Speaker 1: I'm Andy Buckley and I've played David Wallace on the Office.
Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome back to another exciting episode of
Speaker 1: the Office Deep Dive. I am your host Brian Baumgartner,
Speaker 1: and this week we are coming at you with somebody
Speaker 1: that you have all been waiting to hear from. I
Speaker 1: cannot wait to get started. Today's guest is a man
Speaker 1: who means business. And I mean he really means business.
Speaker 1: Not only was he the CFO of dunder Mifflin, which
Speaker 1: was arguably the greatest and most successful paper company, maybe
Speaker 1: even any company of all time, but as a real
Speaker 1: human person, he was moonlighting as a stockbroker for Merrill
Speaker 1: Lynch the entire run of the show. Yep, you guessed it.
Speaker 1: The genius who brought suck It into our lives Andy Buckley,
Speaker 1: who also happens to be one of the treasured members
Speaker 1: of our Office fantasy football team, who last week lost
Speaker 1: by one point to MOA because I had Austin Ekeler
Speaker 1: thanks to Rain Wilson, who dominated on Monday Night. So Andy,
Speaker 1: suck it now. Andy came onto the show a little
Speaker 1: bit later. In fact, he referred to himself as a
Speaker 1: distant cousin of the cast for the first several seasons
Speaker 1: he was on board, but he really grew to have
Speaker 1: a special place in our hearts and the hearts of
Speaker 1: the people back in Scranton, Pennsylvania. To this day, if
Speaker 1: you run into Andy on the street, you might come
Speaker 1: away with a special office themed surprise. Hint, hint. And
Speaker 1: he has gone on to do so many big things,
Speaker 1: from Jurassic World to Shameless and Veep, but he credits
Speaker 1: it all to his time on the office. So from
Speaker 1: the mean streets of Finance to the not so mean
Speaker 1: streets of Scranton, get ready to hear from the boss
Speaker 1: of the world's best boss, the master of dead Pan,
Speaker 1: Andy Buckley. Bubble and Squeak. I love it, Bubble and Squeak,
Speaker 1: Bubble and Squeaker cookie every month, left over from the
Speaker 1: night before. Wow, how are you great? Good to see you. Ye,
Speaker 1: good to see you. You know I wore my finest
Speaker 1: There it is, you know under Mifflin. I'm not I'm
Speaker 1: not playing around. You're not playing the owner of this company.
Speaker 1: You want you are the last we left? Oh? Sit there, yes,
Speaker 1: I will tell you. Have the fun I like to
Speaker 1: put them on. Oh my god, Yeah, this is how
Speaker 1: people get in trouble. They they think it's you know,
Speaker 1: and then they say some thing they shouldn't say, and
Speaker 1: then their career is over. Well, that's what I'm trying
Speaker 1: to make happen for you. Hey, Alex, Alex, Hello, sir Alex,
Speaker 1: I haven't seen your coat today. It's very are you cold? Well,
Speaker 1: that's how Brian likes it, you know, That's how Audrey
Speaker 1: Hepburn liked it. Catherinehipburn all the headburns. Catherine Hepburn like this, Yeah,
Speaker 1: is that? Does that feel good? See? There you go?
Speaker 1: There would be no here's the thing. Oh, I've gotten
Speaker 1: people to say way worse than I'm sure. Yeah, how
Speaker 1: are you? I'm great? Having five got picked up, which
Speaker 1: is good. You got a job? Baby? There you go?
Speaker 1: Where film across the pond? As they say in London,
Speaker 1: like I'll move to I'll be in London for five months. Wow.
Speaker 1: And Gabe is on it a ka Zach Woods, um great?
Speaker 1: Can we swear? Yeah? We can say whatever we want.
Speaker 1: It's so funny. I took a couple of notes of
Speaker 1: like funny things. But it's then it reminds me of
Speaker 1: the It was one of the last episodes it was
Speaker 1: the opening teaser. I come in and I'm like, really
Speaker 1: pissed at Jon Favreau directed, I'm really pissed at ed
Speaker 1: because you were on a fucking boat for three months.
Speaker 1: We did it three, I don't know, four or five times.
Speaker 1: Everybody says great, fine, good um, and I said more
Speaker 1: more and so like we did it like three or
Speaker 1: four more times. I'm saying this, motherfuck are you fucking
Speaker 1: like I was Tony soprano or something like that, and uh,
Speaker 1: and you know, ultimately Greg said, now we we you
Speaker 1: can't like we can't, you know, you're it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 1: It doesn't match what like the character was. But it
Speaker 1: was like Kate Flair, remember the time she walked and
Speaker 1: she said, what the hell is going on? Because like
Speaker 1: they walk in and they just they don't know what's good.
Speaker 1: They just hear this explore almost it's just right, oh
Speaker 1: my god. Um so you let's let's rewind. Yeah, before
Speaker 1: you started on the office, that was our warm up.
Speaker 1: What were you doing? I was born in Boston, No,
Speaker 1: so you were You were born in Marblehead, Massachusetts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: at the Salem Hospital. But I'm from marble Head, Massachusetts.
