William Van Duzer "Bill" Lawrence IV is the creator of Scrubs and worked as the showrunner, a producer, a writer, a director, an actor and an extra for the series.
"He (Lawrence) was as important to situational comedies, and especially situational comedies today, as Carl Reiner or Norman Lear in developing a genre or a style. He's brilliant, and he has heart, as was evidenced in Ted Lasso. He created Ted Lasso, he created Cougar Town, he's superior. He created Shrinking. He's great, he's a genius, a television genius ... and he's a great guy, great man. I can't talk highly enough about Bill Lawrence." - Richard Kind on Mad About You, 2025.
"My mantra is, “Everything goes my way.” I say it mostly to annoy the shit out of people. But, if you put that out into the ether, it almost becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy." - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
"I was talking to (lists people) today, about how fun it is to be around artists and people who love TV and art and theater and music and stuff, because they actually, I didn't grow up kinda ... feeling that comfortable about feeling that hard, and I love being around people who do, and I try to vibe off it. I tried to make a sincere toast to the writing staff tonight at dinner, I swung and missed (laughs), but it's something I try to put in all of my shows is: Look I can tell you guys this; the world is a shit show, so to put out something that makes you feel a little more hopeful and optimistic to work on, and hopefully makes you all a bit more hopeful and optimistic to watch, is of huge value to me personally, so I'm definitely trying." - Lawrence speaking at the ATX TV Festival, 2025.
Childhood[]
"(about his childhood) I lucked out, I've lucked out constantly, I annoy people." - Bill Lawrence on WTF with Marc Maron in 2012.
Bill was born in Ridgefield, Connecticut, as the only child of a working-class mother, Suzanne (maiden name Stonewater), working as an auctioneer, and a very conservative blue-blood father, William, working as a Pitney Bowes salesman. Lawrence's mother is a self-proclaimed redneck (the first member of her family to ever go to college), whilst his father is of the fabled Van Duzer Lawrence-lineage.
"So, money is toxic, and my dad's crazy rich family, I wouldn't say they were necessarily the best and most open-minded in generations passed. But this guy, the original William Lawrence, was a real-estate baron, and he met Sarah Bates, who believed in arts for women. And she was a poet and there was no arts for women back then, and she changed him, and when she died he had their estate turned into an all-girl college of the arts." - Lawrence on Armchair Experts with Dax Shepard, 2024.
young Bill with his father. "He was my best friend growing up. He's the best." - Bill on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
On one side young William lived in a world of butlers, servers and manners-practice, as the great-great grandson of the real-estate baron bearing the same name. On the other side he grew up surrounded by "largemouth bass fishing guys on the St. Johns River in delightful Deland, Florida," as the grandson of foundry-worker Norman "Rocks" Stonewater. Lawrence has made the claim that this inherent cultural contrast in his upbringing was his original comedic fuel. Lawrence won a state-championship as a football-goalie at age 10. When the family would come out to Florida to visit relatives young William was often sent out fishing with his cousins, he hated fishing, and he'd bring a book, this got him the nickname "College." Lawrence wasn't "big on the classics," but he liked crime-capers, and started reading Carl Hiaasen-books at age 16.
"There's a direct through-line from Carl's absurd comedy to the stuff I'd do on Scrubs." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
Lawrence remains a fan of Hiaasen, and in addition to adapting his book Bad Monkey into a limited series for Apple TV+, the HBO show he (per. 2024) is working on with Steve Carell has a Hiaasen-inspired main character. Lawrence also showed interest in comedy at an early age, and his parents would bring him to "Caroline's and stuff like that," and buy him Bob Newhart- and Bill Cosby-records. Lawrence's parents met at Rollins College in Florida. His mother got a scholarship there, and his father was shipped off there because "that's where private fuck-up rich kids go." His parents have stayed together for over 50 years. All the men in the Lawrence-family were either named William Lawrence or Robert Clitherall Lawrence, and Lawrence's dad and uncle were "the first two men in six generations (of the Van Duzer-family) to work for a living."
"My dad and his brother, their whole thing with family-dough is, if you're gonna have a life worth living at all, you can never touch any family money. All my dad's friends that lived that life, none of them lived a good life after childhood. No reason to do anything, no reason to have ambition, they just drift." - Lawrence on WTF with Marc Maron, 2012.
"My parents took great pains to make sure I didn't grow up as a rich kid, and I didn't, we were middle-class ... in the mean streets of Connecticut (haha)" - Lawrence on Armchair Experts with Dax Shepard, 2024.
Lawrence was baptized because his grandparents promised his father to throw a party. His next brush with spirituality was being a tennis-counselor in an all-Jewish sports camp, where his buddy Bob would elbow him into leading the prayer on the first day of camp every year, in hopes of turning him Jewish. The prayers didn't stick. Spiritually, Lawrence's parents "exposed him to everything," and he considers himself spiritual, but not religious. "I'm a massive believer in "good begets good," I wanna believe so very passionately that bad people don't end up happy, and that matters to me. Even if they're winning, I like to believe when the doors are closed and no ones around they go "I'm not really happy," you know."
"We're all shrinked up, the three of us (talking about the team behind Shrinking.) Admittedly, for me, late in life, cuz I grew up with a weird waspy family in Connecticut where ... you know, if I told my dad I wanted to see a therapist in my 20s he would have looked at me with that sideways-head dogs get when they hear a strange noise." - Lawrence in an interview with The Movie Podcast, 2024.
Lawrence's grandmother would bring him to Miami Dolphins-games, he's still a fan, and inclined to geek out about sports in general, but also musical theater. More specifically, Lawrence is a big Tom Stoppard guy, and also had a David Mamet-phase. He prides himself in being "the straightest guy that can sing Le Mis in french." Lawrence has been described by Zach Braff as being the most competitive person he knows, though it's worth mentioning that Lawrence does champion constructive collaboration, and is very open to things such as improvisation. Braff, Neil Flynn, and many other Scrubs-alumni, have also pointed out Lawrence's tendency to over-exaggerate when recounting old stories, like his story of The Janitor being intended to be a figment of JD's imagination all throughout Season 1. (This is worth mentioning because these over-exaggerations might very well sneak into this biography).
He's a great storyteller, the fish gets bigger every time." - Jonathan Doris on Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
Christa Miller: Bill's job is as a writer, and he exaggerates everything. A game they would play in the writer's room was Truth-Lie-Exaggeration, Which goes something like this: Bill will pick up the phone, he's say"Hi, my name is Bill Lawrence" and one of the writers will say "truth,"
Bill: and I'll say "yeah, I read that script, (Christa: Lie) I thought it was amazing (Christa: exaggeration).
Christa: So any story Bill is ever telling on the DVD-commentary, interview, just know: it's either an exaggeration or a lie. - Scrubs S08E14 commentary (2008).
Lawrence attended Ridgefield High School, where he spent a lot of his time playing sports and socializing, all he cared about was "finding free beer and playing sports." Lawrence was a talented tennis-player in high school, and had a strong serve. The young boy reached a turning point when his English teacher, Bob Cox, a former journalist, took a shine to him. Lawrence and a buddy used to sneak out to drink beer at Peach Lake, across the road from the school. Mr. Cox took notice, and suggested they both meet him in his free period two days a week to "shoot the shit about movies, TV, whatever" instead.
Bob Cox.
Finding His Purpose[]
When Lawrence was a junior in high school, Bob Cox flat out told him that he wasn't that great of a student, but that he was very good at writing dialogue. Cox suggested he try to make a living off of it, seeing as it was the only thing he seemed to enjoy doing at school. The thought stuck, and Lawrence started "consuming movies, TV, (and) standup comedy like a crazy person." (Lawrence has gone on to describe Bob Cox as both rash and very funny, implying the inspiration drawn from him for the character of Perry Cox extends beyond just a surname.) By age 15 or 16 Lawrence claims he had decided he wanted to be a TV writer. At age 16 Lawrence also beat his dad at tennis for the first time. His mother ran out with a camera to take a picture of the event, and Lawrence's father, all sweaty and exhausted, gave double barrels (two middle fingers) to the camera. The photo was sent out as the Lawrence family Christmas-card.
"I had a great childhood, but by the same token (I was) so concerned that I don't become one of those guys (living off family funds,) you know. Had jobs since I was 15, did all that shit." - Lawrence on WTF with Marc Maron, 2012.
The buddy Lawrence used to sneak off and drink beer with was Rick Street, a 6'8, 240 pound jock. Because of Rick's stature, Lawrence could stand next to him and quip away towards other students without worrying about getting beaten up. However, when Street thought Lawrence was being crude, he'd walk off and leave Lawrence on his own. Lawrence didn't worry too much about this, in his mind a high school-fight ended after 2 hits, when you got knocked down. In Lawrence's freshman-year, this was disproved. Lawrence got knocked down, but the other student kept going, taking ahold of his ears and banging his head into the ground. This wasn't the last time Lawrence got into trouble. When Lawrence was a senior, he attended a party where he ended up kissing a girl who, unbeknownst to him, had recently gotten back together with her ex. The ex was a tall, big, nasty bully, and showed up ready to fight. The bully quipped: "come on Lawrence, why don't you say something funny now?" Lawrence replied: "(Name) you know, I would say something funny, but someday you'll be putting gas in my car. And I might need regular, and if you put unleaded ..." Before Lawrence got to complete the word "unleaded" the bully hit him hard, sending him to the ground.
"I played sports and was the high school jockey type guy, that was afraid of this stuff (close male friendships, venturing outside the set norms of masculinity), and on the other hand Zach (Braff) and I share a love of Broadway-musicals, so I was always wrestling with what lane I fit in as a young man, (and) wishing that it would be easier to just not have to pick a lane." - Lawrence on episode 103 of Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
Lawrence's unwavering confidence was apparent from a young age.
"He (Bill) recently told me a story recently about how, when he was a high school basketball player, if he missed the first few 3-pointers and was clearly not feeling it that day, his coach would bench him. Not to punish Bill for missing the shots, but because he knew if he left Bill out there he would not switch it up and move to the post or, god forbid, start passing. He knew Bill would never stop chucking 3s." - Matt Tarses presenting the 2025 Herb Sargent Award for Comedy Excellence.
Lawrence had a girlfriend in high school by the name of Sara Briggs, she dumped him "6 or 7 times over the course of 3 years." and would go on to inspire the character of Kim Briggs.
At the conclusion of each school year, Bob Cox often gave his students a list of “10 Books to Read and 10 Movies to See Before You Die” and told them that if they were ever in trouble, they could call him and he would try to help. It is fair to assume Lawrence was given the same treatment.
A photo from the 1989 William & Mary yearbook, featuring Lawrence.
After high school, Lawrence didn't wish to go to Sarah Lawrence College, considering his family ties a social burden. Lawrence instead ended up taking up a fiction writing-program at the College of William and Mary. Lawrence's application was helped along by his tennis-skills. Lawrence found he couldn't keep up with the college tennis-players, and thus his tennis-career quickly came to an end. The weather was nice down there in Virginia, and there was a nearby comedy-club, but it was clearly the "deep south" and "pretty funky." Lawrence briefly wanted to drop out of college and move out to LA to be a comic, but after being told by his father that the love and support from parents was unconditional, but that dropping out of college would put him in a position of "ITI" (instant total independence) financially, Lawrence decided to continue his education.
"Bill and I met when we were 17, we met as freshmen, were in the same dorm but joined the same fraternity (Kappa Alpha). It was a very similar relationship to Turk and JD I think, I was sort of the quiet nerdy guy and he was the popular sports-jock, he's great at basketball, he's good-looking, he'd always be with a different woman, you know I'd just sort of be his mute wing-man. He (Turk) is the biggest personality in the room always, that's Bill to a tee. We were pretty sophomoric, and it was the 80s and there was a lot of beer-drinking, and you know, I think as the party went on I'd be the one to go to sleep and he'd be the guy who'd rage on. I'm sure we started out the parties together, but he always closed down the bar." - Jonathan Doris on Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
Lawrence quieted down in college, only getting into a couple of fights before accepting a more passive demeanor. Lawrence indulged in more innocent types of shenanigans during his time at W&A, once dialing up Jonathan Doris' roommate Josh's biology teacher at 1 a.m. to ask him to settle an argument about who would win in a fight; a polar bear or a gorilla. (The biology-teacher ended up agreeing with Bill, siding with the polar bear.)
"When I was 21 I had just as much fun drinking a beer with my three buddies from college or from work as I did with my dad, who was, you know, only 42 when I was 21, and so he was more a contemporary in my adulthood than my father, you know, he's always my father but that combo, I don't think a lot of people get that." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
The New Kid in Town[]
Getting Signed[]
Lawrence graduated W&M in 1990, and lived in Manhattan for a short period, before driving down out to LA in his Jeep, stock full of scripts. You see, during his time at William and Mary, Lawrence had written several plays. Lawrence's mother was an auctioneer at the time, and it just so happened she had once held an auction for a gentleman named Norman Barasch, who wrote on The Dick Van Dyke Show. Barasch caught wind of Lawrence's aspirations, and asked him to send over some of his work to his old agents, George Shapiro and Howard West. Lawrence sat down and started writing. By the time he got to LA, he had scripts piled up. Lawrence lived up in the hills, and would eat breakfast at Hugo's. At this point, he made his living painting houses, waiting tables and doing standup. During his sets, he would wear a cap, and when he got nervous he would reposition it on his head. According to Lawrence, after reviewing his standup-tapes years later, it looked like he was trying to screw himself down into the ground. Another problem Lawrence faced was that he'd subconsciously slip into the cadences of comics he admired, particularly Brian Regan, when on stage. Lawrence eventually got to a point where he could move on from open mics to getting bookings, but in the early 90s LA comedy-scene, Lawrence he felt out of his depth. The young writer started occasionally hanging out and playing poker with Vince Vaughn around this time, it would continue for years. Every 5 weeks, Lawrence's father would get one of his friends to call and offer him a job. All along the way, Lawrence was regularly sending his material to George Shapiro and Howard West.
"It took me like a year to write 9 scripts, and I gave them 1 and pretended I wrote the other 8 in like 3 weeks." - Lawrence on WTF with Marc Maron, 2012.
Lawrence has given conflicting accounts on how this dance of script-handovers went along, such as the one above. The following story however, consists of the aspect which have been consistent between Lawrence's many stories: The first script was for a Seinfeld lead-in standup bit, seeing as Shapiro and West produced the show, and managed it's lead. Attached was a note saying that Lawrence promised to never bother them again if they just read it and got back to him. Lawrence got a note back saying, “This are pretty good, but Jerry writes his own material, and we’re not looking to add other clients. It's also a little raw and rough.” A month later he sent them another script. Impressed by Lawrence's Chutzpah, Howard West eventually signed him, saying that if he was lucky he could make him some valet-money.
Billy[]
A week and a half later Lawrence was brought on as a staff writer on the short-lived Billy Connolly-vehicle Billy. Lawrence said no thanks to PAs asking if he wanted food the first 2 days of working on the show, he had no money and he found it more economical to bring cereal to work. On day 3 an exec came in and told him that the food was being paid for by the production. This was the first of many norms and customs that would need to be instilled into the young writer. Lawrence would sometimes struggle to understand what the show's lead, Billy Connolly, was saying, owing to his thick accent. A couple of West's associates had seen Lawrence do standup at locals clubs, and when taking on Lawrence, West clarified: "you're a very good joke-writer, (but) you're a mediocre performer." Lawrence's standup-career ended around this time. West later remembered Lawrence as one of the most charming pests he'd ever met. "He always looked like he stepped out of the shower, bright and perky," he said. "He'd come into the office bouncing like a St. Bernard."
