Speaker 1: My name is Randoline Horn. I was the director of
Speaker 1: photography on the Office and sometimes Director of the Office.
Speaker 1: Hello everybody, thanks for joining us back here on the
Speaker 1: Office Deep Dive. As always, I am your host, Brian Baumgartner.
Speaker 1: Now today we have such a treat for you. This episode,
Speaker 1: al right, is the beginning of a kind of mini series,
Speaker 1: a deep dive within the Deep dive, if you will,
Speaker 1: about the camera on the Office, specifically the camera as
Speaker 1: a character. As I have said many times, the thing
Speaker 1: that I am most proud of about the Office is
Speaker 1: the attention to detail about the camera. Every shot was
Speaker 1: meticulously thought out to make it feel like a real document.
Speaker 1: In every scene we shot, there was always a conversation
Speaker 1: about the cameras angle, the way that it moved, and
Speaker 1: the intention of the camera. And so who better to
Speaker 1: talk about all of this than the guy who shot it,
Speaker 1: the guy who was holding the camera, Randall Einhorn. Now
Speaker 1: I love Randall's story. Okay, I'm not gonna give it away,
Speaker 1: but let me just say that he started out as
Speaker 1: a river guide deep in Australia might down Under into wilderness,
Speaker 1: and and then he ended up as dep of the Office.
Speaker 1: It's incredible and even though Randall is this like adventurer,
Speaker 1: e outdoorsman guy who'd rather sleep in dirt than a bed,
Speaker 1: he is also the sweetest guy that you'll ever meet.
Speaker 1: And he and I have spent many a night at
Speaker 1: his home, which used to be an ash ram, drinking wine,
Speaker 1: looking at the stars and talking about life and the
Speaker 1: things that are really important. And as you'll hear momentarily,
Speaker 1: he still holds what we did on the office as
Speaker 1: something truly special. Folks, there may be some tears today. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying who's but you're gonna find out soon enough.
Speaker 1: So please welcome the man behind the camera, Randall Einhorn,
Speaker 1: Bubble and squeak. I love it. Bubble and squeak, Bubble
Speaker 1: and squeaker, cookie, every moment left over from the Natbyle.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know how it is here you're over there.
Speaker 1: It's just been crazy. I just came up for air myself.
Speaker 1: I just I did a pilot for HBO Max that
Speaker 1: I just finished shooting on Friday. You know, pilot. It's
Speaker 1: really good. Yeah, they're doing eight shows in the next
Speaker 1: uh this thank you volumes on the left here, Okay,
Speaker 1: no one has adjusted the volume yet I'm going to
Speaker 1: it's on the left. You watch me if I get
Speaker 1: too much of you. I just just did this on
Speaker 1: the left. Nothing nothing at all? Can hear it at all?
Speaker 1: I can hear you now. I turned it back out.
Speaker 1: Less it. Um. So it's HBO. Max got eighty new
Speaker 1: shows that they're doing next year, and mine was I
Speaker 1: hope one of them. Have you seen Launch forty nine? No? Um,
Speaker 1: I mean unless that makes me sound dumb, and then
Speaker 1: yes I have, but I don't remember much about it.
Speaker 1: Remind me you haven't seen it. Nobody watched it. It
Speaker 1: was an hour on a MC. This feels weird talking
Speaker 1: to you looking at you with through the microphone and
Speaker 1: the headphones. Why we're just having your chat? Um? What
Speaker 1: do you do lodge for you? I did the pilot
Speaker 1: for that on AMC and that was an hour and
Speaker 1: it was on just after A Better Call Saul. Here's
Speaker 1: my issue. AMC is just confusing to me, and I'll
Speaker 1: tell you why. The reason is, they do remarkable shows,
Speaker 1: but I never understand when it's things are on right,
Speaker 1: So I just eventually, but I'm the schmuck that like
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, shoot, better call Saul has had four
Speaker 1: episodes and then I go buy them on Amazon or whatever.
Speaker 1: So I'm I'm I guess I'm contributing to their bottom certainly,
Speaker 1: thank you very much. Maybe they ushul do it for
Speaker 1: lodge by it. Um. Alright, So now you're a big
Speaker 1: time Hollywood director, super big time, really big time. If
Speaker 1: I can draw randall IONHRN super big, super big, super big.
Speaker 1: Does anyone ask you like, oh, is this your production company?
Speaker 1: And You're like, no, I'm just super big time times
Speaker 1: a super big time. I actually have a production company
Speaker 1: name finally, because I have I sold three pilots this year. Um.
Speaker 1: Sad Unicorn. Sad Unicorn, Yeah, because the iron horn is
Speaker 1: a unicorn, and why is it sad? Because it's funny
Speaker 1: when a unicorn is sad? Right, that might be the
Speaker 1: best production company name that I've ever heard. Sad Unicorn. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I will say, I don't know why. The only other
Speaker 1: name that is popping into my head that that I
Speaker 1: think can compete with Sad Unicorn is bad Robot. I
Speaker 1: think that Bad Robot that's a really good that's a
Speaker 1: really good one. I also thought about Misery Loves Company.