Speaker 1: So many of us from the marble Head, the Massachusetts area,
Speaker 1: the Kip pack, the smack pack exactly, and now yes,
Speaker 1: I got. I went to college, moved to New York,
Speaker 1: studied acting, moved to l a meandered around. Didn't like
Speaker 1: set the world on fire. But not only did I
Speaker 1: do a Melrose Place, I did a Caroline in the city.
Speaker 1: So there you go, check it out. I did a
Speaker 1: silk Stockings. I was voted. I was voted the worst
Speaker 1: acting in the history of silk Stockings. So like, that's
Speaker 1: that's pretty that's me coming. I was horrible. Was your
Speaker 1: actually the Razzies for but god, I was terrible? But
Speaker 1: um yeah, no that I actually like packed in acting
Speaker 1: and started working to Mary Lynch. I was a stockbroker.
Speaker 1: Wait wait, so you stopped acting. Well, it's not like
Speaker 1: I was doing much of it, but I officially said
Speaker 1: all right, said I gotta get a come up with
Speaker 1: a job. Or my wife, who was my girlfriend at
Speaker 1: the time, said, Buckley, come up with the job. This
Speaker 1: is ridiculous, your your life is ridiculous. So was you know?
Speaker 1: I stumbled into Merrill Lynch and there was an actor
Speaker 1: I knew who worked there, and he said, hey, come on,
Speaker 1: interview and uh, and you know, they they hired me,
Speaker 1: they were kind enough to hire me. I'm pleasant experience.
Speaker 1: I had no experience, but yeah, I'm reasonably reasonably smart
Speaker 1: and I you know, and I'm seemingly trustworthy, and you know,
Speaker 1: I was a great golfer, you know, like just very important.
Speaker 1: They I think they thought, Okay, this guy, I'll be
Speaker 1: able to bring in some clients. So that was it. No,
Speaker 1: So I was I was there, I was doing that
Speaker 1: and I actually I loved it. I mean I I
Speaker 1: stayed at Merrill Lynch in Century City is where the
Speaker 1: office was um throughout the whole run of the show.
Speaker 1: The last season is when I finally left, like halfway
Speaker 1: through the very last season. So that's what I was doing.
Speaker 1: In four and a half years into that, I had
Speaker 1: run into Alison Jones. She'd be my patron saint. She's
Speaker 1: completely changed my life for the good, for the for
Speaker 1: the great. And uh, I ran into at the local
Speaker 1: farmers market where we're in the living the same neighborhood.
Speaker 1: C what are you doing. I got I'm a stockbroker,
Speaker 1: like I'm I'm married, I got a kid name. Apparently
Speaker 1: I've grown up. And she Uh's like, all right, we'll
Speaker 1: give me your card just in case something comes up.
Speaker 1: Who knows, you know, I said, okay. And my wife
Speaker 1: is an acting coach and has become like a pretty
Speaker 1: soft after ic caon coach. But she had started her
Speaker 1: class and I was going to her class. So I
Speaker 1: had started to like fall back in love with acting
Speaker 1: and for the right reasons and really was loving doing it.
Speaker 1: And it was, you know, small class. So then Alison
Speaker 1: calls me five months after I saw her on the
Speaker 1: thing or four and a half months something like that,
Speaker 1: and says, Okay, Bucky, you should I can't believe I
Speaker 1: found your card, but I'm glad I did. You should
Speaker 1: come in. I think you're the right guy. He's the CFO.
Speaker 1: Do you watched the office like yeah, Kevin Mullins incredible.
Speaker 1: Um and uh. And so I go in and I
Speaker 1: sit there and I'm waiting in the in the room
Speaker 1: like I duck over from my office, you know, like
Speaker 1: Centry City. Okay, so wait, wait what You're at Merrill
Speaker 1: Lynch and you're taking acting classes from your wife just
Speaker 1: because she had started Nancy Banks, great Nancy Banks. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she had like seven people in her class. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'll be the eighth. It will be an even number
Speaker 1: of scenes. It's funny, like the two guys in the class,
Speaker 1: we're me and Channing Tatum and so no, nobody, of
Speaker 1: course wanted to do scenes with me. The teacher's husband,
Speaker 1: who's the who's the hot you know? Um, yeah, she's been,
Speaker 1: she've been. She's been working with him since before like
Speaker 1: anybody knew him. And he's as lovely as as can be.
Speaker 1: But yes, so I'm doing that. And so Allison calls
Speaker 1: you and says, come in, but you're doing that because
Speaker 1: you you are just liking it, You're falling in love
Speaker 1: with acting exactly. Yeah, which was I mean, that's what
Speaker 1: I wanted to do from the time I saw my
Speaker 1: first James Dean movie when I was fifteen or whatever,
Speaker 1: and thought I'd be you know, the brooding heartthrobber or whatever,
Speaker 1: brooding confused teenage kids. And and I'm just a brooding,
Speaker 1: confused adult, uh, you know, fifty year old man and
Speaker 1: uh but no, so I go. But it was funny.
