19 Behind-The-Scenes Facts About "Shrinking," The Can't-Miss New Dramedy Starring Jason Segel And Harrison Ford
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In January 2023, Apple TV+ debuted Shrinking, a comedy-drama show that centers on Jimmy (Jason Segel), a therapist who decides to test out a radical work technique — total honesty — as he treats patients while grieving the death of his wife.
Warner Bros. Television / Via giphy.com
The series was created by Jason, Ted Lasso creator Bill Lawrence, and Ted Lasso star Brett Goldstein. It also features a powerhouse cast including Harrison Ford, Jessica Williams, Lukita Maxwell, Michael Urie, Luke Tennie, Christa Miller, and more.
So far, the show is thought-provoking, heartfelt, moving, and hilarious. Here are 19 interesting facts behind the making of Shrinking.
🚨Warning: Spoilers ahead!🚨
1.The plot of Shrinking emerged from a mix of TV show concepts by Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein.
Lawrence told the Hollywood Reporter in January 2023 that he pitched a show to Warner Bros. TV years ago partly inspired by his neighbor's experience of tragically losing loved ones in a car accident. Goldstein, meanwhile, had been thinking about creating a TV series that included the theme of grief but was "much darker" than Lawrence's pitch. They then merged their ideas to make Shrinking.
"My idea started with that moment [the accident], then tonally got much lighter, and [Goldstein's] idea started in a more neutral place and got much darker, and we kind of smushed them together," Lawrence said.
2.Jason Segel considers Shrinking to feature "the grown-up version of" the vulnerability he showed in Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
Segel said to the Hollywood Reporter that he found the concept for Shrinking to be "a beautiful mix of drama and comedy," which piqued his interest since his "favorite form of comedy" is "making people laugh through tragedy." In exploring the complexities of Jimmy's life amid his state of grief, Segel is able to give a more mature portrayal of "raw vulnerability" on screen.
"Even Forgetting Sarah Marshall, which I did when I was 25, was [about something] as dramatic as you might go through at that age, which is losing your girlfriend," Jason said. "Full-frontal nudity was the best I could do at raw vulnerability back then. This is the grown-up version of that."
3.Harrison Ford took a fashion cue from Jason on set.
When he stopped by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert in January 2023, Jason shared that he decided to begin sporting jumpsuits upon his arrivals to the set of Shrinking. The first day he wore a jumpsuit to work, he got there 30 minutes early so no one would see his outfit since he was "kind of chicken" about wearing it. To Jason's surprise, Harrison, who plays a senior therapist named Paul, happened to be waiting by Jason's trailer that morning to go through their lines together.
"[Harrison's] talking to me...and he kept eyeballing my jumpsuit. I saw it," Jason said before adding, "I felt really embarrassed, like I had been a little emasculated or something by Harrison Ford. And then, the next day I showed up for rehearsal, and this happened."
Stephen then showed a photo of Jason and Harrison posing side by side and rocking similar jumpsuits together.
"[Harrison] went and got a hot pink jumpsuit and was like, 'I'm with you, man. You and me, we're in this together,'" Jason said. "So now, we're best friends."
4.The cast got a chance to bond at the start of filming.
Shrinking cast and crew members spent time hanging out together in Pasadena for the first two weeks on location, during which the sets for the show were being constructed, Christa Miller told the Mary Sue in February 2023. As the group faced rain delays, they got to learn everyone's "personality quirks," which made for a smoother production.
"... And it was like being in theater camp, you know, everyone was kind of able to break it down, and a lot of the other writers were there, too," Miller said. "[We were] able to figure out personality quirks and how everyone has a kind of a slightly different sense of humor. And I think that was really helpful. You don’t always have that time before a show.”
5.Jessica Williams "brought a lot of [her] personal experiences" to her character, Gabby.
Williams revealed that from the beginning of her involvement in the project that Lawrence, Segel, Goldstein, and executive producer Neil Goldman sought out her input when building the character Gabby. This led to Jessica working directly with writers and ad-libbing as she called on her "personal experiences" to embody Gabby, who is a therapist and coworker of Jimmy's.
" ... They wanted to write the character of Gabby to the actress that played her," Jessica said to JoBlo Celebrity Interviews in January 2023. "So, they made it very clear early on that they were very open to collaboration and figuring her out together. I was invited to writers' rooms, the writers would pick my brain to see what I wanted to bring to Gabby, and I was also allowed to improvise a lot on set, which was really fun. So, I brought a lot of my personal experiences to her and just tried to make sure that in between action and cut, I was as present as possible because I think she's a very physical, very present person."