Speaker 1: There you go, that sounds like a game show. CEO
Speaker 1: on the end you have Alright, I'm gonna say that
Speaker 1: I was about to compliment you, but I don't. I
Speaker 1: don't feel I don't feel quiet. Um now I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't feel quite ready. Um all right, So now
Speaker 1: you're this big time, super big, super big, super big
Speaker 1: time sorry, super big time, um writer, producer. What were
Speaker 1: you doing prior to the years two thousand and five
Speaker 1: ish four ish five ish? What were what were you
Speaker 1: working on? Then? So I came in. The reason I
Speaker 1: got to the office is I was depeeing some extreme
Speaker 1: sports stuff, snowboarding with Seawan White and Jeremy Jones who
Speaker 1: are snowboarders, and Jackson Hole and Ben Silverman decided that
Speaker 1: I was the guy to shoot the office because I
Speaker 1: can shoot outdoor extreme sports. So therefore you should shoot
Speaker 1: the office because you've I mean, I came from outdoor
Speaker 1: adventure sports. I came from the Eco Challenge, and then
Speaker 1: I was a DP on Survivor as well the whole
Speaker 1: time the first season of Survivor, the first season I
Speaker 1: did be the first one, and then I ended up
Speaker 1: you know, being operator on six More Wow. So I
Speaker 1: came from outdoor adventure pursuits and then I ended up
Speaker 1: in a fluorescent uh office? Right? And did you work
Speaker 1: with Ben? How did you know Ben? Because Ben came
Speaker 1: to Jackson Hole while I was shooting this extreme sports
Speaker 1: stuff and decided I was the guy. And so he
Speaker 1: went to Greg and said, this is our guy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is our guy. And Greg and I said a
Speaker 1: meeting to meet at a coffee being near here, which
Speaker 1: is on Santa Monica Boulevard. And I knew of a
Speaker 1: coffee being on Santa Monica Boulevard, so I was new
Speaker 1: to the Los Angeles. I lived to ours from a
Speaker 1: stop light in Australia, so I knew of a coffee
Speaker 1: being on Santa Marnica Boulevard. I went there and I
Speaker 1: waited for Greg for like fifteen minutes, and then I figured,
Speaker 1: oh I should I should call and see where he is. Well,
Speaker 1: he was at the coffee being on Santa Monica, just
Speaker 1: about ten miles away. So I showed up for the
Speaker 1: meeting about forty five minutes late. But Greg's all right.
Speaker 1: So yeah, we hung out and that's my first meeting
Speaker 1: with Greg. And did and then did you wait or
Speaker 1: were you? Were? You hired pretty quickly after that, hired
Speaker 1: pretty quickly after that. I think in that initial conversation,
Speaker 1: like I I, I referred to the office as a
Speaker 1: tofu hot dog, and I remember Greg kind of latched
Speaker 1: onto that. I think he liked it. But what what
Speaker 1: it meant to me is it's it's good food wrapped
Speaker 1: like chunk food. So you had you had to always
Speaker 1: kind of dissect it and kind of, you know, put
Speaker 1: it in a a veneer, and you're always putting it
Speaker 1: under a veneer of something just caught or just just leaned,
Speaker 1: or shoot it on a long lens, so it appears
Speaker 1: to be privileged information, which is extra juicy for the viewer. Right.
Speaker 1: We talked a lot about what I thought it should
Speaker 1: look like because I really came from a documentary world,
Speaker 1: and um, it always feels false to me when I
Speaker 1: see a camera right next to people who are having
Speaker 1: a very intimate conversation. And I told Greg, I think
Speaker 1: that that camera should be a very very long way
Speaker 1: away so that the viewers really leaning in they feel
Speaker 1: privileged by it, They feel like it feels it reads
Speaker 1: more honest if it's camera is a long way away
Speaker 1: as post to its just being right there, because people
Speaker 1: would have an awareness of that camera and it's subliminal,
Speaker 1: but to me it makes sense. Ken Kappas talked to
Speaker 1: me a little bit about having to work for a shot,
Speaker 1: that he didn't want the camera necessarily in the right
Speaker 1: place to get the perfect set up television shot, that
Speaker 1: if there was a filing cabinet in the way, or
Speaker 1: if there was a pillar in the way, that that
Speaker 1: was actually a good thing that the camera had to
Speaker 1: work to find it. Yeah, Einstein said, in the midst
Speaker 1: of difficulty lies opportunity, And I think that what we
Speaker 1: did on the Office, like when we build the first
Speaker 1: season we shot on you know, in J. J. Abrams office,
Speaker 1: there was a real office with real doors and real
Speaker 1: low ceilings and real everything, and everything was difficult, and
Speaker 1: every single thing that made it more difficult made it
Speaker 1: better because you had to work for it, and it
Speaker 1: made it seem more real. So we were always putting
Speaker 1: stuff in the way, and you know, making it the
Speaker 1: more inconvenient was the more real and grounded it felt,
Speaker 1: which I think allowed the comedy to go a little
Speaker 1: bit further because the more grounded the look of it,
Speaker 1: maybe you can push things a little bit more comedically.
Speaker 1: I remember, Um, you shooting constantly and being like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think this shot is too pretty, and you would
Speaker 1: just pull you yourself would just pull the plant over
Speaker 1: so there would be some leaves in the corner of
Speaker 1: the screen. Again like trying to block it, trying to
Speaker 1: look trying to be hidden as if we were, you know,
Speaker 1: gleaning something that we were privileged to see. You know,
Speaker 1: we did that out all the time on Survivor if
Speaker 1: people are having a conversation just back way up the beach,
Speaker 1: and it makes it feel more real. Um. I remember
Speaker 1: when we moved out of JJ's office and we built
Speaker 1: and on a stage. We had like a I don't know,
Speaker 1: a thirty thousand square foot stage. We and we built
Speaker 1: this office. And normally in normal television shows, they would
Speaker 1: they would make the walls so that they could fly away,
Speaker 1: and they would make everything so you could shoot through.
Speaker 1: You know, you can pull a wall away and shoot
Speaker 1: put the camera there easily. And we didn't do any
Speaker 1: of that. Everything that made it more difficult made it better.
Speaker 1: And it's I think we owe it all to Einstein.
Speaker 1: In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity. I think that's brilliant.
Speaker 1: But that was he said it in German. It didn't
Speaker 1: sound as lyrical m hm instinctment. I don't know what
Speaker 1: it is, but oh you bring out your German. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if I sneak, That's all I can say. Really. Um So,
Speaker 1: the only thing that was changed from the practical office
Speaker 1: space too when we set up on the sound stage,
Speaker 1: because we wanted the whole uh dimensions and everything to
Speaker 1: be the same. Wasn't there like a nine inches increased
Speaker 1: in the conference room or something like that. I think
Speaker 1: I think we made the conference room like nine inches wider,
Speaker 1: and we made the kitchen like a foot and a
Speaker 1: half wider, okay, just to try to get your ass
Speaker 1: in the corner, just because I'm not a small ass,
Speaker 1: just to try to get it as far into the
Speaker 1: corner to shoot that, you know, exactly. And the kitchen
Speaker 1: was still really really really hard to shoot, and you know,
Speaker 1: I had all these reflective surfaces all all over it.
