ForMelissa Fumerowho deftly played straight-A, jot down-A Sgt.
Amy Santiago and counterbalancedAndy Samberg’s unbridled manchild energy as Det.
Jake Peralta it was time to shut the binder on a career-defining experience.
Melissa Fumero on the ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ set.Melissa Fumero
(Spoiler: tears, hugs, and more tears.)
She also shares her video diaries from those final hours and the day after.
I woke up that morning feeling a surprising amount of just…heaviness.
The ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ cast.Melissa Fumero
It’s so hard to mentally and emotionally prepare for a day like that.
It’s that mix of really proud and grateful.
We spent a lot of time together.
It was heavier than I thought it was going to be.
I won’t get to park here.
I won’t get to use my badge.
I’ll be going to a different building.It just felt so… bizarre.
Are people going to be happy or crying all day?
But also getting a stick up your nose every morning is not the best way to start your day.
It was not a super stacked day.
Just a few scenes.
The very last scene of the episode was the very last thing we shot.
In the morning, it was a mix of people being happy, like, “Oh my gosh!
Today’s the last day!”
[Laughs] I gave her a card.
They made it so normal, so… not a big deal.
Every time I wanted to freak out, they would calm me down.
If something didn’t fit, they always treated it as a minor thing they had to deal with.
I have a very special place in my heart for all those women.
So that was one of the first tough goodbyes.
Then I had to put the damn harness on.
[Laughs] I hate harnesses.
I wore a harness when I had to drop from the ceiling in season 1 in thatMission Impossiblescene.
That was fine because I was like, ‘This is so cool!
I feel like an action star!’
They’re really uncomfortable.
But it helped, because I didn’t cry nearly as much.
It was a good break in the day from all the emotion.
We all assumed, “Chelsea is going to be back for the finale, right?
And Dirk, too?”
It would have felt really weird if either of them weren’t there in person for the very end.
Especially the last day.
The gifts happened around lunchtime.Joe [Lo Truglio]was the first one to send his gift.
But it was really delicious.
There were cards and stuff from other people.
Then I walk in my dressing room and I’m like, “What?
Why is there a bag from All Saints in my room?”
And as soon as I opened the card, which said, “One without blood on it!”
I’m like, “Oh my God, Stephanie [Beatriz] got everybody Rosa leather jackets!
So I love that she gave me permission by just buying it for me.
[Laughs] Now I have an excuse to wear it.
It’s just so cool.
I’m going to wear the s— out of it this fall and winter.
I sent my gift to the cast after we wrapped.
They received it just a few weeks ago.
I’m known for taking the most pictures.
[Director of photography] Rick Page helped me because he has really beautiful pictures of our set.
He sent those to me and I made everyone a collage-y, scrapbook-y photo book.
It’s memories from all eight years, and most of the at-work pictures are from the last season.
I actually made them one second season.
It was my Christmas gift.
I had the intention to make one every year but it just never happened.
Shout-out to my people who always have good intentions but not great follow-through!
[Laughs]
The props department gave us a frame of our badge and our little business cards.
Mine was always in my folder, and sometimes they would show up in random places.
I don’t think they were ever really featured on the show.
They were just a little prop detail.
That was really nice of props to do.
I just wanted one chair back and they gave me five from all the different seasons.
I’m going to save them for charity or something down the line.
By this point, everyone is there.
Walking on the set, it felt like,Oh, there’s a lot of people here.
And just during rehearsal, it freaking wrecked me.
I was not expecting it.
I’m just like,Oh my God, how are we going to even do this scene?
[While the lights and cameras are being set up], we’re hanging out.
That was the other thingthroughout the day, we have our little chairs set up outside.
But that day, you were in the pen hanging out with everyonelike,alldaywhich was really lovely.
So we piled back in to film the scene and everyone’s crying.
There were maybe two takes where no one cried.
I couldn’t look at anyone, but somehow we got it.
Then I remember bodies moving around and I was talking to Chelsea and Joe and laughing with them.
And then everybody got real quiet.
I was like, “Oh my God!”
And then we did it.
That’s it.”
He gave everyone instructions to move outside [to celebrate].
Pretty much the first person that I hugged and sobbed on his shoulder was Andy.
It was a lot of sobbing.