Billy was cancelled in the summer of 1992. The crew-gift was denim jackets with the show's logo on the outer pocket. The logo was simply "Billy" with a heart over the "i." Lawrence chose not to wear the jacket, fearing that people would think he was the kind of guy to get his own name sown onto his jackets. Yet again young Lawrence was out of work.
Boy Meets World[]
Thankfully, April Kelly, a writer on Billy, had grown a liking to Lawrence, finding him "young, funny and energetic", and so when she went on to co-create Boy Meets World, Lawrence found himself back in a writer's room. Lawrence ended up writing some episodes of the series, including Topanga's original introductory episode, but made it clear that he wasn't part of the target audience, and that he found the show's humor to be below him. One time, after writing an episode of the show where a character repeatedly uttered the line "I can't believe I hurt my dad, I love him more than anything in the world." Lawrence got home to a slew of messages on his answering-machine from old friends from back home, tauntingly saying that line and playing off it after having seen his name in the credits. Lawrence would act like he was above it all, and it got him fired. Bill has in later years made it clear that this experience taught him an important lesson about how anything that generates an audience has value. That writers sometimes have to write what a show's creator thinks is funny, not necessarily what they think is funny themselves, without pointing it out. In his later work on shows like Scrubs, Lawrence made it a point to be clear about this when bringing on new writers.
The Nanny[]
Lawrence then moved on to writing for The Nanny. However, the staff was split at one point, the show's original creators were leaving, and two parties were pushing for the job of showrunner, and supporting their respective new staff writers. Lawrence was one side's candidate. This tension lead to higher-ups on the other side openly criticizing one of Lawrence's writer's drafts. Lawrence suspected the higher-ups hadn't even read his draft, and set them up in a way to reveal they hadn't, the plan succeeded, and Lawrence got a snarky dig in at them. However, it was a bad career-move, and led to Lawrence getting fired.
"The worst thing I've bequeathed upon my children is completely unearned confidence" - Lawrence on Armchair Experts with Dax Shepard, 2024.
Lawrence's managers, George Shapiro and Howard West, would always get annoyed that Lawrence, when he was feeling like he was at a standstill, in response to the question of "what's going on?" would be flat-out honest and say "nothing, I'm lucky I got out of my boxers today." Lawrence, in his own words, used to be "bad at handling the valleys" (meaning career-lows).
Rebranding[]
Lawrence went on to write a play, Full Cycle, in 1993. It featured Robert Maschio, a standup and theater guy fresh from New York.
"Those guys (George Shapiro and Howard West), I took a play that was kind of like a more adult play and wrote it, Those guys put up the money and produced it and then got me signed with an agency and kind of reinvented me as a writer. It's all bullshit, you know. My agent, once I did that play, he's like "Yeah, all those kids' shows never happened, you're a playwright who just got out here from New York," and I'm like "Alright, I'm in man" - Bill on The Ryen Russillo Show, 2020.
"The play was a success and it really highlighted Bill’s great talents as he was unknown at the time. (However) I was back in New York in eight months because I was broke and had no idea how the game worked.” - Rob Maschio, 2007.
At some point in the 1990s Lawrence married actress Megyn Pryce.
Friends[]
After letting Jenji Kohan go in pre-production, a new show by the name of Friends just so happened to be in need of a staff-writer, and so Lawrence was back into the TV-business. While writing on the show, Lawrence went on a trip back to Ridgefield, and found the guy who had knocked him down in high school mowing the Lawrence family-lawn, on contract from a local landscaping-company. Their eyes met, and Lawrence felt horrible. Lawrence figured out that he didn't want to use comedy to hurt people, and later in his career he'd walk the fine line between well-crafted, character-based, snark and mean-spirited, directed, attacks carefully. Lawrence wrote the episode "The One With The Candy Hearts." Courteney Cox came up to Lawrence sometime near the end of the first year and said "If no one else says it, I know we're here because the writing is funny and you guys bust your hump and we get all the credit. I just wanted to thank you for that, Chris." Cox had mistaken him for co-creator Marta Mauffman's assistant, who had recently tried to turn in a script. Lawrence didn't correct her. Robert Maschio had auditioned for the role of Joey in the show. Lawrence jibed well with one of the show's creators, David Crane, however, his personality didn't mesh with that of the other creator, Marta Kauffman.
After slipping up during the season 1-wrap party and accidentally revealing (in subtext) to Lawrence that they were planning to let him go, Friends co-creator David Crane placed a call to long-time television producer Gary David Goldberg. Crane told Goldberg that Lawrence sadly didn't mesh with their group, but that he'd recommend him wholeheartedly for Gary's future projects.
“When I got let go from Friends, and the second season it was the biggest show in the world, I was in the fetal position on a futon in my shitty apartment,” - Lawrence speaking to AV Club, 2023.
Finding A New Mentor[]
Gary David Goldberg had kept David Crane's recommendation in mind, and he ended up bringing Lawrence on for his next project, DreamWorks' first sitcom, Champs. Goldberg made it clear from the start that he didn't care about titles (producer, executive producer, writer), any input was valued. Lawrence liked this approach, and it also motivated him to work harder as a low-tier writer. While working on the show, Lawrence got to know associate-producer Randall Keenan Winston, who was staying with friends of his. Lawrence and Winston figured they'd make bigger strides as a team than as solo players, and would continue working together. 12 episodes were shot, one written by Lawrence, but the show was cancelled before the 3 last episodes had even aired, the last episode airing August 7, 1996.
Spin City[]
Bill during his Spin City-years.
Lawrence partnership with Larry David Goldberg outlasted their first outing, and after winning a bidding war for Michael J. Fox's televisional return, the duo got working on Spin City, with a guarantee of 2 years on air, and no studio-notes. Fox sealed the deal by hugging Lawrence, their high-difference made this somewhat difficult. Fox was sick with Parkinson's at this point, and Lawrence was informed from the get-go that the goal was to efficiently make 100 episodes over the course of 4 years. Due to 1990s television-censorship, shows were only allowed a limited amount of certain swear-words, for the word "ass", that limit was 2. After turning in the pilot-script for the show, Lawrence got a note from a network-exec saying "you have the word ass on page 7, and the word ass on page 19, and the word ass on page 29. Please pick your ass." Lawrence found the note hilarious, and kept it. 30 years later, he has it framed in his office.
One of MJF's conditions for doing the show was that it had to be shot in New York, and so Lawrence moved out there, to a small studio-apartment loft at the corner of Prince and Mercer, while Goldberg sporadically went out to his place there to mentor and assist him. Lawrence moving away to a different state played a part in him and Megyn Price ultimately separating that very same year, 1996. John Michel, the editor of the show, came out to his apartment around this time and took him out for a beer to cheer him up. The two of them went out, drank, and talked about sports. Lawrence very much appreciated it.
"we worked 45 days in a row to start that show (Spin City) off, 16 hour days, including Saturdays and Sundays, and a lot of us were married and relationships fell apart and stuff" - Lawrence in his 2023 speech at Sarah Lawrence College, + on a 2024 episode of Armchair Experts with Dax Shepard.
"The first year of Spin City, it was a joke that didn’t go over well, but for Christmas, Gary bought me and the writing staff comfortable cot beds for our offices because we worked all the time. The upside was, out of necessity, everybody was around all aspects of production. You had to throw writers into editing. You had to have writers on the stage talking to actors. You had to have one room outlining and one room punching up." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
Early seasons of the show were shot in Studio D at Chelsea Piers. One of the central themes of the show, the friendship between Alan Ruck and Michael Boatman's characters, was inspired by Lawrence's own friendship with Randall Keenan Winston. The mayor depicted in the series was also named after Winston, and he was an associate-producer on the show. In one of Lawrence's speeches at the GLAAD-awards, he accidentally outed Winston as being gay. Close to the end of season 1, Goldberg asked if Lawrence felt like he was getting into the groove of things, Lawrence responded affirmatively, and so Goldberg started to space out his visits a tad more, letting Lawrence take control.
"Look, I grew up with a mentor, Gary, who was, for whatever reason, antagonistic toward the notes and development process. It was famously not his thing. When Gary split from [Spin City,] he was very supportive of me and told me it was going to be great. Then I went to the next table read, and I’m like, “Wait, there are like 30 people here I’ve never seen before, and they have opinions.” (Laughs.) Someone’s like, “They all work for ABC and DreamWorks,” and [I think], “Oh, this is going to be bad for me.” But [Jeff Ingold,] the guy that runs my company, was one of the first executives who gave me tons of notes, and I found it very helpful. By the way, once your ego gets a rest, you realize the more the merrier. Notes are only a problem if you don’t have the leverage or the ability because of where you are in your career to say, “I appreciate it, but I’m not going to do that one.”" - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
John Michel stepped in to teach Lawrence how to edit, as that was a skill a sole-show runner would have to be able to handle. Another thing Lawrence would have to handle was being the adult in the room. A writer once made a sexist off-color remark in the writer's room and Lawrence laughed. The writers took that as Lawrence being okay with that kind of stuff, and it gave everyone grounds to be horrific. Lawrence had to be the voice of reason and shut it down, he wasn't just one of the guys anymore, he was the boss. Even though the show was off the ground, the stress didn't cease, the team was still under great pressure to produce 100 episodes in 4 years.
"I was doing a ton of blow, drinking, being crazy. The narcotics were almost a work-requirement when doing 25-episode seasons." - Lawrence on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, 2024.
Robert Maschio in Spin City.
"Bill Lawrence is a f#@king genius. He works very hard at being a genius, and sometimes he works to the last minute at being a genius, but none the less he is a genius at what he has chosen to do. He makes things accessible, funny, weird. He was a great writer, Gary (David Goldberg) was a great show-runner, he was a great captain, but not necessarily as great of a writer as some of the product he put out, but when you have a genius like Bill Lawrence ... you get it. And Gary was able to teach things to Bill and generate things that Bill not only learned but cultivated and made blossom even more." - Richard Kind on Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2021.
Sam Lloyd appeared in a Season 2-episode of the show, and he and Lawrence ended up playing basketball together after the shoot. Lawrence worked on 3 seasons of the show, and his parents went out to New York to attend all the late-night tapings. Lawrence's father would drive out from Connecticut after work. Lawrence returned to co-write the season 4-finale, Michael J. Fox's sendoff. Lawrence struggles to watch Spin City because his mother tended to over-exaggerate her laugh when a joke didn't land with the wider audience, and he recognizes it right away. His father, on the other hand, would often fall asleep. Rags, the pet of Michael Boatman's character, was inspired by the 17-year-old dog of a writer's mother, whom Lawrence had convinced himself was talking to him when he came over to visit, in an altered state. Most of the series' crew was under the age of 27, because Lawrence was afraid to hire anyone who would be able to see his inexperience. Barry Bostwick, Richard Kind, Alexander Chaplin, Michael Boatman, Alan Ruck, Robert Maschio, Sean Whalen, Peter Jacobsen, Michael Hobert and John David Conti would all come to return (in some capacity) for Lawrence's next show. Lawrence in retrospect likes to jokingly refer to the show as "Spin Shitty."
Lawrence started a production-company in 1998, at ABC Studios (then called Touchstone Studios.) The company's name was Doozer Productions, it was a play on Lawrence's regal last name (Van Duzer.)
Meeting Christa Miller[]
Lawrence has later talked about the Spin City years feeling somewhat empty personally. Lawrence had a lift going up and down from his loft-apartment every night for 6 years, and his life became about figuring out "how to get people to leave without having brunch with them, and it was all so empty and horrible." At times he hated himself, only to wake up and do the same thing all over again.
Christa Miller posing for Maxim, 1997.
That all changed when Lawrence met Christa Miller in May of 1998, at a Jamie Tarses-hosted ABC party in the Mercer Hotel in SoHo. Miller had grown up in New York, and was well-known for having played Kate on The Drew Carry Show. Thankfully, Lawrence wasn't sporting his Guy Fieri-like Spin City look. Randall Keenan Winston had taken Lawrence out to buy a suit and get a a new haircut prior to the party so he'd "Look like an adult for once."
"Christa was one of the first women I became friends with before I ever dated, cuz she was always dating somebody else." - Lawrence on Not Skinny But Not Fat, 2023.
"(Lawrence) followed Ms. Miller around the party, showering her with one-liners. "For me and my circle of friends," he recalled, "the big question is, Will she get my jokes? Christa did. Then I found out she was seeing somebody. I thought, 'Oh, it's me being tortured again.' " - New York Times, 1999.
"I vibed on crazy damaged women, and I was very lucky that I met somebody when I was 28 that had had that vibe, but had done all the work and been in therapy for 10 years, and you know somebody who grew up very hard, with addiction in her family and a sister that had been killed. So I got the crazy vibe I wanted but with somebody that said "there's nothing wrong with getting a little help and talking about all the stuff you're bottling up." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
The relationship started out as a flirt-laced friendship. Lawrence would comment on thing such as how Miller kept dating short actors, and how she should date a comedy-writer. Miller called him up one day and said "you know what? I've decided to finally break down and date a comedy-writer". She continued "I bet you know him," Lawrence, thinking it was him, answered "I bet I do." The writer turned out to be Les Firestein. Lawrence would call in from New York (she was living in LA) once or twice a week as a friend, and after about 3 months Miller told him that her boyfriend didn't like that they talked so much on the phone. That's when he knew he was in.
"The following December, she was visiting New York and sitting alone in a SoHo cafe, turning her cell phone on and off, like someone plucking petals from a daisy. "I was thinking, 'Should I call him, should I not call him?' " she remembered. "Finally, I called and left a message, and when I didn't hear back from him, I thought, 'Oh, it's too late.' "
In fact, he was in Puerto Rico with a big group of friends. When he returned, he got her message, called immediately, and said, " 'You better be single.' "
Miller said yes, and Lawrence made plans to fly out and take her to dinner. This time around, Lawrence didn't have Randall Winston's wardrobe-help, so he showed up in a blousey shirt and a sweater west, sporting slicked-back frosty-tipped hair, Doc Martins and ripped jeans. Miller was put off by Lawrence's style, but she was living in a duplex with Nicole Sullivan at the time, and Sullivan convinced her to go on a second date with him anyway.
Bill and Christa on their third date.
"When she (Miller) and Bill were first dating he was so in love (I mean she was in love with him too,) but he was so puppy-dog in love with her (still is). - Nicole Sulivan on Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2024.
The ball got rolling, and Miller came along for Lawrence's trip to Cabo with some friends that Christmas. "A bi-coastal romance ensued, and in March Lawrence left "Spin City" for Los Angeles, where he is now developing new sitcoms for ABC. The couple live in the Hollywood Hills and spend their weekends battling each other at various outdoor sports."
