That TV Comedy Podcast
Join us as we discuss our earliest comedic influences, our favourite shows, and how our passion for comedy has shaped our lives.
That TV Comedy Podcast
The Office (USA)
Unpacking The Office (US) Dinner Party Mayhem
What makes Michael Scott’s leadership both cringe-worthy and compelling? Our inaugural episode of the TV Comedy Podcast dives headfirst into the beloved, chaotic world of “The Office” (U.S.). Hosted by Jacquie J Sarah, a writer, performer, and podcaster, and alongside her is Amanda Davies, a true enthusiast of TV comedy. Together, they kick off our series by sharing personal anecdotes about their deep-seated love for comedy before plunging into the intricate character dynamics that make “The Office” such an iconic show. Despite her limited exposure to the series, Amanda offers fresh insights from her recent in-flight binge of a season.
In this episode, they dissect the complex, often toxic relationship between Michael Scott and Jan Levinson, highlighting Steve Carell's masterful portrayal of a less lovable yet fascinating boss. They reminisce about the chaotic hilarity of the infamous dinner party episode—complete with Jan’s awkward dance moves, Dwight’s becoming an unexpected guest, and Michael showing off his tiny plasma TV. They also discuss the importance of allowing TV shows time to find their footing, with “The Office” being a prime example of a series that blossomed beyond its rocky start. Join them as they laugh, cringe, and analyze the memorable moments and character evolutions that make “The Office” a comedy classic.
Presented by Amanda Davies and Jacquie J Sarah
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Hello and welcome to this new podcast series. All about wait for it television comedy. I'm Jacquie J Sarah and my co-host is Amanda Davies. I For each episode, we'll be taking a look at a television comedy series, breaking it down with a focus on a specific episode, giving it a bit of a deep dive, geeking for want of a better word geeking out about it and generally discussing it. We will be taking it in terms of picking a series, so it may not be something we have seen ourselves. Before we get to the good stuff, as it's the first episode, a quick introduction to us.
Speaker 1:I am Jacquie and I'm a writer, performer and podcaster. You may not have seen me on television, stage or screen or even heard of me, and you, Amanda, I'm a fan of all things TV comedy related and I'm not a writer, I'm just a fan. Okay, now we've got a sense of you, Amanda, we'll just kick off then. We are doing this together because we have two major things in common. One an overwhelming deep sense of urgency over the ticking time bomb of mortality, waking up every morning realising how much time would be wasted and where did it go all so wrong. Okay, that's three major things in common. The others are that we have the same parents and we are both obsessed with comedy, mainly TV comedy, which has led us here. Hopefully, in future episodes it won't just be our voices, you hear, because we want to open the discussion up. If you're obsessed by comedy too and want to join in, we'll be giving the contact details at the end of the show. So why are we doing this? The reason is comedy is a serious business.
Speaker 1:Broadly speaking, this podcast will be about sitcoms and half-hour comedies, some of them known as comedy dramas. Will be about sitcoms and half-hour comedies, some of them known as comedy dramas. Sitcoms are like theatre. James Burroughs, director of programmes like Cheers, frasier, friends and the Big Bang Theory and so many others, came from a theatre background and liked three cameras picking up reactions. Half-hour comedies, or sometimes comedy dramas, are usually single camera and there's no laughter track and no live audience. But we'll go more into this as we go through the whole process, because we just want to geek out about TV. Growing up, we watched comedy all the time. Yes, we didn't always agree on which comedies we found funny, but we enjoyed discussing them and arguing about what we thought was funny, yeah, and what we liked or disliked about shows, and at the end of the conversation it didn't matter, which is true now and still true today. And your comments about theatre yeah Well, we both love theatre, that is true, and when we go to the theatre we often go multiple times.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And just to see something different, to see different reactions, or see something that others have discussed that we might have missed when we watched it. And it's the same with comedy shows. When you like a comedy show, you watch it multiple times and pick up new things as you're watching. And this is why we want to do this, because we want to go deep, deep within the programme. Deep Welcome to the show. This week is my choice, and we'll be talking about the Office, the US version.
