Mockumentary formats are great for a couple of things. One of them is delivering the toughest part of any sitcom episode, what writers call "pipe" - the nuts and bolts of the story where you explain what's happening, the boring plot stuff.
Michael SchurI think if you're too concerned with being cool or hip or liked, you can't really make good TV because sincerity and coolness are opposites.
Michael SchurI got a lot of texts from friends and emails from friends and most of them were just pure jealousy.
Michael SchurYou should be nice to people because it's better to be nice to people than mean to people, not because you think there's something in it for you.
Michael SchurI care more about making sure the story is correct and the characters are behaving in character than I do about the individual jokes.
Michael SchurWith mockumentaries, the conceit is that the characters are being interviewed, so you can start a scene and cut to a character looking at the camera and saying, "I'm working on this project," instead of having to figure out ways for people to talk naturally about what they're doing. You see this problem in pilots - people end up explaining things to each other that they'd never explain in real life.
Michael Schur