"My wife beats me in every couple-battle, every mental battle, you know, she decides what I do, she's in charge of everything in my life. The only victory I ever had was when I left New York, cuz you know I fell in love with her and I was running this show in New York, Spin City, and she had to work, she was in LA doing The Drew Carey Show, and I thought "Man, if I don't move to LA. You can't do that long-distance thing for years, this relationship's gonna end", so I said "I'm moving back to LA". Christa said "You know you're not moving in with me", and I said "Cool, whatever". And when i came and visited once she showed me this cool house she was building up in Nichols Canyon and I remember going "man, this is gonna be a perfect place for me to live", right? But she's like "you're not moving in with me", and I said "I don't want to, I'm gonna rent kind of a party-place at the beach in Malibu" and she's like "By yourself?" and I'm like "No, I'm gonna do it with Rob Maschio, it's better". Then I saw Rob like two nights after that and I go "Hey, I've told Christa Miller, this woman I'm dating, that you and I are, when I move back to LA, getting a house on the beach in Malibu that I'm paying for that we'll live in together and have lots of parties", and he goes "Are we?" And I said "No ... We're not at all, but you have to know that in case you see her". And then when I got to LA she said "you shouldn't have a party-house on the beach, you should just crash here at my new house." And I was like "Alright". That's my only victory, that's the house you (speaking to Donald Faison and Zach Braff) did the table-read at.
Bill and Christa the night they got engaged.
... Don't get me wrong, when we lived there I was like "Hey, I have this favorite couch ...", - "No", "I have a favorite chair" - "nu-huh", "what about this fork, can I bring this fork to our new house?" - "No, these forks don't work", I'm like "Alright". We got engaged like 7 weeks later, and as a gift she turned an extra room in that house into an office for me, for about 2 months, and the she's like "I'm pregnant"; and the very same workers who had put office-stuff in there came back 60 days later and ripped it all out and turned it into a nursery." - Lawrence in episode 310 of Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
On Nov. 27, 1999, they were married in New York in the chapel at the Convent of the Sacred Heart, where Ms. Miller went to school. In some ways, it resembled a Hollywood wedding. Guests had to check their cameras at the door since there were celebrities inside, including the casts of "Drew Carey" and "Spin City."
As a bridegroom, Lawrence was characteristically boyish and wide-eyed. "I'll always remember how blown away I was when I saw Christa in her dress," he said a few days later. "Everything leading up to that moment was pure terror and then, the second I saw her, she was so beautiful it had a very calming effect. The only nagging thought was, 'What on earth is this woman marrying me for?' " - New York Times, 1999.
"As a young man who grew up without a lot of girl-friends, people who were just in my world, it was eye-opening to me at a very young age to not only see the independence and empowerment of a real human being, but also having to look at myself, and my writing as a younger guy ... without a doubt some of the female characters when I started out were ciphers and weren't necessarily going on their own journeys, so me, I take great pride in not only having crazy strong female voices on our shows, but in making sure that the female characters demand as much of the men in their life as they do of each other, and B: that they have their own journeys that are independent of however better they want the guys to be as people." - Lawrence on We Disrupt This Broadcast, 2025.
The End of Spin City, and The Birth of Charlotte[]
Neil Flynn had appeared in a season 4-episode of The Drew Carey Show, playing opposite Miller. Shortly afterwards Flynn got invited to come along with some friends to a dinner with Christa and "her new husband." Flynn recognized Lawrence. It turned out they had been part of the same basketball-team years prior, when Flynn lived in LA (1986-1992).
Even though Lawrence left Spin City after Season 3, he returned to write the Season 4 finale. The finale aired on the 24th of May, 2000. The Aaron Sorkin show Sports Night (which Sorkin, according to Lawrence, had wanted to name Aaron Sokrin's Sports Night) got cancelled that same year, after having aired after Spin City for 2 years. The show was struggling by the end, and Lawrence would later recall having to do end-of-episode lead-ins to Sports Night on Spin City to boost viewer-retention. When the show got cancelled Aaron said in a New York Times-interview that it was no surprise that the show got cancelled, after all they were "on after a show that had a talking dog." Lawrence didn't appreciate Sorkin's dig at the show, and it's occasionally voiced dog Rags. Fittingly, Lawrence already had a retort on hand. One of his writer's room-jokes was to act like he was a pizza guy in a Aaron Sorkin show. Lawrence had found that Sorkin didn't know how to write unique and contrasting characters, a pizza guy in The West Wing would always be as quick and quip-y as the main characters, and he found that to be funny. When Lawrence later ran into Sorkin at a bar, he did the imitation right to his face. Lawrence has later clarified that when Sorkin writes for something that warrants his brand of self-importance, and it isn't contextually overkill, like in The Social Network or A Few Good Men, it's "really really good."
"I try super-duper hard to be specific. If you're writing a pilot, and you have a joke and go "eh, instead of this character saying the joke I'll have a different character saying the joke, it's my personal belief that you've failed, because you shouldn't be able to take a line from one character and give it to another, Gary (David Goldberg) taught me that." - Lawrence in a 2021 WGF Library Script Breakdown.
Bill and Christa welcomed their first child, Charlotte Sarah Lawrence, into the world on June 8th, 2000.
Scrubs[]
Conception[]
Back in LA, writing, Bill got the idea to draw some inspiration from his childhood-friend Jonathan Doris, nicknamed JD. Lawrence and JD had joked around so much back in high school that JD had to go back to undergraduate school to get onto his desired career-path: medicine. Lawrence couldn't imagine anything scarier than awaiting surgery and seeing JD's face just as he was being put under. Lawrence had seen the wild, immature, partying side of JD, and now he was a doctor. It was surreal, and definitely sitcom-material.
''Two of my best friends from high school became doctors, they supplied me with stories of their internships and from there the contacts grew. We did the pyramid - every doctor knows another three doctors,'' - Lawrence speaking to The New York Times, 2001.
Reading House of God and getting some insight into the medical industry also awoke some interest in Lawrence, and he'd take inspiration from that book as well. Lawrence ran the idea by Jonathan Doris, who at that point was a internal medicine resident "at Brown in Providence, Long Island". Doris was worried a show based on his stories would stop people from ever going to a hospital again, but figured Lawrence would be able to pull it of. Doris gave the green light, as long as Lawrence portrayed the doctors as what they were, heroes, and not egocentric or money-centered. Lawrence promised to do so. Lawrence pitched the show successfully, the pilot got picked up, and thus, Scrubs was born.
Bill sporting prop-antlers during shooting of the pilot, My First Day.
"When I first pitched the show, I pitched it to ABC because I was under an ABC deal, and the feedback I got was general disinterest - unless I was interested in making it a multi-camera sitcom. And I just didn't… creatively, I think that the second you put a medical show in one of those sitcom prosceniums, it looks like a bunch of television actors playing doctor. For the show to look realistic at all it had to be a single camera show." - Lawrence speaking to IGN, 2006.
Sorting The Paperwork[]
In October 2000 Lawrence inked a three-year, seven-figure exclusive development deal with NBC Studios' production arm, which called for him to "create and produce series and other programming" for the network, which entailed a development-deal for the show. Scrubs premiered October 9th, 2001, under Lawrence's production company Doozer, which had recently moved over from ABC's Touchstone Television to NBC. The show was produced and owned by ABC, who Lawrence had done Spin City with, making it so that NBC didn't have to sink the production-costs, only the licensing. This arrangement also separated the business from the creative aspects, having Lawrence engage with the latter.
"When the show was picked up, NBC wanted it to be a co-venture, which would have been owned half by NBC and half by Disney. And Disney gambled - because everybody liked the show a whole lot, they decided not to give up any ownership, and get all the money for themselves. And the reason that's a good gamble, believe it or not, is that as a result, NBC having no stake in the profit of the show." - Lawrence speaking to IGN, 2006.
"The strangest thing is that, technically, I worked at NBC, but my studio on the show has been Touchstone. (Lawrence refuses to accept the studio’s new name (ABC) and is launching a grass-roots campaign to bring back the old Touchstone moniker). They’ve been my partners, and I’ve been working closely with Mark and (executive vp) Julia (Franz)." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2007.
Lawrence's wife was still under contract with ABC for The Drew Carrey Show, but seeing as Scrubs was owned by ABC, she was allowed to appear in "a bunch of episodes." In Lawrence's mind, the show was to be both a live-action hospital-set version of The Simpsons, and a cross between The Wonder Years and M.A.S.H. The show's central relationship, between J.D. and Christopher Turk, was once again inspired by Lawrence's friendship with producing-partner Randall Keenan Winston.
"The only thing we switched is that I'm Turk, I am the jockey guy who is getting better at saying his feelings." - Lawrence on We Disrupt This Broadcast, 2025.
"Randall Winston is the closest thing I have to a life-partner, besides my wife." - Lawrence on Episode 218 of Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
Winston got at least two characters named after him (Randall Winston, Robert Dolan's Mr. Winston), as well as the Season 9 medical school Winston University. Naturally, he also worked on the show as an associate producer, as well as playing Grim Reaper and Leonard the security guard.
Casting[]
Lawrence, who had always been rooting for Robert Maschio, wrote him the part of "The Todd." Maschio had just recently signed with the well-established Gersh Agency. He finally had a real chance to either make it as a standup or a theater actor, and was hesitant to move back out to LA yet again. When he got serious with Lawrence and told him all this, Lawrence told him he had a spare red Mustang convertible in storage that he'd loan Maschio for 6 months if he moved out to LA and took on the role. Maschio did just that, and eventually bought out the car. The car was a bit squeaky, and this would go on to be referenced in My Nickname, where The Todd talks about how his car was squeaking the previous night. John C. McGinley's mentoring character was based off Lawrence's old English teacher, Brian Cox, as well as his father in law, Charles Miller, a stern surgeon at Lenox Hill. Lawrence once got to meet a nurse that used to work with Miller, and she recalled everyone being scared whenever he'd enter the room. In the casting-call, the character was described as a "John C. McGinley-type." Zach Braff, Donald Faison and Sarah Chalke got the series' leading roles after regular audition-processes.
Bill, Zach and Christa in the early days of Scrubs.
''What's helping Zach is his present experience in real life, he's being pushed in over his head, dealing with a lot of pressure, very similar to the character he is playing.'' - Lawrence speaking to The New York Times, 2001.
Faison blew one of his auditions. Thankfully Lawrence had his back, allowing him to try one more time.
"I like JD and Turk's friendship because when I was a kid, anytime a black guy and a white guy were friends on a sitcom it was a very special episode, it was the episode that Timmy has a black friend. And I really always wanted to write a friendship-relationship of two guys who would kill or die for each other, and not only was race not an issue, they could talk about it. And I love writing about the ‘bromance’ (between J.D. and Turk), because behind closed doors the real J.D. and I were that close. I love him like my other wife.” - Lawrence in a 2009 speech at the College of William and Mary.
"With these two characters I was always joking that I was wrestling with both sides of myself (the jock and the musical theater-fan)" - Lawrence on Episode 103 of Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2020.
The show was originally set to premiere on Tuesday 9/11/2001, but was postponed by a week.
''I'd be lying if I said we weren't feeling the pressure, the worst-case senario is a noble failure. Anyway, my mom liked it.'' - Lawrence speaking to The New York Times, September 2001.
Braff and Chalke had a brief relationship around the start of the series, and a volatile breakup soon thereafter. Some of the same casting-personnel from The Drew Carey Show was brought on for Scrubs, and Neil Flynn got a call, originally suggesting he audition for the role of Dr. Cox. By the time Flynn auditioned, Lawrence already considered the part locked down, and suggested he audition for another part instead. Flynn ended up in the role of The Janitor, and after seeing Flynn do an improv show as part of Beer Shark Mice, Lawrence made Flynn's character a bigger part of the pilot.
"Neil Flynn is one of the best improv guys in the US." - Lawrence for the Writer's Guild Foundation, 2011.
Sam Lloyd, who Lawrence had gotten to know through Spin City (and their following basketball-matches) got the part of the resident lawyer, Ted Buckland.
Piecing It All Together[]
Lawrence wanted to shoot the show in a real abandoned hospital, and was presented with a saddening amount of options. The pilot was shot at a hospital in Glendale, California. The rest of the show ended up being shot at North Hollywood Medical Center, with the exception of season 9, Med School, which was shot across various sets at Culver Studios. The hospital was pretty worn down, and over the course of the show various crew members stumbled upon things such as an opossum lounging in a couch on the grounds to a rat's nest in a cupboard. The urgent care center at the hospital had closed just 5 weeks before Scrubs started shooting, so injured people would occasionally come in looking for medical assistance. Lawrence also had set-dressers make a gym-set in the hospital's basement during the show's third season, paid for by ABC, only to later ask them to leave it up for crew, staff and actors to casually use. Lawrence wasn't able to get the rights for the music he wanted in the show's pilot, but his wife suggested alternatives that Lawrence really dug. Thus, Christa Miller ended up being the main music-supervisor on the show, with help from Neil Goldman and Zach Braff. The team made a giant playlist, split into genres, and they'd play around until something felt right. Miller had used to DJ in New York, and grew up with a young cool mom who would play good music. Her uncle was also a producer on Saturday Night Live, and she'd come to set and see the bands play sometimes. Shortly after being cast in the show, Zach Braff recommended Lawrence the song Superman, off Lazlo Bane's third album, All the Time in the World. The song ended up as Scrubs' theme song. Colin Hay, the former vocalist of Men At Work, ended up contributing music to the series, starting with the Season 1 finale, My Last Day, after Miller had brought Lawrence to several of his concerts at Largo at the Coronet. Joshua Radin, a friend of Zach Braff, also contributed music to the series, starting with the first song he had ever written and recorded, Winter, which was used in My Screw Up. John Michel from Spin City was brought on to edit several episodes over the course of the series. Jonathan Doris and his wife were both brought on as medical advisors for the show. Doris was given the nickname "Real JD", (or "Real" for short). His wife, Dolly Klock, was a partial inspiration behind the character of Elliot Reid.
"This show (Scrubs) exists because he (Jonathan Doris) was my best friend from age 18 on, we went to college together and were roommates" - Lawrence in a Scrubs-panel at the Vulture Festival, 2018.
The cast and crew crafted a unique atmosphere. Actors had dressing rooms on one floor of the hospital, editors worked on another floor, everyone were allowed to bring their dogs, and it was not uncommon for people to stick around at the hospital and drink in the late hours of the day. Lawrence once pulled a prank on Zach Braff. Braff had bought a used Nissan 240SX for $5.000 when he first came to LA (borrowing money from his parents). By the time Season 2 or 3 rolled around, Braff bought the newly released Nissan 350Z (giving the 240SX to a former colleague at the French-Vietnamese restaurant he had used to work at). Braff had been an admirer of Nissan sports cars for a long time. He had been enamored by his father's Nissan 280ZX, which he remembered being one of the first cars that "could talk", saying things such as "your lights are on." Lawrence got the prop department to put a fake license plate on the car that said "TV DOC," "so he he looked like a tool when he took his girlfriend out." Braff drove around with the license plate for over a week before realizing it.
"Scrubs was the last of the Wild West in television." - Lawrence on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, 2024
"Ultimately Scrubs wasn't a giant hit out of the gate, and it wasn't a failure, either. It was somewhere right in the middle." - Lawrence speaking to IGN, 2006. <-- (amazing interview.)