Speaker 1:Amanda, tell us about the Office. The Office is a mockumentary focused on the employees of the Scranton Pennsylvania branch of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. It ran for nine seasons and 201 episodes on the NBC network, beginning on March 24th 2005 and ending on May 16th 2013. Imdb describes the office as a mockumentary on a group of typical office workers where the workday consists of ego clashes, inappropriate behaviour and tedium. The office was based on the earlier BBC series of the same name, which was created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. It was adapted for American television by Greg Daniels, a veteran writer whose credits include Saturday Night Live and the Simpsons.
Speaker 1:Imdb gives the series an overall rating of 9 out of 10. Why only 9? Well, the truth is, amanda can't tell me, because how many episodes of the Office have you watched? Not that many, yeah, we're starting on one that Amanda hasn't got a huge knowledge base of. No, no, I've never. It's been on my list to watch, but I haven't actually got round to it in the last 10 years. In the last 10 years, no, I had seen one episode which you suggested I watched one day while I was exercising on a treadmill. Yeah, and that was a christmas episode and I thought it was okay, but I wasn't really inspired to watch anymore at that point. And then last summer we went on a long-awaited holiday to New York yeah, long-awaited, after Covid and everything, yes, and there wasn't much for me to watch on the plane. There was so much for you to watch, mom, it was just you didn't want to watch it Nothing of interest.
Speaker 1:Nothing jumped out at you, no, and there it was the Office. I watched about half of season three on the way to New York and nearly watched the rest of the series on the way back, although I didn't finish it. You didn't finish it, I have to say. I watched the rest of season three a little bit later, but I didn't do it straight away. But I thought I should at least finish that season. And then you decided that the Office was the series you were choosing an episode from, and actually I knew you were going to choose the Office First of all. There was going to be no question that you were going to choose the Office first. I knew it was also going to be an episode I wouldn't have seen. No, I deliberately picked an episode you haven't seen. You got to the end of series three.
Speaker 1:You saw Jim go into the Office and ask Pam out for a date and then you went oh, I just stopped there. I'm done with that for a bit. Yeah, that'll do. Is that right? The thing is there's so many spoilers out there, so I knew that those two were going to be together. You don't really have to have spoilers from the outside, but I get it. They were always going to end up together. But I was a bit confused by some of the things that were happening in there, for example, in the episode that you chose, which we haven't got to yet. Which we haven't got to yet. But but Michael is in a relationship with Jan, yeah, whereas in the season I saw he split up with her after chatting to the girls from the office and saying how mean she was. So I was really surprised that he was actually back with her. Yeah, there's a lot to unwrap with that, which we're not going to be able to do, I don't think in this episode, but yeah, there's definitely a build-up to it. As you probably guessed, it was quite a toxic relationship.
Speaker 1:Now, you haven't watched the US one, but you've obviously watched the British version Multiple times. I love the British version. So what you're saying is the British version is better than the US version. At this point, I would definitely say that Whoa. To be fair, I haven't seen the whole series of the US version, so I can't At this point. Yes, I'm saying the British version is better. However, once I've watched every season of the American Office, I might change my mind. I wouldn't recommend you watch the first season of the US Office because it's a carbon copy of the British one. I know Dwight's quite a different character to Garris and things like that, but you probably get the gist of it by going heading straight into season two. Obviously, the Office is nine seasons, so there's no way we can condense nine seasons into something like this. So I reserve the right to go back to the the office so there'll be no spoilers to the end. But jim and pam do get together shocker.
Speaker 1:Just to give you a bit of background to me as well as somebody who's a self-confessed geek, I'm not very good at quotes from things. I don't get geeky about quotes or useless information with contained within an episode. For example, I don't know how many brothers or sisters Pam has. You've got a lot of fan bases where they can break down each character, who they are, what their family situation is. I'm not very good on that, but I like the fun behind the scenes stuff the writing process, how the series came together, how the writers were involved. Was it a writer's story? Because obviously Greg Daniels is the writer of the US office, but he was a writer for hire. He didn't pitch the idea to the network, which was NBC. He was employed to write the series. So that's the stuff that I find fascinating and tends to stick in my memory. If somebody gives me a quote from the Office, I'd probably go yeah, that's from the Office, but not be able to riff on it or anything like that, so get that out the way.
