploading the staff bios onto the Pawnee parks and recreation site,^[6] and she jokingly made a fictional bio for herself that reads as follows:

April Ludgate was born in Björk’s house in Iceland and grew up on Easter Island, where her parents were giant stone heads. She has the ability to fire beams of tacos out of her hands and she can turn her legs into tigers. On Sundays, April enjoys reading Family Circus and traveling through time. Her favorite color is greenish-transparent and her favorite movie is the one you just watched. April is in charge of uploading the staff bios to the website, and no one has checked over her work.^[6]

Storyline[link]

Season one[link]

April starts as an intern at the parks department who is somewhat rebellious and is often annoyed by her fellow parks department workers. Her boyfriend, for the first two seasons, was Derek, who is openly gay and simultaneously dates a fellow college student named Ben, whom April dislikes. (Aubrey Plaza herself came up with the idea of her character's boyfriend being gay and dating another man.)^[7]

Season two[link]

Although still dating her gay boyfriend, April begins to develop a crush on Andy Dwyer (who works at city hall), the ex-boyfriend of Ann Perkins.^[8] Andy is able to make April smile, which is something she rarely does.^[9] April flirts with Andy and even convinces Andy to let her give him hickeys on his neck in order to make Ann jealous, but Andy nevertheless remains unaware of her feelings toward him.^[10] In order to remain close to Andy, April volunteers to work as Ron's assistant, ending her time as an intern and establishing a full-time position at the Pawnee town hall.^[11] April finally breaks up with Derek after he makes fun of Andy and gives her a hard time about spending too much time with him.^[12] Toward the end of the season Andy and April's relationship begins to grow to the point that he begins to reciprocate her feelings but their age difference continues to be a wedge between them. They admit their mutual attraction to each other in the season finale, but she tells him she does not want to get involved with him due to what she perceives as his lasting feelings for Ann. She changes her mind after he gets into a car accident and the two kiss for the first time, but she leaves abruptly after he reveals Ann kissed him.

Season three[link]

April traveled to Venezuela between seasons but has returned to Pawnee to continue her job at the Parks Dept. and has a new Spanish-speaking Venezuelan boyfriend, Eduardo. April eventually loses interest in and breaks up with Eduardo after he becomes friends with Andy. Andy and April decide to get married in "Fancy Party" after only one month of dating. Andy had proposed to April the day before the party asking, "What if we got married tomorrow?" to which April replied, "Fine." They were married at their dinner party (which was actually a surprise ceremony) in front of their friends and family.^[1][13] With a great deal of help from new housemate Ben Wyatt they have learned, to a limited extent, how to live and act like working adults.

Season four[link]

April and Andy throw a Halloween Party at which Ron and Ann go around fixing all of the problems in her and Andy's house. She becomes a member of Leslie's Campaign as the "youth outreach". April takes over a large portion of Leslie's duties in the Parks and Rec department towards the end of the season to allow Leslie to concentrate on the election. April is shown to somewhat enjoy and excel in this position. In "Bus Tour", April becomes legally known as April Ludgate-Dwyer.

Development[link]

The role of April Ludgate was written specifically for Aubrey Plaza. Upon meeting the actress, Parks and Recreation casting director Allison Jones contacted series co-creator Michael Schur and said, "I just met the weirdest girl I’ve ever met in my life. You have to meet her and put her on your show."^[14] Schur said he met with her and was taken so off-guard by her quiet and deadpan personality that he felt incredibly awkward and uncomfortable, spending the whole meeting trying to keep her entertained. Schur said that from that meeting on, he and fellow co-creator Greg Daniels knew they wanted to cast her on the show.^[14][15] When the scripts for Parks and Recreation were first written, the character was referred to simply as "Aubrey".^[15]

References[link]

Amy Poehler
Poehler at the 71st Annual Peabody Awards Luncheon 2012.
Born	Amy Meredith Poehler (1971-09-16) September 16, 1971 (age 40) Newton, Massachusetts, U.S.
Occupation	Actress, comedian, writer, producer
Years active	1995–present
Spouse	Will Arnett (2003–present; 2 children)

