WEBVTT - We Love Our Writers 0:00:16.079 --> 0:00:20.000 Well, hello there, friends, and welcome to a very special 0:00:20.560 --> 0:00:25.440 episode of Off the Beat. I am your host, Brian Baumgartner. 0:00:25.600 --> 0:00:28.160 Today we're going to take a little trip, a trip 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.680 to a place that I like to call memory Lane. 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:35.960 Believe it or not, I have now been podcasting for 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:41.280 over three years, and it all started out with me 0:00:41.440 --> 0:00:44.919 talking to some of my old co workers on the office, 0:00:45.200 --> 0:00:49.640 the actors, directors, makeup artists, camera operators, anyone I could 0:00:49.720 --> 0:00:53.600 find basically to help me understand what made that show 0:00:53.680 --> 0:00:57.280 so special. Well, the first line of attack in that 0:00:57.680 --> 0:01:02.440 specialness was, of course, the writers. So today I wanted 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:08.520 to highlight some of the brilliant, hilarious minds who shaped 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:12.280 the stories and crafted the jokes that well that you love. 0:01:12.680 --> 0:01:17.399 I'm calling this my WGA episode. Seems fitting at this 0:01:17.480 --> 0:01:20.480 point in time, am I right? But you can think 0:01:20.480 --> 0:01:24.080 of this as a best of some of my favorite 0:01:24.120 --> 0:01:27.759 snippets from my conversations with some of my favorite people 0:01:27.800 --> 0:01:30.760 on the planet. Whether you're a longtime listener to the 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:33.800 podcast or this is your first time hearing these, I 0:01:34.240 --> 0:01:39.040 hope that you'll enjoy these stories about the inner workings 0:01:39.080 --> 0:01:42.880 of the writer's room and the magical place that was 0:01:43.600 --> 0:01:49.200 and still is the office. 0:01:49.680 --> 0:01:55.320 Bubble and Squeak, I love it, Bubble and Squeakna. 0:01:56.840 --> 0:01:57.800 Bubble and Squeak. 0:01:57.840 --> 0:02:02.480 I cook it every month. Oh from the Nah people. 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:15.680 Let's start it off with this clip from my conversation 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:21.000 with Jeane Stupnitsky talking about how he and his writing 0:02:21.040 --> 0:02:24.440 partner Lei Eisenberg, got to be in that room in 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:25.280 the first place. 0:02:25.800 --> 0:02:27.799 So one of the things that separated Lee and I 0:02:27.840 --> 0:02:29.600 from everyone everyone, like a lot of those a lot 0:02:29.600 --> 0:02:32.160 of the stuff went to Harvard. They were all kind 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:35.440 of like it was almost their birthright to write the sitcoms. 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:36.320 Okay, you know. 0:02:36.400 --> 0:02:39.360 I was from Chicago. He was from Boston, and I 0:02:39.400 --> 0:02:42.880 had just five years of just nothing. I was, like 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:44.959 I said, I'm just getting fired a lot. I was 0:02:45.320 --> 0:02:49.240 terrible at everything. So not a good assistant, not a 0:02:49.240 --> 0:02:53.239 good PA, just a huge fuck up. Really just a 0:02:53.639 --> 0:02:57.080 history of failure in many ways. So there was no 0:02:57.320 --> 0:03:00.400 like we didn't expect anything, We weren't didn't feel like 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:03.160 we should be there. But yes we got. I think 0:03:03.760 --> 0:03:07.279 I was maybe twenty six or twenty seven, Yeah, started. 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:11.800 What do you think you and Lee, both of you, 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:16.160 what do you think your greatest contribution to the show 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.280 was or how do you feel like you helped? 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:21.760 Oh wow, what are you most proud of? 0:03:22.639 --> 0:03:25.079 Yeah, you know, there are certain jokes that I'm really 0:03:25.520 --> 0:03:28.720 proud of that I remember writing. That feeling you get 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:32.000 when you just you're like this is this is this 0:03:32.080 --> 0:03:34.840 feels like it could be really good. So I have 0:03:34.920 --> 0:03:37.840 those moments in my mind of just remember writing certain 0:03:37.880 --> 0:03:39.880 jokes and they were weren't even always from my episodes, 0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:42.680 but like they're just jokes that I'm proud of. 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:44.360 It feels so weird. 