Speaker 1:So it's not season four, episode three. Season four, episode three. Do you remember what happened? No, what's season four, episode three. Do you remember what happened? No, what's season four, episode three. The episode we're doing today is season four, episode 9, called Dinner Party. According to my trivia deck and episode guide, this is actually episode 13. And bear in mind this is official NBC merch Made in China. Let me say what it said Jim, pam, angela and Andy are invited or, I would argue, tricked to a dinner party at Michael and Jan's condo, but the hosts get into an argument about having children so the guests try to leave. Dwight arrives with his old babysitter as his date to make Angela jealous. The police are eventually called by a neighbour and Michael leaves Jan.
Speaker 1:The reason why I picked this episode is it's often cited as one of the best episodes of the Office. Often cited as one of the best episodes of the Office. It currently is a 9.4 on IMDb and I think it's because of the extremes of the characters. Disney speaking, it's not my favourite, but I picked it because it's such a big episode to explore and there's no way again we're going to be able to get down to the nitty-gritty of it here, but it's a fun one and it proves to someone who doesn't really watch it that it is a funny series. Yes, I enjoyed the episode.
Speaker 1:It made you laugh out loud, didn't it? It did as I was watching, I made a little note of every time I laughed out loud, and throughout the show I laughed 10 times. That is really good, which is really high, because quite often when you're watching something, you find it funny but you don't always laugh out loud. Generally, if I laugh out loud at something, it shocks me. It was so good, I really enjoyed it. And how they filmed it I don't know. Well, they did struggle to film it. There's so many outtakes you can find on YouTube and on the DVDs of the Office.
Speaker 1:I love this episode, but it's not my favourite because a lot of the characters in the Office are not in it for the main part, and this is a reason why I like this episode, because I preferred the episodes of the series that I watched that were set out of the Office, but then you missed the point of the office. It's called the office the office, yes, granted. However, I did enjoy the fact that they were not in the office, that it was different, and seeing where michael lives, michael's condo and the characters there. At the beginning, it was obvious that nobody had ever been there. Dwight had been there. Amanda who wrote the episode? Written by the writing team of Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky and directed by Paul Feig? And how did Gene frame it? As who's afraid of John Levinson? Who's afraid?
Speaker 2:of John Levinson.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because in earlier drafts Greg Daniels called it Virginia Woolf because of the echoes to the Edward Albee play. Yeah, it starts in the office. The whole gang are there. They've been told to work late, but Michael is not happy about it so he jumps on the phone to corporate telling them they won't be working late. No, I think you'll find he was literally shouting down the phone at corporate in an action that was so clearly that there was nobody on the other end of the phone and it just meant that jim and ham and andy and angela were free to go to dinner. I thought that was quite clever of him. I'm sorry.
Speaker 1:Sorry, it was hugely manipulative, but actually clever of Michael, he's not usually that supremely clever, because he knew they couldn't have had plans and clearly he'd been trying to do this for ages, as Jim says that he'd invited them over many, many times and they'd always had an excuse. Exactly right, jim and Pam turn up there. They're starving, hungry. They didn't want to go there, they just want to sit down and have some food and go to bed. It's a Friday night, but it's good news because Jan has got the dinner on, so in three hours time it will be served. Laugh out loud moments when Michael asks Jim what he'd been up to and Jim says in the hours since I last saw you, I've been getting ready and driving here, and Michael says to me like, or me too, apart from the driving over here. They really made me laugh and I also liked the way that they both hugged Jim and ignored Pam. Yeah, because Jan thinks Pam likes Michael and who's told him that Michael? Yeah, awful. Now this is one of the things I want to talk about the office, because would it be made today, not in the same way that, for example, the boss suggesting that the receptionist or his worker had feelings for him and he'd also told jan that they dated? Yeah, exactly right, that is horrible. They're talking about doing the new version of it. The writer, greg daniels, is actually in talks too. I don't even know if they've made a pilot now. I don't know what stage they're at it. It can still be really funny.