Speaker 1: I think we made the doors like four inches higher
Speaker 1: because I don't know if you remember, we were we
Speaker 1: boomed the whole show, which was crazy but but really
Speaker 1: worth it. And the camera would go in and the
Speaker 1: cameras I'm six five and the camera was like another
Speaker 1: I'm five ten. I thought you'd pick up on that. Anyway,
Speaker 1: you think of me at six five, right, six five?
Speaker 1: That's how I think of myself too. Anyway, Um, you
Speaker 1: know I'm five ten and the camera would be another
Speaker 1: you know, four inches above my head and then and
Speaker 1: then the boom would come in the room over my head.
Speaker 1: So we had all the you know, entering a room
Speaker 1: was always a an adventure. So we we tried to
Speaker 1: shoot the office as cruthful as possible, and there were rules.
Speaker 1: For instance, we could not show where another camera was
Speaker 1: because that would that would give up the lie like
Speaker 1: in in other words, if some if a camera is
Speaker 1: standing in a doorway, um, and another character comes to
Speaker 1: that doorway and I'm over the shoulder of that character,
Speaker 1: we would never show that character standing in that doorway
Speaker 1: because there should be another camera there. So we would
Speaker 1: never show a big wide shot of a room. That
Speaker 1: is completely conventional in all television. You would see the
Speaker 1: wide and then you would see the tights, and within
Speaker 1: that wide there should have been cameras inside the right.
Speaker 1: If it's a documentary, if Steve standing at his office
Speaker 1: and someone is filming Steve and then we cut, we
Speaker 1: go back and then we have a camera that's shooting
Speaker 1: over Steve to the rest of the of of the
Speaker 1: people in the bullpen watching, you should see a camera
Speaker 1: man standing behind them. Yeah. And the rule that we
Speaker 1: came up with is if it could have possibly been
Speaker 1: done by being really skilled verity documentary cameraman, we could
Speaker 1: do it. If not, we shouldn't do it right. Um.
Speaker 1: And so we always we always tried to figure out
Speaker 1: another way of doing it. And I think that that
Speaker 1: made it cooler. It made it made it so much
Speaker 1: more challenging and and more interesting. But we had rules.
Speaker 1: We had rules that we would not break. Did you
Speaker 1: ever catch a camera man. We would whip through each
Speaker 1: other at times, but we would hope that you would
Speaker 1: never use the take where we whipped through each other. Um.
Speaker 1: But we would also just duck and Matt would know
Speaker 1: that I have to duck down, or I would he
Speaker 1: would duck down when I'm whipping through him. You remember
Speaker 1: one of your favorite examples of doing that. There are
Speaker 1: so many. We were always we were always hiding. We
Speaker 1: were always hiding from each other because we were shooting
Speaker 1: three sixty. Which is a tricky thing about lighting that set,
Speaker 1: is that we were just using the fluorescent lights to
Speaker 1: make these scoops, these light scoops to send out a
Speaker 1: soft wash. Um, I don't wait, say that again, these
Speaker 1: light scoops to send out a soft wash. So we
Speaker 1: had these, that is, say that again. We had these.
Speaker 1: We made these milar box these boxes out of cardboard
Speaker 1: with milar inside of them and a piece of diffusion.
Speaker 1: You would stick that my large that you'd stick that
Speaker 1: box on a light and that's the light that would
Speaker 1: send out a nice soft wash to the rest of
Speaker 1: the room. But not on a fluorescence. We weren't really
Speaker 1: using fluorescence. We were really using fluorescence. Yeah, unbelievable. Get
Speaker 1: you fired from other shows, Well that's that's what you're
Speaker 1: supposed to do on our show. Do whatever would get
Speaker 1: you fired on other shows. I didn't know any better.
Speaker 1: Sound It all worked out, you know. There were so
Speaker 1: many things that were done to create this ultra reality
Speaker 1: and working conditions that we're not on the outside pleasant.
Speaker 1: We were stuck in that room. We were there all
Speaker 1: day long, camera moving around, which really the other potentially
Speaker 1: most important character and the whole show was the camera
Speaker 1: itself in terms of creating that family and everybody there.
Speaker 1: It was the camera, guys and one boom operator. We
Speaker 1: were all in there together. We were just you know,
Speaker 1: fitting in where you could get in. I mean, because
Speaker 1: so so much of that place was not not an
Speaker 1: easy place to move and it wasn't convenient, But it
Speaker 1: was awesome, I mean, being able to work all that out,
Speaker 1: and you know, having come from a cinema verite style,
Speaker 1: documentary style. While I had done a shameful amount of
Speaker 1: reality TV, it wasn't my flavor of choice. It was
Speaker 1: just something I had done. So I was really used
Speaker 1: to just trying to fit in where we could get in,
Speaker 1: and like you know, the other operator and then DP
Speaker 1: and then director of the show, Matt Son. We had
Speaker 1: shot a bunch of reality gun together. You know, they
Speaker 1: talk about the line when you know the line is is,
Speaker 1: and cameras want to be on one side of the
Speaker 1: line or another. They don't want to be on either
Speaker 1: side of the line because one person's face will be
Speaker 1: looking left to right, and you want the person they're
Speaker 1: talking to face to be looking right to left. If
Speaker 1: you're on the wrong side of the line, you'll end
Speaker 1: up with two people looking left to right and it
Speaker 1: won't look like they're having a conversation. So we always
Speaker 1: paid a lot of tension to the line. But it's
Speaker 1: also that one thing that we just kind of were
Speaker 1: so versed in because you have to be when you're
Speaker 1: telling a story that is truly caught, that line comes
Speaker 1: very naturally. So blocking scenes was a blast, and it
Speaker 1: was so much fun just Matt and I just looking
Speaker 1: at each other and the boom boom person operator looking
Speaker 1: at us like, Okay, where do I go? Um? And
Speaker 1: that's not my problem, right because you're a sound guy, right,
Speaker 1: But a ton you bring up a great point that
Speaker 1: a ton of our rehearsal time was really about not
Speaker 1: block of actors, but blocking of the cameras and and
Speaker 1: in every show you you have to, you know, figure
Speaker 1: out where the camera is and how it's moving. But
Speaker 1: the intricacies of that to make sure that you could
Speaker 1: capture the action was truly masterful. Well we I think
Speaker 1: we spend a lot we spent a lot less time
Speaker 1: on that on the office, blocking, blocking camera and blocking.
