Fake Doctors, Real Friends Podcast: 10 Things We Learned From Bill Lawrence In Episode Three
2. Neil Flynn Did Not Have To Audition For The Janitor And Improvised Most Of His Lines
While Donald Faison struggled in his audition for Turk, Neil Flynn didn't even have to audition for his role as the Janitor. The actor did turn up with the intention of reading lines for the part of Dr. Cox, but Bill Lawrence, who knew Neil already, had a different part worked out for him in his head.
Zach and Donald spoke about Neil Flynn in a previous episode, hailing him as one of the funniest men on the entire show. Bill echoed this sentiment, saying that after a while the writers just began adding into the script 'Neil says something funny here', instead of any written dialogue.
One of the greatest examples of Neil's genius is the dead duck story that was completely improvised in the moment. The Janitor suggests to Ted that a nice gift for his girlfriend would be to do what he did for Lady, and give her a dead duck.
He then launches into a monologue about how he intended on killing the duck in front of her, which would have been more romantic, but on the way over he and the duck ended up on the side of the road, shirtless, and 'seeing what's what'.