Brooklyn Nine-Nine: How Andy Samberg graduated from SNL to viral video superstardom

Sketch comic rose to fame through Lonely Island spoofs with best friends Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer

Comedian Andy Samberg, fresh from co-hosting the Golden Globe Awards, returns to TV with a new series of Brooklyn Nine-Nine on 10 January.

An incredibly prolific creative force, Samberg, 40, was a cast member on Saturday Night Live (SNL) between 2005 and 2012, has appeared in the movies Hot Rod (2007), That’s My Boy (2012) and Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping (2016) and stars in the wildly popular police sitcom, for which he won a Golden Globe himself in 2014.

But the comic, who hails from Berkeley, California, is best known for his work with The Lonely Island, the troupe he formed with close friends Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer. Together, the trio produced such viral R&B spoofs as “I’m On a Boat”, “I Just Had Sex” and “Dick in a Box”, the latter winning an Emmy in 2007, its title engraved on the statuette’s base, according to custom.

Kieron Passaway of Vice recently argued the group’s 2008 follow-up, “Jizz in My Pants”, simultaneously a parody of hyper-sexualised music videos and male anxiety, marked a turning point in internet history, bringing YouTube to prominence as a venue for professionally-produced original content and a “new frontier for toilet humour”.

While the playful vulgarity The Lonely Island often trade in is nothing new, owing a debt to the “gross-out” comedies of the Nineties perfected by the Farrelly Brothers and the American Pie series, the group bring it off in surprisingly sweet-natured, inclusive style and their affection for and knowledge of the genre they're satirising is obvious.

Samberg with Brooklyn Nine-Nine co-star Terry Crews (Startraks Photo/Rex/Shutterstock) (Startraks Photo/REX/Shutterstock)

The production values of their videos are extraordinarily high, an asset Samberg attributes to Schaffer’s technological prowess, as is the calibre of guest stars appearing in cameos. Justin Timberlake is a frequent collaborator while the likes of T-Pain, Akon and Kendrick Lamar have all appeared to generously send-up lazy hip-hop tropes.

Michael Bolton’s appearance as himself on “Jack Sparrow”, allowing his preoccupation with the Pirates of the Caribbean films to derail their track together, is one of their most inspired moments, while “Motherlover”, in which Samberg and Timberlake propose a novel solution to the problem of finding Mother’s Day gifts, features two very game supporting turns from veteran actresses Patricia Clarkson and Susan Sarandon.

The popularity of those videos, produced as SNL Digital Shorts, gave rise to three albums – Incredibad (2009), Turtleneck & Chain (2011) and The Wack Album (2013) – as well as Popstar, effectively a Lonely Island movie, in which Samberg starred as the deluded and self-sabotaging Bieber-esque Conner4Real.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine has been Samberg’s biggest project since 2013. The show was cancelled by Fox after five seasons last May before being picked up for a sixth series by NBC just one day later following a public outcry.

Samberg appears as Die Hard-obsessed detective Jake Peralta alongside former elementary school classmate Chelsea Peretti and a talented supporting cast including Andre Braugher, Stephanie Beatriz, Melissa Fumero and Terry Crews. The result is a gently progressive and warm comedy loaded with slapstick and ludicrous escapades.

As that show commenced, the comedian married his long-term girlfriend Joanna Newsom, the renowned singer-songwriter and harpist. This unlikely couple were introduced after one of her concerts in 2008 by Samberg’s SNL colleague Fred Armisen.

Samberg described himself as a “superfan” of her work in conversation with Marc Maron in 2013 and said he regularly attended her shows before they met.

The couple have a baby daughter and live in California.