Speaker 1:There are so many different sorts of office. Jan, she's a guest character and she's brilliant. She's so good, and I'd seen her previously in the episode where they'd broken up. Yeah, where he broke up with her by phone and they were telling him not to, and then she arrived and listened to his dumping in front of him. Horrible, there is a fine line with him. I find sometimes that he's too much, not the way steve corral plays him. Steve corral plays him to perfection, but there's parts of his characters which are not lovable. Right at the beginning they were saying he's more lovable than ricky gervais character david branton. He's not lovable than Ricky Gervais' character David Brent. And he's not. But was that written by an American? Oh, yeah, written by an American. Yeah, they wanted him softer than David Brent. Obviously, I haven't seen the whole thing, but Michael's character doesn't come across in the same way that David Brent.
Speaker 1:He seems that he's got a much crueler streak.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's got a really dark side of him. But in this episode this is not one of the dark Michael Scott episodes, because you feel sorry for him in this one, don't? You Totally feel sorry for him and Steve Carell's performance and Jan Melora Hardin they are equally brilliant. I don't know why Melora Hardin hasn't got her own TV theories. She auditioned for one of the Friends characters. Obviously it might not be true. She was a very strong contender. They wanted her and she later appeared in an episode where she dates Ross. But you know good actors, really good actors You're going to see them crop in lots of different things because so many people are brilliant actors, but it doesn't mean they can act comedy. If somebody can do comedy, well, I think they can do serious drama.
Speaker 2:I think that's yes, but it's not the other way around the subtleties, yeah, quiet, for for everything.
Speaker 1:and a brilliant example of somebody you wouldn't consider being able to do comedy but is actually brilliant at it Harrison Ford. Oh gosh, we're going to talk about shrinking one day. Why haven't we seen more comedy with Harrison Ford? I feel cheated all these years. I know he did comedy bits in films he's funny in Indiana Jones and things like that but proper comedy are wasted wasted, I tell you there we go we're talking about an episode of the office and we're meandering.
Speaker 1:We're meandering which I knew would happen. Jim and pam they're at the house and they just want to eat, but unfortunately they have to do the tour of the house. They go upstairs, we see jan's office, which has clearly never been used, and then, of course, her workspace. She can't be expected to be using the same space, of course not. She can't use a workspace on her office space. It can't be the same place, can they have to have somewhere to be creative?
Speaker 1:But also, she can't sleep in the same bed as michael, and this is where we feel sorry for him, that he has to sleep on a bench at the end of her bed. Yeah, and I say her bed because it's his bed really, but it's now her bed and he has to sleep there. And of course, there's the camera which we'd heard about before, how she films him and then gives him critiques on his performance. She's awful. But she's angry at Michael in this episode and I kind of understand why she's angry with him, because I can't remember if it was a previous episode or a previous couple of episodes she's suing Dunder Mifflin for being sacked and Michael sticks up for Dunder Mifflin for being sacked and michael sticks up for dunder mifflin, not her. Oh yeah, so this is clearly why she's angry at this stage, right, even though it's a dysfunctional relationship and they're not good together so there's kind of a reason prior to this episode why she's really angry with him.