We had a mutual back-and-forth of, “We did good work here.
We feel proud.”
I said something like, “We did it!
Look what we made!”
It wasn’t just saying bye to Andyit was saying bye to Jake and Amy, you know?
Every time it was a Jake and Amy episode, we would work so hard on it.
How can we make the scenes better?
How can we find little things that are specific to them?
Like him being freaky in bed and role-playingleaning into those things and finding moments to add in.
It was that moment of feeling like, “We did it!
“this thing we were always working really hard at.
We made this couple something that the fans love.
Andy and I had such a beautiful working relationship.
I’ve learned so much from him [over] the last eight years.
Everyone shuffled outside where they had a stage setup.
Then Dan makes an incredible speech.
By this point, I’m fully wrecked and I’m not even trying to control my sobs anymore.
I’m like, “The gig is up and everyone knows Melissa is a cryer.
It’s fine!”
And then Dan stops his speech and he’s like, “Melissa!”
And I’m like, “What?”
And he’s like, “I can’t look at you!”
And I’m like, “So then don’t look at me!
Say your speech and don’t look at me!”
That kind of broke up the heaviness for a second.
Andy made a really beautiful speech.
It was that wonderful Andy Samberg mix of funny and heartfelt.
He started it being like, “I see there’s a lot of phones out right now.
Just want to say: no soash, no posting.”
This is amazing, you have a really great thing and everyone is so wonderful!”
To which he would just reply, “I know!”
We really did, and that’s true for me, too.
This is amazing.”
Just the vibe, the energy on set.
That was true for our whole run, from season 1 to season 8.
Everyone came with the energy of: “How we make this scene the best we can make it.
Is this the funniest version?”
The relentless, constant tryingthat was really unique and special about this show.
And [finally]: “That’s a series wrap onBrooklyn Nine-Nine.”
There were lots more hugs and tears.
Technically, you’re not allowed to hug at work.
I did walk through the bullpen when it was empty, one last time.
It was weird and eerie.
I’ve been on that set plenty of times with it emptymostly, though, in the morning.
It’s going to go to other shows.
They refurbished Shaw’s Bar, because the show takes place in the bar.
And in that bar is the jukebox from Shaw’s Bar.
I got very emotional when I saw that.
I also was like, “I’m going to go take something from set!”
Then I’m just doing it to do it."
There was lingering and mingling outside.
Stephanie and I had a teary hug.
Stephanie is really the one person I clung to the most throughout the eight years.
[Laughs] We went through this together.
And then she was pregnant, which also was emotional.
She had a little belly on the last day.
She’s my girl for life, and I just love her so much.
Joel [McKinnon Miller, a.k.a.
Scully] wrecked me a few times this season because he was so emotional.
Joel is, like, a big old mush.
All my memories of Joel from the last day are him crying.
Terry and I had a hug goodbye at the very end.
That’s how you start the day with Terry Crews.
I had a big teary goodbye withAndre [Braugher]also because Andre lives on the East Coast.
So I was like, “Don’t stop doing that!”
I was pregnant, and the next season, she was pregnant.
And when I was pregnant with Axl, she got pregnant, so she also had a pandemic baby.
She had that big old camera on her shoulder with a pregnant belly, which is just so badass.
There were so many weddings and babies and pregnanciesso much life happened during the course of the show.
If I think about when my kids were born, it’s connected toBrooklyn.
So that made it all just feel so much heavier.
Everyone really stalled walking back to the cars.
I got in my car and just sobbed the whole way out of the lot.
I got home and my husband was like, “You okay?”
And I was like, [imitates voice cracking] ‘Nooo.’
It took a few days.
I think that surprised me too, because I knew it was coming.
It was a rough few days after.
The comedown was really, really stark and heavy.
And it’s fine!
It’s hard to truly articulate what this job has meant.
Obviously, it changed my whole life.
This show jump-started my career and [gave me] a shot at having longevity in this business.
And I got to buy a house with my husband!
It still astounds me that I got to be on such an amazing show with so many talented people.
There’s so many writers fromBrooklynthat are running other shows, which is a legacy in and of itself.
To also be part of that NBC legacy of great comedy is hard to wrap my mind around.
Then my mind will really be blown.
I’m really proud of what we made.
It’s the feeling that we had while we were making it.
