This show has managed to survive — through COVID, through strikes — and we were able to still tell the story we wanted to tell and end it on our terms and wrap it up in a way

I sent him the script and he called me back pretty quickly,” McBride tells PEOPLE before explaining what happened nextBradley Cooper may have needed just a little nudge to sign on to appear in the fourth and final season of The Righteous Gemstones.

The creator and star of the hilarious HBO series tells IndieWire about casting his "Aloha" costar in a standalone prologue episode that pushed McBride and his crew to their creative edge.