'HSMTMTS' Creator Tim Federle Says the End Credits Scene Is the 'Grace Note of the Whole Series' (Exclusive)
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
"The show is so self-referential," Federle tells PEOPLE about a poignant moment at the end of the season 4 featuring a beloved song from the musical 'Wicked'
Fred Hayes/Disney
Warning: This post contains spoilers from the final season of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.
High School Musical: The Musical: The Series ended on the perfect note.
In the show’s fourth and final season, the East High students prepare to put on a stage production of High School Musical 3: Senior Year, only to have their plans derailed when it was announced that Disney was making the long-awaited High School Musical 4: The Reunion movie at their high school, and they'd all be playing featured extras.
With numerous nostalgic moments and meta references, the show went back to its roots in many ways this season — right down to the final scene.
After an eventful night at East High, where the students put on their production of High School Musical 3: Senior Year and Gina (Sofia Wylie) took on the lead of a big movie production, the drama club loaded into a stretch limo for one last hurrah.
As they performed “Born to Be Brave” from the first season, the last scene showed the characters pulling up to Denny’s for the afterparty — a scene creator Tim Federle tells PEOPLE is a major callback to the season 1 finale.
Natalie Cass/Disney
“There's a moment that's very subtle in the [series] finale after [Larry Saperstein's Big Red] says, ‘What do theater kids do on opening night?’ And Ricky [Joshua Bassett] smiles and looks off and says, ‘I have an idea,’” Federle recalls. “For people who really know the show, they'll remember that in episode 110, [Ricky] says [to Nini], ‘What do we do now?’ And she says, ‘Usually, the theater kids cry and then we go to Denny's.’”
“He'll always take Nini with him,” Federle adds of the nod to Olivia Rodrigo's character, who left the show at the end of season 3. “Gina will always take EJ [Matt Cornett] with her. These relationships are so important. Even if they're not marriage or the person you have kids with, they inform who you are.”
Though Federle jokes that getting Denny’s to approve that final shot included a lot of “logistics,” he was always adamant about that being the final scene. “That was the most difficult shot of the entire series,” he says. "I was like, ‘It has to be Denny's. That is the theater kid thing.’”
He adds, "My not-quite-subliminal message to the cast has always been, ‘No matter how famous you become, no matter how speculated about you become online and your personal lives, I hope you always go to Denny's together and just stay kids at heart. Because fame is fleeting and it's slippery, and it can be very challenging for a lot of people, particularly young people. But if you have each other's backs, you really are all in this together.’”
Related: 'HSMTMTS' Season 4: Everything to Know About the Final Season
Carell Augustus/Disney
As emotional of an ending as that was, the show didn’t end there. At the end of the credits, there was a special scene with the cast as they sing “For Good” from Wicked, which Federle reveals was the “very last thing” the cast shot together.
That scene in particular had many layers to it as it related to the show’s characters and real-life actors. In season 4, Kate Reinders’ Miss Jenn turned down a role in the touring cast of Wicked for her “role of a lifetime” as an East High teacher — but Reinders herself actually played Glinda in the 2005 Chicago production of Wicked.
“The show is so self-referential,” Federle says of the meta moment. “‘For Good’ felt like the perfect song. Then I had the music people reach out to Stephen Schwartz, and it turns out, [he] was a fan of Better Nate Than Ever, because Wicked is referenced throughout that movie. Stephen Schwartz approved it, and I, like, wept because they're shooting Wicked right now and he could have said no.”
Related: Everything to Know About the 'Wicked' Movie Starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo
Fred Hayes/Disney
Despite the scene being an emotional moment for the cast, Federle adds that “it felt like more of a celebration” in the end. “It was a final celebration moment that they got to say the truth, which is that because they knew each other, they'd been changed for good.”
“I also think as a final grace note of the whole series [it goes] back to our roots at the first table read when Disney told me, ‘Don't be crazy, don't have Josh sing live. What if his voice cracks and it all falls apart?’ I was like, ‘He's going to not let me down, I promise,’” he recalls. “In the end, Joe Serafini actually playing live and Frankie [A. Rodriguez]'s voice harmonizing with Kate, it felt like a perfect grace note to say, ‘We don't need autotune or even a drum set. They're enough.’ It's saying to the audience, ‘You are enough as long as you find your people.’”
Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from juicy celebrity news to compelling human interest stories
Season 4 of HSMTMTS is currently streaming on Disney+.
For more People news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!
Read the original article on People.