Speaker 1: I'm sitting in the waiting room and then all the
Speaker 1: actor Why am I look at all these guys? These
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, and then and then Chip Eston
Speaker 1: is there also auditioning. I'm like, gosh, ship, there's there's
Speaker 1: Chip like and he's the guy for the folks at
Speaker 1: home and played Josh Porter and in my head and
Speaker 1: think they're gonna hire him, Like what am I doing here?
Speaker 1: This is ridiculous, Like he's great. And then to bake
Speaker 1: matters worse for the negative actor had Rain pops his
Speaker 1: head into the waiting room and he and Chip are buddies,
Speaker 1: and he says, hey, good you're here. Great. Look I
Speaker 1: also told them you should read for this other part.
Speaker 1: Luckily because he's gonna do I don't know, a bunch
Speaker 1: of episodes, just an existent one off. So then Rain
Speaker 1: says this in front of you. Well he pulled him aside.
Speaker 1: I just happened to be sitting close and I don't
Speaker 1: think everybody else started. I just like it wasn't like
Speaker 1: he broadcasting across the room. But uh like okay. So
Speaker 1: then I go in and it's Allison and Michael Shure
Speaker 1: and old Mikey can tremendous and I do the scene,
Speaker 1: do the second scene, feel good about it? And Michael's like,
Speaker 1: now wait, now you're you're like a financial guy, right,
Speaker 1: you're that's what you're doing, like, yeah, you know a Meryl, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I'm and I'm a Marylynch guy. And he's
Speaker 1: like okay, okay, good. And then the next day Alison
Speaker 1: calls me and says, all right, they're gonna hire you Buckley.
Speaker 1: They're gonna give you a glasses, maybe gray your hair
Speaker 1: a little bit. And that was it, and it was
Speaker 1: like it was awesome. Wow. Yeah. And at that point,
Speaker 1: did you you thought it was just one episode? I
Speaker 1: thought it was one episode. I mean, it was so
Speaker 1: fun and Greg directed that episode and um, and it
Speaker 1: was so great that it was. I just loved it.
Speaker 1: I mean I remember the first scene that we did
Speaker 1: was the conference room scene and I would do it
Speaker 1: and then he would come up and he would say okay,
Speaker 1: and he would just like whisper in your ok try
Speaker 1: you know, try it whatever the suggestion was. And it
Speaker 1: was awesome and that'll be fun. Maybe I'll get to you, like,
Speaker 1: you know, one a year or something like that. And
Speaker 1: then I really started to think, oh man, I may
Speaker 1: be on this a fair amount. After we hired Ryan
Speaker 1: to work in corporate. So to answer your question, I
Speaker 1: was a stockbroker. Well, it's it's interesting to me because
Speaker 1: it's the same thing with Phillis, Like Phillis was a
Speaker 1: casting associate, right, who just read naturally with the people
Speaker 1: who were involved and and yeah, so it's interesting that
Speaker 1: Mike asked you those questions. Yeah, yeah, And it was
Speaker 1: funny because the guy who ran my office at the time,
Speaker 1: it was just a lovely guy. Like he wasn't some
Speaker 1: corporate you know, asshole that you sort of the cliche
Speaker 1: of what a corporate guy. He was just like a
Speaker 1: great guy. Um, Dick Valentine if you're listening for still Buddies.
Speaker 1: But it was like, and Dick's a good guys didn't
Speaker 1: have to be like some you know jerk. You're a
Speaker 1: good guy. Why not. So in that first episode it
Speaker 1: was just Stephen Milaura, right, well that was the second scene.
Speaker 1: The first scene it was Steve Malaura and then Chip
Speaker 1: was in that Josh Porter and the guy that was like, well,
Speaker 1: maybe I should have just slept with jan too. I'd
Speaker 1: be funny, right right, right, right. But but in terms
Speaker 1: of that, you know, the original sort of corecast with
Speaker 1: Stephen Stephen Laura. I mean, at this point it was
Speaker 1: occurring to me when I was looking at a meeting
Speaker 1: with you today. By the time you came on the show,
Speaker 1: Steve was a movie star. Yeah, like you know when
Speaker 1: we started, he wasn't. Had you seen fourty year old virgin? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'd seen that. I've seen the show and like, oh
Speaker 1: my crap, you know, and uh and I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: he couldn't have been more every and everyone couldn't have
Speaker 1: been more welcoming. And he's such a pro and he's
Speaker 1: just always coming up with funny or different ways to
Speaker 1: do it, and which is really I guess that's a
Speaker 1: Second City thing. I've maybe it's a Steve thing too,
Speaker 1: but it's a something they try to do in Second City.
Speaker 1: You'd never do the same thing in a row or
Speaker 1: you know, twice, right, right right? I mean you certainly
Speaker 1: had scenes with other people, but so much of your
Speaker 1: interaction was with Michael Scott, and you guys played so
Speaker 1: well together. How was it for you playing with him?
Speaker 1: Oh my god, it's spectacular. I would of course constantly laugh.
