Jason Segel Talks Apple TV+'s 'Shrinking' and Working with Harrison Ford
Moviefone speaks with Jason Segel about Apple TV+'s 'Shrinking.' "We underestimated how funny Harrison Ford was. He's like a comedy savant," Segel said.
Premiering on Apple TV+ on January 27th is the new comedy series ‘Shrinking’ from creators Brett Goldstein (‘Ted Lasso’), Bill Lawrence (‘Scrubs’) and Jason Segel (‘The Muppets’).
The series stars Segel as Jimmy Laird, a therapist who is dealing with severe grief from the recent death of his wife. While raising his teenage daughter Alice (Lukita Maxwell),
Jimmy begins to breach ethical barriers at work by telling his patients exactly what he thinks, resulting in massive changes to his and their lives, as well as the lives of his co-workers Gaby (Jessica Williams) and Dr. Paul Rhodes (Harrison Ford).
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Jason Segel about his work on ‘Shrinking,’ creating the series with Brett Goldstein and Bill Lawrence, Jimmy’s new found therapy style, how it affects his colleagues, his relationship with his daughter, and working with Harrison Ford.
Jason Segel stars in Apple TV+'s 'Shrinking.'
You can read our full interview below or click on the video player above to watch our interviews with Segel, Brett Goldstein and Neil Goldman, Bill Lawrence, Jessica Williams, Christa Miller, and Lukita Maxwell about 'Shrinking.'
Moviefone: To begin with, can you talk creating the series with Brett Goldstein and Bill Lawrence, and having the idea to set it in the world of therapy?
Jason Segel: Well, I must admit, I got very lucky. I had Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein come pitch me a pretty fully formed idea, and it was this show. I thought it sounded brilliant, and so I signed on very early and then brought whatever my secret sauce is to the table. But these guys had a really brilliant idea, which is somebody going through a nervous breakdown continuing to practice therapy.
MF: Jimmy's personal life is falling apart and that begins to affect his work until he discovers a new way of doing therapy, can you talk about that?
JS: I think that there is a really magical element to rock bottom, which is that you've got nothing left to lose. The only place to go is up, and so it seems like a really pitiful position, but in a lot of ways it's enviable. It's only going up from here. So, you are watching a guy scramble his way out of rock bottom and trying to bring his patients with him because he recognizes that, it seems like we're all stuck, and let's get out of this mess.
(L to R) Jason Segel and Jessica Williams in 'Shrinking,' premiering January 27, 2023 on Apple TV+.
MF: Jimmy and his colleagues are all therapists with their own patients, but they act as therapists for each other as well. Can you talk about the relationships between Jimmy, Gaby, and Dr. Rhodes?
JS: Isn't that the truth of life though? As you get older and learn to communicate better, we're all each other's kind of defacto therapists, right? But yes, me, Jessica Williams and Harrison Ford all work in a therapy office together. How crazy is that? And we have a lot of scenes of us therapizing each other, which are really fun.
MF: Harrison Ford is very funny in this series, and he hasn't done a lot of comedy in the past. What was it like for you working with him and did you have any idea that he would be that funny?
JS: We underestimated how funny Harrison Ford was. We thought that the way that we would write Harrison Ford is kind of what you'd expect, that he would be the gruff straight man while we did comedy around him. But Harrison Ford is funny! He's like a comedy savant. Wait until you see as these episodes go on. It just goes to show you how we all are limited by our own imaginations, but this guy knew what he was capable of doing and wanted to show it off.
(L to R) Harrison Ford and Lukita Maxwell in 'Shrinking,' premiering January 27, 2023 on Apple TV+.
MF: Finally, can you talk about Jimmy’s relationship with his daughter Alice, and how he’s trying to put the pieces of that relationship back together?
JS: It's one of the primary storylines of this series. Jimmy, my character, has lost his wife in an accident, and in his spiral downward, this parental daughter relationship has flipped to where she is taking care of me now, and it is this slow road back. That to me is one of the main elements of the show, my character becoming an adequate father again.
Jason Segel in "'Shrinking,' premiering January 27, 2023 on Apple TV+.
