UPDATED: April 5, 2018 at 2:34 p.m.

Since its premiere in September 2016, NBC’s “This Is Us” became one of TV’s highest-rated shows. It’s won a Golden Globe, a Primetime Emmy and a Screen Actors Guild award. This weekend, one of the people behind the show will visit central New York to speak about it.

Mike Nunes, a Syracuse University alumnus and vice president of current programming for NBC, will speak at SU on Friday. He will give a lecture later that day as part of the Cazenovia Forum. The lecture in Cazenovia will be at the Hampton Inn ballroom at 7 p.m. Nunes’ talks, both titled “Framing the Story: From the Outside In,” will be structured around the hit NBC show “This Is Us.”

“This Is Us” is an NBC drama created by Dan Fogelman that follows the lives of three siblings and their families. The show’s second season ended in March. For Nunes, the show is multi-dimensional.

“I think there are a lot of social issues (the show) touches on, and does it in a way that is not one-sided,” Nunes said. “I think there is just a variety of pieces (of the show) that I will eloquently or not eloquently sort of talk about.”

Michael Schoonmaker, an associate professor at SU and the chair of the television, radio and film department, echoed that sentiment.

“I think that there is something about it that acknowledges the importance of how many viewpoints there are in collaboration with each other in everyday life,” Schoonmaker said. “And I think this story does a very good job of creating multiple lenses, and appreciating those points of view within the same story, character set and plotlines.”

Every once in a while, a show touches you in a way you didn’t expect, Schoonmaker said. “This Is Us” knows the viewers’ needs and are there to deliver, he added.

“I guess it’s notoriously a very difficult show not to cry (about),” Schoonmaker said.

Nunes will discuss the world of entertainment, the business and storytelling during his lectures, Schoonmaker said. Nunes works on the inside of storytelling and explains how it goes to the outside world of people who consume those stories.

“He’s going to talk about a show that people seem to be really fascinated with, and in awe of, and he’s going to talk about the place that these stories originate from,” Schoonmaker said.

Nunes said the forum will be as interactive as possible, using a combination of lectures, videos and discussions. He hopes the audience, especially those who have not seen the show before, leave with an admiration for it, just like he has.

The discussion should impact audience members who don’t watch the show, too, Nunes said.

Nunes’ lectures are thanks to a partnership between the Cazenovia Forum and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications. Admission to both events is free. Audience members area also invited to join the speaker for a post-event reception, according to a press release from the Cazenovia Forum.

He hopes what he talks about evokes emotions, like the show does — whether it is being more open about something, bettering themselves or calling a family member they haven’t talked to in a long time.

“I think the sense of family is probably the biggest thing about the show, and a family comes in many shapes, sizes and forms, and I think this show works to accomplish that,” Schoonmaker said.

CORRECTION: In a previous version of this post, the quote referring to “the sense of family” in “This Is Us” was misattributed. Michael Schoonmaker spoke to the show’s sense of family. The Daily Orange regrets this error.

Published on April 4, 2018 at 11:37 pm

Contact Jony: ktsampah@syr.edu