Speaker 1: I mean, he would just make me laugh. If we
Speaker 1: did eight takes, four of them, I would have burst
Speaker 1: out laughing. Oh it was hard for It was hard
Speaker 1: for anybody, for sure. Did you when you come on,
Speaker 1: say for the first time, when you entered the bullpen
Speaker 1: at under Melflin for the first time, or with working
Speaker 1: with Steve or whatever, did that make you nervous? Of course? Yeah,
Speaker 1: the first day I was nervous as as heck. Um,
Speaker 1: And then that thing you sort of settled back into Okay,
Speaker 1: what am I doing in this scene? Why am I
Speaker 1: hear all that stuff? And you know, and Steve, you
Speaker 1: walk on, I couldn't, you know, walks right over. Hey
Speaker 1: you doing, I'm Steve, you know, glad you're here, blah
Speaker 1: blah blah. You know, just couldn't be more gracious. And
Speaker 1: Greg was like that as well, you know everybody um,
Speaker 1: And well it's funny because, like as you said, the
Speaker 1: first I don't know the first number of years, it
Speaker 1: was always me and Steve mostly, but it was always corporate,
Speaker 1: so I was never in the bullpen. It was always
Speaker 1: he would come. It was season five or so. I
Speaker 1: don't know when I started going to Scranton, but the
Speaker 1: first few times like, oh wow, like I'm never here.
Speaker 1: This is wild. And I mean I didn't really know anybody.
Speaker 1: Didn't you know, I didn't know you. I didn't know
Speaker 1: kid or you know Angela. Any of the people were
Speaker 1: really and you were all very mean, No, especially No,
Speaker 1: And so I was like, oh, wow, this is wild. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like I'm never here, this is only smokes. The one
Speaker 1: thing I think that really I feel like this made
Speaker 1: a significant difference in them perhaps using me more was
Speaker 1: the convention in Scranton. I said, A got myself invited
Speaker 1: to that. So we had we had finished season three,
Speaker 1: you know, we hired Ryan. He started thinking me, I
Speaker 1: wonder if there's a way I can sort of figure
Speaker 1: out how to grade some business Merrill Lynch wise with this.
Speaker 1: So I just look up is there a Merrill Lynch
Speaker 1: office in Scranton? And lo and behold, there there is.
Speaker 1: I called the office and there's a fellow who was
Speaker 1: there at the time, and he said, hey, we're they're
Speaker 1: having a convention, you know, in about a month, and
Speaker 1: are you coming to that? I like, oh't no. I
Speaker 1: know the guy putting on the convention, Tim Holmes, And
Speaker 1: he said, let me call him. So like he set
Speaker 1: it up for me to meet Tim, and Tim said, hey,
Speaker 1: come on, we'll bring in And so it was great
Speaker 1: to get to be a part of that because I
Speaker 1: didn't know anybody. I didn't know, the writers, I didn't know,
Speaker 1: so for three days, like I get to be around
Speaker 1: and I'm there and I'm talking to people, and I
Speaker 1: feel like that made a I don't know, I feel
Speaker 1: like it made a difference because then the writer's got
Speaker 1: a sense of like, uh, he's all right, he's okay, Yeah,
Speaker 1: he'll he'll do let's bring him back. That's fascinating. How
Speaker 1: was it for you, just on a personal level, having
Speaker 1: two jobs for such a long period of time, I mean,
Speaker 1: was that about security for you? Or yeah? Yeah, and hey,
Speaker 1: I mean I really enjoyed my time at Maryland, like
Speaker 1: and uh, and I got partners when I started getting busy,
Speaker 1: because when I started getting on the show a lot
Speaker 1: that didn't necessarily take a ton of time. I mean
Speaker 1: that most ever did, I think was twelve episodes. But
Speaker 1: it was because of that that I was getting opportunities
Speaker 1: to audition for a ton of stuff, for get to
Speaker 1: be in some movies and things like that. Or I
Speaker 1: had then had gotten on this other show when his
Speaker 1: team Dramas. It was really great fun show, look called
Speaker 1: The Lying Game like a pretty little liarsty think, so
Speaker 1: then it was a little crys like, all right, I'll
Speaker 1: probably leave in a year or two, but let's just
Speaker 1: keep me on the books. And and then then I
Speaker 1: eventually left at the end of two twelve. I guess,
Speaker 1: through throughout your time on the going back a little bit,
Speaker 1: how aware were you from episode to episode or season
Speaker 1: two season how much you're going to be involved? Not
Speaker 1: at all? Well, that was the crazy thing on season five.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of funny in hindsight because I
Speaker 1: would just get a call from Alison Jones. Hey, they're
Speaker 1: gonna use you next week. They'll EMAILI a script. Oh great,
Speaker 1: I didn't have an agent. I had not, like, I
Speaker 1: didn't have anything. That's awesome. And then after a little
Speaker 1: while Alison was great. She's like, I'm gonna get you
Speaker 1: some more money that you should be getting paid a
Speaker 1: little more. And she did that, and then you know,
Speaker 1: I ended up in a ton of the episodes that year.