Speaker 1:this helps us to see both sides. Yes, and on top of that he's insisting that Jim and Pam go over there and he's telling her that she's an ex-girlfriend. I'm not excusing her behaviour in the slightest, but there is a reason why there's a bit of friction between them. Yeah, it helps to build the drama, doesn't it? Then this volatile relationship, and for viewers, then it's good to see that you, that it's not just one side no there are two volatile people in a toxic relationship yeah, although
Speaker 1:she's obviously more volatile than michael in this episode. It's just toxic. Yeah, and they shouldn't be together. Oh, they shouldn't be together and I hope that they're not together after. They're never together again after this episode Spoilers. But she did do the worst thing she could do to him. Not that worst thing she could do to him.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about the TV on the wall, the plasma TV, which is about 14, 15 inches Very tiny, it's tiny, but he's really proud of it because you can move it off the wall. He introduced three things that he was proud of. So the pine candle holder, the Dundies yeah, and the plasma TV. And why is he proud of them? Why is he proud of the Dundies or the plasma TV? Why is he proud of those three things he made the pine holder, which just looks like an old carton. It's just awful. Yep, obviously he earned those Dundies, dundies, whatever they were. Are they Dunder Mifflin's award? No, now the Dundies are his awards, which he gives out to the staff. Every year he posts a Dundies which he gives out to the staff. That would be how he posts a Dundee. So on the eighth Dundee's Awards, he awarded Phyllis the busiest beaver award. Busiest beaver, but he misspelt busiest to bushiest, ryan got the hottest in the office. So you know, did PJ know that? Like that the thing is about the writer's room in the office was they'd write together, they would break storylines together and then they'd be allocated an episode, but that didn't mean that the end episode was one they'd written completely. What would happen is they'd go away and write it and they'd come back to the writer's room and then it would be added to and bits taken away and if a funnier joke could be come up with, it would be put in. Things like that. So it was much more group effort than somebody going away and writing it and then that would be the episode.
Speaker 1:In the UK, for example, if somebody's written the episode, chances are they've written that episode. In the UK, for example, if somebody's written the episode, chances are they've written that episode. Usually there's one person who writes a whole series. The writer's room. In America in a sitcom like this, maybe 22 episodes a year the writers are there the whole time. They're on set making sure the jokes work. They're behind the scenes. One or two might be away from the writer's room writing an episode, but it goes back to the writer's room, it goes back to Greg Daniels and they write again. That's how they ensure quality. In Tina Fey's book, david Cameron wrote to her, asked to meet her because he wanted to know how to make British sitcoms as good as American, which would argue that some are, some aren't. And Tina Fey said no, we want to write something like you six episodes.
Speaker 1:We don't want to do 22 episodes and it's changed now, because we've had COVID and because we've had a writer's strike and then the actor's strike 22 episodes a season is not happening at the moment. No, and it does seem quite excessive, doesn't it? That is probably what nine months work it is, but then, at the same time, you're employing someone for nine months, true, and then, and of course, they weren't getting a fair wage. Well, things like the Office on a network, they kind of were. I can't say for certain, I wasn't there, I don't know how much they earned, but the problem is now with the streamers. They're doing up to ten episodes, kind of were. I can't say for a certain. I wasn't there, I don't know how much they earned, but the problem is now with the streamers. They're doing up to 10 episodes and then they're not getting any residuals. You know the royalties. What's happening there is they're losing on royalties and they're only working for three months.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it makes it so much tougher that it's not fair. It's not fair. So every time something's streamed, they should have money for it, but they're not. You can celebrate something being downloaded a million times, but the writer's been paid already. Yeah, same with the actors, and that was what the parts of the strikes were for was the fact that streamers are taking advantage of the fact that there's less episodes and not paying the writers and the actors accordingly. Yeah, it's unfair. It's a sticky area, because who wouldn't want to write for a streamer? I'd love to write for a streamer. Yeah, exactly because that's how you get your work out there.
Speaker 2:Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1:How else do you get your work to a mass audience? It's not podcasting, I can tell you. Can I ask another question? Of course you can. Why was David Cameron asking Tina Fey? Oh, I don't know. We probably just wanted to meet Tina Fey, because what's he got to do with comedy? Well, obviously, what he said is laughable, but it's not meant to be. This is what she said. It's in her book Boss. That it's not meant to be. This is what she said. It's in her book Bossy Pants, I think the name of her autobiography is so Michael, yeah. So he's proud of those three things. He's proud of those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's go back to the episode, because they are the only three things that belong to him In the whole house, and it's his house, in the room, yeah.
