‘Chad': Inside the 5-Year Odyssey From Failed Fox Pilot to TBS Comedy

When TBS debuts its new comedy “Chad” on Tuesday, its star and creator is probably going to have a hard time believing her eyes. “Certainly when I first had this idea and became excited about it, I didn’t expect that it would premiere exactly five years later,” Nasim Pedrad, who serves in the triple role of star, creator and showrunner on the teen comedy, told TheWrap. “It truly feels like nothing short of a miracle.” The unconventional series, which stars the “Saturday Night Live” alum, is built around a premise that you’d expect to see in a sketch on the venerated late-night comedy series. Pedrad plays Ferydoon “Chad” Amani, a Persian-American 14-year-old high school boy, complete with all the awkwardness and cringe that usually accompanies early teenhood. “I knew I loved writing about adolescence, and mine happened to be really awkward,” Pedrad, who is Iranian American, said. “But more than anything, I just had never seen a coming-of-age story where the teenager at the center of it was played by an adult who’s in on the joke.” Pedrad points out that “Chad” was developed years before Hulu’s comedy “Pen15,” which stars Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle as middle-school versions of...

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