Speaker 1: I was like, man, if I, like what I had
Speaker 1: an agent, like I might have been able to make
Speaker 1: like a lot more money, and like, what could have
Speaker 1: been a regular man? What was I thinking? But I, like,
Speaker 1: I would have that thought fleetingly and like, hey, man,
Speaker 1: are you kidding? So I didn't really dwell too much
Speaker 1: in that but no, I wouldn't really know. And then
Speaker 1: at the end of season five is when Randy Cordray said, Hey,
Speaker 1: they're gonna you know, we gotta get you some sort
Speaker 1: of a deal next year. And I said, oh, great,
Speaker 1: all right, And then that was the got rid of me, like, crap,
Speaker 1: we'll give you eight or ten shows and at the
Speaker 1: end you'll be gone. And you thought you were gone
Speaker 1: for good. I was gone for good. And if we're
Speaker 1: doing the table read and I'm reading it and huh,
Speaker 1: and I said to Paul Am I gone. He's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, we'll figure out a way to bring you
Speaker 1: back at some point. But then, you know, it's so
Speaker 1: funny when they did ultimately bring me back. Like a
Speaker 1: year and a half later, I met a local Scranton fundraiser.
Speaker 1: I just happened to bump into edit the bark Buckley.
Speaker 1: You're back. Let's go with it. Let's go with it. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's amazing. So I want you to I want you
Speaker 1: to teach me a little bit. In late two eight
Speaker 1: early two thousand nine, the housing bubble burst and we
Speaker 1: went into a recession. So first off, I want you
Speaker 1: to educate me what was the financial crisis that happened?
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess there were all kinds of things,
Speaker 1: but what the big thing was the lending on questionable credit.
Speaker 1: So what what you had was all this lending going on.
Speaker 1: You know, you had had whether they're actually were at
Speaker 1: the banks or actual individual more mortgage brokers. They all
Speaker 1: these banks lowered the credit standards that were necessary, that
Speaker 1: had been necessary to get alone. So all kinds of
Speaker 1: people were getting houses or condos or and then buying
Speaker 1: second houses and third houses and all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 1: You had people who you know, generally would be lucky
Speaker 1: to own one house with basic credit standards, who suddenly
Speaker 1: owned like, you know, four or five houses, and and
Speaker 1: then it just reaches a crescendo or like wait a second,
Speaker 1: this guy can't pay a mortgage on five houses, he
Speaker 1: can barely pay one. And so then the bank to
Speaker 1: start losing all kinds of money. I mean, it was crazy.
Speaker 1: There was There was a the weekend that Lehman Brothers
Speaker 1: went out of business, like Mary Lynch almost when I like,
Speaker 1: it was two or three different ones that were possibly
Speaker 1: going to go out of business, and Lehman Brothers was
Speaker 1: the one when all of this was happening. That was
Speaker 1: my busiest year on the show. Like there was one
Speaker 1: day the day um the stock market by three hours
Speaker 1: in was down over seven hundred points, And back then
Speaker 1: it would be like if the market was down fifteen
Speaker 1: hundred points that you know by two hours in. And
Speaker 1: that was the day that I think it was the
Speaker 1: Michael Scott negotiation, buying back to Michael Scott Paper Company.
Speaker 1: It was a big scene. And it's like Steve and
Speaker 1: and I have to like keep ducking out, like whenever
Speaker 1: they'd say, Okay, we're gonna you know, let's take let's
Speaker 1: take five. You know, I'd like duck out and Dr Wilson,
Speaker 1: Andy Buckley, We're gonna be fine. It's a temporary thing.
Speaker 1: I have to be out of the office today, John
Speaker 1: and and Danner and there. You know. Meanwhile, I say,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I got a huge scene. This is no
Speaker 1: fun like I wanted. I want to you cannot believe
Speaker 1: what I'm getting to do today. Of course, couldn't say that.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like the office spoke to or how
Speaker 1: do you think that that crisis affected storylines, either you're
Speaker 1: specifically or others. Well, it's yeah, like the shareholders, like
Speaker 1: we went bankrupt, and that's sort of coincided with what
Speaker 1: was going on in the world at the time. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess the writers were paying attention to
Speaker 1: their own brokerage accounts, you know, which we're going down,
Speaker 1: or paying attention to the news. Oh that was the
Speaker 1: funny thing. Uh. There were some of the folks that, uh,
Speaker 1: not my partners or whatever, but like just some of
Speaker 1: the other folks at Mary Lynch at the time. They're like, well,
Speaker 1: are you talking to them about their accounts? Like, no,
Speaker 1: freaking way, I'm not mentioning. I want them to keep
Speaker 1: writing from me, like I want to keep acting. I
Speaker 1: don't want I don't want like someone's accounting, and I
Speaker 1: certainly don't want them thinking I'm like sniffing around who
Speaker 1: handles your money? You know? Once you come talk to
Speaker 1: my partners, you know, that's so great. Yeah, So they're like, hey,
Speaker 1: can you go get us Steve Carrell's wealth account, Greg Daniels,
Speaker 1: And You're like, no, I don't want to work with
Speaker 1: you guys anymore. I want to do that. I want
Speaker 1: to do Yeah. Oh that's so interesting, And would you
Speaker 1: be honest about that with them? Would you yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, like the ones that I knew, Like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not doing like, there's no freaking way I'm doing.
