Kansas City's mayor did not subscribe to Apple TV+, had never sat down with "Ted Lasso," and only caught fragments of the show here and there. Then the series filmed its season four premiere in his city — and he walked away a fan.

Quinton Lucas told The Hollywood Reporter on the day before the new season's return that he does not subscribe to Apple TV+, so the show had not been on his family's viewing list. He had seen episodes in passing. That changed after he watched the season four premiere, which he said left him impressed and smiling. He called the show one that "builds joy and ropes viewers in through its characters." The Hollywood Reporter

The new season premiered on Wednesday, 5 August 2026, with Kansas City taking what the local tourism agency Visit KC called a starring role in the episode. Visit KC via Instagram

In the premiere, Ted visits three Kansas City landmarks: the American Jazz Museum, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, and Gates Bar-B-Q. The episode puts the city's cultural institutions front and centre rather than treating the location as a generic backdrop. The Hollywood Reporter

Kansas City, Missouri won the production over the Kansas side of the state line because Missouri offers a film tax-incentive program — a rebate that returns a portion of production spending to the filmmakers — that Kansas lacked. Lucas welcomed the production when it was announced, and by November 2025 he was celebrating a record-setting year for the city's film industry, one that also included Hallmark's holiday productions. The Hollywood Reporter; City of Kansas City, Missouri

The Hollywood Reporter interviewed Lucas on a day that doubled as a local Election Day, which gives a sense of how the production sat alongside the ordinary machinery of city governance.

For Kansas City, the premiere is a tourism moment packaged as a television episode. Three named landmarks appear on screen. The mayor — who had no Apple TV+ subscription and no prior relationship with the show — is now a self-described fan. Whether that turns into visitor numbers is a question for the city's accountants, not its television critics.

What is clear is the pipeline: a state tax incentive attracts a production, the production films at local institutions, and the platform distributes the result to a global audience. Kansas City filled the slot. Ted Lasso got its backdrop. The mayor got a new favourite show.