Speaker 1: You know, for me, the best way of of gleaning
Speaker 1: a scene on the office was everybody be what there
Speaker 1: would be, and I will shoot what I can. And
Speaker 1: that's kind of how we did it. And I remember
Speaker 1: Harold Ramos came in and he everybody's so excited. Harold
Speaker 1: Ramos is all I said, Oh my god, Harold Ramos.
Speaker 1: And he spent like a week extra just blocking the show.
Speaker 1: And there was a point where, you know, the rehearsal
Speaker 1: was done, and he had a theory of how it
Speaker 1: would be blocked, and you know, Matt and I just
Speaker 1: kind of stood back and used our fingers as if
Speaker 1: they were cameras and you get this. I'll get this great,
Speaker 1: We'll cross the line here, We'll come over there, I
Speaker 1: will come around here. You know, need duck because I'm
Speaker 1: zooming for you to get this line, and I'll duck
Speaker 1: from udis him through. And Harold looked at me and
Speaker 1: he says, I should just throw my plans out right.
Speaker 1: I'm like, no, Mr Ramas. It's a real privilege sort
Speaker 1: of that is so happy to here. I'm sure that
Speaker 1: all that work you did in there with graces and
Speaker 1: this is okay. I'll keep it for a little bit.
Speaker 1: And then we just blocked another scene because I should
Speaker 1: chuck this out right. I'm like, no, Mr Ramas, it's
Speaker 1: really great to see you coming away in with with
Speaker 1: a plan. He's don't ship me kid, I should get
Speaker 1: rid of this. I'm like, well, you could keep it
Speaker 1: his back up. Oh my gosh, that is amazing. Yeah. Well,
Speaker 1: one of the things that um, one of the things
Speaker 1: that Ken mentioned was that actually in traditional documentaries you
Speaker 1: don't see that whip pan that. Um there was some
Speaker 1: discussion slash argument early on about people not wanting to
Speaker 1: include that. But you know, he like that on television,
Speaker 1: that that those visual cues of of messiness was was
Speaker 1: really important. Did you feel the same way. Yeah, I remember,
Speaker 1: like I just watched an earlier episode of the Office,
Speaker 1: and my god, the camera work because outstanding was the
Speaker 1: one one thing I took away. But um, you know,
Speaker 1: it's kind of insistent that if if somebody would, you know,
Speaker 1: like if Michael was wanted to close his office door,
Speaker 1: the persistence of the camera and it's like, no, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna look through the blinds, Okay, you close the blinds, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna come around of these and I'm gonna get in,
Speaker 1: and just it just made it feel more delicious and
Speaker 1: that that the camera was nosy and it was really
Speaker 1: was not relenting. It wasn't going to give you the
Speaker 1: space it might let you think you have the space
Speaker 1: to go have a private moment, but it probably had
Speaker 1: another angle on you anyway. But that but that's what
Speaker 1: I mean about the camera being a character itself, that
Speaker 1: it was an active participant in the action. Yeah, it's certainly,
Speaker 1: you know, I definitely feel like the camera was was
Speaker 1: a character in the show. And some of the some
Speaker 1: of the best direction I ever got from directors was
Speaker 1: the type of direction you would give an actor. You
Speaker 1: feel this, You're you're worried about this, you're curious about that,
Speaker 1: but you know this, and it was kind of a
Speaker 1: similar type of direction you'd give an actor, And that
Speaker 1: was some of the best you know, um inspiration as
Speaker 1: a camera like to that that the camera always had
Speaker 1: a point of view, It had an agenda, It had
Speaker 1: its own stories it wanted to tell, regardless of what
Speaker 1: the characters in the show wanted to tell. That was
Speaker 1: the thing that I was the most proud of, I
Speaker 1: think of everything in the show, how much care and
Speaker 1: thought was put into the camera, and not just their attitude,
Speaker 1: but the camera as it related to the other characters
Speaker 1: in the space. Every single scene, there was always a
Speaker 1: decision made, and I'm tremendously proud of that and you're
Speaker 1: working that. Thank you. Yeah, it was. It was so
Speaker 1: much fun. I mean I remember doing scenes, and I
Speaker 1: think that at any different time, the camera would have
Speaker 1: a different relationship with the characters, just like another character
Speaker 1: would have a different relationship with a character. Like I
Speaker 1: would look at Jenna and I would you know, Jenna
Speaker 1: would smile and I would smile back. I just could
Speaker 1: not not. Um, you know, at times I think I
Speaker 1: was probably somebody who is invasive to Michael Scott's privacy.
Speaker 1: Or when you caught Michael Scott in an embarrassing moment
Speaker 1: and he really wishes you weren't there. Um, that's where
Speaker 1: I think so much of the fun is. Or when
Speaker 1: Rain thinks he's gonna he's gonna pull one over on Jim,
Speaker 1: and you just kind of like, Okay, I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: along with this with you because it'll be fun and
Speaker 1: it'll make a great TV story. So yeah, you had.
Speaker 1: It definitely felt like I had relationship with everybody on
Speaker 1: that show. Yeah, and the you just brought us something
Speaker 1: that I hadn't had sort of forgotten about or hadn't
Speaker 1: thought about how significant it was. But on most television shows,
Speaker 1: as an actor, when you're shooting it the camera. The
Speaker 1: person who's operating the camera is typically very dead faced,
Speaker 1: often just looking into the lens or having their head
Speaker 1: down or sort of turned away, and the sort of
Speaker 1: traditional um, you know, that's just sort of traditionally how
Speaker 1: it's done because you're attempting to not distract the actor
Speaker 1: from whatever they're saying, whether it's serious or dramatic or
Speaker 1: funny or whatever. But you would laugh, like you would
Speaker 1: specifically as the camera laugh and interact with the action
Speaker 1: that's going on. And that's so rare and also helpful
Speaker 1: most of the time, probably really unprofessional. Well no, but
Speaker 1: I think no, but I think that was part of it.