During Scrubs' first season Zach Braff took a leap of faith and wrote an episode for the show. He handed it to Lawrence for him to take a look. Lawrence was in a hurry at the end of the day, and accidentally left the screenplay on the roof of his car. When Braff got out to the parking lot, his script was spread out, sporting tire-marks. Lawrence would go on to help Braff with the script for his movie Garden State. The movie originally had a heart-wrenching scene near the end, Lawrence said "that's the best scene of your movie, and you have to cut it." The movie had evolved into it's own thing, a love story, and the scene didn't fit into that.
The show usually utilized glycerine to get the actors to cry, but Sarah Chalke had her own "crying CD". Donald Faison sported behind-the-teeth braces for Season 2. Sarah Chalke also had dental work done, correcting her snaggletooth with similar braces around the time of Season 3.
At the very beginning of Scrubs, some of the network-suits weren't sure if it was possible to fulfill what Lawrence had put down on the page, to go from gut-busting funny and absurd to gut-wrenchingly heartfelt and sad at the turn of the dime. In response Lawrence joked "If I turn down the lights and play some emotional indie-song I think it'll work."
"The thing I'm most proud of about this show (Scrubs) is the amount of medical professionals that have said that we either caught what they were going through or influenced them into becoming nurses or doctors. It means so much to me, so thank you so much for saying that, for doing it, I think it's really cool." - Lawrence in a Scrubs-panel at the Vulture Festival, 2018.
Christa dancing with Charlotte, in Their Story.
Clone High[]
Lawrence acted as a sort of godfather to Phil Lord and Christopher Miller when they were making Clone High for MTV in 2001, and when they couldn't afford their own offices, Lawrence got part of North Hollywood Medical Center, the filming-location for S01-08 of Scrubs, cleared out for them. Many Scrubs-cast members crossed over into Clone High, because the teams would frequently cross paths. Lawrence once got a call from higher-ups at ABC, complaining about how the food they financed being eaten by the crew of a MTV show. Sarah Chalke briefly dated Phil Lord. Lawrence was also a producer on Clone High, voiced The Shadowy Figure, co-wrote an episode and was in every sense of the word a co-creator.
The Show Finds It's Footing[]
Lawrence appeared alongside parts of the Scrubs-cast in 2002's It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie. in 2003, Lawrence renewed his NBC-contract for another 5 years.
In 2004 Lawrence was driving with his wife, Christa Miller, to the filming of the Matthew Perry-penned Scrubs episode My Unicorn. Perry was a friend of Miller's, back from her LA days, and Lawrence had always wondered how friendly the two of them got. As a test, Lawrence asked her "are you sure it isn't gonna be awkward working with Matthew, seeing as you two slept together?" Miller answered "no, no, that won't be a problem." Lawrence was ecstatic that he managed to fish that information out of her, and he frequently tells the story. Miller's fondness of Perry runs deep, and she was deeply saddened by his passing. There's a photo of Perry hung in the Lawrence-home that Lawrence's kids used to think depicted their father. Throughout his career Lawrence has gone back and forth from being told that he looks like a "Matthew Perry's skinnier younger brother" and "Matthew Perry's chubbier older brother." Lawrence is also aware that he bears a resemblance to Brendan Fraser. in 2004 Lawrence was also in talks about doing a Brian Regan sitcom with Tim Hobert.
Fletch Lives[]
In 2005, Lawrence was brought on to direct Fletch Won for Miramax, a prequel to the previous Fletch films. Zach Braff, who had done other Miramix films, at one point became Harvey Weinstein's choice as a lead, but ended up dropping out as the production wasn't moving along (long story). Dax Shepard at one point had a meeting with Lawrence about taking the spot. Lawrence ultimately ended up quitting the project, seeing as it was at a standstill, and he only had 6 weeks available for other projects before being in breech of his Scrubs-contract. Lawrence didn't get a good impression of the movie-industry, a industry where "everyone's second-guessing you and giving you shit." Weinstein took a liking to Lawrence's version of a script for the movie, and wanted to put it to film after Lawrence left. Lawrence made it clear that he wouldn't allow them to make the movie based off his script. Weinstein took advantage of Lawrence's wording and started passing around the script to different studios as the basis of a TV-show instead of a movie. The disagreement evolved into a legal battle.
Bill and Zach Braff celebrating the big 100, My Way Home.
Nobody's Watching[]
In 2005 Lawrence, along with the Scrubs writing-duo Neil Goldman and Garrett Donovan, wrote a pilot for the reality TV-spoof Nobody's Watching. The pilot starred Taran Killam and Paul Campbell, both having worked on Scrubs. Paul Adelstein also played a part. The show was not picked up, however, the pilot leaked onto YouTube in 2006. The pilot garnered some traction, and Warner Bros. TV agreed to produce webisodes of the series. Webisodes of varying length were released until January 12, 2007. In an interview with TV Squad, Lawrence divulged that NBC would broadcast a live TV special in March 2007. However, soon thereafter a NBC spokesperson stated, "The project is not going forward." The actors' contracts were set to expire at the end of February. 2005 (but also in part 2004) was also the year that Lawrence wrote and executive-produced a pilot for the show Confessions of A Dog. The show was to focus on three good friends in their 30s, one of whom — the “Dog” of the title — was a guy who has never had a serious relationship. One was married, and the other was engaged. The show didn't get picked up. Lawrence had written the pilot together with Eric Weinberg, who would go on to get fired off the show by Lawrence for inappropriate conduct a year later, for doing things such as harassing a background actress during the shoot of My Life in Four Cameras and "inappropriately propositioning a woman off set."
The 2005 Scrubs-crew.
The Late Era[]
Lawrence spent 9 years working as the showrunner on Scrubs (2001-2010). When Lawrence thought season 6 was going to be the last, he killed off the character of Laverne Roberts, but when the show got renewed, he brought the actress back as Shirley. The fact that the comedy-scene was crowded and hard to get work in, and that the actress had just bought a brand new Escalade, factored into Lawrence's decision to bend the plot to make sure she had steady work. In 2007 Lawrence left NBC, with one year left of his deal, for an 8-figure overall deal back at ABC, involving a a multimillion-dollar advance and roughly a $3 million yearly paycheck. The cause of this was that NBC had announced that it wouldn't be renewing Scrubs for an eight season. Lawrence thought the show would have a better chance of continuing being on air if he signed on with the network. ABC, who already had ownership of the show, did indeed end up picking up the airing-responsibilities.
“The lesson I learned is never to put on a network a show that is owned by another network." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2007.
The Season 8 Bahamas two-parter, My Soul on Fire, Part 1/My Soul on Fire, Part 2 was shot in Hope Town, Abaco, with a crew of 93 people. The location was no coincidence, Lawrence's father has some houses out there, that he rents out when he's not there. Lawrence's father is the man who sits by Kelso's side at the bar.
Bill's father sitting at the bar, Ken Jenkins to his left.
Med School[]
In 2009 a 9th season of the show came along. Every writer from previous seasons departed from the show, with the exception of Lawrence and Andy Schwartz. Lawrence had reduced involvement in the season, but wanted it to be a spinoff. ABC initially respected this, but changed their minds late in pre-production.
“I said, ‘I’ll do a spinoff called Scrubs Med and have it be med school,’ but they panicked at the eleventh hour and gave Zach [Braff] a lot of money to be in some and it was no longer a spinoff,” he says. “Now, at least once a day, someone will go, ‘Aren’t you bummed you ruined the show’s legacy?’ “ - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
The Bigger Picture[]
“We wrote almost 200 episode of that show, I just had to do something else, it was so fun though.” - Lawrence on Not Skinny But Not Fat, 2023.
Over the course of the series' 9 year run, the cast and crew had over 30 babies. Lawrence likes to say the monologue that tail-ends the finale is really about being a TV-writer.
Over the course of the show's production, Lawrence and Miller had two more kids, William Stoddard Lawrence in January of 2003, and Henry Vanduzer Lawrence in October of 2006.
Bill, Christa and the kids, 2006/2007.
When Lawrence's kids were younger, he'd do a "magic trick" by pausing shows they were watching and predicting the next line or story-beat, he'd often be right.
"He (Lawrence) started with Spin City, took it to a greater extreme with Scrubs, two-page/three-page scenes that add up to a story. That was never done before, and when you get stuff like 30 Rock and success of shows, that started with Bill, and it started on Spin City a little bit, but it really continued with Scrubs. He is the creator, he is the mind behind the new thing, because he was young and attention-spans shifted. That's what he did, he created that, and it's astounding what he did, and I don't think anyone credits him." - Richard Kind on Fake Doctors, Real Friends, 2021.
When Scrubs Won a Peabody-award in 2006, Lawrence accepted the award, and held a brief speech, but managed to forget to thank his wife Christa. Lawrence quickly re-entered the stage, interrupting Bob Costas, to correct his mistake.
Cougar Town[]
Conception[]
During Scrubs' eighth season Lawrence co-created the sitcom Cougar Town with Kevin Biegel, starring former Scrubs guest star Courteney Cox, and Christa Miller. The series went on for 6 seasons, and had a cast containing of many Scrubs-alumni. Christa Miller was yet again the music-supervisor. The story of the show's conception is not entirely agreed upon. According to Lawrence, Cox had shown interest in doing a sitcom, and ABC reached out to him. According to Cox on the other hand, she reached out to Lawrence specifically. Either way, he thought was good enough at writing for women to take the task upon himself, and didn't give a definitive answer. He went back to the Scrubs writer's room and ranted about how it was so hard to get a show on air, and how strange it was that if he called up ABC and pitched a show called Cougar Town, about Cox's character getting divorced at 40 and being on the prow for younger guys, the network would put it right up on the schedule. A part of the joke was also that a cougar would reach out it's paw and rip down, with a "wrah!"-sound effect whenever there was a transition. The fictional show became a running gag in the writer's room.
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Cox played a part in 3 Season 8-episodes of Scrubs, according to Cox this was to test the waters for a potential partnership, because her reasoning as to Lawrence holding out was that it was out of skepticism of having a lead who would also be a creative partner.
As the story goes, Lawrence came in one day and showed a glimpse of interest in actually going through with the idea, and Kevin Biegel quickly caught on and suggested they do it. The two guys went ahead, and the network-president did as they had joked about, and gave it an immediate green light. The guys had simply went in and pitched the rough room-bit. According to Cox on the other hand, Lawrence came up with the idea after, at long last, saying yes to doing the show, either way, the wheels got rolling.
"We've all lived through the death of the multi-camera sitcom, the death of the single-camera sitcom, the death of the drama, the death of the sitcom again, you know, it's all bullshit. If one thing works, you're gonna see 20 versions of it, and I think the thing everyone' gravitating back to is shows that mean something, you know, that you guys hopefully feel an emotional connection to. I learned this lesson from my dad, I used to get him to watch these shows that I love, and I still love them, I loved Arrested Development, by the way that's a great comedy-writer show. I called my parents, said "you've gotta watch this show." And after two weeks my dad was like "who gives a shit?" And I was offended, and I was like "why?" And he was like "eh, if I'm gonna spend half an hour watching TV I wanna care about someone, you know." As a comedy-writer I don't necessarily need that, and I think that in tough times, the one trend beyond single camera/multi camera is I see people really responding to characters they care about. The biggest lie in television-comedy is that Seinfeld was a show about nothing, because the reason some people wanted the finale to be different is cuz they loved all those people, and you can't fight it. What I hope is going on with this show is these are people that I would hang out with anyways, and enjoy spending time with each other, and that people can see that on the screen." - Lawrence talking at the Paley Center of Media as part of a Cougar Town-panel, 2010.
Separating The Show From The Room Bit[]
The show went on for 6 seasons, ditching the joke-concept after 6 episodes (according to Lawrence.) The shifting of focus to adult friendship was influenced by an experience at Courteney Cox's house. Cox had this old tradition, from her childhood in Alabama, of gathering family and friends on Sunday-nights to eat and stand in a circle and talk about what they're grateful for. Lawrence was there one Sunday-night and it planted the idea of making a show about adult-friendship. Lawrence was not comfortable letting anybody else than his wife "touch his body," so the holding of hands was something he struggled with as the show went on and he kept getting invited. The first year Lawrence juggled the show with Season 9 of Scrubs. At the time of release, Lawrence was quoted as saying: "the title is noisy and that people will be aware of this show." He also justified it by saying "any movie that comes out with a woman even 4 years older than a guy, every review says "this cougar-story..." on the other hand Sean Connery can be dating Catherine Zeta Jones in a movie or Michael Douglas can be married with Gwyneth Paltrow, who I believe he is 130 years older than, you know. And so we thought that it'd be fun to do a story on the other side, and make no apologies."
Bill on location for Cougar Town.
Behind the scenes, Lawrence wanted to ditch the name pretty early on, and change it to The Sunshine State, but the show was pulling in good ratings on DVRs. If the name had changed everyone would need to re-program their DVRs not to miss it, which would effectively lead to a drop in ratings. Lawrence compromised by adding jokes to each title card, often poking fun at the name. Lawrence's wife yet again served as music-supervisor. She had some friends in London who'd send her songs from this unknown singer, Ed Sheeran, and so she used some of them in the show. Years later Lawrence and Miller were out for dinner and he came up to their table and told them that he had been sleeping on friends' couches at that time and that those checks really mattered to him.
"it took me a long time to learn how to write women. I still don’t think I’m great at it. Even when we did that goofy show Cougar Town, I remember it became a story — and it shouldn’t have — that even though Kevin Biegel and I were the creators, there were more women on that staff than men. People would sometimes go, “Oh it’s cool and noble.” Yeah, it’s also out of fear because my wife is one of those women. If they get pages of dialogue that sound like they’re written by a bunch of dudes, it’s not going to be good for me." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
The show was off the air for 9 months between Seasons 2 and 3, but a spot opened up on the ABC-schedule and the show got it's third season. Lawrence and the crew ran a grassroots-marketing campaign to promote the new season, hosting watch-parties around the country, with an open bar and and celebrity-guests from the cast. Lawrence also promised to answer every Twitter-post he got tagged in during this period, and encouraged the cast members to do the same. Lawrence and Biegel left their day-to-day duties on the show after 3 seasons, when the show moved over to TBS. Following this, Miller would sometimes leave scripts on Lawrence's pillow, to improve upon or fix issues. Ken Jenkins played Courteney Cox's father in 19 episodes of the series. Sarah Chalke played Angie, a doctor, for 4 episodes, while Robert Clendenin, Dr. Zeltzer, was a series-regular, playing a neighbor to Cox's character for 65 episodes. Brian Van Holt, who had the part of water-boy in Spin City, played one of the leads. Lawrence had taken a liking to him back in the 90s, and when they met again at a charity-event years later and Van Holt expressed a desire to get back into comedy, Lawrence told him about the show he was working on and that he'd call him about it the next day. Barry Bostwick and Alan Ruck, from Spin City and Scrubs, made several appearances. Scott Foley also popped by. Michael McDonald appeared in 2 episodes, and was a writer, director and producer. Every episode of the show was named after a Tom Petty song. Petty took notice, and when a stage he and his band was somewhat secretly rehearsing to play on coincidentally was placed right by one of the show's shooting-locations, Petty let Lawrence listen in on the rehearsal.