6.Michael Urie and Devin Kawaoka, who play a couple on the show, are friends off set.
Kawaoka told Tell-Tale TV in February 2023 that he and Urie, who play boyfriends and friends of Jimmy in Shrinking, are friends off screen. In addition, Kawaoka initially tried out for Urie's role, Brian, but instead scored the part of Charlie.
"I actually originally auditioned for Michael Urie’s character — for Brian," Devin said. "Michael and I are friends from New York City. We sort of have the same circle of friends. My best friend is his partner’s best friend, and we had actually, during the pandemic, played Mafia together over Zoom for about a year."
He added, “It was really exciting just to have a friend on set like that. Michael is just one of the kindest people, so present in his everyday life, and to get to sit there with him and chitchat while we were waiting for them to turn the scene or whatever is just such a pleasure.”
7.Acting in Shrinking inspired Michael Urie to start his own therapy journey.
"I began therapy because of this show," Urie said on Good Morning America in February 2023 while discussing Shrinking. He added, "I was reading the scripts and thinking, 'I don't know enough about this. I need to learn more, and I need to get in touch with my own mental health and treat myself a little bit better.' And so, I started therapy, and it's been fantastic. ... I can't believe I didn't do it sooner."
8.After reviewing the first episode of Shrinking, Harrison Ford told Brett Goldstein it was the "best script [he's] ever read."
Ford offered high praise to Goldstein.
"I walked in, and [Ford] said, 'Best script I’ve ever read,'" Goldstein told Variety in January 2023 when revisiting a meeting he'd had with Harrison in London regarding Shrinking. "I saw a bunch of scripts on his table, and I thought, 'He thinks I’m someone else. There are loads of scripts here. This is embarrassing.'"
As the pair continued to converse about the show, it became clear to Goldstein that Ford's positive feedback was, in fact, meant for him and the other creatives behind Shrinking.
"[Ford] went, 'Best dialogue I’ve ever read,'" Goldstein said. "I said, 'You want to do it then?' He said, 'Yeah. Let’s eat.' We had dinner. We talked about the character. He cared about how his character dressed, how he fit in the story."
9.Harrison Ford's character is based on a real-life therapist.
Segel has noted that Lawrence modeled Ford's character after a therapist he's familiar with, and Ford also threw in "his own voice" as well.
"Harrison's character is based on a real therapist who Bill knows, and I think that that voice is where it started," Segel said to Jonatan Blomberg of MovieZine.se in January 2023. "And then, I think Harrison injected his own voice very quickly."
10.Jason Segel wants Brett Goldstein to act in future Shrinking episodes if the show gets more seasons.
"I really want [Brett] to be in it," Segel told the Hollywood Reporter in his interview alongside Goldstein and Lawrence. "If we get future seasons, I really want that."
The Ted Lasso actor confirmed that he'd be interested in joining the Shrinking cast lineup.
"Yes. Of course. I’d love to play with these people," Goldstein said when asked for a response to this suggestion.
11.Harrison Ford revisited a past performance of Jason Segel's before filming Shrinking and was impressed with what he saw.
During a February 2023 visit toThe Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Ford refuted a headline stating that he didn't know who Segel was before starring with him on Shrinking as "not true."
"I knew who [Segel] was. I had seen a couple of films that he was in," Ford said. "I had seen at least some of ... Forgetting Sarah Marshall."
Furthermore, Ford said he'd enjoyed another movie of Segel's, The End of the Tour, and called him "a very talented guy." Prior to starting Shrinking, Ford decided to rewatch Forgetting Sarah Marshall, in which Segel has a scene with full-frontal nudity. The Indiana Jones star then gave a hilarious, NSFW review of the film to a Shrinking producer.
"The producer asked me what I thought, and I said, 'Nice penis,'" Ford said to Colbert.
12.Creator Bill Lawrence and actor Christa Miller are married in real life.
Lawrence and Miller, who plays Jimmy's neighbor, Liz, in Shrinking, have been married since 1999. The couple previously collaborated on Scrubs and Cougar Town.
13.Actual therapists were consulted when writing Shrinking.