Speaker 1:Everything else is all her erratic face Candles everywhere. Let's skip ahead on the episode. Andy and Angela have turned up. They're not impressed either. They don't want to be there. In Michael's mind, he and Jan are the love story and Jim and Pam are the side characters. But having Andy there, yeah, means that Michael can try and pitch a business proposition to Jim. No way To sell Jan's candles, which seems to be the whole motive of holding the dinner party. Yes, and because Andy's a bit of a creep, he wants to buy in. Of course he wants to buy it away. Yeah, but he had money. He came from money, does he? I don't? Yes, right, he comes from a wealthy family. Andy going oh, I'll invest. It's like me giving you a five and saying go on then knock yourself out.
Speaker 1:I really didn't realize that he was rich. The next bit was so funny. Michael and jan argue, yeah, and so she gets up to put on some music and we have the wonder of that one night by Hunter Hunter, who was Ex-assistant, ex-assistant in corporate, in Dunder, mifflin, yep. All I can say is that bloody song is an earworm. It was in my head for days. This is clearly about Jan, you took me by the hand, made me a man so raw, so right, all night, all right, oh, yeah, it's horrible. And she dances off, beat to it and that dance, and she tries to get Jim to dance and he just looks Rabbit in headlights. So funny, but you could see she was desperately trying not to laugh. Yeah, the music was written by todd fancy of the new pornographers, and he also sang it. And you know what? It was written by eisenberg and stupnitsky, but they wrote extra verses. Yeah, that they didn't use because they were so into this. The best bit, though, was later, when Jim reveals that he stole the seat the end.
Speaker 2:It was for the best.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at some stage then Dwight had shown up with the babysitter. Yeah, his babysitter. Oh, I did feel sorry for Dwight because he was crying. Yeah, because, because he wasn't invited, because he wasn't part of a couple. Horrendousous, absolutely horrendous. Yeah, that was the excuse Given. He wasn't part of a couple and twice minted he has a whole farm, he has a beet farm. At a certain stage he buys the building because he loves being a salesman, he loves Dunder Mifflin and all he wants to be is manager there. But first of all he just wants to work for Michael.
Speaker 1:So is the character of Dwight more of a combination of Gareth and David Brent? No, I think Dwight is what Gareth should have been, not should have been. In the terms of the programme. I think he was written differently. In the original office, the British office, they wrote Gareth a little bit more like Dwight. They imagined someone bigger taking the role. And then Mackenzie Crook came in and played him that way, and Ricky Gervais and steven mitchell. They were like, well, no, we'll have him instead and he can play it this way. When rain wilson came in, he brought his own vision of dwight as well, so it was kind of amended for him also. Yeah, so when different actors come in, they bring different things to the role and the writers go oh, that works, we're emphasized, we'll work with that more. Which is one of the reasons I think that over here, even in America now, they've got it wrong.
Speaker 1:You cannot let the program run for six episodes and think that's it. The American office was threatened with cancellation after six episodes because it had no traction, it didn't have the viewers. It was just lucky that somebody in the network liked it enough to take it on to the next series and they were only offered 12 episodes, I think. Then 10 or 12 episodes and the background characters I call them background characters. They became the main characters all the way through then, people like Angela and Oscar and Kevin. They weren't series regulars until way into the second series. Right, I'll go back to my original point is these things needs time to develop. So there's no way you should be taking a comedy on six episodes and then cancelling it. No, that's, it's really not fair. It's not. You've got to wait for that word of mouth. People need to get to know the characters and see what actually will happen. Yeah, six episodes is not it's just not long enough for any kind of development.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's why I think, especially over here actually, that all programs should be given two series comedy, I should say all comedy, 12 episodes yeah, not necessarily 12 at the same time, not, but six episodes and then in further six, because changes can be made, things can be changed and it gives people time to hear about it, to gain that traction that you talked about, that people watch it. Back to the episode. Michael thinks that jan is poisoning him at the table so they finally get to eat, yeah, and he puts that element of doubt into pam's mind, that michael thinks that jan is trying to poison him. Pam straight away realizes that if that's true, she's also in trouble because jan has accused pam of looking at michael in a certain way you can tell straight away it's all over her face. Oh no, I cannot eat this meal.
