“Sure, you have to acknowledge the challenges, but we also feel like there should also be a lane for something that is silly and fun,” he added. “People here are dying to rally around something positive.”

Riddle, a native of Atlanta, said he got an in-depth education on all things South Side Chicago when writing the series. But the show’s setting is in many ways simply a stand-in for a host of predominantly black communities across the country, he said.

Yes, locals are sure to appreciate the show’s insider references — in the pilot episode, a new female employee at Rent-T-Own brags that she is personally acquainted with the underperforming N.B.A. center and Chicago native Eddy Curry — but “we always say that specificity makes itself relatable,” Riddle said while standing outside Harold’s Chicken Shack #55, a few blocks from Salahuddin’s childhood home.

“Bashir and I always make sure everything we do has that universal appeal,” he said. “So we’re trying to treat South Side Chicago like our big playground.”

The two men learned to cast a wide net with their comedy during the three seasons they worked on Fallon’s first late-night show, beginning in 2009. They met in the 1990s at Harvard University as members of an all-black male a cappella group, and they bonded over a shared love of “Saturday Night Live” and “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure.” After graduation, they moved to Los Angeles together, immersing themselves in the local sketch-comedy scene and writing hundreds of scripts that never got sold.

They eventually got hired by “This Just In,” a short-lived joint web venture between HBO and AOL, and had an early viral video with “Condi Rice Raps,” which imagined a world where the then-secretary of state was a hip-hop artist.