Speaker 1: I just want them to see me as like the CFO,
Speaker 1: and let's keep him around. Let's keep him around. Um,
Speaker 1: how do you feel like David? What was his journey
Speaker 1: through the show? Um? Hey, man, I don't know, well,
Speaker 1: but I mean he actually he actually goes through quite
Speaker 1: a lot. Yeah, I mean he's it's I always joke, Um,
Speaker 1: like he must have been a terrible CFO because like
Speaker 1: the company went bankruft, we had to sell and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, getting involved in local branch things like why
Speaker 1: are you know the Scranton branch? What's going on? And
Speaker 1: they show up? Of course the companies gonna run out
Speaker 1: of business if the CFO is doing that. Um, it's
Speaker 1: so funny the way that the writers just get like
Speaker 1: the whole sucket thing. I think Jen wrote that episode
Speaker 1: and Krasinski directed that. It's funny. I remember at the time.
Speaker 1: Thing boy, he's like he's a pretty good director. Cut
Speaker 1: a Quiet Place, which was terrible. By the way, what
Speaker 1: is that? I don't that is that a play he
Speaker 1: was in? What? No, I'm kidding something good's gonna happen
Speaker 1: for him. He'll have He's a good kids like, but
Speaker 1: when they brought him back, it was, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know, he's ups and downs we have in life.
Speaker 1: The He's just some creepy guy hanging out in the
Speaker 1: tub for a while and then he gets lucky with
Speaker 1: the suck it. Like I say about Steve in the deposition,
Speaker 1: he's a good guy. I think Wallas was a good guy.
Speaker 1: I but you know, he probably believed in people. You know,
Speaker 1: whatever it was he did, he took his eye off
Speaker 1: the ball too much. I guess, like like I guess
Speaker 1: many people. I mean, it happened to many people during
Speaker 1: that time, so you know, maybe he was halfway decent,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't great at it, right. It happened to
Speaker 1: a lot of people, oh meaning like like just in
Speaker 1: the world. You know a lot of people that are
Speaker 1: probably smart, capable of people didn't see the financial bubble
Speaker 1: happening as it did. So we'll put Wallace in that pool.
Speaker 1: It is interesting to me though, that you know that
Speaker 1: I think a typical show would serve to demonize the CFO.
Speaker 1: You know that, you know, the top top executives in
Speaker 1: a way and both you know, through the writing and
Speaker 1: your portrayal. He was like a good human being that like,
Speaker 1: you know, everybody loves Jim, right that, like Jim wanted
Speaker 1: to hang out with him, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: no that And I think that was the thing he
Speaker 1: was just he was a pretty regular guy who you know,
Speaker 1: he's married, got his kids, I mean all that stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he's not a cliche, you know, caricature of the
Speaker 1: corporate guy that you see on some I mean he's
Speaker 1: just a a normal guy that works hard and does
Speaker 1: you know, reasonably well. And then you know, like many
Speaker 1: people lost and lost the company. But yeah, and and
Speaker 1: Michael Scott like his like in the in the one
Speaker 1: I forget what the episode is called. I think it's
Speaker 1: in the duel. He uh, like, Michael, you're you know,
Speaker 1: all the other branches are failing, but your branch is
Speaker 1: doing well. You know, what are you doing? Right? Like
Speaker 1: his branch always like succeeded even though he was bumbling
Speaker 1: and all that. But well, hey, he keeps winning. You
Speaker 1: know Mark fid Rich, you know, to reference someone, we know,
Speaker 1: you know, the guy was a crazy picture, but he
Speaker 1: kept winning. Look him up. You kids the bird. But
Speaker 1: I think it goes to also your character that you
Speaker 1: go to him and say, how are you succeeding? Yeah,
Speaker 1: how are you doing this? So maybe he was good
Speaker 1: at his job or he's best linger. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Something I did hire Ryan though that you know, that
Speaker 1: was a bad move. That was bad. That was a
Speaker 1: bad move. What do you remember about finding out that
Speaker 1: the show was going to be concluding? Do you remember? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And um, I mean it was unfortunate obviously, but I
Speaker 1: think it was great the way that ended, and they
Speaker 1: had the year and created all the storylines and it
Speaker 1: was interesting. So at the time I was on this
Speaker 1: line game and I'm a regular on the show, and
Speaker 1: luckily in the contract that you know that when you
Speaker 1: do these things and said how you can't do any
Speaker 1: other shows, blah blah blah. But we had put in
Speaker 1: there like Jeff Frankel, my lawyer, and put in there
Speaker 1: you know, if the office calls, he can do up
Speaker 1: to X amount of episodes, which is great because they
Speaker 1: greg wanted me for like thirteen or fourteen shows, and
Speaker 1: technically that it was only you know, six or seven
Speaker 1: or eight or something like that, and so I ended
Speaker 1: up having to do the other four just like on
Speaker 1: the phone. But I mean, it was fantastic to get
Speaker 1: to be a fairly big part of the last season
Speaker 1: at least, you know, to be around a lot, which
Speaker 1: was fun because it because it was I mean, I
Speaker 1: was kind of like an outsider. So like you guys
Speaker 1: were there constantly all the time. You're there all and
Speaker 1: I just kind of pop in and hey, and you know,
Speaker 1: everybody's nice and friendly. But it's like I'm the I
Speaker 1: don't know what, I'm like, the distant cousin sort of
Speaker 1: thing who shows up every once in a while. I
Speaker 1: don't know if you were really the distant cousin. I mean,
Speaker 1: by the rap party, you are no distant. Think you
Speaker 1: know you weren't a distant cousin anymore. It was so fun.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Yeah, I feel like you had a
Speaker 1: special connection to Scranton. Yeah, I I loved it. I
Speaker 1: mean Tim and Michelle and those are my two great buddies,
Speaker 1: and I know with you as well, and you may
Speaker 1: have others. Yeah, I love it. I mean it's funny.
