Peacock Quietly Ordered the Most Ambitious Comedy of the Fall
Chelsea Adelaine Hassler is an award-winning editorial, social, and creative director with two decades of media and entertainment experience and an all-consuming obsession with TV. A native New Yorker, she always completes the Sunday crossword, reads at least 100 books per year, and has Knicks season tickets.
More than 11 years after Parks and Recreation aired its final episode, Amy Poehler and series co-creator Mike Schur are back together. The former collaborators teamed up to develop the upcoming series Dig for Peacock, a 10-episode comedy based on the bestselling 2023 novel Excavations by Kate Myers. But the reunion comes with a major added bonus: Poehler won't be staying behind the camera. With Dig, she's stepping back into a starring scripted role for the first time in nearly a decade.
Poehler was synonymous with television comedy for the better part of 20 years, starring in all three seasons of Upright Citizens Brigade and eight seasons of Saturday Night Live before becoming Leslie Knope, the relentlessly optimistic heart of Parks and Rec, for its seven-season run. But after featuring in Netflix's second Wet Hot American Summer spin-off in 2017, Poehler began scaling back her on-screen appearances, turning her attention to producing, podcasting, voice acting and unscripted hosting. Now, Dig marks a long-awaited return to the kind of role that made Poehler one of a generation's defining comedic actresses – with Hugh Laurie sharing top billing.
What to Know About Peacock's Upcoming Comedy Series 'Dig'
Dig centers on four women archaeologists, all at wildly different stages of their lives, who are spending the summer together at an excavation site in Greece. After they make a shocking discovery that has the potential to rewrite history, however, the group finds themselves at the center of a wild, high-stakes international conspiracy that takes on a life of its own. The pilot was written by Poehler and Schur, but Schur and his wife, fellow SNL alum J.J. Philbin, serve as co-showrunners and writers for the 10-episode series, which will drop on Peacock in its entirety on November 23.
Poehler plays Elise, the excavation site's lead archaeologist, and Laurie plays Neville, a British professor who is genuinely obsessed with archaeology and considers himself a de facto mentor to everyone at the site. The core group is rounded out by Dylan (Geraldine Viswanathan), a former excavation team member who returns to the site after five years in order to settle unfinished business, Clare (Antonia Thomas), the head preservationist who runs the lab and museum and is less than comfortable in the dusty world of a dig, and Patty (Fina Strazza), Neville's undergraduate assistant, who's never been to a dig or traveled outside the US. The ensemble cast also includes guest and recurring cast members Kayvan Novak, Jon Pointing, George Basil, Mason Vale Cotton, and Bonita Friedericy.
‘Dig’ Is a Big Swing With the Potential for Comedic Greatness
Dig is easily one of Peacock's most ambitious comedy undertakings to date, and it's a series that has a lot riding on it for everyone involved. For starters, it's a high-concept premise that defies the conventional sitcom mold, requiring a far higher production budget to deliver on its international scope and a complex narrative that dabbles in genre-bending with its mystery and intrigue. It's also a high-profile reunion between some of its most beloved in-house talent – Schur and Poehler both have overall deals with Universal Television – that has the potential to rekindle the must-see NBC comedy spark for the broadcaster's streaming platform.
For Laurie, who's best known to American audiences as a killer dramatic presence but in the UK is widely considered comedy royalty, it's a chance to return to his sitcom-style roots and show the US a different side of his range, flexing the comedic muscles that made him, alongside long-time partner Stephen Fry, satirical icons. And for Schur, a former SNL and The Office writer now known as one of the most influential figures in modern TV comedy, creating not just Parks and Rec with Greg Daniels and Brooklyn Nine-Nine with Dan Goor but creating The Good Place and A Man on the Inside on his own, it's a chance to showcase his unique brand of nuanced comedy using well-established and rising talent, and to deliver a series that's global in its narrative scale.
Everyone has a lot of skin in the Dig game; from the platform, to its cast, to all the people behind the scenes. But if there's one thing that personal investment is known to do for a TV show, it's moving the needle from good to great – and that's a very big reason to get excited about what's to come with Peacock's tentpole comedy. And while much about Dig remains very tightly under wraps for the time being, there's never been a better time to pick up a copy of Excavations, which Amy Poehler said was one of her absolute favorite reads of 2024.
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