Speaker 1: I mean I think it actually we talk about the
Speaker 1: camera as the character, but it really was you. I mean,
Speaker 1: it really was the operator of the camera who was
Speaker 1: that character, much like you know the quote unquote documentarian
Speaker 1: who was usually the director who was asking questions during
Speaker 1: the talking. That's fascinating. I never thought about that before,
Speaker 1: but you're laughing, and total lack of professionalism was actually
Speaker 1: can benefit. It's unbelievable that in the terrible lighting, I
Speaker 1: do the terrible lighting right, and I don't know, you know,
Speaker 1: for me, form follows function. The fact that you're the
Speaker 1: camera has a point of view and it's really trying
Speaker 1: to discover things, and it has its own agenda that
Speaker 1: informs why that show looks that way, which is other
Speaker 1: shows that I did don't have that look. It's really
Speaker 1: important for me to try to find the right look
Speaker 1: for any show I'm doing, and being a character in
Speaker 1: that place, investigating what the stories that are going on
Speaker 1: informed to me how that show should look. It's really documentary, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, it was really about trying to find all
Speaker 1: of the elements of making a documentary. And in a
Speaker 1: true documentary, it's being put together solely in the editing bay,
Speaker 1: and the story that's happening actually in real time that
Speaker 1: you don't get retakes of. You get what you get,
Speaker 1: whereas in this you were really telling the story in
Speaker 1: the moment visually that then you know, we take the
Speaker 1: best takes, and we do. But but but how that
Speaker 1: story is told is influenced way more by you as
Speaker 1: the operator of the camera then in post the editors
Speaker 1: might disagree, but I I think the attitude that the
Speaker 1: camera has on set is certainly how the story is told.
Speaker 1: Do you think the editors would disagree. No, No, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I'm just giving them a dig. No, No,
Speaker 1: I think they loved, they enjoyed that attitude, and they
Speaker 1: always would would cut that attitude in there because I
Speaker 1: think that was a really a special sauce that no
Speaker 1: other show had. And although we didn't shoot a whole
Speaker 1: lot of warners, right, so one shot that carries us
Speaker 1: through an entire scene that you can't really cut up.
Speaker 1: You you really were oftentimes by connecting, as you said,
Speaker 1: Jenna to John, we see John and then we see
Speaker 1: Rain looking at John looking at Jenna, and you you
Speaker 1: see the realization from all of those characters what's happening
Speaker 1: in that moment. It's not an Orson Wells however many
Speaker 1: minutes a wonner, but you're still creating the story that
Speaker 1: an editor can't change. We did, We did do a lot.
Speaker 1: I mean I always tried to do a lot of
Speaker 1: warners because I thought they told so much. They gave
Speaker 1: so much background us to where everybody was, and and
Speaker 1: things just would often line up so beautifully. Um. I
Speaker 1: really enjoy those things where you see Steve go into
Speaker 1: his office and the camera tried to go into his
Speaker 1: office and he just shuts the door, and then he
Speaker 1: just shuts the blinds, and then he just shots the
Speaker 1: other blinds, and then he goes around to the other
Speaker 1: You know, I really enjoy that. It tells me what
Speaker 1: the camera's thinking in a really cool way. Do you
Speaker 1: remember any happy accidents or things that happened in one
Speaker 1: ears that you you would not have been able to
Speaker 1: get if you had shot it differently. We certainly tried
Speaker 1: to shoot like the gym and Pam kiss I was
Speaker 1: so far away from the ken Cooppas was directing, and
Speaker 1: I was in the kitchen and all the lights were
Speaker 1: out and we just had barely barely light on. And
Speaker 1: it was a really long lens shot. It was probably
Speaker 1: three d millimeter long lens shot. It's really so it
Speaker 1: just felt it felt so real, and I remember doing
Speaker 1: it is like, you know, I was actually getting choked up,
Speaker 1: and I knew very well that I was John Krasinski
Speaker 1: and Jenna Fisher and that there was craft service just
Speaker 1: out the out the door, and I would see John
Speaker 1: and Jenna there in a minute. But I would still
Speaker 1: get emotionally involved. I would get invested because it to me,
Speaker 1: when I was shooting looked real and I was with
Speaker 1: those characters and it all felt real. Yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 1: Well that was beautiful, my Um, what I was thinking
Speaker 1: of was not nearly as sweet as what you said.
Speaker 1: We tried to do kind of a wonder. I don't
Speaker 1: think it was actually a wonder, but in stress relief
Speaker 1: in the episode where the fake fire drill happens where
Speaker 1: Dwight lights the fire, and we tried to do that.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if you remember this, but there's
Speaker 1: a shot where Kevin me, I'm running through the office.
Speaker 1: I'm running through the kitchen to go from the I've
Speaker 1: just raided the vetting machine and I'm running through the
Speaker 1: kitchen and I shoulder you, I nudge you. You go
Speaker 1: down on the on your ass on the ground, and
Speaker 1: Chris Workman, who was the camera assistant, huge beef, be
Speaker 1: very strong guy, reaches down, picks you up by the shoulders.
Speaker 1: You stand back up with the camera and keep filming.
Speaker 1: And that that stayed in Oh man. I was so
Speaker 1: proud of that, you and more of me, but of you,
Speaker 1: and most I was really proud of Chris. I mean
Speaker 1: he picked me up like I'm not small and no
Speaker 1: camera is not small, um, and he just picked me
Speaker 1: up with one arm and I'm like, did I fall down?
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, he kept rolling and it is in
Speaker 1: the show and it's great. It's felt so real. I remember,
Speaker 1: I remember, I'm backing up, backing up, backing up, backing up.
Speaker 1: Not fast enough. Boom, I'm up again. Thank you, Chris. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's funny because like on on normal, normal TV shows,
Speaker 1: where there's always a guy who's guiding you backwards, and
Speaker 1: I never wanted and I was always weirded out by
Speaker 1: somebody guiding me to where I should be because I
Speaker 1: always always kind of looked half look behind me and
Speaker 1: half flip through the viewfinder and just normally it's a
Speaker 1: grip who's doing that? And I never wanted that. I
Speaker 1: never never allowed that. But Chris was there that day.
