This Parks And Recreation Character Was Only Supposed To Appear Once

Everyone who has seen NBC's "Parks and Recreation" knows that the entire world loves to hate Jerry/Garry/Larry/Terry Gergich. Consistently ridiculed by both his friends and enemies, Jerry is the laughing stock of Pawnee, Indiana. In fact, he is so often treated as a sorry individual that it throws others through a loop when they learn he has a surprisingly beautiful wife with two happy daughters. Despite this, people never stop treating Garry with utter disdain.

However, there is one character who is even more pitiful than poor Larry. A frequent customer at Andy Dwyer's shoeshine stand is Kyle, a state attorney, played Andy Forrest (via IMDb). Kyle is so low on the Pawnee City Hall ladder that he is treated roughly by everyone, including Jerry. As it seems to go with any character who is ridiculed by others, he sticks around as a minor character for quite a few episodes. Interestingly, he was originally only supposed to appear once but was later given a chance to return.

In 2019, several "Parks and Recreation" cast members gathered at San Diego Comic-Con for a special panel (via Twitter). The cast members in attendance were: Andy Forrest, who played frequent shoeshine customer Kyle; Colton Dunn, who played one-half of the inept Animal Control team; Jay Jackson, who portrayed news anchor Perd Hapley; Kelly Washington, who appeared as Allison Gliffert, aka mini-Leslie; and John Balma, the accountant who hires (and re-hires and re-hires again) Ben. During the panel event, the alums revealed several surprising facts, including the fact that Kyle was only meant to appear in one episode.

This fact was discussed by Forrest in a piece for Entertainment Weekly a few months before Comic-Con 2019. Per EW, the character was only supposed to appear at Andy's shoeshine stand once, but he was called back for a later episode when they needed someone to stand in. According to Forrest, Kyle was written to be the head of Pawnee's Water and Power department in earlier versions of the script. Ever since his debut in the Season 2 episode "The Camel" (via IMDb), Kyle acted as Andy's most faithful customer, allowing the writers some opportunities to embellish him with bits of backstory.

The most shocking wrinkle they almost added to Kyle's character explains exactly why the unlucky attorney kept returning to Andy's stand despite being mocked and abused. Though it was never officially included in the "Parks and Rec" canon, at one point, Chris Pratt thought it would be fun to reveal Kyle is Andy's father (via Buzzfeed). This twist might have made the character even more tragic as he tried to reconnect with his estranged son by going to get his shoes shined.