Amy Meredith Poehler  /ˈpoʊlər/ (born September 16, 1971) is an American actress, comedienne, producer and writer. She was a cast member on the NBC television entertainment show Saturday Night Live from 2001 to 2008. In 2004, she had a minor role in the film Mean Girls with Tina Fey, with whom she worked again in Baby Mama in 2008. She is currently the lead of NBC's comedy Parks and Recreation. She has been nominated twice for both the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance on Saturday Night Live, and for the Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series for her performance in Parks & Recreation. For the latter series she also received a 2012 Golden Globe Award nomination.

Early life[link]

Poehler was born in Newton, Massachusetts, and grew up in Burlington, Massachusetts. She is the daughter of Eileen Frances (née Milmore) and William Grinstead Poehler, both teachers.^[1] She is a distant cousin of author Stephen King and U.S. senator Scott Brown, through shared New England ancestry.^[2][3][4] Poehler was raised Catholic.^[1]

A 1993 graduate of Boston College, Poehler was a member of America's oldest collegiate improv comedy troupe, "My Mother's Fleabag."^[1] After graduating from college, Poehler moved to Chicago, where she studied improvisational theatre at Second City, with friend and future co-star Tina Fey.^[1] She also studied with Del Close at ImprovOlympic, going on to become part of the touring company as well as teaching classes at IO.^{[citation needed]}

Career[link]

[edit] Upright Citizens Brigade

During her time at Second City and Improv Olympic in Chicago, Poehler studied under Del Close and Charna Halpern along with Matt Besser, where they were part of the original improv team called the Upright Citizens Brigade.^{[citation needed]} While the group initially consisted of many members (including Horatio Sanz, Adam McKay, Rick Roman, and Neil Flynn), Poehler quickly became part of the group along with Matt Walsh. The two, along with Besser and Ian Roberts, performed sketch and improv around Chicago before moving to New York in 1996.^[1] Immediately after moving to New York, the group quickly scored a TV gig,^{[citation needed]} appearing as sketch regulars on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

In 1998, Comedy Central debuted the group's eponymous half-hour sketch comedy series.^{[citation needed]} During the show's second season, the group opened an Improv theatre and training center in New York City at 161 W. 22nd Street, occupying the space of a former strip club.^{[citation needed]} The UCB theatre held shows seven nights a week in addition to offering classes in sketch comedy writing and improv.^[1]

In the summer of 2000, Comedy Central canceled the Upright Citizens Brigade program after its third season, though the UCB Theatre continues to operate.^{[citation needed]} The foursome continue to work together in many projects, and frequently perform together in live improv shows at their comedy theatres in NY and LA.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Saturday Night Live

Poehler joined the cast of SNL during the 2001–02 season, her debut episode being the first one produced after the 9/11 attacks – with host Reese Witherspoon, musical guest Alicia Keys, and New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani as a special guest.^{[citation needed]} Poehler was promoted from featured player to full cast member in her first season on the show, making her only the third person to have earned this distinction (after Harry Shearer and Eddie Murphy).^[5]

Beginning with the 2004–05 season, she co-anchored "Weekend Update" with Tina Fey, replacing the newly departed Jimmy Fallon. In a TV Guide interview, Fey said that with Poehler co-anchoring, there now is "double the sexual tension." When Fey left after the 2005–06 season to devote time to the sitcom she created, 30 Rock, Seth Meyers joined Poehler at the anchor desk. Poehler was nominated for a 2008 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress – Comedy Series,^[6] the first SNL cast member recognized in this category.^{[citation needed]} She was heavily favored to win by many critics, but ultimately lost to Jean Smart. She was nominated once again in 2009, but lost to Kristin Chenoweth. On September 13, 2008, the SNL season premiere opened with Fey and Poehler as Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton, respectively, performing a "joint political campaign spot."