Speaker 1: He was there. He totally caught me. I think maybe
Speaker 1: he was opening the door for me as well, because
Speaker 1: I was rushing back, you were rushing backwards. There was
Speaker 1: the door. We kind of got missed time because the
Speaker 1: door was I don't remember, but I shouldered you and thought,
Speaker 1: oh that's bad, and then realized we were still going
Speaker 1: and I kept going. He was still going. I remember
Speaker 1: also there was a time there was some on the
Speaker 1: basketball episode, John got his nose a bloody nose, and
Speaker 1: the story was he was supposed to get a bloody nose,
Speaker 1: but he actually really got a bloody nose. So I'm
Speaker 1: I'm rushing right in there because John's bleeding and I'm
Speaker 1: shooting it, and he stayed with it. He's like, okay,
Speaker 1: all right, we just cut because my nose hurts. But
Speaker 1: I remember we just rolled with it. I also remember
Speaker 1: up on the roof, Dwight and Michael we're growing a
Speaker 1: watermelon off the roof onto a trampoline to try to
Speaker 1: hit Stanley's are and they didn't think they'd be able
Speaker 1: to hit Stanley's car, but and we thought, okay, we're
Speaker 1: gonna have to do this visual effects and it's going
Speaker 1: to be a fake watermelon is going to smash on
Speaker 1: the car. And we're all, you know, leaning over the
Speaker 1: roof in harnesses and they throw the watermelon off. It
Speaker 1: hits the trampoline and hits Stanley's car and dense the
Speaker 1: roof and it was a real It really happened. So
Speaker 1: I just pan back up to them and they just
Speaker 1: kept going with it. It was it was fantastic. Um
Speaker 1: there was another thing that has come up. Talk to
Speaker 1: me a little bit about the positioning of the talking
Speaker 1: heads and and where certain characters were shot, and if
Speaker 1: there was there a reason for which direction there was,
Speaker 1: and and I don't know if you know everybody else
Speaker 1: and anybody ever got this. It just meant meant something
Speaker 1: to me. And that was, you know, everybody was shot
Speaker 1: um pointing into the office where Leslie was sitting so
Speaker 1: in front of Stanley, except for Jim, because I thought
Speaker 1: that Jim was the one person who was going to
Speaker 1: leave that place and they had something bigger they wanted
Speaker 1: to do. And so Jim got to his position was
Speaker 1: looking out the window and the parking lot in the sun.
Speaker 1: And eventually once Jim and Pam got together, then Jim
Speaker 1: and Pam were both in front of the windows because
Speaker 1: they're both going to leave this place and go to
Speaker 1: some place better. That's awesome. I love that. That's like,
Speaker 1: what do they call it the kids, an easter egg?
Speaker 1: That's an Easter egg for the kids, That's an Easter egg.
Speaker 1: So you were telling stories in the reality world, and
Speaker 1: then you know, being the director of photography and holding
Speaker 1: the camera, but then now you move into directing for
Speaker 1: your first time. So what was the first thing you directed?
Speaker 1: You know it was it was the office because Greg said,
Speaker 1: you're telling jokes with a camera like trying to He
Speaker 1: says you should direct some I'll try too. And Greg started,
Speaker 1: you know, insisted that I start directing, and you started
Speaker 1: with the webisodes, right, No, No, it started with UM.
Speaker 1: First one I did was I think I'm right The Accountants,
Speaker 1: Las Contador Contadores. I thought I thought I was. I
Speaker 1: thought I didn't initiation Ben Franklin, and then Office Party.
Speaker 1: I thought it was after that, We're gonna check the records.
Speaker 1: I mean, didn't we check the records? Guys, didn't I
Speaker 1: do them? As anyone listening, I think I'm right. I
Speaker 1: think the accounts was first. But it doesn't matter. So
Speaker 1: NBC and Ben and Greg, um, this idea is hatched,
Speaker 1: or a request is made from the network that while
Speaker 1: we're not shooting one summer, we want to continue UM
Speaker 1: to tell story ease of other cast members who maybe
Speaker 1: don't get as much attention during some of the episodes.
Speaker 1: And we created the first ever digital streaming series for
Speaker 1: a network, which was called Los Contadores The Accountants, and
Speaker 1: you directed that. UM, how was that different or what
Speaker 1: did you think doing it? Well? I remember that it
Speaker 1: was done without resources, none, none, whatsoever. Um. I shot
Speaker 1: it on a camera you could buy at target. It
Speaker 1: was like a camera. I was pulling my own focus.
Speaker 1: I think I had a gaffer and and a grip
Speaker 1: and that was it. We had nobody else and so
Speaker 1: I shot it with one camera and I directed it
Speaker 1: and it was really fast and it was really fun.
Speaker 1: And I love the accountants. I mean, that's the that's
Speaker 1: that's really where the cool kids are. It really is.
Speaker 1: What I remember you saying when we started working on
Speaker 1: that was kind of like I don't know what it is.
Speaker 1: It's it's like there's school or there's work, and then
Speaker 1: there's like, you know, an extracurricular activity or something that
Speaker 1: you get to do which is still at school, but
Speaker 1: you can be a little bigger. And I remember you saying,
Speaker 1: like we don't have to play even by our own
Speaker 1: weird rules for the office, like we can invent a
Speaker 1: different style for for this to exist. And it's I
Speaker 1: went back and watched it. It's really fun. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: was just fun to just to do do it. Such
Speaker 1: a skeleton crew, I mean everything, but like when we
Speaker 1: went to New York. Remember the first time we went
Speaker 1: to New York was me, Greg and Steve. That was it.
Speaker 1: And then we had we had to hire a We
Speaker 1: had to hire a Union gaffer and a grip and
Speaker 1: they just sat in the van and the whole day
Speaker 1: they just sat in the van. Who who hell? Who
Speaker 1: held the camera? Shot around a tiny little you know,
Speaker 1: consumer camera. Did Yeah, we just take it like a
Speaker 1: three thousand dollar camera there and it just sticks in
Speaker 1: my bag. You just put it in your suitcase and
Speaker 1: took it on a plane with Steve Carrell and Greg
Speaker 1: Daniels and shot shots outside of New York City. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because New York City looks beautiful and anything you could
Speaker 1: do to it in a lighting sense, it's probably gonna
Speaker 1: screw it up. So we just shot what was there.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. Yeah, I would love to see the stuff
Speaker 1: with it that we shot that We just played that.