Busy Philipps - Bill is always the first one to be like "whatever you feel like, you know, if that's the way you want to say it you should say it that way."
Bill Lawrence - Aaron Sorkin is the same way. (shakes his head slowly and repeatedly). (crowd and crew erupts in laughter)
Busy Philipps - there's a time and a place for word-perfect and there's a time and there's a place where there's not, and Cougar Town maybe isn't, that's all I'm saying, and it's so freeing and amazing to be a part of something where you feel like there's a collaboration involved, and you're able to improv, even if it doesn't make it into the show it's like ...
Christa Miller - Wait, but if I say to Bill, very rarely because I don't write, if I say to him "you know, this joke ... I feel," at home I'll say this, and he'll say "it's funny, you're totally wrong, just do it."
- An Evening with Cougar Town, 2011.
Ties to Scrubs[]
Sam Lloyd appeared as Ted Buckland in two season 2-episodes. In addition, S03E05 of the series, A One Story Town, contains cameos from The Worthless Peons, Robert Maschio, and Zach Braff. Maschio is credited as "Pool Man / The Todd," and appears to be in character, offering a confused Ted Buckland a high-five. Zach Braff goes uncredited as a pizza-boy, whilst the Peons are all credited under the names of their Scrubs-characters. The list of other Scrubs-actors who appeared in the series includes Barry Bostwick, Matthew Perry and Nicole Sullivan.
The Turbulent 2010s[]
In 2011, at the end of his ABC-contract, Lawrence signed a deal with Warner Brothers Television, after NBC head of comedy Jeff Ingold had joined his production-company. He took his production company and left ABC on good terms with Paul Lee. After having worked 3 weeks at WB Lawrence joked that president Peter Roth had hugged him more times than his father had ever done. "It's not that I don't love my dad, but we don't hug in Connecticut, that's not what we do, we don't express our feelings." In 2011 Lawrence also sold a "Jason Belleville Firefighter Comedy" to ABC, nothing came to be of the project.
In 2012 Lawrence wrote and directed a Fox-ordered pilot for his single-camera comedy Like Father. The show was to be based loosely upon Lawrence's own relationship with his father, and was to "revolve around 19-year-old Will Lyons (Amell) who comes of age in the shadow of his 39-year-old father, Van (Colin Ferguson) as his dad infiltrates his college life and influences his friends." Phill Lewis played a part in the pilot. The show was not picked up. That very same year ABC signed on to make Lawrence's adaptation of the British comedy show Feel the Force. Company-president Paul Lee had called Lawrence personally to make the offer, but shortly thereafter, in the show's development-stage, Lawrence got a network-note that put the show on it's head. Lawrence was so annoyed that he decided to contact the network and pass on them. Lawrence sent an email and laid out his frustrations, telling them "I'll pass on making this for you guys". Shortly afterwards Lawrence's business-partner walked in and asked "Hey, did you just email the network-president passing on making the show?" Lawrence replied affirmingly and the partner replied "Ok, cool, you can't make it anywhere else so it's dead."
"If you're not a writer you have no idea how satisfying that was for like 25 seconds, it was fricking awesome. Now it's just really upsetting." - Lawrence on Screaming into the Hollywood Abyss, 2021.
For the next little bit, Lawrence continued to create and executive produce various Doozer television-series under contract with WB Television, often featuring actors from past shows. Neil Flynn appeared in an episode of Lawrence's short-lived series Surviving Jack in 2013. The series starred Christopher Meloni. John C. McGinley was a co-star in the Doozer-series Ground Floor from 2013 to 2015, appearing in all 20 episodes.
(Talking about Lawrence) "One of the few who can nurture the actor, run the writer’s room and placate the network/studio at the same time. He will have four shows on the air during the 2013-2014 season. If he gets off the basketball court, he might have a fifth.” - Howard West speaking to Next TV, 2013.
"Show-running is such a high-burnout thing, and if you love your family and love your relationships you either have to stop doing it; if you're a control-freak and can't let go, and can't empower other people, or; you need to learn you have to empower other people and go home. Christa had done 22 years of back-to-back sitcoms, from The Drew Carey Show to Cougar Town, and was taking a break to look after the kids. I didn't, and I was absent for a bit, I tried to catch up later, but I had missed out. I really regret that." - Lawrence on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, 2024.
Bill doing standup, Rick Glassman standing on his left.
Undateable[]
The show Undateable got picked up in 2012, started casting in 2013, and shooting in March of 2013. Adam Sztykiel created the show, but Lawrence was an important writer, overseer and executive producer. He was a guiding figure for Sztykiel, and in a lot of ways they ran the show together. Lawrence advocated for casting stand-up comedians to enhance the show's comedic dynamics and chemistry among the cast, and that's what they ended up doing. Robert Maschio appeared in a 2014 episode of the series, credited as "The Todd." Tom Cavanagh played a part in the very same episode. In 2014, Lawrence and four other cast members from Undateable did a standup comedy tour to promote the show, scratching Lawrence's old standup-itch. Zach Braff, Donald Faison, Neil Flynn and Christa Miller all appeared in a 2015 live-taped 2-part episode of the show (Miller had previously appeared in another S03-episode,) whilst Sarah Chalke appeared in a separate 2015 episode, portraying herself. The show was on air from 2014 to 2016.
"The show Undateable, for instance, only survived for three seasons or whatever the heck it was, but the super fun part for me was if you said, “Hey, did you ever think you were going to get to run a live sitcom for a year with Adam [Sztykiel]?” It was an awesome experience. Would I have handled the business of it differently? Yeah, man. I feel like that show should’ve been successful. They should’ve kept it on in the summer for years. It was a summer hit. The summer it came out, it got ratings that [NBC] still can’t beat. It got 1.0s and 1.1s in the summer. Then they’re like, “Hey, we didn’t help this show at all, but maybe now we should put it on the fall, and then maybe now we should put it all live, and then maybe now we should cancel it.” It’s just the game." - Lawrence talking to Decider, 2019.
Lawrence appeared in Undateable-alumn Rick Glassman's five-part web series The Sixth Lead, about his experience working on the show. Like on many of his shows, Lawrence had been a mentoring figure, and also accepted Glassman into a private basketball-game. Glassman was very competitive, and not aware of how the rest of the team, who at one point voiced wishes of kicking him out, perceived him. Lawrence sent Glassman an email, telling him all this, and it was a real turning-point for Glassman.
Bill on the set of Rush Hour.
On-Field Losses, Off-Field Victories[]
In 2015, Lawrence renewed his WB-deal and co-wrote a series-adaptation of Rush Hour, airing in 2016. The show was cancelled after one season. Lawrence would rather forget about the show.
In 2015 NBC also ordered a pilot for Lawrence's multi-camera comedy A Bronx Life. Lawrence yet again joined forces with Undateable's Adam Sztykiel for this, but the show didn't get picked up. In 2017, Lawrence started developing a new multi-camera comedy series called Spaced Out, a show set in the world of commercial space travel. Along for the ride yet again was Undateable co-creator and executive producer Adam Sztykiel. Brett Goldstein starred in the pilot, and Donald Faison was involved, but the show didn't get picked up.
in 2017 Lawrence and some members of his family were on board a seaplane that went through several failed takeoffs, before suffering a rough landing on the East River, New York. "We were a couple hundred feet up in the air, then the engines failed and the whole thing crashed back (down). And one of the pontoons shut off, so there's water rushing on the plane, and you have to get out and the coast guard picks you up and stuff. I remember the fear, not for me, but my daughter was way too young." It was a wake-up call for Lawrence that things could change in an instant, and that;
"You can't keep waiting for some other time to take care of yourself and your family, even though I grind I still, I don't care how much work there is to do, I still leave in time to see my son's water polo-games, I still show up at my daughter's concerts around the world, even if I'm going to get absolutely crushed business-wise, I still show up for my middle-son, even if it's just a inter-medial basketball game in Brooklyn. I leave work, and I didn't have that skill-set necessarily, until soon after that (the crash.)" - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
Lawrence's daughter Charlotte had been serious about making music since she was 15, when one of her songs caught the attention of someone who had done music-supervision on a Doozer-show, and later ended up becoming her manager. In 2018 an artist with over 40 million social media followers shared one of her songs, and she ended up with a hit in South-America with her song Sleep Talking. "Lot of guys in shiny suits" descended upon their house, when she was two weeks into her senior year, and said that "the way music is now, she should leave school immediately and go on the road, and she'll have a chance to have a career doing this." Lawrence said no, because education was important within their family. Charlotte didn't talk to him for a week or two. Lawrence's dad ended up calling him, and him being very conservative, Lawrence expected him to give him a pat on the back for his decision. Instead he, in Lawrence's words, said "you're fucking up, and if it was your son and someone said he needed to go to Spain to play basketball for a year cuz he's so good, he'd already be gone, and you're being an absolute chicken-shit because it's your daughter." Lawrence ended up changing his mind and letting Charlotte go, in return she promised to get her GED.
In 2018 Lawrence also renewed his contract at WB, and sold a "Brent Morin department-store comedy" to NBC. Nothing more came to be of the project. Lawrence also executive-produced a pilot for the show Dead Inside.
Whiskey Cavalier[]
Lawrence was an executive producer on Whiskey Cavalier in 2019. The (network) show was shot in the Czech Republic because a show the scope that Lawrence and the rest of the producers were imagining wouldn't be feasible on their budget in the US. Lawrence arranged for the show's creator, David Hemingson, to have breakfast with Scott Foley, and see if he'd agree he was a good fit for a leading role in the series. Foley got the part.
"When Bill is on set, he can't help himself, he hangs out right behind camera when we're doing our scenes, and when you get these little snickers from Bill it's just the best things in the world. Because he'll like, he'll rewrite a joke on the day or re-write something on the day and he'll go; "Go, go with it, lean into it, trust me", and you just go with it." - Laura Cohen talking to BUILD Series in 2019.
Bill getting interviewed for Whiskey Cavalier.
"The reviews have been the best I could hope for with a network show. We’re actually happy for where it’s starting. This is the funny story of this is that Scott and I came up, we were talking, and we both miss … Well, first off all, network TV can’t compete with the hipness of Apple, Netflix, these streaming things, [like] PEN15, is not what network TV does. Let’s be honest. It’s becoming something that’s for 40 and 50-year olds, and we get it. Scott and I were like, “Man, I miss shows like Moonlighting and Hart to Hart.” We’re like, “Man, let’s do it. Let’s do a light action comedy that the spy stuff is all backdrop to that kind of banter, and make it an ensemble. The pilot will be a two-hander. The show will be an ensemble.” We set out to do what we wanted to do, and who knows if that nostalgic aspect of it will work, but I do know there’s plenty of TV out there that depresses the shit out of me, and there’s not a ton of TV right now the I’m like, “Hey, that’s a good time, have a glass of wine, get a smile, hopefully you like the characters-type show.”" - Lawrence talking to Decider, 2019.
The show did not get renewed. Lawrence penned a very passionate email asking ABC-president Karey Burke to reconsider, she briefly did, but the show was ultimately cancelled.
"The trigger finger is so quick in network television that you’re asking all these young writers not to choose between a 22-episode season and a 10-episode season on cable, but between an initial 10 episodes on a streamer that’s liable to go three seasons or a network show that, odds are, will be 13 episodes and gone. They have taken the business incentive out of doing network TV. I am always behind network TV, but if I were the president of a network I would say, “Hey, we know how hard it is to find an audience. If the show is good, we’re going to stick with it for two seasons and see if it can grab a toe hold.” I really argue against the itchy trigger finger that they get. It’s probably sour grapes because I thought Whiskey Cavalier, on ABC, should have lasted more than a season." - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2020.
Around this time Lawrence decided that if he ever was to change the name of his production-company, he'd change it to Noble Failures Productions. Because if you can create something you're not embarrassed to show your friends or family, that's all you can really set the bar with. Still, Lawrence was feeling like he was throwing shows off a cliff, and had trouble adjusting from the (at the time) dead format of network-television to streaming.
"I’d say the biggest hit my career took later in life was with Whiskey Cavalier. I’ve had tons of garbage shows that didn’t get on because they were awful. And I’ve had shows that were flawed that got on and I’m like, “That’s flawed, maybe we can fix it in time,” and they went away and I got it. Whiskey Cavalier was the first show where I was like, “This show is really good and it should pave the way to me going, ‘I want to do this type of thing but on a streaming thing at a little bigger budget.'” When that show didn’t make it, I was like, “What’s going on? My type of TV might be dead.” - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
The Lawrenaissance[]
Ted Lasso[]
Lawrence didn't let the stagnation bring him down, he loved writing, or having written something (Lawrence jokes that people who actually enjoy the act of writing itself are sociopaths,) wasn't all that hung on securing a legacy, and he had always been financially stable. One day Lawrence decided he was going to wager a bit on his future success, he and Christa sold one of their houses, and he started getting serious about making a streaming-show.
Bill with Jason Sudeikis and Zach Braff.
The wager payed off, and in recent times Lawrence is best known for having co-created and executive produced the Emmy-award winning series Ted Lasso for Apple TV+. The show was based off a series of Premiere League ads. Lawrence originally approached Jason Sudeikis with the idea of adapting Carl Hiaasens Bad Monkey into a series, with him as a lead. Lawrence had already written a script. Sudeikis, on the other hand, was more interested in doing something more with his old Ted Lasso-character, with the emotional undercurrent of Scrubs, and that's what they ended up doing. Sudeikis and Brendan Hunt had previously "tried mapping out a season" for such a show in 2015, after Sudeikis' then-girlfriend Olivia Wilde had suggested doing something with their two characters. Sudeikis, Hunt, Lawrence and Joe Kelly, a writer who had been involved in the original sketches, crafted the show bit by bit.
"The last time I had a true partnership was back in the Spin City-days when Mike Fox, if he didn't like something or wanted it to go in a different direction, it went in a different direction, and now I'm partners with someone else, or a group of people, who are like "No, Bill we know you like this but we're not gonna do it" -"So I'm gonna stay here later tonight? Alright" (laughs). So it's been a kind of interesting ... I think it's healthy for me because it forces you to kind of open your ears and listen to others a little bit, you know? ... It became a joke in the writer's room, because you get caught in patterns, and if I at any time pitched something that was reminiscent of Scrubs those guys had seen it before, and they could pick it out of 9.000, like "That's the Scrubs-thing, you can't do that again", and I'm like "I'm trying to be lazy here, man, give me a break, let me get home". - Lawrence on TV's Top 5, 2020
In the years that elapsed between talks getting started in 2015 and Lawrence getting everything stared for real in 2017 "there had been a darkening of the discourse," and the world was in need of some Ted Lasso.
"The discourse on social media and out in the ethos had become so toxic, and dark and cynical that we were joking around and said if we met someone like Ted Lasso in real life, out immediate thought would be "wait 2 weeks and that guy will reveal himself to be an asshole like everyone else", and then if two weeks later he doesn't, he turns out to be kind and empathetic and forgiving and supportive then you have to look at yourself, and that was kind of the influence of the show, we said "even if this show fails, It'd be cool to do a show that felt therapeutic for everyone involved." - Lawrence in a 2021 WGF script-breakdown.
