A familiar face is missing from “Community,” which resurfaced this week on Yahoo Screen.
Yvette Nicole Brown, who played Shirley throughout the show’s NBC run, announced last summer that she wouldn’t make the move to Yahoo. Brown said at the time that her father was ill and needed her care.
In October, though, Brown became a regular on CBS’ remake of “The Odd Couple,” playing Dani, assistant to sports-talk host Oscar Madison (Matthew Perry).
After CBS introduced “The Odd Couple” to TV critics meeting in Los Angeles in January, Brown explained that the work load of a single-camera comedy such as “Community” is very different from a multi-camera show such as “The Odd Couple.”
“My father has dementia,” she said, “and I’m his only caregiver.” She moved him from her hometown of Cleveland to live with her, she said. “I couldn’t do that working 80 hours a week, but now it’s like 25 hours a week, and that’s great for me.”
She thanks the powers that be at “Community” for releasing her and calls “The Odd Couple” a gift from God.
“What’s amazing to me is that you can make a choice for the family, and God can bless you. We shoot five minutes from my house. I can go home and see my dad at lunch, make sure he’s OK, bring him back with me if I want to. He can come to the tapings. It’s just an easier, more relaxing type of environment. And he needs me.”
At this point, it’s just the two of them, she said.
“I don’t have any people. It’s me and my dad, in a house. I’m the one who gives him his medication, I’m the one who cooks his food, I’m the one that makes sure he’s OK. If he’s having a tough day, I get up and sit with him.”
On “The Odd Couple,” Brown is much slimmer than in her Shirley days. The weight loss was a matter of health, after she developed Type 2 diabetes, she said.
“I had to put the doughnuts down and start getting on the treadmill,” she said. Her other secret: portion control.
“Before I eat something now, I go, ‘Is it worth your feet? Do you want to walk? Or do you want to eat that?’ “