Speaker 1:But I'm starving I'm starving but I'm not gonna eat it. She gets a burger in the end, though, didn't? She gets her burger. And do you remember why there's no patio door? Pam is cold, yeah, and Michael gives her a jacket which annoys Jan because it's Pam and she said oh sorry, it's cold in here. The glass in the sliding doors has shattered because Michael thought he heard the ice cream truck and then he said it was because it was so clean.
Speaker 1:Michael gets really fed up, gets his neon sign has actually got the name of a red light district abroad on it and she tries this passive-aggressive let's take it down and talk about it later, sort of thing. He refuses. She starts getting really cross, gets up and throws one of his dundies at the plasma TV and it breaks. So she's destroyed a dundie and his beloved plasma TV. So they all leave. They have to go. Police arrive, neighbours complained, and then Michael needed someone to go home with and Dwight offers straight away and he still looks to Pam. Jim says oh no, we can't remember the fire. And he corrects no, no, the flood, the flood.
Speaker 1:But then you feel sorry for the babysitter. Yeah, he left her on a bus, but he made her carry the chairs. He arrived with chairs and glasses and food. Yeah, because they got no excuse not to let them stay there, but they were the lucky ones because they got to eat. I'll talk more about the episode in Geek Corner, but let's have a quiz. Okay, are you going to start? What excuse does Michael give to Dwight for not inviting him to the dinner party? It's couples only, okay.
Speaker 1:What does Jan say she'll do with the wine that Jim and Pam presents to her on their arrival? Use it for cooking. Oh, what colour is the wall on Michael's bedroom? Oh, my gosh, this is the thing I told you. I'm not good at this stuff, but I'd already written this. Oh, my gosh, brown, it's eggshell white on Jams. Insistent because white the original white is too much like an asylum, of course. But Michael adds eggshell white and white are the same. They are. What is the name of Jan's candle company? Serenity by Jan. Well done. How many photographs of Michael are there in his condo? Oh, my gosh, none One. Oh, you were right first time. There are's all about jan. Good, I'm gonna give you this one. I thought it was a bit mean, but it's not because you've watched the whole of season three. So what is andy's nickname for jim? Why do I think it's something like quackers?
Speaker 1:no quackers no, now, I got that from Once. I say it, I know it. Tuna oh, in my notes I've got tuna and a question mark. And Andy, that's what it means. Tuna is because when Jim started in the other office when he met Andy, he had tuna sandwich for lunch, so after that he'd just become Tuna. It's a really boring nickname, right? Well, who's Quackers? I've never heard of Quackers on the Office, sorry. Something else I've seen. Okay, what musical instrument does Michael keep in his garage? Oh, guitar. He's got some bongo drums. Oh, of course.
Speaker 1:What time is dinner set to be served at? Oh, so they arrived at. So it's like 11 o'clock, or is it 11 o'clock or midnight? It's 10pm, so there's three hours to cook. And Pam asks if they started cooking at 4pm. So it means that was at 7 o'clock. Okay, well, you'll know this, because we've actually talked about this one. Which play? Does this episode have a similarity to who's afraid of virginia wolf? And this one we've already talked about as well. How did michael smash the glass door? Oh, I've got that as a question as well.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we already know that you're running for the ice cream, okay and what was angela talking about when she said what am I supposed to do with this? Oh, the rose. He plucks out a single rose from the bench of flowers and he gives jan and she's like, well, I'm supposed to do this. Which I thought again, fair enough. And that was the quiz. This, this one, we're going to call Geek Corner, because I don't know what else to call this. Do you want to sing a little titty to get us into it? Geek Corner, geek Corner, geek, geek, geek, geek Corner. Oh my God, you've got to do that every week now. Well done.
Speaker 1:No, no, no no, yeah, yeah, no, no, I'm not doing it every week. Commit that to memory, that's what we're doing.
Speaker 1:It's not going to be there. Okay, what's your fact? I've got some facts. Amanda's got her fact. My fact is that this episode was the last episode written before the 2007-8 Writers Guild of America strike, although the striking didn't affect filming of the already written episodes. The cast refused to cross picket lines and this episode was not filmed until after the strike was over four months later. Some more geeky facts.