Speaker 1: We just you know, we're just screwing around. Because there
Speaker 1: was a bunch did you have what did you have
Speaker 1: security or no? No one was closing off the street, nothing,
Speaker 1: nothing at all. I remember with a night did Steve
Speaker 1: have a trailer? Like I'm so curious about all of this.
Speaker 1: We stayed at the w and Steve and I we
Speaker 1: got in and we went to go get We went
Speaker 1: to Johnny's for a slice. And at the time, there
Speaker 1: was you know, the forty year old Virgin posters were
Speaker 1: a Times Square, and there was the Chipmunks movie that
Speaker 1: he was in, and the Office was getting big, and
Speaker 1: and I remember Steve and I walking to Johnny's and
Speaker 1: then walking home on Times Square where there's a bazillion people,
Speaker 1: and Steve being as gracious to the first person who
Speaker 1: stopped him as he was to the thousandth person that
Speaker 1: stopped him. He just was never in a hurry, never
Speaker 1: wanted to go. It was great. That's who that guy is.
Speaker 1: That is who that guy is. Initiation was two thousand six,
Speaker 1: which was which was what season? Oh dang it, you
Speaker 1: guys got it in the right order, and I changed
Speaker 1: it around because I thought you were wrong. Um, all right,
Speaker 1: so you are telling stories by holding the camera. You've
Speaker 1: told stories shooting through reality. Now you finally got your
Speaker 1: first chance to actually direct the scripted program which was
Speaker 1: on the Office. Initiation Yeah, and um, I think yeah.
Speaker 1: B J wrote it and it was when Dwight takes
Speaker 1: b J out to the farm to initiate him. And
Speaker 1: there was one of my favorite lines of the office
Speaker 1: that we got to do improv of that was just
Speaker 1: as you plant that seat in the ground, I am
Speaker 1: going to plant my seat in you. And it made
Speaker 1: the television so amazing, and it made television that is
Speaker 1: so amazing. Um, how did leaving the office so going
Speaker 1: to the Beat Farm or you know, we think about
Speaker 1: the show as being so stuck in that one place,
Speaker 1: and it's known obviously the iconic the office, the bullpen
Speaker 1: that we shot most of the stuff in. But then
Speaker 1: as the seasons began to move and we started to
Speaker 1: go out, for example the Beat Farm did did that
Speaker 1: alter anything? Leaving that bullpen environment? I think, well, you know,
Speaker 1: if we try to make the bullpen environment seemed like
Speaker 1: a prison um, which I think we did, Um, then
Speaker 1: outside could be the liberation, a liberating feeling, Dick, get
Speaker 1: people outside, get people breathing fresh air. Like there's a
Speaker 1: scene in the Beat farmers just back the camera's way
Speaker 1: off really far away and it's just Dwight and b
Speaker 1: J in the you know, b J on his knees
Speaker 1: planting a seed and and uh and just backed the
Speaker 1: camera way off and just let the sun play, and
Speaker 1: it was just gorgeous. So I tried to make it
Speaker 1: up a reprieve, a break from women, not the of
Speaker 1: fluorescent tubes. Was that a metaphor? No, I don't know
Speaker 1: what a metaphor. I don't either. It might have been
Speaker 1: someone just sent it that I should say that word
Speaker 1: a lot. So I've just been trying. I've been trying
Speaker 1: to use the word metaphor dramaturgy, and I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: to work it in here some place. The word I
Speaker 1: keep using is juxtaposition. Juxtaposition nice, yeah, because there's an
Speaker 1: X in it, and words with exs make you seem
Speaker 1: real smart. Contextual is I mean contextualize a great word.
Speaker 1: When you contextualize the juxtaposition of ideas, it's um usually
Speaker 1: enlightening this good stuff. Um I uh. But that was
Speaker 1: the first time we went to the Beat Farm. That
Speaker 1: was the first time it at at the at the
Speaker 1: Beat Farm. Yeah, and you know it was it was
Speaker 1: It was really really cool to get to direct a show,
Speaker 1: the show because everybody had in my back. Everybody was
Speaker 1: so supportive and tolerant, and and I knew how I
Speaker 1: wanted to shoot it too. But everybody was just so
Speaker 1: behind me, and that just felt incredible, you know. And
Speaker 1: I think I've gone on and I've directed fifteen or
Speaker 1: sixteen episodes of the show, and Greg Daniels like, bless
Speaker 1: his heart, he was you know. I I started to think,
Speaker 1: maybe I want to do more directing, and Greg, let
Speaker 1: me go direct other TV shows and come back to
Speaker 1: the office two d P. And nobody in this industry
Speaker 1: does that. Nobody does that for people. So he wanted
Speaker 1: you to be able to pursue what you wanted to
Speaker 1: do and come to you back whenever you could certainly did. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's pretty special. That's really special. Yeah. No, I mean
Speaker 1: everybody's you know that you're shooting twenty two episodes or
Speaker 1: something in a season, and and everybody needs to be
Speaker 1: there pulling their weight, and Greig's like, no, you should
Speaker 1: go do something else. Yeah, it's awesome. Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: that's Greg. It's Greg. Yeah. So, end of season six,
Speaker 1: you leave the office. How difficult was it to make
Speaker 1: that decision to leave? You know? I mean I think
Speaker 1: that's when I stopped dpeeing. Yeah, when I stopped deepaying.
Speaker 1: That was that was scary. I was really scary because
Speaker 1: I knew I could shoot. I mean I didn't go
Speaker 1: to film school. I didn't go to school. I you know,
Speaker 1: I barely graduated high school, but I high school. You
Speaker 1: mean third grade? I do, um. You know, I didn't
Speaker 1: really have a backup plan other than maybe I could
Speaker 1: go back to the office if they sayn't didn't work.