Lawrence's wife was yet again involved with the show's music-selection. Lawrence and Sudeikis initially struggled with pitching the show, because their source material, the Premiere League sketches, were a lot more broad and silly than what they really wanted to do. Lawrence's Scrubs-pal Matt Tarses passed on the project. Apple dared to wager a bet on the project. It paid of, as the show has been credited with offering a lifeline of positivity during the COVID-19 pandemic, and was critically acclaimed throughout its run.
"The cool thing is, there used to be, in Network TV, that it was like "hey, come up with a show that appeals to everyone in the world." (It's impossible). Now if you come up with something that just appeals to a niche audience you're fine, so figure out what your thing is and stick with it hard."- Lawrence for The American Film Institute, 2023.
"I ran that show the first year because Jason was still shooting movies while we were doing the writers room. Then, at the end of that year, much like Gary with me, I was like, “Ah, I’ll spend a couple of months teaching him how to edit.” But after like a day or two, he’s like, “Yeah, I got it.” (Laughs.) So, the second year, we ran it together, and I’m only able to do other things now because that guy ran the show himself the third year, as it should be. It’s his voice and his world this season." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
"I think what Jason taught me is that there are no rules anymore. You guys understand, I stated out with, at the end of the day, the person running the room would say "we've gotta count the jokes on the page," because multi-camera sitcoms, we liked to average 3 jokes per. page. The genres have changed, the amount of time it takes to do it has changed. I think it's evolved because Jason is savvy enough to realize that people are into that show enough that they will watch a 58-minute episode of a comedy just to see Dani Rojas ... run a ... you know, he's right. man." - Lawrence for The American Film Institute, 2023.
Through the show, Lawrence crafted productive relationships with actor and writer Jason Sudeikis, and actor, co-creator and writing-partner Brett Goldstein, expanding his creative horizons. Goldstein was brought on through his Spaced Out-connection, originally to play Higgins, but the role was quickly filled. After a meeting with Sudeikis, Goldstein started writing for the show instead, and became part of the creator-trifecta. Goldstein started sniffing around one of the other roles, the role of Roy Kent. He made a self-tape, showed it to Lawrence, and Bill found it worthy of sending to Sudeikis. Sudeikis liked it, and Goldstein got the part. Zach Braff directed the second episode of the series. Lawrence gradually left the reigns more and more to Sudeikis, the character not originally being created by Lawrence made it easier for him to step aside and abide when his "ego and narcissism had to go away."
"When filming a pilot a character belongs 60% to the writers, ideally the dynamic shifts to 50-50 pretty quick, and on Scrubs the actors took full ownership of their characters by the end of the first season" - Lawrence in a 2024 WGF Library Script Breakdown.
The pandemic resulted in Lawrence staying at home a lot. Christa Miller, who enjoys her alone-time, eventually asked their son for help to hang a "Doozer Productions"-sign on the guest room door.
“I’m expected to be in here at 9:30 a.m. I’m not expected to leave until 5 p.m. I am allowed to come out and get lunch — but not in a way that forces everybody to stop what they’re doing to engage me.” - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2020.
During the pandemic Jonathan Dorian worked at a COVID-command center, and Lawrence would call him after hours to help him unwind before going home to his family.
Bill recovering from a Vince Vaughn-induced belly laugh on the set of Bad Monkey back in 2022.
Bad Monkey & Shrinking[]
Lawrence went on to finally get his Bad Monkey-adaptation off the ground around the time season 3 of Ted Lasso was under production, starting filming in February of 2022. While shooting Bad Monkey Lawrence was also making the Goldstein co-penned Apple TV+ show Shrinking, which started shooting in April that same year. Lawrence would travel back an forth L.A.-Miami to work on both shows, which had accidentally crossed schedules. Lawrence and Goldstein had been bouncing around ideas during their time together in London, they each had an idea that they molded together into the framework of Shrinking.
"I hate writing. I love having written something, but anybody who says they enjoy writing, I think they’re a sociopath, so I’m always looking for someone to split the work. Brett and I were sequestered in London, which is a rough city to be in for months at a time because it’s very rainy. We were writer buddies, long before Ted Lasso. He was a writer on Ted Lasso, before being an actor on the show. And so, we literally met in a pub and I was like, “Let’s write something together.” We were talking about different ideas and I said, “I’m working on this thing about a neighbor who went through this accident. He was a doctor, not a psychiatrist. It was a bummer because he was so sweet, and I made him a therapist in my pitch. And then, Brett was also working on a much darker show about therapists with murder in it. We liked the idea of doing a classic sitcom about grief. That’s the tonal tightrope. We’ve been very clear about what we wanted to do. Everybody, right now, is a few degrees removed from some kind of grief. Our fathers are both struggling, and we’ve had our share of other family stuff, as everybody has. It doesn’t make us special. Where we connected was both of our families laughed our way through it. And Brett and I both like a traditional sitcom, with jokes, trying to make people laugh, and trying to make people enjoy the half-hour. What we pleasantly found is people that get that we’re doing a classic sitcom about dealing with grief, which is maybe a topic that classic sitcoms haven’t done, seem to really like the show, and we’re grateful for it. It’s a tightrope when you screw up and it’s really stupid, but when it works, it’s great because that’s how we get through it in real life." - Lawrence speaking to Collider, 2023.
"The first year is about grief, the second year’s about forgiveness and the third is about moving forward.” - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
Lawrence wanted Harrison Ford for a role in the series, and he eventually got on board, saying the pilot-script was one of the best he had ever read.
""It took me forever to get over the embarrassment of people saying no, and I'm finally over it." - Lawrence on not Skinny But Not Fat, 2023.
Ford's character was partially based on Christa Miller's long time-psychologist Phil Stutz, who she started seeing around the turn of the millennium. However, there's also parts of Stutz embedded in Jason Segel's character. Ford called Lawrence when he was in Florida working on Bad Monkey, and asked "I'm not in this first one a lot, will I be more in the second one if I do it?" Lawrence responded "Dude you'll be in whatever you want, man, you're Harrison Ford" Ford wasn't familiar with the show's star, Jason Segel, so Lawrence got him a few movies to watch. Amongst the movies was Forgetting Sarah Marshall, which features full-frontal nudity from Segel. Ford soon thereafter sent Lawrence and Segel a text reading "saw Sarah Marshall, enjoyed it. Nice penis."
Bill, Brett and Harrison at the 2024 Apple TV+ Primetime Emmy party.
"When you ask him why he was doing this, he’s nice and he said that he liked the writing, but he’s also challenging himself to do stuff he hasn’t. That’s why he’s doing a streaming TV show and there are rumors that he’s doing Marvel movies. The guy is 80 years old, and he’s still out there throwing himself into these things. So, the biggest messages is that he’s not mailing it in. He’s very collaborative and very trusting, but he went through everything. He tries new jokes. He asks us to push him. I never expected to have a career highlight, starting my career out with Michael J. Fox, this icon who turned out to be like you’d want him to be, and then, at this point in my career, to have the same experience on the other end (with Harrison Ford) has been pretty cool." - Lawrence speaking to Collider, 2023.
Ford was in London, shooting Indiana Jones and The Dial of Destiny, Brett Goldstein came over to have drinks and talk with him about the show. Ford took a liking to him, and was disappointed to hear Goldstein was busy working in London and that he wouldn't be working with him on the show. The first couple of weeks on Shrinking there weren't sets built yet, so they shot in houses in Pasadena. According to Lawrence the table read for the show was the first table read Ford had ever attended. When it was raining the writers, the cast, everybody gathered in a house. Christa Miller yet again served as music-supervisor on the show, as part of a team, in addition to playing an important part in the series. On set Miller and Segel would playfully call each other "fucker."
"It’s going to sound corny, but she’s very muse-like to me and we make each other laugh." - Lawrence talking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2023.
"My favorite thing on earth is working for my wife and working with my wife. I said working for intentionally because I think she’s monster talented and it makes me happy, on a day-to-day basis. We did it for a long time, and then, it’s almost a cliché, but she literally stepped out of it. She was a star of a TV show for 22 straight years, and then she raised our kids and stepped out of it, but she worked occasionally. So, she wanted to come back to it again and the idea of working with her was such a gift, for me personally. The cool part was that I know how to write my wife as Jordan from Scrubs because I’ve done it before. I thought that’s what I was doing again, but she told me, on her own, “I’m gonna turn this into something different.” It was really cool. My joke to her is, “You seem like an almost sensitive and likable person in this one.” She was playing something I haven’t seen her do before, so I had a good time with it." - Lawrence talking to Collider, 2023.
The two first episodes of the show were put up on Apple TV+ on the 27th of January, 2023. The last episode of Season 1 was put up on March 24, Zach Braff directed episode 7 of the show.
"I've made tons of stinkers and shit-bombs in my past, I'm lucky that most of the really horrible ones never got on TV. The worst ones are ones where I tried to do something I thought would sell, instead of something that was in my voice. There's one of them you can see. A buddy and I were convinced we could make a TV-version of Rush Hour, it's so bad. And by the way, I wrote so much of it, it's so awful. It hurt my heart when I see it and Wendie Malick is one Shrinking because when it was over she said "you owe me a better job. And I was like "I know, you'll be Harrison Ford's girlfriend, will you speak to me again? (haha)" - Lawrence for The American Film Institute, 2023.
"An advantage of being older and having done this for so long is that I have ridiculously talented people working with me. The production designer of Shrinking and I celebrated our 30th anniversary working together recently. She was the production designer on Spin City, which means I created Spin City when I was 11 [laughs]." - Lawrence talking to AV Club, 2024.
"Shrinking is a father-daughter dynamic straight from my life, and it's no secret that my biggest mentor Michael J. Fox has Parkinson. and that my father struggles with Lewy body's, the Parkinsons (like Ford's character in the show)." - Lawrence on We Disrupt This Broadcast, 2025.
In 2020, a Clone High-revival was green-lit. Two further seasons of the show have aired, in 2023 and 2024, with Lawrence returning as an executive producer. Lawrence has found a new home on the Apple TV+ platform, with his 3 seasons of Ted Lasso, 2 seasons of his series Shrinking (featuring Neil Flynn), and his adaptation of the Carl Hiaasen-book Bad Monkey all releasing through Apple's pipeline over a 4 year period (2020-2024). Bill has on occasion called Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple, "T-Dog." Additionally, Lawrence is working on a project with Steve Carell for HBO. On his podcast, Pete Holmes dubbed this professional resurgence, helped along by Lawrence teaming up with fresh writing-partner Brett Goldstein, the "Lawrenaissance."
"Apple is cool because it really means a lot to me that they still do it weekly, so at least it has that kind of communal feel, of like "Oh, I wonder what's gonna happen next week on Ted Lasso" or Shrinking or whatever. And the other thing I love, in the old model I used to do you're never pushed to have a beginning, middle and end. The only thing I didn't like about it was that they literally were like "we want the characters to stay the exact same for forever. If Coach passes away we're gonna replace him with Woody, and they're gonna be the same character, just different ages, and nobody changes ever." So I do like the feeling of a beginning, middle and end. The thing I miss is, you know, look. In the first 3 seasons of Shrinking we will have done 6 more episodes than the first year of Spin City. And we did so many years of Spin City, right? What I miss is, when you used to do that, I felt like I kind of became a part of these dysfunctional families, that I had time to consider them my friends and my world in a way that sucked me into TV, and I don't know if that's there anymore because these shows are like, people go "I'm gonna watch these 10 episodes, wha! (mimes quickly throwing food into mouth), then I'm gonna go onto something else." So I do miss that, I miss that a lot." - Lawrence talking to GogglerMY, 2024.
Following up on his promise to Carl Hiaasen, Bad Monkey was filmed in Florida, and made to be as authentic as possible. Lawrence wrote with James Garner from Rockford Files in mind as the lead, but seeing as realizing that casting-call would require a time-machine, he chose to cast his old poker-buddy Vince Vaughn.
"This is not usually my lane ... The coolest career-milestone for me, man, was to go to my favorite author, drink a few gin and tonics with him and convince him to trust Hollywood for a second. It's like going "hey, you wrote my favorite book, I'm gonna add like 6 or 7 chapters in the middle, what do you think?" and he's been so cool about it, man. And he's as cool as you would think, great dude" - Lawrence talking to GogglerMY, 2024.
Lawrence, his daughter Charlotte, and producer Matt Tarses, one of his best friends, shared a condominium during filming to be in close proximity of the shoot for 3 months in early 2022. It was "one of those Russian oligarch-places," and they were surrounded by "80-year-old men, people with machine guns and 24-year-old women."
"Both my sons came out at different points to visit, and I'm sure, behave horribly in Miami. Had I not been able to create a family-environment, which is a luxury at this stage in my life and career to do, I probably would not have done so." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
This move also gave Lawrence the opportunity to be close to his folks, who reside in Winter Park. Lawrence would fly back and forth to work on Shrinking as well. The first episode of the show dropped on August 14th, 2024. The show is successful, and it's soundtrack is all centered around Tom Petty-covers. Zach Braff plays a part in the series, and got the pitch from Lawrence as they were sitting in his sauna.
"Because Bill is just such a champion of mine, he was like, “I have this part, and it's not something that a casting director might think of you for, but I'd like to see you do it.” Of course, I'll do anything he says. I appreciated that so much. I was just stoked to be in a scene with Vince Vaughn. It was great to play something different than I usually get to play." - Zach Braff talking of Lawrence in a 2024 Collider interview.
Charlotte, Lawrence's daughter, also played a major part in the series. It was her first acting-gig, and she got some mentorship from Vince Vaughn.
A second season of Shrinking started it's weekly release-schedule on October 16, 2024, Zach Braff having directed episodes 3 and 4. The show was swiftly greenlit for a third season.
On December 5th it was announced that a Scrubs reboot/revival was officially in the works at ABC, with Lawrence developing the series, but not running the show, because of his exclusive deal at Warner Brothers.
"I think I've always written with a relentless sense of optimism. I have to be inherently optimistic or I feel slightly buried by all the bleakness. The dialogue out there has gotten so toxic, and when you find people out there trying to ride whatever ship they're on through that storm ... man, I wanna get on board as much as I can." "The Ted Lasso-experience, that people embraced that show, it feeds it for me. I go "Wow, people are craving optimism and kindness" you know?"
In spite of it not being what Lawrence tends to write himself, he appreciates good snark. He watched, and loved, 30 Rock when it was airing, and has on several occasions mentioned Veep being his favorite show. He's also a fan of Amanda Hirsch, even though "most of the stuff she does is usually bathed in snark rather than kindness" and he's "a big kindness-guy."
Bill accepting the Herb Sargent Award for Comedy Excellence.
On February 15th, 2025 Lawrence was awarded the Herb Sargent Award for Comedy Excellence. Matt Tarses went up to the stage and said some well-chosen words about his long-time colleague.
March 2025 was an eventful month for Lawrence. On the 5th of March, 2025 it was announced that Lawrence's production company would be betting even bigger on Lawrence's old hero Carl Hiaasen, as it had signed on to produce the Adam Horowitz & Edward Kitsis adaptation of his book Skinny Dip. On March 14th, Deadline reported that Ted Lasso had been green-lit for a 4th season. Lawrence previously left day-to-day duties on the show to make Bad Monkey and Shrinking, but the mogul is said to be more involved with the show's 4th season. Lastly, on the 23rd of March, Lawrence shared through X (formerly Twitter) that he was in the process of writing the pilot for the Scrubs continuation.