Speaker 1: I remember the first time I went there, I was, man,
Speaker 1: I love this town. This is like, this is a
Speaker 1: pretty great town. I mean I've I've been back there
Speaker 1: maybe a dozen times. Right, I went back recently and
Speaker 1: walked around that old ballpark. Yeah, I mean, my god,
Speaker 1: how great. That was so fun. That was a blast
Speaker 1: to get to do that. I mean, it's certainly a
Speaker 1: fun place to walk around. You walk around and people
Speaker 1: said to do a double take, and then, well was
Speaker 1: because it's more than half the town probably knows this,
Speaker 1: you know, knows the show perfectly. How do you interact
Speaker 1: with fans? Now? I love it shown them. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: on an HBO show. No I don't have time for
Speaker 1: these people. Uh No, you kidd me, Im like, I'm
Speaker 1: super interactive. You've seen the David Wallace business card that
Speaker 1: I've that I hand out. Oh kids, you know, or
Speaker 1: people generally, it's like college kids are they come up
Speaker 1: to me in airports and they're you know, hey, well
Speaker 1: I was probably give them that and say, you know,
Speaker 1: we're hiring if you want to get in the paper
Speaker 1: business and you have stress balls that Yeah, that. I
Speaker 1: don't know how I can't thought of that, And it
Speaker 1: was funny. I was thinking about this during season five
Speaker 1: or six, and I was in New York and getting
Speaker 1: to do the other guys like, which was the coolest thing,
Speaker 1: because yeah, well Ferrell and Wallburg and and I meet Will.
Speaker 1: He knows everything about the show. He's like, hey, what's
Speaker 1: going on with the show? And he had seen the
Speaker 1: episode the night before. And I mean, there's like one
Speaker 1: of my comedy heroes and holy crappy like those who
Speaker 1: I am, Oh my god. But so I I would
Speaker 1: have these stress balls, and I would. I would. I
Speaker 1: would walk around New York City and I would have
Speaker 1: these and if somebody sort of you know, said something
Speaker 1: or something like that, like I would have awesome at
Speaker 1: dunder Mifflin's dress Ball just because I thought it was funny.
Speaker 1: And then and then one night, a like a great
Speaker 1: friend of mine she called and she said, Bucky, you
Speaker 1: like walking around New York tossing out dunder Mifflin's dress
Speaker 1: ball is my friend? You know. Tommy called me and said,
Speaker 1: I think I think it was your buddy. But I mean,
Speaker 1: I have a ton of fun with it. Why, you know,
Speaker 1: why not? Because it's like, I'm not Steve, and I
Speaker 1: think about you, I'm like, you must constantly just be
Speaker 1: bombarded like I'm not once a day, twice a day,
Speaker 1: and it's generally in like a line at a coffee
Speaker 1: place or whatever. Yeah, hey, thanks man, you know whatever.
Speaker 1: When it first started, I mean, frankly, I would purposely
Speaker 1: wear my David Wallace glasses. You know that someone would
Speaker 1: say something, this is like the first year or two
Speaker 1: write like, which is so crazy. I remember one time
Speaker 1: in New York doing the other guys during Halloween, and
Speaker 1: I literally went out as as Wallace during Halloween and
Speaker 1: walked all around. But it was funny, like nobody, nobody
Speaker 1: I saw. I saw a couple of Dwhite shoots and
Speaker 1: no one, you know, made the connection. But yeah, so
Speaker 1: I would purposely walk around wearing the glasses. It's interesting
Speaker 1: though for me that it began in a way in Scranton.
Speaker 1: For you, Yes, I mean it was suddenly I'm the
Speaker 1: convention at the convention and you know, there's like ten
Speaker 1: thousand people there and they hey, it's Wallace, and uh,
Speaker 1: I'm just so happy to be there. I'll I'm the
Speaker 1: last guy, like you know, with you, the last guy
Speaker 1: to leave the bar, and you're serving drinks and having
Speaker 1: fun and talking to people and photos and everything else.
