Earlier this year, we got the chance to talk with Communityâs Danny Pudi in conjunction with Speed Stickâs âHandle Itâ campaign. Fans were asked to tweet their most embarrassing stories, and the winning selection was turned into a video narrated by Pudi. The contest has now come to a close, and Pudi spoke with us again about how they settled on this particular embarrassing story as the winner and the many awkward submissions that were turned in.Additionally, with the fourth season of Community set to kick off next month, we spoke quite a bit about the new batch of episodes. Pudi teased an Inspector Spacetime convention episode, a ghost-filled Halloween episode, the appearance of Jeff Wingerâs (Joel McHale) dad, played by Josh Brolin, and gave his thoughts on the Inspector Spacetime web series. I also asked Pudi about the showâs regime change, as David Guarascio and Moses Port replaced Dan Harmon as showrunner, and he divulged his personal favorite episodes of the series thus far. Hit the jump to check out the interview.First off, hereâs the winning Handle It video narrated by Pudi:How did you come to decide upon the winner of the Handle It contest?DANNY PUDI: We started this campaign a couple of months back, we asked guys to submit their Handle It storiesâhilarious awkward moments where they managed to keep their cool under pressureâand we got a number of Tweets, a lot of really great ones, and this guyâs story was really funny so a team of judges and everyone kind of came onboard, went through them, and picked this one story which we made into a video that I narrated with my inner freakout voice. And that video goes live today on YouTube, youtube.com/speedstick. In his story, he managed to shrink his girlfriendâs clothes in the dryer and somehow he didnât get punched or violently attacked afterwards, so thatâs the winning video of the Handle It moment.Did you have a hard time picking one winner out of all the submissions?PUDI: Yeah I was actually really impressed by how many awkward stories we had, ranging from bad haircuts to one guy told us about being on the beach and he threw a Frisbee and it hit a lady in the head. His immediate reaction was to turn and he found a kid next to him and pointed to the kid, itâs those kinds of moments. I was really impressed with the volume of fun stories we got to play with. No one was a loser in this game; they were all winners (laughs).Iâm a big fan of Community. How far are you guys into the new season?PUDI: We just finished up the fifth episode, so we start shooting episode six on Monday. Itâs pretty incredible, thinking back. I feel like we just started season one, so just to have a fourth season is pretty miraculous, especially for our show after what weâve been through in the last year or so. But yeah we finished up our Halloween episode, which I think is going to air early this year, we just did an episode about an Inspector Spacetime convention, and Iâm excited for people to see what weâve been up to.Are you familiar at all with the unofficial âInspector Spacetimeâ web series?PUDI: Yeah I know Travis, the guy who plays the InspectorâI actually just ran into him. There was a âSix Seasons and a Movieâ art show in downtown Los Angeles which was all dedicated to Community fan art, which was pretty incredible, and I ran into him there. A couple of people recently told me about the web series which I think is pretty funny, but I havenât seen any of the episodes yet. I love the outpouring of fan support and I think itâs pretty cool. I know itâs still pretty early in the season, but is there anything you can tease fans about the upcoming episodes? Are there any big concept episodes coming up?PUDI: Yeah I think the big one is the Inspector Spacetime convention thus far; you get to peek into Abedâs fan world a little bit more. We have a couple of really great guest stars coming up, Malcolm McDowell, Matt Lucas from Little Britain. A big episode, I wouldnât say itâs a theme episode but itâs an important episodeâwe meet Jeff Wingerâs dad pretty early on this season which I think is significant in terms of the group and in terms of the formation of Jeff Wingerâs character, so thatâs important. My favorite episode thus far this season of the oneâs weâve shot is our Halloween episode which I think people are going to love. Great costumes, Tory and Abed definitely have a costume together, and there may or may not be ghosts in that episode. Obviously the show had a fairly significant staff change before this season began. What would you say David Guarascio and Moses Port have brought to the series as the new showrunners?PUDI: Well immediately they came in and were very adamant about âWe donât wanna change the show. We wanna preserve what makes the show great,â so for us at least, that was calming because it was sort of a wild summer with a lot of different changes and we werenât really sure what to expect. For me, Iâm a fan of the show itself as well as being on it. I love watching the show, especially when Iâm not in it so I can actually watch it (laughs), so for me there were definitely questions, âAre they gonna preserve the integrity of the show? Is the spirit of the show gonna live on?â and I think theyâve done a good job of convincing us that thatâs what they wanna do. In terms of the rest of the writing staff we still have Megan Ganz and Andy Bobrow and a couple other writers who have been with us through last season as well, so I think theyâll help in that transition. Theyâve encouraged us to also speak up in terms of stuff thatâs true to our characters or not true to our characters, and I think thatâs been pretty good. So far itâs been good, five episodes in and Iâm excited to kind of see whatâs next. Will we see the return of the dreamatorium this season?PUDI: I hope so! I donât know, we havenât seen it yet this season so far, so I donât know if the writers have something in mind for later in the season, a big dreamatorium arc. I think for the most part, the dreamatorium kind of collapsed on itself, but there were definitely some hints to it still being around in some capacity. And I think you see early on in season four, in the premiere itself, we talk a little bit about whatâs going on in Abedâs mind since that took place. Especially with the face that Abed now has to really face the possibility that this may be the last year that the study group is together in one piece, and you see the toll thatâs taking on him. So the dreamatorium might not be there physically, but itâs definitely there, itâs definitely present and heavy on their minds. Do you have a favorite episode of the series so far or one thatâs particularly close to your heart?PUDI: Itâs really hard. I think itâs tough to pick a favorite because we do so many wildly different episodes; week-to-week our show shifts dramatically. Itâs really hard to pick just one. Thereâs a lot of them that are really special to me, I think season oneâs chicken fingers episode (âContemporary American Poultryâ) was one of the first oneâs where I felt, âWow our show can go in a completely new direction that I hadnât envisioned.â Paintball (âModern Warfareâ) was just fun for all of us. In season two we did my birthday episode (âCritical Film Studiesâ), which was My Dinner with Andre homage mashed up with Pulp Fiction, and that to me was an incredible experience and really rewarding as an actor. I got to work with Richard Ayoade who was our director and with the stuff that Dan Harmon was coming up with, me pooping my pants on the set of Cougar Town. I canât believe I got to say those things. So thereâs just been a lot of episodes where I look back and Iâm like âI canât believe we got to do this.â  But those threeâchicken fingers, paintball, and My Dinner with Andre birthday episodeâwould probably be the three I look back to most often.Season four of Community begins on NBC Friday, October 19th at 8:30/7:30c.
Danny Pudi Talks Speed Stick’s Winning “Handle It” Video, COMMUNITY Season 4, the Showrunner Change, Inspector Spacetime, and His Favorite Episodes
Danny Pudi Talks Handle It and COMMUNITY. Danny Pudi talks about the fourth season of Community, the showrunner change, and his favorite episodes.