Speaker 1: And it was a very good job and I had
Speaker 1: fun doing it every single day. But I started, I
Speaker 1: fell in love with directing. I still love shooting, but
Speaker 1: I fell in love with directing. And it was scary
Speaker 1: because I had this job for six years, and in television,
Speaker 1: having a job for six years is unheard of. There
Speaker 1: are very few shows that get to do that. And
Speaker 1: I was making good money. And I moved my family
Speaker 1: out here from Australia to try so I could go
Speaker 1: home at night. And it was scary to step away,
Speaker 1: but I really felt very safe that I was, that
Speaker 1: Greg would always be there, he'd always let me back
Speaker 1: in right. And you know, a lot of conversation obviously
Speaker 1: about when Steve left, but I remember when you left,
Speaker 1: and it was a deeply emotional time for us as well.
Speaker 1: I mean I remember us talking about it, and you're
Speaker 1: talking about some of your fear or anxiety, but feeling
Speaker 1: like it was it was time. And you know, as
Speaker 1: one of those quite frankly core cast members, um that
Speaker 1: we're together. I remember that being a very it was
Speaker 1: very difficult for us. We knew we were going to
Speaker 1: miss you. I missed everybody, and it was it was
Speaker 1: that that was tricky. It was like leaving home. You know,
Speaker 1: It's like you know you need to or you're not
Speaker 1: going to grow, but at the same time home is
Speaker 1: a great place. Yeah, what are you most proud of
Speaker 1: about the show or thankful for? You know what I'm
Speaker 1: thankful for is Greg giving me the chance. Greg Andvent
Speaker 1: and giving me the chance. I mean, it's completely changed
Speaker 1: my life. I'm you know, it's and they did it
Speaker 1: in such a gracious way. That's another thing I think about.
Speaker 1: It's like there was never a bad idea on the office,
Speaker 1: never a bad If somebody in Craft Serve is Cave
Speaker 1: Craig and idea, He's like, that's a great idea. He
Speaker 1: would go run with it. So it was it was
Speaker 1: just I think what I love so much about it
Speaker 1: was it was just so collaborative and it wasn't always
Speaker 1: easy to find a way to do something, but we
Speaker 1: always figured it out and and I think it was
Speaker 1: Greg he first said, yeah, everything we do everything that,
Speaker 1: everything that makes it harder makes it better, which I
Speaker 1: think is kind of a metaphor for life. You know,
Speaker 1: it strikes me, you know, Ben told me that he
Speaker 1: went to Kevin Riley and said, this guy Greg Daniels
Speaker 1: is the guy, the guy who had not worked very
Speaker 1: much at all in in live action program. And then
Speaker 1: Ben goes to Greg and says, this guy ran the
Speaker 1: line horn. He's the guy someone who's never shot a
Speaker 1: script show. And it's like these kids got given the
Speaker 1: keys to this really cool toy that Ricky Gervais created
Speaker 1: and went, Okay, well let's you know what, let's not
Speaker 1: worry about doing it how other people would do it,
Speaker 1: because we haven't done that. Let's do it in our
Speaker 1: own way. I think there's there's there's something very liberating
Speaker 1: about not knowing how to do something that you come
Speaker 1: up with your your own way of doing it. That
Speaker 1: might be special. You know, I didn't. I had no
Speaker 1: formal film training whatsoever. I just thought I like that,
Speaker 1: Oh that's cool, and that's what I would you know,
Speaker 1: I would just get to Chase. What I felt was cool,
Speaker 1: not what I thought I knew. Yeah, the notion of
Speaker 1: hiring a documentarian to be the documentarian on a scripted
Speaker 1: TV show, when you dissect that, I don't know that
Speaker 1: that's necessarily the wisest choice, but it really worked. And
Speaker 1: I think obviously Ben saw something and and Greg saw something,
Speaker 1: and it's not necessarily the choice that I think people
Speaker 1: would ever make, but they did. They did. Where do
Speaker 1: you think you would be right now if the Office
Speaker 1: had never happened? Australia the out Yeah, I love for rain.
Speaker 1: Remember Rain used to make fun of my accident, which
Speaker 1: I don't hear do I have? You do have an accent?
Speaker 1: Now when you listen to this, you'll be like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean my rain rains My there I was. It
Speaker 1: was beautiful, caught a while bull my gold just beautiful,
Speaker 1: so amazing. Um. I just want you to know that
Speaker 1: I think the work you did in creating the vision
Speaker 1: of this show and the aesthetic is truly on inspiring.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, and all of your success um is
Speaker 1: well deserved. Even though you're an idiot reality guy. Um,
Speaker 1: you turned out to be pretty dead gum smart, and
Speaker 1: I love you ma'am, thank you. I love you too.
Speaker 1: It was a pretty unhappy reality guy. Yeah, it was
Speaker 1: my first scripted job and I've I was really lucky. Alright,
Speaker 1: awesome anything else, you guys? That was fun? Dude, I
Speaker 1: can't believe I cheered up because Greg guy me. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I can't. I can't believe it. How incredible was that?
Speaker 1: I had so much fun talking to Randall? And as
Speaker 1: I told him after the recording, he really surprised me
Speaker 1: during that interview. He was so smart and insightful. I mean,
Speaker 1: I didn't think he was dumb before, but he quoted
Speaker 1: Albert Einstein, who does that. And by the way, Randall
Speaker 1: only has one testicle, so that kind of thinking from
Speaker 1: a man with one testicle is also very impressive. Maybe
Speaker 1: we'll get Randall back to talk about that story. That's
Speaker 1: a gem of a story on another occasion. But thank
Speaker 1: you Randall. Listen. His work on the Office so special.
Speaker 1: It would not have been The Office without Randall. Anyway.
Speaker 1: That's gonna do it for this week, folks. Stay tuned
Speaker 1: next week as we dive deeper into all things camera
Speaker 1: with some actors on that subject. Until then, have a
Speaker 1: great week. The Office Deep Dive is hosted and executive
Speaker 1: produced by me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our executive producer, Lang Lee.
Speaker 1: Our senior producer is Tessa Kramer, our producer is Adam Massias,
Speaker 1: our associate producer is Emily Carr, and our assistant editor
Speaker 1: is Diego Tapio. My main man in the booth is
Speaker 1: Alec Moore. Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by
Speaker 1: my great friend Creed Bratton, and the episode was mixed
Speaker 1: by Seth Olansky