Central Park, the animated musical comedy from creator and star Josh Gad, is back with its first three episodes of season 3 on Apple TV+.

The sitcom centers around the Tillerman family as they strive to save Central Park from being bought up by money-hungry land developers. Gad developed the show with Bob’s Burgers creator Loren Bouchard, and gave ABC Audio insight into how they brought the series to life.

“I basically said, ‘I want to do a musical. Here’s who I would love to work with. Here are the people that I think would be great.’ And then we started developing characters around them,” Gad said.

First, he wanted to “build a show around these people,” he said, and then “kind of figure out what the characters are. It was more of a proof of concept for us, like, does a musical animated series work?”

Four Emmy nominations and three seasons later, Gad says he thinks that part of the show’s success should be credited to the location of Central Park itself.

“It’s a place that is a melting pot of society where you can be the richest person in the world, or you can be somebody with no money, and the two of you are on equal footing in this park,” Gad said. “It is a park that belongs to everyone.”

These themes of belonging resonate with Emmy Raver-Lampman, who voices Molly Tillerman in the series.

“At the core of it, and the thing that I am learning from Molly — not learning, but the thing that I am constantly reminded about — is her love for her family,” Raver-Lampman said. “I just admire that so much. She’s helped me grow and actively pursue being a better daughter myself.”

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