“The only bummer is that hospital is beautiful condos now on Riverside Drive in L.A. So we’ve gotta find a different creepy deserted hospital. The sad part is I’m sure we can.” - Lawrence speaking to AV Club's Drew Gillis, 2025
Sensibility[]
On Set And in The Writer's Room[]
Lawrence is known to uphold a no asshole-policy on his shows.
"There’s toxic folk in every profession. They often fail upward because it’s the unwritten rule: If you make a lot of money, people look the other way. I don’t think that is specific to Hollywood. I was lucky enough to be brought up in great workplaces. Gary Goldberg was a leading proponent in establishing child care at Paramount for his employees with Family Ties, and he was so uniformly lovely. That doesn’t mean that they didn’t have their own issues, but working on a TV show is like being with your family at Thanksgiving — only for six or seven months at a time. It’s going to be a dysfunctional mess at times. You only get through it if people are kind. You’re often being thrust into very close partnerships almost immediately with people — be it actors, other writers, directors — that you don’t know. What I always say is, “Hey, we’re going to anecdotally check on you and talk to everybody that’s worked with you.” I tell people this up front because they should do the same about me. And I say that." - Lawrence speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, 2020.
Bill in the writer's room of Undateable.
Furthermore, Lawrence is known to be supporting of his cast- and crew-members, and tries to take the role of caretaker. Lawrence has admitted that his supportive nature sometimes has been counterproductive, in situations where actors would be better served by frankness, but he also claims to have gotten better at addressing this over the years. Lawrence is not a stranger to working with "stoners" such as Donald Faison, Ken Jenkins and Harrison Ford. During auditions, Lawrence is known to ask actors if they're happy with what they've showcased, if they're not; they get to go again. Lawrence is also known to keep his name off scripts he collaborates with others on.
"Every script of every show, every Shrinking-episode, when the writers were done with it, I took it home and re-wrote it. Not to, what I sometimes call do the lateral punch-down, which is just changing it for no reason except for, you know, in your head. But the main reason you do it is you want it to sound like the show that you wrote sounded, right? And so you're allowed to put your name on it ... If you wrote a script, I could take it home a weekend and re-write it, and now it's written by Bill Lawrence and (your name.) If you noticed, like on West Wing, Aaron Sorkin wrote every episode, because he took that home and did it. The bummer of that is, when you do that, I don't get any extra money, because I'm under an overall-deal, and I get paid the same no matter what. You get 50% less for your script, because I just wrote half of it. And so, it's my pet-peeve, if you acknowledge that we're all doing this together, that it's this communal thing, don't ever ... you can take as much credit as you want, because, you know, it's part of the game, but don't ever take money out of anyone else's pocket because you badly need to see your name up there." - Lawrence for The American Film Institute, 2023.
In the Writer's Guild's Showrunner's Training Program showrunner John Welles, the man behind ER (a show that is often brought up alongside Scrubs as one of the most medically accurate around) teaches a class on organized show-running. Lawrence on the other hand, (occasionally) teaches a class on unorganized chaos. Lawrence usually dedicates the first couple of weeks in a writer's room to establishing characters and their trajectories, basically spitballing to nail down each character. In the writer's room for Ted Lasso, several writers struggled with getting used to being 4 weeks in and not talking story yet.
Lawrence jokes than he loves to let actors improvise and turn "7-material into 9s" and when people rave about it say "Oh, thank you." He is known to be open to improvisation, but also wanting to get coverage for what's on the page. Lawrence wants actors to take ownership of their characters, and this involves granting certain freedoms. This is another way in which Lawrence differentiates himself from Aaron Sorkin, who is very detail-oriented.
"(talking about Sorkin's method) I used to judge that, because what I do is "make something up, Vince (Vaughn.) Make something up, Neil Flynn. Make something up, Sarah Chalke. You know, and if it's better I'll put it in, but then I realized, if you're an actor and you went to do Romeo and Juliet, you know, at the Lincoln Center, and you were like; "Hey! on tonight's show I'm just gonna riff a little," they would fire you immediately, right? So I think I'm trying to understand both sides. So the point is, there's things to learn from a boss who says "We're doing this, we're not here to have fun. it's a comeptition, the winner gets more money, the loser gets less. And guess what, there's shareholders in this company and there's 110 other crew members who are not in this writer's room and if it's good, if it works for me, it's gonna kick ass, and those people are all gonna have great lives and makes great money." That's ... I have to emapthize, if that works for those people and people fall in that system, as long as it's not toxic I think it's ok. It's not for me, I enjoy the familial relationship of the kindness a writer's room brings, where people feel protected and not nervous. You could say; "what's the negative?" No one thinks they're gonna get fired. The meanest thing, that was funny, that one of the writers said to me on some show that failed ... Ground Floor, was that "the only way to get fired by Bill is to steal money from him, and even then it won't happen right away."" - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
Lawrence also dislikes ham-fisted exposition, and opts for revealing information organically when possible.
Lawrence is good at working with execs and higher-ups. After coming to the realization that every suit telling you what to do got into the business because they too love TV, this got easier. Lawrence didn't see it as a big deal to have a guarantee for no network-notes through the course of Spin City, he sees writing and creating shows as a collaborative process. At the same time Lawrence has not always agreed with the suits telling him what to do. For instance, when Lawrence wanted to do a Scrubs-subplot about Elliot and Carla getting weed for a female cancer-patient to ease her pain, the higher-ups stopped him. Lawrence changed it from the patient wanting weed to her wanting a male hooker, and that was totally okay for the network. Lawrence had started shooting before handing in the script, and so the censorship had cost the production time and effort, Lawrence didn't really see the point. That episode came to be My Rule of Thumb.
"All the people who are successful in Hollywood realized early on that there's no magic card that allows you to skip the business of it. And so you have to learn to navigate "what is the way that things are done, what are the things you have to do." You know, what are the rules you have to follow, and if you're lucky and have some success you can push the envelope a little bit, but you still live in those perimeters. I do, I'm grateful for all my success, but I'm still living in them now. Depending on what company I'm working for ... The lesson I learned early on in Hollywood, right or wrong, is; there is no rules as long as you're paying the bill. If other people are paying the bill, the get to at least, in their minds anyway, put structure and bureaucracy around you, and stipulations. And you get to choose whether or not you adhere to them. We were randomly talking about Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the guys who created South Park, and I'm always interested in talking about them because they're the closest ones, for me, to having established a world with no rules. Cuz they've essentially built their own studio, gotten outside-investors and said, you know "you're investing in us to do what we do." I embraced early on in my career that right now Warner Discovery is paying the salaries of my employees, and paying for my projects, and I'm not self-funding, and I think they're a great partner, and with that partnership comes "hey, here are at least 10 or 20 things that you might not love that you have to line up with. I think that's part of capitalism. That's why the pipe-dream is to live like a kind of autonomous creative life that you do your own thing. I think it's the reason you see so many interesting things happening on YouTube ... and (it's) personalized and people aren't answering to anybody." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
"If you wanna experience injustice on a day-to-day basis you should definitely build a career in Hollywood. Just constantly wanting to tell people "this is the way it should be" or "this is how you behave better" or "this is how you should treat people." And once you let that stuff go, man, it's a lot more smooth sailing. It's been an ongoing process in my own life and career, I wanna say that I nailed it, but if my wife were here, and she sometimes gets interviewed cuz she's such a good actress, she'd probably disagree." - Lawrence talking to Paul McGuire Grimes, 2024.
Lawrence appreciates honest feedback, the best note he ever got was from Jeff Ingold, who told him "I know by ad-break I'm supposed to give a shit about these two characters, but I don't."
"Working with him (Bill) is like a masterclass in editing". - James Renfroe, Shrinking co-editor, 2023.
Lawrence acknowledges the importance of mentors in his life and career, mainly Bob Cox, Norman Barasch and Gary David Goldberg, and at the very start of Ted Lasso's production one of the things he and Jason Sudeikis would ask of prospective crew-members was for them to tell a story about someone who helped them get to where they are. They ended up hearing a lot of beautiful stories. Lawrence has become somewhat of a mentoring figure himself.
"It's really hard deciding what really matters to you, unless you're in some weird retrospective stage of your life and looking back on who you are, but I realized very young that mentorship mattered to me, and Hollywood doesn't have a lot of mentorship, generally. It's a cut-throat business ... There's nothing wrong, in America, with wanting money. I have this conversation a lot with young writers, you know, a lot of my company's projects aren't just stuff I write, we do shows that other young people come in and pitch and I say "we can help you get through the system," and I literally will say to people "Hey, what are you chasing here? Are you chasing art? are you chasing commerce? or are you chasing something in the middle?" And if you're a man or a woman with a husband or wife and children there's no wrong answer, you just gotta be at least honest with yourself up front of like "oh, I'm chasing commerce," then that's a different show, that might be, even now, that might be a network-show, cuz network's coming back, and it's ad-supported and it can syndicate and it can be worth a lot of cash. And if it's art it might be "no, I'm cool doing a limited series that's six episodes and you know, not a ton of people see it, but I'm proud of it till' my dying day." There's no wrong answer, but I think that you should know what you're chasing early on." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
"Part of my big sales-pitch now is to (because there's so many talented people out here, and I say it and I mean it) go "Hey, I'll help you through the process, and I'm old enough that if it becomes a dumpster fire I'll take all the blame, and if it's a huge success you get all the credit, I could give a shit." - Lawrence on The Producer's Guide, 2024.
"He has been just a huge champion of mine. I'm so, so grateful, and it's beyond what you said ("There's Scrubs; he had you direct an episode of Ted Lasso, which got you an Emmy nomination; he had you direct Shrinking. He got you a part in Bad Monkey".) When I make my movies, he's the first person to give me script notes. When I have a cut of it, he's the first person to give me editorial notes. He gives me so much life advice. We sauna together. We lie in the sauna and give each other life advice. He's a brother to me, he's like my big brother, and I'm just so grateful for him." - Zach Braff talking of Lawrence in a 2024 Collider interview.
Examples of shows Lawrence's company has produced, but that he hasn't ran nor penned the pilot for, are 2018's Life Sentence and 2021's Head of The Class.
Speaking of taking care of people, Lawrence has a tendency to bring back people from his previous shows when making new ones.
"the truth is; one of the gifts of TV, and of getting to do this (I’m so lucky getting to do this for a living) I go out of my way to do it with people I would wanna hang out with anyways. I used to get shit for it because all of the actors and actresses from Spin City were in Scrubs, all of the actors and actresses from Scrubs were in Cougar Town, if I like someone and like being around them anyways, and the added gift is they’re super talented, why wouldn’t you go “oh, I’ll have to go somewhere held up for 6 months, I’d rather do it with Zach or Busy Philipps or my wife”, you know? It’s so fun.” - Lawrence on Not Skinny But Not Fat, 2023.
Lawrence's wife has her own account of working with him:
Christa - At work Bill is smart, dynamic, sexy, knows where things are, knows where people are, knows what people do, knows everyone’s names, knows everything, and so funny. Genius, I’m gonna say, such a pleasure to work with Bill, I don’t say anything, I’m just one of the actors there, and I love watching Bill work. Thank god we work together because at home he’s so dumb and annoying, doesn’t know where anything is, follows me around the house, doesn’t know how to turn the air-conditioning on, so dumb, so thank god we work together ...
He also has a lovely thing at work, I have worked with people who don’t have this, he has no ego. Like if I say “can we try this” he says “sure!” Once we get it in the can, if the way to do it is better (which it rarely is, Bill’s way is usually better) but he’ll say “try it” if it was better he’d say “that was better, you’re right.” At work. And also to see him move around with all the actors and come up with jokes, he comes up with great jokes on the spot, that’s why all the actors love to have him on set, and it’s sexy and interesting, and when he comes home and doesn’t know where the scissors are it’s okay."
Bill - I’m literally one of the only husbands in the world with a strong dynamic wife who a couple days a week gets to tell her what to say, how to say it, change something I think it’s wrong, to me it’s like a gift, and it makes the reality of my home-life go down a little easier." - Not Skinny But Not Fat, 2023.
Lawrence defines himself as an observer, and plot-lines in his shows are often based upon his own experiences or those of others close to him.
Views on Diversity[]
"It's so fun as a writer hearing all these new viewpoints. When I first started working on a TV show, the writing staff was eight white dudes, one woman, and me, you know what I mean?" - Lawrence talking to GogglerMY, 2023.
"I think TV-writing, the fun thing about it is the communal feeling of it, and being in a room with young men and women from different backgrounds, with different sensibilities, shooting the shit." - Lawrence on The Producer's Guide, 2020.
"People generally hire people with the same sensibilities as themselves, sometimes it works, like on Frasier. On Scrubs to have me and a bunch of waspy red-cheeked white guys sitting around writing that show would have been disingenuous to life in a hospital. You know, Scrubs, the writing staff, it was a giant melting pot. A girl from India, a Mormon (Debra Fordham) who'd pull her hat down when we got crude to go to her "happy place."
Bill - "The younger version of me would never have hire Deb Fordham, cuz she's not raucously funny in a meeting. a very spiritual and sensitive person that, you know, would not line up with my sense of humor at the time with my age, but she was so talented and so great at staring at an empty board and saying "what's the story you wanna tell?", and then plotting it out and making it work, and then if all you ever have to do is fill in some jokes for people, you know, it was a gift. ... She was a huge asset to that staff. The first show I ever put together was a nightmare to write, Spin City, because we hired 9 other people and we all had the same exact sense of humor, you know what I mean? So, when you'd be like "Hey, who's good at outlining shit, oh, none of us, cool. Hey, who's good at writing ...
Ron Funches - No checks and balances because you're like "I think this joke ... - I love it!"
Bill - "We all love it! We made that joke last night at the bar at 4 in the morning, it's amazing", and you do it in front of an audience and it goes like: *cricket noises*. "Why is it not working? All 9 of us who like the exact same things like it" - The Gift of Jab, 2018.
... One of the things we wanted to do on Cougar Town was to specifically, as always, have a big mix diversity-wise in the staff, but also, because Kevin and I are not women in our 40s. That was one of the first comedy-shows I did that had more female writers than male. And I'd venture a guess one of the only shows, because it's still a male-dominated industry." - Lawrence for The Writer's Guild Foundation, 2011.
"(Talking about Shrinking) The writing staff, you know, is such talented young men and women, and they bring their own real experiences into it. And they're so diverse and from so many different background, and if I just wrote my experience it would be a pretty good show about what it means to be a pasty white guy from Connecticut, and the coolest thing for us is that, in this melting pot-world I can sit back and watch people portray, you know, Jessica Williams' life, what it'd be like portray to be a black female therapist in a very male-dominated world, or Luke Tennies life or Lukitas life. And so for me, to let other people kind of make it honestly authentic is part of what makes the TV I really like to watch work." - Lawrence talking to movieweather, 2023.
