S2E22: I think I need to break up with Mark
No better send-off for Brendanawicz than a 24 hour telethon (nervous shake)
Happy almost Thanksgiving! I’m currently writing to you from back home in Virginia, where the fall leaves are kinda still colorful and my parents’ dogs now almost outnumber the amount of people in our home (3 dogs to 4 humans, but 2 out of 3 dogs are 100+ pounds). Cal beat Stanford on Saturday and we all rushed the field, which never gets old. Any excuse to be back in Berkeley and I’m immediately there. Can I get a Go Bears?
This week’s episode, “Telethon,” is yet another one that I didn’t remember until I rewatched it (and then honestly forgot about it again in the time it look to take me write this). This might be because the next episode is SO good that this one pales in comparison. The next one is the arrival of Ben Wyatt and Chris Traeger!
Ben and Chris’s arrival also means it’s time for another pivotal moment: the slow departure of Mark Brendanawicz. I’m soooo sad writing this! See:
For those who have been living under a rock up until this point, you’ll know that I have no love lost for Mark Brendanawicz, aka Paul Schneider. As a rule, I hate calling people boring, but there’s simply no better word I can use for Mark: he is so godawfully, unbelievably boring.
Paul Schneider was one of the earliest cast members brought on for Parks and Rec. Initially scripted as a love interest for Leslie, Mark ultimately started dating Ann near the beginning of season 2 once it became evident that he and Leslie didn’t fully click. Mark and Ann’s relationship is like watching paint dry. We start witnessing the beginning of the end in the “Summer Catalog” episode, when Tom takes pictures of Mark and Ann at the park and she looks super unhappy in every single one. Mark asks “is something wrong Ann?” and she goes “well, you know I had just gotten off a long shift and I was really tired….” Sooo trouble in whatever the opposite of paradise is!
In this episode, Leslie reveals to the entire Parks department that she’s signed them up to work an all-night telethon to raise money for diabetes research. Mark reveals to Leslie that he’s thinking about proposing to Ann and has acquired his grandmother’s ring for the occasion. Leslie eggs him into proposing on the telethon at the 5 am slot to try to get her viewership numbers up. Meanwhile Ann, who knows nothing about this plan, pulls Leslie aside about five minutes later and tells her that she thinks she needs to break up with Mark. He’s not “the one” (no shit Ann). Mark comes back to the telethon with his grandmother’s ring and Leslie intercepts before he can propose on the air. And this …. officially seals the deal for our “good” pal Mark. Commence the slow roll out.
On paper, there’s nothing really wrong with Mark and, to be fair, I don’t really think there’s anything wrong with Paul Schneider either. The character wasn’t written all that interestingly and Paul himself just didn’t seem to find that lightning-in-a-bottle chemistry that the rest of the cast has.
I almost think of Mark as the P&R equivalent to Ginny Weasley in the Harry Potter movies. I would die on a hill for Book Ginny. She’s by far and away my favorite character, but Movie Ginny — in the hands of writers who shortchanged her of notable dialogue, hand her bend down to TIE HARRY’S SHOE at one point (!?!?!), and Bonnie Wright, who unfortunately didn’t bring anything at all special to the character other than looking exactly like Book Ginny was described at age 11 — is a a character with totally wasted potential.
Mark Brendanawicz is the same. I’m sure on paper, as Schur and Daniels and the other writers were crafting season 1, he seemed like a great idea for a character. Handsome, rational, smart, someone who could grow into a partner for Leslie. In the hands of a different actor, maybe the writers would have taken his plot line and run with it, the same way they wrote Andy’s character evolution from guest star into full-blown core cast member just because they loved Chris Pratt so much. But Paul Schneider just isn’t it.
On my flight home from SFO to Richmond the other day, I read Jim O’Heir’s new book, Welcome to Pawnee. If you don’t know who Jim O’Heir is, he plays our very own Jerry Gergich and the book is largely a memoir about his time on the show. Jim writes about his close friendship with Paul Schneider, who would hang out in his trailer in the early days of the show. Jim writes:
“By mid-second season, Paul knew his days at Parks were dwindling. I don’t wish to speak for Paul or anybody else, but things must’ve been strange by this point. Not only had his character arc been reduced (hitting a painful low, perhaps, in episode 22, ‘Telethon,’ where Leslie tried to persuade him not to propose to Ann since Ann didn’t think he was the one, thus diminishing Mark’s potential as a love interest), but he still had to meet all of the expectations for an actor despite knowing his time on the show was nearing the end.”
Greg Daniels, one of the Parks and Rec co-creators, also chimes in at this point in the book:
“Paul’s role was sort of to be this love interest for Amy [Leslie], but I don’t think there was any chemistry there, so that just wasn’t really going anywhere … He didn’t grow into what we thought we were going to grow into.”
My feelings about Mark Brendanawicz aside, I highly doubt the slow roll-out about Paul Schneider was a lack of chemistry from him specifically. Rather, I think it goes to show how critically important it is to have that ineffable, electric chemistry between each and every actor on a show. The group as a whole has to just click, and it’s not like everyone else was clicking except for Paul. Actually, it’s evident the minute we get to episode 23, “The Master Plan,” that the whole group doesn’t click in the way we need until our two last critical members arrive: Ben Wyatt and Chris Traeger. It’s something greater than the sum of all of the parts, but the individual parts are still pretty damn important.
But before that can happen next week, we have to trim the fat (a little Thanksgiving-themed metaphor for you, huh?). And even though I’m really truly so heartbroken that we soon have to wave goodbye to Mark Brendanawicz, rewatching this episode opened my eyes to how close Parks and Rec came, in so many ways, to not finding that lightning in a bottle feeling. So many stars had to align, and so many stars did align to make the show what it is. Mark, unfortunately, just wasn’t one of them. So bye!
Highlight reel moments:
A puppy licking Ron’s mustache:
Tom standing in front of NBA superstar Detlef Schrempf:
The fact that Ron suffers from a disorder called sleep fighting, which is … exactly what it sounds like.
I had forgotten that Leslie leaves herself voicemails!! “Hey Leslie, it’s Leslie. Hang in there!”
There’s this iconic scene of Leslie trying to play-by-play recount her favorite Friends episodes and all I could think was … is Friends her Parks and Rec? Is this scene her Park It?
Perd Hapley takes the stage right at the end in a TANK TOP and does THE WORM. The caption “Hapley Continues to Worm” is my Roman empire:
See ya next week, folks, for one of the best Parks and Recs episodes in existence, AND a very, very special Park It. Happy Thanksgiving but, more importantly, happy blackout Wednesday! Cheers team.
I know we've talked about Mark, but, man, I had to rewatch "The Reporter" (E3) after we last talked, and he actually is terrible. I am no longer neutral on this character. He visibly *hates* Leslie, I swear.