‘Parks and Recreation’ season 6 spoilers: Kristen Bell joins; Ben Schwartz returning

Based on this story alone, you would think that Mike Schur and the folks over at NBC’s “Parks and Recreation” have to be pretty big fans of “House of Lies.” Why is that? The simple answer here is that they’ve managed to cast a pair of series regulars from that show for parts early on during the hit show’s sixth season.

Let’s start first of all with what is probably going to be the biggest news: Kristen Bell is going to be playing … Leslie Knope? According to Entertainment Weekly, the actress will be jumping over following the “Veronica Mars” movie to this show, where she will be playing a successful city council member in Eagleton, who is superficially superior to Leslie in every single way. We already know that this town and Eagleton does not have the greatest relationship in the world already with Pawnee residents, and whatever happens here will probably cause the relationship to be even worse in some way.

As for Ben Schwartz, he will be back to reprise his role yet again as Jean-Ralphio, the aggressive, bizarre friend of Tom who tends to show up on occasion and cause mayhem. Last season, we saw Jenny Slate stop by for an extended arc as Jean-Ralphio’s sister, and she caused plenty of chaos of her own, especially when Tom tried to break up with her.

At this point, we do personally believe that “Parks and Recreation” needs just about all of the help it can get when you consider the competition. Maybe these two actors can be a source for something extra.

What’s your take on these castings? If you have not heard the news about “Parks and Recreation” heading to London earlier on this season, just be sure to check out the story over here.

Photo: NBC