‘Parks And Recreation’ Special Raised $2.8 Million For Coronavirus Relief Fund

The Parks and Recreation reunion special on NBC did more than just entertain Americans hungry for some new entertainment.

The creators of the half-hour television special that aired this week announced that they helped to raise $2.8 million for Feeding America’s COVID-19 Response Fund, which aims to help food banks and other resources that are serving vulnerable communities amid the coronavirus crisis.

As Variety reported, the special brought back the cast from the beloved sitcom for an episode showing them dealing with life in isolation amid the virus outbreak and gave fans an update on what the characters have been doing since it went off the air in 2015.

The virtual special asked viewers to check out the Feeding America website and The National Institute of Mental Health, and all donations up to $500,000 were matched by NBC Universal as well as the show’s writers, producers, cast, and sponsors, State Farm and Subaru of America.

Parks and Recreation creator and executive producer Michael Schur said in a statement that he saw the reunion special as an opportunity to help some good causes, and found that all of the cast members were thrilled with the idea.

“Like a lot of other people, we were looking for ways to help and felt that bringing these characters back for a night could raise some money,” Schur said in a statement, via Marie Claire. “I sent a hopeful email to the cast, and they all got back to me within 45 minutes.”

The episode generated quite a bit of buzz, earning good reviews and plenty of attention on social media. The outbreak of the coronavirus has led to the closure of movie and television studios, with all projects halting production indefinitely, making new entertainment a premium. Though some have found creative solutions — like Saturday Night Live, which has now hosted a series of virtually filmed episodes — many shows will remain on hiatus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Vl_oUMyGYU

The special managed to reunite all of the major Parks and Recreation cast members, as well as some popular minor characters, including daytime talk show host Joan Callamezzo (Mo Collins) and news anchor Perd Hapley (Jay Jackson).

As USA Today noted, it even used some creative structuring to give updates on other characters — including hapless local political failure Bobby Newport (Paul Rudd), who introduced the episode and seemed completely unaware of the coronavirus outbreak.

“In fake commercials interspersed in the episode, we see other favorite recurring characters including Jeremy Jamm (Jon Glaser), Dennis Feinstein (Jason Mantzoukas) and Jean-Ralphio (Ben Schwartz),” the report noted.