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:47.720 This when the imposter syndrome really kicks in when you 0:03:47.720 --> 0:03:51.160 start talking about stuff like this. But I think maybe 0:03:51.160 --> 0:03:53.920 we kind of subverted. I think we like, you know, 0:03:53.960 --> 0:03:56.560 we did things like when Jim kind of became like 0:03:56.760 --> 0:03:58.400 not the greatest partner every She's like, oh, I gotta 0:03:58.480 --> 0:03:59.920 I gotta leave. I gotta go to the houses on 0:04:00.080 --> 0:04:02.680 fire or flood and you know, trying to leave camp 0:04:02.720 --> 0:04:04.440 like you would really piss Officer and a segment of 0:04:04.440 --> 0:04:07.360 the audience. But just things like that, I don't know. 0:04:07.600 --> 0:04:09.880 I think we probably wrote. Everyone had their own, Like 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:11.680 I feel like Mike Sure wrote like Michael it is 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:14.720 almost most noble in a way, like the best version 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:17.880 of Michael version. Personally I like a lot, and like 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:19.640 everyone had like a different version. But I think we 0:04:19.839 --> 0:04:23.200 probably wrote like the the most biggest British version of 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:25.800 the show in a way. Okay, maybe some of the 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:26.560 darker stuff. 0:04:27.160 --> 0:04:29.320 Well that that was sort of where I was going. 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:32.320 I mean, the two episodes that you guys were responsible for, 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:39.640 Scott's Todd's and Dinner Party unquestionably considered the most cringiest 0:04:39.880 --> 0:04:43.120 of episodes in the history of the show. Were those 0:04:43.240 --> 0:04:46.120 your ideas or did you execute them? And what I 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:47.880 mean by that for those of you listening who don't know. 0:04:48.200 --> 0:04:53.040 Sometimes there are stories that are decided collectively in the 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:56.640 writer's room and then you're assigned a script to write. 0:04:56.880 --> 0:04:59.680 I'm curious about sort of the genesis for either one 0:04:59.760 --> 0:05:00.960 or to those episodes. 0:05:01.080 --> 0:05:03.600 Yeah, so yeah, it's true. Some like writers will come 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:06.360 in with ideas after we'll have like time off in 0:05:06.360 --> 0:05:08.520 between seasons. We're coming with new ideas, and the ideas 0:05:08.520 --> 0:05:10.080 who come in come in with aren't always the ones 0:05:10.080 --> 0:05:12.000 that you end up writing. Sometimes other writers write them 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:15.480 and you write other writers ideas. Neither one was our 0:05:15.520 --> 0:05:21.839 idea Dinner Party. It might have been Greg's idea I 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:25.520 don't actually remember whose idea that was, but I remember 0:05:25.800 --> 0:05:28.560 feeling very I knew how to write that episode, and 0:05:28.720 --> 0:05:31.240 I remember Greg assigned it to Mindy, who like wasn't 0:05:31.279 --> 0:05:33.520 that I don't think she she want to write a 0:05:33.520 --> 0:05:35.400 different episode. I think at the time it was called 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:39.520 like Who's Afraid of John Levinson Gold? But Scott's Tots 0:05:39.600 --> 0:05:42.160 was a Paul Lieberstein original that we were assigned. 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:47.920 Ok, you make your acting debut in the office correct 0:05:48.279 --> 0:05:49.000 on television? 0:05:49.080 --> 0:05:49.680 On television? 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:51.839 Yes, Yes, on television. 0:05:52.480 --> 0:05:55.719 Leo and Gino the delivery guys, was this something you 0:05:55.760 --> 0:05:59.080 were excited about doing or was this just fun for the. 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:01.200 Right I did not enjoy at all, and it was 0:06:01.240 --> 0:06:03.520 really the other writers kind of. I think Greg thought 0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:06.159 it was funny, and the other writers, like I thought 0:06:06.160 --> 0:06:08.520 it would be funny to force us to act. I 0:06:08.560 --> 0:06:11.400 hated it, didn't want to do it, fought against it. 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:13.640 But if we were going to do it, we did 0:06:13.760 --> 0:06:15.400 Lee and I did think it was funny for him 0:06:15.440 --> 0:06:17.080 to play Geno and me to play Leo, which was 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:18.919 just really confused when the people work on the show, 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.320 you know what our names was? What our names were? Anyway, 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:25.080 at the beginning, I think by the end, we're really confused. 0:06:25.600 --> 0:06:28.680 And sometimes if I felt someone didn't like, if I 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:31.280 knew someone wasn't sure, if I was leader Gene and 0:06:31.560 --> 0:06:33.920 Lee would walk by and be like, hey Gene to Lee, 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:36.440 I would call him Gene, which would just doubly confuse 0:06:36.520 --> 0:06:39.200 them and they think they finally have to haven't figured out, 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:42.120 and then I would just continue confusing. 