Following a series of production challenges due to the coronavirus pandemic and the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists strike, prime-time television is back. Warner Bros. Television hosted a comedy studio day for the Television Critics Association this Tuesday to promote its spring sitcom lineup.

The event featured four panels of cast and crew members on their respective sets: “Abbott Elementary,” “Night Court,” “Bob Hearts Abishola” and “Young Sheldon.” 

“Abbott Elementary” is a show about teachers at an inner-city school that is currently airing its third season. Quinta Brunson, who plays Janine Teagues and is the creator of the show, said the decision to use a mockumentary format has allowed the viewers to enter the world of the characters and capture seemingly raw moments.

“I love going behind the veil. ‘Who are these people really, that we think we know? We think we know what office workers look like, we think we know what these people are, but who are they really?’” Brunson said.

Executive producer Justin Halpern discussed a different component of the show’s development, where characters are at the forefront of the writing process.

“These are people in their 20s who make big decisions — sometimes make rash decisions,” Halpern said. “They want to try things out. They want to see where they fit.”

Brunson said the show is political in itself and tackles real-life issues, but is a comedy made to entertain the audience first and foremost. 

“It’s an underfunded school. It’s public education. It’s a predominantly Black environment [and] neighborhood. It is the politics that everyone is fighting about, ​but we approach this as, ‘What makes us laugh in the room?’” Brunson said. “We love coming into your living room for those 22 minutes and giving you a place of peace.”

Brunson said the show’s most empowering impact wasn’t with teachers who already understand the issues “Abbott Elementary” tackles, but with parents who haven’t previously understood the challenges teachers encounter.  She said she’s grateful for the show’s diverse audience.

“That’s the beauty of creating for networks, in my opinion, because if it hits, then you get to hit so many people,” Brunson said. “Our show is engineered that way to kind of be there for everybody.”

Attendees also heard from “Night Court,” a reboot of the ’90s sitcom of the same name that is currently airing its second season. The show follows Abby Stone (Melissa Rauch) on her job as a Manhattan judge.

John Larroquette, who plays Dan Fielding in both iterations of the show, said his experience reviving the series three decades later has been “bittersweet.”

“There’s a different flow going now, but [Dan] is still egotistical, he still wants to get ahead, he still wants to be the best, but he can never because he’s still a man-child in many ways emotionally, but we found ways to make him funny without all of the baggage of that character from 35 years ago,” Larroquette said.

Rauch, who is also an executive producer of “Night Court,” said the production team intentionally ensured the new iteration remained authentic to its source material, down to the scale of the set and props used on the show. 

“Bob Hearts Abishola” has also just begun airing its final season. The show captures the interracial marriage of Detroit native Bob (Billy Gardell) and his Nigerian wife Abishola (Fọlákẹ́ Olówófôyekù).

Right off the bat, an attendee asked the cast about their feelings about the show coming to a close. The question brought Olówófôyekù to tears.

“​​It’s bittersweet. Bitter obviously because it’s coming to an end and sweet because of the work that we’ve done here for the last five years. It’s extremely impactful. I can speak from my culture of Nigerians, and the reflection of these characters in such a positive mindset is something that we’ve yearned for for so long,” Olówófôyekù said. “For it to be done on the level that it’s being done here gives context to our experience as immigrants and as Nigerians as a whole.”

Executive producer Matt Ross said he treats the characters as real people who may not always have perfect endings.

“We get our little windows into these moments, and there could be 50 more stories to tell,” Ross said. “It’s not our job to say, ‘Bon voyage, they’re done learning and they’re done being interesting.’ It’s our job to have fun with them and to entertain the audience as long as we have the privilege to do so.”

The event also featured a panel with the cast of “Young Sheldon,” a prequel to “The Big Bang Theory,” about wunderkind Sheldon Cooper, which is set to air its final season beginning this Thursday.

Executive producer Steve Holland said the decision to have season seven be the last one was influenced by numerous factors — chief of which was the established fact from “The Big Bang Theory” that Sheldon goes to Caltech at age 14, his current age in “Young Sheldon.”

“It just felt like the right time to end the show and to end it strong and while it was still on top,” Holland said.

Iain Armitage, who plays Sheldon Cooper, responded to Holland’s comment with a joke.

“Can we just leave it with I’m tall, cool and look like Jim [Parsons]?”

Lorre said considering what would satisfy the audience the most would be the wrong approach to deciding how to end the show.

“That’s all a level of hubris that I think gets in the way of doing a good job. You do what feels right, you do what feels appropriate for the characters and the relationships, the tone of the show … and I don’t know any other way to do it,” Lorre said. “To assume we know what the audience wants is ridiculous. How can you possibly know?” 

Armitage, along with Raegan Revord, who plays Sheldon’s sister Missy, and Montana Jordan, who plays his brother Georgie, discussed what it has been like for the trio to practically grow up together through filming “Young Sheldon.”

“I watched back a video that I sent to [Armitage] whenever we started the show and I was in a car seat, and now I’m learning how to drive and that is wild,” Revord said. “But I feel like having the knowledge that this is the last one makes it even easier to cherish and be able to hold on to those moments and be grateful for them.”