Whereas therapists in films and shows often offer a chance to gain insight on other lead characters, Lawrence wanted to focus on the personal lives of the therapists depicted in Shrinking "to hopefully destigmatize and humanize that profession." Part of this process consisted of reaching out to real-life therapists to maintain credibility.
"We got a lot of shrink advisors that made sure that we weren't being inauthentic," Lawrence shared with JoBlo Celebrity Interviews in January 2023.
14.Harrison Ford and Lukita Maxwell's improvisations continued after the end of their scenes.
Maxwell referred to Ford as the "most incredible scene partner" while talking to the Hollywood Reporter in January 2023 about taking on the part of Alice, Jimmy's daughter. At times, Maxwell and Ford would keep on ad-libbing long past the close of their scenes together.
"The energy was constantly oscillating between us," Maxwell said. "We would go into this improv that sometimes lasted five minutes after a take."
15.Jessica Williams chose the music she and Harrison Ford sing together while their characters carpool.
William's and Ford's characters, Gabby and Paul, are colleagues who begin to carpool together, with Gabby driving them to work. They sing along to music during these drives, and one track they belt out is "Every Morning" by Sugar Ray. Williams said to JoBlo Celebrity Interviews that singing with Ford "has gotta be in one of the top five moments of [her] life, ever." She also revealed at the January 2023 Los Angeles premiere of Shrinking that she was the person behind this music selection.
"I got to sing a lot of songs I really liked on the show, ‘Story of a Girl,’ lots of Sugar Ray. I think Gabby and I definitely have that in common," Williams told Vulture. "Literally, the music in the show that I got to sing with Harrison in the car, I got to choose."
16.An accessory of Harrison Ford's was, at times, incorporated into his character's attire.
"Harrison showed up on the first day of work...it was a scene inside the therapist's office, he was wearing a big hat," Lawrence told reporter Paul McGuire Grimes of Twin Cities Live in January 2023.
He went on to detail how he and other crew members didn't want Ford to keep the hat on during this scene. So, the group "huddled up" to figure out who should be the one to voice this to the actor. Lawrence was the person who broke the news to Ford, and the two figured out a compromise.
"I was the one. I went and said, 'Uh, dude, you can't wear the hat for a scene inside.' And [Ford's] like, 'Well, I'm gonna wear the hat sometimes.' It was like a negotiation," Lawrence said. "And I'm like, 'Any time you're outside giving the kid [Alice] therapy, you can wear your hat.'"
Lawrence added, "Eventually, we got close enough that, toward the end of the year, we start openly mocking the hat."
17.Luke Tennie communicated with sources who have firsthand knowledge of his character's diagnosis to portray Sean as accurately as possible.
Tennie's character, Sean, is a military veteran who has been diagnosed with PTSD and goes to Jimmy for treatment. After he earned the role, Tennie "did [his] homework" to ensure that he "held [his] own" and did the part justice, he said in a January 2023 CBS 8 San Diego interview.
"What I did was I asked people — I asked people who served, people who may have struggled with that diagnosis or knew people who did, got some perspectives together and tried to pull from that as opposed to just doing some online research," Tennie said.
18.The writers purposely threw in some curveballs for viewers.
At the end of the first episode of Shrinking, Jimmy attends Alice's soccer game, and it appears that a positive conclusion will be reached. Soon, however, this mood shifts when the husband of a patient of Jimmy's attacks Jimmy on the sidelines. This is done in retaliation for Jimmy encouraging the man's wife to leave him. Lawrence was asked if this plot twist was intentionally added to make the show feel more true to life in his talk with Alex Maidy of JoBlo Celebrity Interviews.
"The discussion was, 'Are people really that savvy as TV viewers yet?' ... We're hoping that, even subconsciously, people expect things to be neat and tidy, and then, they get gut-punched a little bit," Lawrence said in response. "So yes, it was with tremendous intent."
19.Lastly, one aim of Shrinking is to demonstrate that people can find wellness in their lives through offering help to others.
Segel chatted with E! News in January 2023 and spoke about how viewers are introduced to Jimmy when he's "at rock bottom" as he tries to cope with his wife's death. He added, "We watch Jimmy, clumsily, figure out how to rebuild." Through the character's journey, audience members see that healing can be achieved as one gives support to the people around them.
"By helping others, we can somehow heal ourselves," Segel said.
Make sure to watch episodes of Shrinking on Apple TV+.
