NBC's Community is coming back for a new season this fall, and I didn't think I could be more excited – until I had the chance to speak with Danny Pudi, who plays Abed Nadir on the show. Danny and I chatted about his "Handle It" moments, the upcoming season of Community, and life as a new dad to twins.
Danny recently teamed up with Speed Stick for their "Handle It" video contest, where entrants used Twitter to share their most awkward moments. The winning story was turned into a short video with Danny as the narrator. "A gentleman told us a story about doing his laundry and shrunk his girlfriend's clothes," Danny told me. "His ability to think on the fly was rewarded."
As a new father to eight-month-old twins, Danny is no stranger to sticky situations himself. "Every day is another 'Handle It' moment," he said. "We flew back to Chicago a couple of weeks ago for a wedding, and prior to the plane even taking off, my boy James pooped twice on the airplane. They didn't have a changing pad in the airplane bathroom so I had to balance him on the toilet while I changed the diaper. The second time he also threw up on my shoulder, and I was covered in a lot of stuff and smelled terribly. And this is all within half an hour on the airplane."
Danny has had his share of outrageous moments playing Abed on Community, but he says he treasures those little awkward moments in his day-to-day life. "Nothing makes me more excited when things like this happen," Danny enthused. "My eye doctor once told me I have abnormally large irises, last year, I think. He literally prefaced it with a hand on the shoulder... I don't know what to do with that other than tell people I have that."
Danny and his unusually large irises return to Greendale Community College in the new season of Community premiering on October 19. When I asked him if he could give any hints for the new season, Danny fired off some questions of his own. "Is Abed going to be a world-famous documentarian or is he also going to be able to manage his father's falafel restaurant? Jeff Winger meets his dad, that's a question I have as well. How's that gonna affect him? And it looks like Troy and Britta are starting a romance. Who is Abed going to watch Kickpuncher with?"
Troy and Abed's bromance is one of the highlights of every episode of Community. I asked Danny if he had any special Troy and Abed moments that are dear to his heart. "I will always love our original 'la biblioteca' rap. That to me is great," he replied. "These are things that I always wanted to do – being able to rap in Spanish and not make sense is a dream. That's a dream of mine. To be able to do it again, in 'Anthropology 101' and sing Toto's 'Africa' with Betty White. I think Bert and Ernie on Sesame Street we did in the tag, that was one of my favorites. I really really love that. I think that was fun. And then last year, in terms of an episode, where we got to play two characters Rod and Barry in our heist episode ['The First Chang Dynasty'], and we got to wear mustaches ... like two New York plumbers, that was another dream for me. I get to wear lots of disguises. That's really a treat."
Danny also mentioned some other of his favorite episodes, including one that's on every Community fan's list, season one's "Modern Warfare." "I think in season 2, the My Dinner with Andre/Pulp Fiction episode is the one I probably think about the most in terms of being challenged in multiple ways," Danny told me. "I loved working with Richard Ayoade and Joel McHale in that episode because he's so good in that episode. He's a really good actor and it's rare to have an episode where we just talk. Usually they're pretty involved episodes where we're doing multiple things like a weird heist or we're playing paintball, so that was a fun episode because it was a little bit more slow-paced.
"Beyond that, of course paintball is always going to be something that we can't believe we got away with. Being able to jump off a wall in slow-motion and have Justin Lin direct it – I mean, for a guy like me, I wake up in the morning and I don't look like an action movie star. It gave me a moment of feeling like an action movie star, which I think is pretty incredible."
The Dinner With Andre episode, "Critical Film Studies," also prompted Danny to do some research. In fact, playing pop culture fanatic Abed often leads Danny to look into fandom that he hasn't yet delved into. "I kind of have to do research," said Danny. "There's some things that fit, that I already have a frame of reference for. Like Indiana Jones was my favorite movie... I grew up in the 80s and a fan of 80s movies. But things like Doctor Who and some of Abed's knowledge like Farscape and some of those, I definitely need to research. I get to tell my wife, 'Sorry, honey, I have to watch Dinner with Andre tonight.'"
Danny's wife Bridget also gets to play a part in his Abed research from time to time, including being a sounding board for Abed's gravelly Batman voice. "The secret is to practice [the Batman voice] all day and terrify my wife and children with it," Danny revealed. "You've got to really make sure to lubricate your throat there. I got lots of cough drops and definitely some hot tea with honey and lemon."
Danny Pudi and the cast of Community return for their fourth season on Friday, October 19, with an homage to The Hunger Games. "It is our senior year, so there's still room to grow. We need to know what's going to happen," Danny told me, and I couldn't agree more. I'll be tuning in every week to find out.