Speaker 1: I mean, because I'm a fan of all that's like
Speaker 1: what I like when I met Alec Baldwin during that time,
Speaker 1: and I was a dirty rock fan. I was so excited,
Speaker 1: you know there you know, Jack, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: Or if you meet whomever, you know, if you meet
Speaker 1: a movie star you have been a fan of, and
Speaker 1: it's uh, it's it's it's fun, you know, or a
Speaker 1: ball player or something like that. Um, my favorite, my
Speaker 1: favorite story is, uh, so, my wife is an acting
Speaker 1: coach and she coaches off our garage and some people
Speaker 1: come to the front door. Normally they just like walk
Speaker 1: down the the driveway and so uh we we we
Speaker 1: were were at home and I'm looking all scruffy, like
Speaker 1: the suck at David Wallace, and the doorbell rings and
Speaker 1: I know that she's she's this woman is coming. My
Speaker 1: answered the door and it's Courtney Love and she looked great,
Speaker 1: like she's in the suit, like she looks super put together,
Speaker 1: and and I said, hey, um, Nancy's coming down. She'll
Speaker 1: be back here, come on back and then wait in
Speaker 1: the back or whatever. And then Nancy comes down and
Speaker 1: they walk back to the studio and I guess the
Speaker 1: first thing that that Courtney says to my wife is like,
Speaker 1: why why is the guy from the office in your house?
Speaker 1: What is why is he? Which is just like you
Speaker 1: wouldn't necessarily picture her as as you know, but I
Speaker 1: guess her in their their daughters love the show, like
Speaker 1: the people who are huge fans, like what Obama was
Speaker 1: watching it on the way to the inauguration, Like how
Speaker 1: crazy is that? It's pretty cool? Yeah, what are you
Speaker 1: most thankful for about doing the show? I mean, oh
Speaker 1: my god, I gave like I got to have an
Speaker 1: acting career, you know, I mean seriously, the fact that
Speaker 1: Alison found that card that like given her that said
Speaker 1: Mary Lynch Buckley, you know, and it was at the
Speaker 1: bottom of a file drawer. She's just like, I took
Speaker 1: me an hour to find this card Buckley. I can't
Speaker 1: believe it. And um, and it's crazy because of the show.
Speaker 1: I'm in Jurassic World. Colin is a huge office fan.
Speaker 1: That's the only reason a minute, Like regular folks, guys
Speaker 1: who are making shows are man's and like, hey, let's
Speaker 1: get you know this guy right? Well, you know. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons that we're having this just quession with
Speaker 1: people is the show was the number one scripted show
Speaker 1: on NBC for a number of years. But you know,
Speaker 1: to a lot of us, the show is way bigger.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, it's huge. It's like the numb number
Speaker 1: of that and Friends of the two biggest shows in
Speaker 1: the world. I mean in London it's certainly not what
Speaker 1: it is here. But I mean a couple of times
Speaker 1: a week, you know, some people say stuff. And then
Speaker 1: certainly when the summer rolls around and you have all
Speaker 1: the US tourists there. But yeah, and I mean I
Speaker 1: think you know all over the world they're they're watching it.
Speaker 1: You can get a table at a restaurant in Sydney, Australia.
Speaker 1: I bet just say it's Brian Bonker. Why do you
Speaker 1: think why do you think it has endured? Well, I
Speaker 1: think it's probably the performance of the guy that played Wallace.
Speaker 1: Um No. I mean, it's just exceptionally funny, for one,
Speaker 1: and you have characters and like every everybody has it.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know some guys you're their favorite character,
Speaker 1: Rain Jim, you know Steve, and just that the heart
Speaker 1: that Steve has and brought to it, aside from just
Speaker 1: the crazy, great humor. So I think that's I think
Speaker 1: that's probably and I mean the heart that Steve put
Speaker 1: into Michael Scott. Even though he has all these potential negative,
Speaker 1: you know, traits, he just had this heart of gold
Speaker 1: and I think that is also part of it, along
Speaker 1: with the comedy and then just the sexual chemistry between
Speaker 1: Holly Flax and Kevin Malone. Well, it's all right. Last
Speaker 1: thing I need you to say two things for me. Um.
Speaker 1: This is for oral identification. I'm Andy Buckley and I
Speaker 1: played David Wallace on the Office. I am Andy Buckley
Speaker 1: and I played David Wallace on the Office. Good say
Speaker 1: faster you. I'm Andy Buckley and I played David Wallace
Speaker 1: on the Office. Awesome, Andy, Thank you so much. You
Speaker 1: are wise, funny and exceptionally sexy. All Right, we good.
Speaker 1: Not only are we good, We're good. Well, there you
Speaker 1: have it, folks. I guess he really is as funny
Speaker 1: in real life as he is on TV. All right,
Speaker 1: maybe I already knew that, but now you do too.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Andy, and thank all of you as always
Speaker 1: for tuning in. Make sure to come back next week
Speaker 1: to hear once again from everyone's favorite office heartthrob. Now
Speaker 1: also John Krasitski. Have a fantastic week, everybody, and uh,
Speaker 1: I will see you. I will see you next time
Speaker 1: the office. Deep Dive is hosted and executive produced by
Speaker 1: me Brian Baumgartner, alongside our executive producer Langley. Our senior
Speaker 1: producer is Tessa Kramer. Our producers are Diego Tapia and
Speaker 1: Liz Hayes. My main man in the booth is Alec Moore.
Speaker 1: Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by my great
Speaker 1: friend Creed Bratton, and the episode was mixed by Seth
Speaker 1: Olandski