0:06:42.320 --> 0:06:45.240 That's so good. I mean, look the show. The show 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:48.039 gave all of us so much. I mean, for you, 0:06:48.040 --> 0:06:51.120 your first job in a writer's room, your acting career 0:06:51.120 --> 0:06:54.640 on Delvion, whether you liked it or not, your directorial debut, 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:59.240 when you look back on that time, what feelings do 0:06:59.279 --> 0:06:59.560 you have. 0:07:00.040 --> 0:07:02.200 I mean, I owe so much. It was my film school, 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:04.719 you know, I owe so much to the show. It 0:07:05.320 --> 0:07:07.760 because you know easily you can easily get on a 0:07:07.800 --> 0:07:09.680 show that last six episodes, and then you get on 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:12.800 another show and it kind of you know, gets canceled 0:07:12.960 --> 0:07:17.520 or it's I mean, we got so lucky being hired 0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:19.280 on the show, to be on a show that went 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:20.960 as long as it did, and we didn't stay the 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.560 whole time, but it changed our lives, met a lot 0:07:23.600 --> 0:07:24.400 of amazing people. 0:07:24.440 --> 0:07:25.360 We learned so much. 0:07:25.840 --> 0:07:28.600 We learned how to become showrunners and how to write 0:07:28.920 --> 0:07:30.880 and how to run a room and kind of one 0:07:30.920 --> 0:07:34.040 of the things in the Writer's Strike that we talk 0:07:34.080 --> 0:07:36.800 about is just and I know Mike Scohn record talking 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:38.480 about this just true. It was like, you know, for 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:41.920 the next genreal. You know, we learned from Greg how 0:07:41.920 --> 0:07:43.680 to do these things, and a lot a lot of 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:48.840 people are aren't learning that anymore. But we just completely 0:07:48.880 --> 0:07:52.000 change our lives, can change the trajectory of our careers. 0:07:52.080 --> 0:07:55.560 I remember thinking before it became preessional writer, I thought, oh, 0:07:55.600 --> 0:07:58.760 these writers are They're so lucky. They're so lucky that 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:00.440 they get to do this. And then when I became 0:08:00.440 --> 0:08:02.120 one and I was like, it's all talent, lucky, has 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:04.640 nothing new with it. I'm just that talented. Now I 0:08:04.680 --> 0:08:08.160 realized I'm back to the lucky part. There's talent, for sure, 0:08:08.400 --> 0:08:11.640 but there's so much luck involved. There's just things you 0:08:11.680 --> 0:08:14.040 can't control that we got on the show that it 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:15.840 went as long as it did, that we met these 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:18.760 made these connections and met these people. It just it's 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:20.880 you know, things are lot of our hands and I 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:23.040 feel so lucky. I feel so lucky. 0:08:23.680 --> 0:08:26.559 Well, I think we were all pretty lucky to be there. Jean. 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:30.880 However, Lee remembers their early days on the staff as 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:35.960 a little less nostalgic. In fact, I think neurotic is 0:08:36.000 --> 0:08:39.239 a better word for it. Here's Lee Eisenberg. 0:08:39.760 --> 0:08:42.120 We had never been in a writer's room before, so 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:45.000 we didn't know anything. And so in a writer's room, 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:47.080 if you pitch a joke and people don't like it, 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:48.680 they don't tell you they don't like it. It just 0:08:48.720 --> 0:08:52.080 you're met with silence, and then you extrapolate the silence to. 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:53.120 Mean move on. 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:55.000 But we didn't know that, so we thought that maybe 0:08:55.000 --> 0:08:58.120 like people couldn't hear and so like I remember Jean 0:08:58.240 --> 0:09:00.600 saying to Paul once, like did you hear what I said? 0:09:01.600 --> 0:09:03.240 And that like stuff like that would happen a lot. 0:09:03.320 --> 0:09:06.199 And then I pitch, I pitched something and. 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.120 Because you thought they were being rude, well I didn't 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:09.120 sea it was just like bond. 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:11.040 Well, it's just not the way that people interact with 0:09:11.080 --> 0:09:13.520 each other. You don't you acknowledge someone you say like, oh, 0:09:13.559 --> 0:09:15.160 I'm not sure that's right for me, But like if 0:09:15.200 --> 0:09:17.480 you did, you know you're generating thousands of jokes a day, 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:19.319 Like if you have every single joke and explain why 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:20.960 it's not right. You would get anything done. 0:09:21.000 --> 0:09:23.520 That's funny, Lee, I don't think it's works for this moment, right, 0:09:23.520 --> 0:09:24.200 should we think of it? 0:09:24.280 --> 0:09:26.360 Yeah, no one does that. We keep going, right. 