Barry Stars Explain Why It’s Ending With Season 4: ‘You Can Only Paint Yourself Into a Corner So Many Times’
Barry is taking his final bow on HBO this year, and the way last season ended had a lot to do with that.
“After Season 3 and Barry got caught, it kind of seemed like, well, the cat’s out of the bag,” star and co-creator Bill Hader tells TVLine in the video above ahead of this Sunday’s Season 4 premiere (10/9c). “It seems like it’s going to probably have to end soon, or it has to become a completely different story. And I didn’t want to do that, so it was just like, ‘Well, let’s just make sure it ends.'”
Sarah Goldberg, who plays Sally on the hitman comedy, admits to feeling “a mixed bag” of emotions after learning the show was ending with Season 4. “We knew we were going to mourn it,” she recalls, but it also felt to her like the story was “ending in the right place, and we kind of have to honor that. So that felt very satisfying.” Henry Winkler, who plays acting coach Gene, also confesses that he understood the decision to end it, but the actor side of him “was, and is, very sad… I loved playing this character, and it will be a big hole in my life.”
Anthony Carrigan, aka Chechen gangster Hank, remembers he was “a little bummed out” when he heard the news, but he supported it: “I think we end on a really high note, and I think it’s the smart move.” Plus, “you can only paint yourself into a corner so many times before you’re out of paint,” he notes. Stephen Root, who plays Barry’s handler Fuches, remembers talking with Hader about the show’s future after Season 3, and “it seemed like a natural way to end the show. Somebody with PTSD is not going to be a happier comedy in the next season. It’s just going to go downhill. So that seemed, in reality, much better to me to go out in a realistic sense than to try and draw it out.”
Press PLAY above for more of the Barry cast’s reactions to the final season, and drop a comment below to give us your thoughts on what’s to come in Season 4.
I’ll never complain about a show ending on its own terms. TOO many shows have gone on past their expiration date and it always cleary shows. Hoping they stick the landing
Should have been one season because season 3 was rubbish.
The current season finale also would have served as a fine series finale.