Shrinking Renewed for Season 4 with a Bold Time Jump and Fresh Start
While the third season finale of Apple TV's Shrinking felt decidedly like a series finale, the show will indeed be back for a fourth season, with the story moving just a little bit further down the road.
"Maybe a couple years later," executive producer Neil Goldman revealed during the series' Contenders TV panel Saturday. "[Shrinking creator] Bill [Lawrence] has spoken about a little time jump...just to reset things and pick up from. So there's a little bit of re-piloting involved, but I think in a way that we'll inject some new energy into the show and people will be really interested in what has happened in between."
Tying up the dangling threads of the first three seasons seemed right, Goldman said, so both the characters and the audience could move on to mine different emotional territory. "The feeling was just that the story that we were telling initially, this three-season story, had come to a natural close," he said. "To extend it anymore might feel a little bit like we were trying to draw a little bit of water from a stone, especially with respect to the fact that Bill always makes the joke that if we came back for season four and Jimmy was still upset about his wife dying, we'd all be like, 'All right, get over it.'"
"Just narratively and storytelling wise, it felt like it was a very natural end to it," Goldman added. "And we also felt like every ending is a new beginning. And so we were confident, especially with these characters and all the ingredients we have in this show, that there were definitely more stories to tell in terms of what happens after healing. Where do you go from there?"
"Yeah, so those babies are fired," laughed Michael Urie, whose character became a father to newborn twins in the last season.
"Hard way to find out," added Goldman.
Urie reflected on one of his favorite scenes from the previous season in which his character Brian and Jason Segel's Jimmy sing the dramatic duet "The Confrontation" from Les Miserables in a car while a befuddled Harrison Ford's Paul tries to comprehend what exactly is happening. When Lawrence pitched the idea to Urie, he said, "I was like, 'Say no more. Am I Javier or am Valjean? I'm in!'
"Jason and I were giddy about it from the two weeks," he added. "We were so excited. Harrison had no idea what we were about to do. He had no idea. In the script it just said 'They sing "The Confrontation" from Le Miz.' And I don't think Harrison knows what that is...Yeah. I'm not sure Harrison's even acting in the car. He's just behaving and reacting to us and playing every human emotion too, by the way. He's nervous. We're going to crash. He's concerned about what's wrong with us. He's delighted at one point."
"He loves to be surprised," Urie said of Ford. " And if you look at his work, that's one of his greatest qualities is he always seems like he's experienced something for the first time, whether it's punching a Nazi or navigating Melanie Griffith in Working Girl. It's always like, 'What is this life?' He's such a curious guy."
Shrinking is produced for Apple TV by Warner Bros. Television, where Lawrence and Goldstein are under overall deals along with Lawrence's Doozer Productions. Lawrence, Segel, Goldstein, Neil Goldman, James Ponsoldt, Jeff Ingold, Liza Katzer, Randall Winston, Rachna Fruchbom, Brian Gallivan, Ashley Nicole Black and Bill Posley executive produce.