Future Prospects[]
"When I made it in Hollywood (referring to when he got an overall deal at age 28[1] ) my dad and my mom flew out to congratulate me, and we went out to dinner, and afterwards me and my dad were having a drink and he said "I just want you to know that I plan to die with nothing, you're getting nothing, you've made it, it's on you for the next generation, and I'm so proud of you and happy about it." You know, he really instilled that drive in me, but they also provided a safety-net so I didn't have to live in fear." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
“When you get to TV you live in this weird world where, even if you had a cup of coffee in the features business, someone will go “alright, you are the head-writer, cool. You pick the music, you get final cut, the director will rehearse the scene in front of you and if you don’t like the angle or how it looks you get to tweak it and change it. When you wanna direct you can direct.” If you like that gig, and like being able to dabble a bit into everything it’s such a fun job … That’s the allure of it, man, I love every aspect of it, and aside from my guess being an independent filmmaker or somebody that hits the Chris Nolan/Spielberg-ranks where you get to handle anything you want and do anything you want, there’s nothing else like it, so fun.” - Lawrence on The Producer’s Guide, 2020.
Lawrence has 15 full-time employees, but whenever he starts a new project there's about 120 additional hires going into that. He's the CEO and CFO of Doozer Productions, whilst Jeff Ingold is the company-president. Liza Katzer is the vice-president.
"I became a bit Teflon when it came to the failure or success of a show, cuz I would say "I'm gonna create something that's a noble failure at worst, and I'm not embarrassed for my friends or family to see it. If it doesn't work I'll be fine," and when you add to that "well now if it doesn't work there's some people who're not getting payed what you're getting payed who will suffer for it and might be in trouble looking for work, and might have trouble paying their mortgage." It adds a level of stress and pressure, but the other side of that coin is; how great is it to do something fun, that you can hire people you'd wanna spend time with anyway, and they can make a living for them and their family doing it. And I would argue they know the roll-the-dice of getting involved in anything that's an artistic endeavor, and as long as you make it a great experience for them to be there, and as long as you're doing your best, you have to learn it's not on you. As long as you're working your hardest there's no guilt in failure, you know, for me now there's the joy of people having come along for the ride with me. I'm really trying to get to that point." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
"I don't think I'll be running a TV show when I'm, like 65 ... I know that If I did nothing I would age 20 years in a year. For me maybe it's teaching at Sarah Lawrence College, maybe it's writing one show or helping a young person write something, but the second I embrace that putting my voice out there is what sustains me, I think all the hassles and negatives that come with it don't sting as much, they're just part of the journey. ... One of the things that I admire about my dad is that he worked for corporate America his whole life, he started at 21 as a salesman for Pitney Bowes ... He worked himself up to being the director president of marketing for the whole company, and after he retired I said "do you miss it?" And he said "selling office-equipment? no!" And he had rationalized the whole thing "I'll tell you what I love about it; I love the people, I love being able to provide for my family, I loved being able to take vacations with you and other people and doing that, but I rationalized early on that my job is not my passion, the result of my job enabled me to enjoy my passions." And I think that the world is divided in half between people that are lucky enough to enjoy what they do for a living, (and I'm grateful for it every day, I can't believe that I get to do this) and hopefully the other people don't get to enjoy what they're doing, but hopefully most of them get to enjoy the spoils of what they're doing, and I think that the people who fall in-between, they've gotta be careful ... I think the trap is to say "I have to find my joy in what I do." Because even if you're lucky enough to enjoy your job, if that's your only joy, good luck to ya ... ... I always divide people into two categories, this is for real, people who will always keep themselves from being happy, and people that happiness is within their grasp." - Lawrence on The Dan Le Batard Show: South Beach Sessions, 2024.
In 2022, Lawrence renewed his contract with Warner Bros. Television for another 5 years, starting in 2023, in exchange for an undisclosed, 9-figure, sum. A bump up from his 2018, 8-figure, deal, owing to the massive success of Ted Lasso. The deal was briefly suspended in 2023 due to the Writer's Strike.
"More often than not when you’re talking to someone like me, it comes down to the people, and I would be lying to you if I said my decision to stay at Warner Bros. was business based, completely, because I just like my experience here, and I have a good shorthand with the men and women, the Susan Rovners, and Brett Pauls, and Peter Roths, Erin Wehrenbergs that run this studio. Being an old guy, I’m like, “Man, I like it. There seems to be some continuity here, and that I get these rhythms already, and know and like these folks ... The best thing I can tell you is that the landscape here has changed quicker than I thought it would from when I started here people going, “Hey, give us your network multi-cam, and your other network project, and then we can talk about the projects you want to sell outside of the networks.” To almost over night, “Hey, what project are you most excited about, and where do you think it’s good for?” And if it’s not network, no one cares." - Lawrence talking to Decider, 2019.
"Part of my adult life, that translates very directly into stuff I write, is about found family. A lot of these shows, you could argue, instead of me writing a family-comedy are "the family we find for ourselves once we leave the nest", and to repeat, those kind of complicated dynamics that we all grew up with, I love my dad and so I'm not being disparaging, but I made a joke that, this is Hollywood, and the president of Warner Brothers Studios was a guy named Peter Roth for a while, and I joked that in the first year of working here I had hugged Peter Roth more than I'd ever hugged my father. One of the coolest things about being a storyteller is sometimes writing relationships as you wish they would be, the things I wish I could say, and the relationships I wish I had, I'm always trying to unpack that. I have a really complicated relationship with my daughter, who I love but which I'm constantly perplexed by, and I think it could feel disruptive too, under this umbrella is that I'm always amazed when I get to talk about Shrinking as I grew up as a network-television guy, and so I'm a dinosaur a little bit, and the amazing appeal of writing these stories that stem from that trauma is that as comedy writers it didn't use to be an option for us, and I often do a comedy-bit in the room about what it would have been like pitching Shrinking back in the day when I was doing Spin City and Scrubs. I'd have to walk in to the network president and go "I have an idea for a super-funny comedy, this dude's wife died, and he's doing a lot of drugs and hanging out with sex-workers, and he's the worst father of all time, and in the pilot episode he has one patient because he's a horrible therapist, a young African-American kid, and he gets that kid in a massive fight and thrown in jail, I think it's gonna be really fun!" I wouldn't even have gotten a second meeting, much less been able to make the show, and so I think one of the reasons you're seeing shows like this is that there's people that came from a drama-world where you aren't allowed to be funny, and there are people from the comedy-world that are filled with their own version of pain and backstory, that this was not an avenue opened up to us ... It's also not surprising in the world of comedy right now, a lot of these shows are coming from a place of tremendous pain, before they get to the funny, and it's what appeals to me about comedy" - Lawrence on We Disrupt This Broadcast, 2025.
"We generally have a real hard time understanding what someone else's frame of reference is, see right now, in a comedy-room we're randomly talking about the fact that, I'm a very open and quite outspoken liberal person, I went and saw Blazing Saddles when I was a kid, great Mel Brooks movie, I think if someone put that out there now or if I made the mistake of telling someone's teenager "you've gotta see this movie, it's real funny" his parents, and the frame of reference now, would have them wanna murder me, right? So, I think there\s so much value to understanding that we're all a product of the world, the time and the zeitgeist that we have come from, and to acknowledge that, you know, is not only a way to be healthier yourself, but it's a way in to connect with somebody. I'm closer to my dad than I ever was when we were younger, and hearing what his life was like, and how he grew up closer to a nanny than his parents. Same on the other toe, as my comedy comes from, my mother's family, and to see that and say "Oh shit, she was dropped into that weird world" and the push and pull I've seen my whole life of a woman who wishes we would talk more open and emotional openly, and a guy who has trouble you know, saying "I love you" if there's other people around. And I also think it sort of gives you the ability to forgive yourself, because sometimes we're just doing the best we can, you know, under the rules we've been given." - Lawrence on We Disrupt This Broadcast, 2025.
Bob Cox passed away on August 6th, 2024, word was quickly passed on to Lawrence.
Lawrence is known to be down-to earth, on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepherd he joked that his full blowout during his Spin City-phase, with the crazy hair, partying and womanizing, is the reason why he doesn't get sucked into the Hollywood-stuff now. Both Lawrence and his wife continue to go to therapy, following the program of Barry Michels and Phil Stutz, Michels is Lawrence's guy, Stutz is Miller's. Lawrence liked the initial part of uncovering problems and using the Tools, but he's not as comfortable with the second part, addressing it all.
(Pr. 2025) Lawrence currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife, and their son Henry. Lawrence is attempting to carry on his father's ITI-principle in his parenting. Their first child, Charlotte Sarah, has a successful music-career, and Lawrence attends every concert he can, around the world, dressed in full merch. The star is yet to get her GED. Lawrence's wife frequently lures their daughter home with good food and by doing her laundry, they watch reality-TV together, which Lawrence ridicules. Lawrence's middle child, Will, is a senior at NYU. He got into the school's year-abroad program, but because of all the unrest in the world, the school is sending people to LA, so he'll just be back home. Lawrence's youngest, Henry, is "very Hollywood," and attended the Shrinking-premiere dressed in a white suit covered in pink flowers. Harrison Ford asked him why he chose to wear that and his response was "Dude, you've gotta go big." Lawrence's wife, Christa, appreciates her alone-time, but Lawrence "would carry her around in a BabyBjörn facing him if he could," and sometimes interrupts her in her activities for a "stop-hug." Lawrence remains a fan of standup, and has brought his kids to several shows. Every Tuesday at 8.p.m. he hosts a privately held indoors basketball-game, originally started by Gary David Goldberg in the 1990s. Through this game, Lawrence gets to show off his "underrated" passes, and "good old man-game," while also getting to kid around in a safe environment, like he is back in high school with Rick Street by his side. Only difference being: now, he contains it to the game. Positivity, on the other hand, is something he spreads out generously.
The Lawrence family in December of 2024. (from the left: Bill, Charlotte, Henry, Christa & Will)
Awards[]
| Year | Ceremony | Award | Result | For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1997 | GLAAD Media Awards | GLAAD Media Award | Winner | Outstanding Television Comedy Series - Spin City |
| Satelitte Awards | Satellite Award | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City | |
| GLAAD Media Awards | GLAAD Media Award | Nominated | Outstanding Television Comedy Series - Spin City | |
| Satelitte Awards | Satelitte Award | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City | |
| 1998 | Golden Globe Awards | Golden Globe | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City |
| GLAAD Media Awards | GLAAD Media Award | Nominated | Outstanding Television Comedy Series - Spin City | |
| Satelitte Awards | Satelitte Award | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City | |
| 1999 | Golden Globe Awards | Golden Globe | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City |
| GLAAD Media Awards | GLAAD Media Award | Nominated | Outstanding Television Comedy Series - Spin City | |
| 2000 | Golden Globe Awards | Golden Globe | Nominated | Best Television Series, Musical or Comedy - Spin City |
| 2001 | Writer's Guild of America | WGA Award | Nominated | Episodic Comedy - My First Day |
| 2002 | Television Critics Association Awards | TCA Award | Nominated | Outstanding Achievement in Comedy - Scrubs |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Winner | Best New Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| TV Land Awards | Future Classic Award | Winner | Future Classic - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Episode of A Comedy Series - My First Day | |
| Teen's Choice Awards | Teen's Choice Award | Nominated | TV Choice Breakout Show - Scrubs | |
| Teen's Choice Awards | Teen's Choice Award | Nominated | Choice TV Show: Comedy - Scrubs | |
| 2003 | Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Nominated | Episodic Comedy - Scrubs |
| Golden Satellite | Golden Satellite Award | Nominated | Best Television Series, Comedy or Musical | |
| Teen's Choice Awards | Teen's Choice Award | Nominated | Choice TV Show: Comedy - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| 2004 | PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Nominated | Comedy - Scrubs |
| Teen's Choice Awards | Teen's Choice Award | Nominated | Choice TV Show: Comedy - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Writing in A Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| 2005 | Emmy Awards | Emmy | Nominated | Outstanding Comedy Series - Scrubs |
| PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Nominated | Comedy - Scrubs | |
| Golden Derby | Golden Derby TV Award | Nominated | Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Golden Satellite | Golden Satellite Award | Nominated | Best Television Series, Comedy or Musical | |
| Teen's Choice Awards | Teen's Choice Award | Nominated | Choice TV Show: Comedy - Scrubs | |
| People's Choice Awards | People's Choice Award | Nominated | Favorite Television Comedy - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Writing in A Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| 2006 | PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Nominated | Comedy - Scrubs |
| Emmy Awards | Emmy | Nominated | Outstanding Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Peabody Award | Peabody Award | Winner | Entertainment - Scrubs | |
| Golden Derby | Golden Derby TV Award | Nominated | Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Television Critics Association Awards | TCA Award | Nominated | Outstanding Achievement in Comedy - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Writing in A Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| 2007 | Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Writing in A Comedy Series - Scrubs |
| Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Television Award | Nominated | Best Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| Golden Derby | Golden Derby TV Award | Nominated | Comedy Series - Scrubs | |
| 2008 | Imagen | Imagen Award | Nominated | Best Primetime Series - Scrubs |
| 2020 | Online Film & Television Association | OFTA Hall of Fame Award | Winner | OFTA TV Hall of Fame - Scrubs |
| 2021 | Emmy Awards | Emmy | Winner | Outstanding Comedy Series - Ted Lasso |
| PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Nominated | Comedy - Ted Lasso | |
| Emmy Awards | Emmy | Nominated | Outstanding Writing For A Comedy Series - Ted Lasso | |
| Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Nominated | Episodic Comedy - Ted Lasso - Pilot | |
| Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Winner | New Series - Ted Lasso | |
| Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Winner | Comedy Series - Ted Lasso | |
| 2022 | Emmy Awards | Emmy | Winner | Outstanding Comedy Series - Ted Lasso |
| PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Winner | Comedy - Ted Lasso | |
| Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Nominated | Comedy Series - Ted Lasso | |
| 2023 | Emmy Awards | Emmy | Nominated | Outstanding Comedy Series - Ted Lasso |
| 2024 | PGA Awards | Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy | Nominated | Comedy - Ted Lasso |
| Writers Guild of America | WGA Award (TV) | Nominated | New Series - Shrinking | |
| The Astras | Astra TV Award | Nominated | Best Writing In A Streaming Comedy Series - Shrinking | |
| 2025 | Writers Guild of America | Herb Sargent Award | Winner | Comedy Excellence |
Episodes Written[]
- Season One:
- Season Two:
- "My Overkill"
- "My Philosophy" (story)
- "My T.C.W."
- Season Three:
- Season Four:
- Season Five:
- Season Eight:
- Season Nine:
Episode Directed[]
Episodes Appeared in[]
- Season Four
- "My New Game" (During the divorce ceremony)
- Season Five
- "My Missed Perception" (In the group photo)
- Season Six
- "My Best Friend's Baby's Baby and My Baby's Baby" (In the waiting room)
- "Their Story" (At Coffee Bucks)
- "My Point of No Return" (Running away with everyone with a teddy bear in his hands)
- Season Seven
- "My Identity Crisis" (During Dr. Cox's celebratory Mexican Wave)
- Season Eight
- "My Soul on Fire, Part 2" (Van)
- "My Finale" (Janitor)
| CREW | ||
|---|---|---|
|
All Crew Members • Writers • Directors • Producers • Editors • Other |
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| SCRUBS PRODUCTION | ||
|---|---|---|
|
Creator: Bill Lawrence Production Companies: ABC Studios • Doozer Networks: ABC • NBC |
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