Speaker 1:It was down to two people. For the part of Michael Scott, it was obviously Steve Carell was one of them, and the other one was Bob Odenkirk from Breaking Bad, better Call Saul. Better Call Saul, which I've seen recently and absolutely loved. He's brilliant in it, which, again, I would argue that very funny. People can do straight drama so well. But he does actually appear, bob Odenkirk, in an episode. I believe it's in season nine and Pam goes to an interview at another office and he is running the office. Oh, and it's played like Michael Scott. 100%. He could have played the part. Well, maybe he'll be the office manager in the new spin-off. Well, that would be worth watching.
Speaker 1:Ben Silverman was the guy who brought the office in america. He saw it on rich's tv and loved it. He just phoned up ricky gervais and said can I do this? Oh, and ricky gervais? And yeah, of course you can. But obviously ricky gervais and stephen merchant don't just own the rights to it, it's a's a BBC comedy, so it's a bit more long winded than that. Silverman brought it to NBC but they wanted to do studio based comedy at the time. The timing of it was bad because it was announced at the same time.
Speaker 1:Coupling do you remember the BBC? I think it was BBC 2 comedy. Stephen Moffat, coupling came out on NBC. They did an American remake. They didn't show the british version over there and they pulled it after six episodes. They said it was so bad. I think what they did was a straight copy of it instead of adapting it for america. So the timing was really bad.
Speaker 1:I remember reading that when the corporate people said they couldn't show the British one because they were all ugly and you just you are out of your mind. Wasn't Jack Davenport in it? Jack Davenport was in the who gets work in America all the time. The cast of Cuddling was so attractive it was ridiculous. So they were a bit apprehensive of doing another British knockoff, bj Novak, who we've seen we have in Edinburgh. Bj Novak was brought in because Daniels was interested in writer performance but he was brought in as an activist so he had the part of Ryan before he was even brought in as a writer. Mindy Kaling and Paul Lieberstein was also taken on as writer performers. You probably know BJ Novak dated Mindy Kaling when they were filming, so they were also on and off in the series. They're on and off in real life. They called each other their lobsters after the Friends lobsters episode.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:The one with the prom video. They're still friends. Bj Novak and John Krasinski went to high school in Boston together and Krasinski was in a play that BJ Novak wrote in his senior year. Wow, when they did the talking heads, there was always windows behind Jim and Pam, because they were always the ones that were going to get out of the office. Ricky Gervais was asked to play Michael Scott and he said no, I've already done it, I don't want to do it. I'll give you the last one, because I just keep talking and talking.
Speaker 1:The reason Greg Daniels got the role was Ben Silverman and Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant met with Greg Daniels and he wrote things like King of the Hills and the Simpsons and he understood the heart of the relationship was going to be about Pam and Jim, or what was going to become Pam and Jim. But the reason they really liked him is because he wrote an episode of the Simpsons called Homer Badman, which is where Homer is accused by the kid's babysitter of being a pervert, but all he was doing was retrieving a gummy bear from the seat of her trousers. Then Homer is put into a media nightmare, including things like he was sleeping in an oxygen tent, and that episode ends with one of my personal favourite exchanges of the whole time. And that episode ends with one of my personal favourite exchanges of the whole time. Marge said Homer, hasn't this experience taught you that you can't believe anything you hear? And Homer says Marge, my friend, I haven't learned a thing Stephen Merchant and Ricky Gervais loved this episode, and that was that we're finally at the end of that. So thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 1:We got a lot of this from the internet, and did you know the internet can lie? It can. But I've also used the Office, the Untold Story of the Greatest Sitcom of the 2000s by Andy Green, and also Jenna Fisher's book the Actor's Life. If you want to get in touch, instagram at tvcomedypod, or you can visit the website thattvcomedypodcastcom, or you can email us at thattvcomedypodcast at outlookcom, and we'll see you next time. Goodbye, bye.
Speaker 2:That TV Comedy Podcast was presented by Amanda Davies and Jacquie J Sarah. It is a deliciously bright podcast produced by Jacquie J sarah. For extended episodes and exclusive content, become a subscriber at patreoncom/ that tv comedy podcast.