0:09:26.440 --> 0:09:28.000 It was just weird, and we didn't know what we were doing. 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:30.960 And then everyone will go out to lunch together. They 0:09:30.960 --> 0:09:33.560 would all kind of like run to their cars and 0:09:33.640 --> 0:09:35.440 like five people pile into a car, and then Gene 0:09:35.440 --> 0:09:38.560 and I would like get into like our camera. It 0:09:38.679 --> 0:09:40.160 just we felt like we were the new kids and 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.640 we didn't fit in. And so I think our contract 0:09:43.760 --> 0:09:45.920 was like twenty weeks. It was ten weeks with an 0:09:45.920 --> 0:09:48.080 option for another ten weeks or something like that. And 0:09:48.120 --> 0:09:50.160 we were ten. We're getting close to ten weeks, and 0:09:50.160 --> 0:09:53.800 we're we were nervous, but we also kind of felt like, 0:09:54.679 --> 0:09:56.920 no one's that nice to us. I think we're gonna 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:01.280 get fired anyways, can we can we quit? And we 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:04.319 called our agent and we said, he's like, hey, so 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:05.760 you're you're almost up. You know you're going to you 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:07.640 know we're gonna try getting you those other ten weeks. 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:10.160 We said, well, what if we want to quit? He said, well, 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:12.600 I don't stand why you're asking and we said, well, like, 0:10:12.800 --> 0:10:14.720 you know, people aren't that nice to us, like we're 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:17.240 fourth graders at the New School. And he was like, 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:20.000 this is the stupidest question anyone's ever asked me. And 0:10:20.080 --> 0:10:22.720 he just was Mark Provozero, who represented me and Bean 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:25.880 and Mindy and BJ and he was like, dumbest question 0:10:25.920 --> 0:10:28.400 I've ever been asked. And he hung up on us, right, 0:10:28.440 --> 0:10:31.800 and then we stayed on the show for five more years. 0:10:32.760 --> 0:10:34.720 Were you close to being fired? Do you think? Or 0:10:34.760 --> 0:10:37.560 do you Was that just your perception because people didn't 0:10:37.559 --> 0:10:38.199 seem nice. 0:10:38.440 --> 0:10:40.480 I think that when you say people didn't seem nice, 0:10:40.480 --> 0:10:43.319 I really feel young. I think that the you know, 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:45.280 when you're acting and when you first start acting and 0:10:45.320 --> 0:10:47.520 you're like, the scene isn't about you, and you're like 0:10:47.600 --> 0:10:48.520 you want to go up to the director and. 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:50.440 Be like, hey, did you like what I was doing? Right? 0:10:50.520 --> 0:10:52.320 And you think the scene's about you even though no 0:10:52.360 --> 0:10:54.400 one cares about you because the scene isn't about you. 0:10:54.800 --> 0:10:56.920 That's the way I felt about the writer's room was 0:10:56.960 --> 0:10:59.760 I was like, they're scrutinizing us every moment, and they 0:10:59.800 --> 0:11:02.680 were Greg had eighty five thousand other things to worry 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:07.720 about than the staff writer's happiness or our contributions. We 0:11:07.720 --> 0:11:09.800 were contributing, but I think for us it was like 0:11:09.960 --> 0:11:12.120 Gene I would drive back and forth. We live together, 0:11:12.559 --> 0:11:14.200 and we'd have like a forty five minute commute every 0:11:14.280 --> 0:11:18.160 day each way, and all we would do is just say, like, hey, 0:11:18.200 --> 0:11:20.280 Paul laughed a little bit at that joke I said 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:23.280 in the small room, how did it go with Mike 0:11:23.320 --> 0:11:26.360 and Jen in the other room? Did bj acknowledge you today? 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:28.200 I mean, it was like we were parsing out the 0:11:28.280 --> 0:11:32.920 smallest little things, and then Greg got pneumonia season two 0:11:33.480 --> 0:11:35.400 while we were breaking the fight, so we had to 0:11:35.400 --> 0:11:38.400 outline the fight. Everyone else got to outline the episode's 0:11:38.679 --> 0:11:40.160 kind of more as a group, and for us it 0:11:40.240 --> 0:11:42.559 was like me and Jean and Paul and everyone else 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:45.040 was off on script. And then we had to go 0:11:45.120 --> 0:11:47.959 meet Greg at his house because he had walking pneumonia, 0:11:48.200 --> 0:11:49.439 and it was like, Oh, they're setting us. 0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:49.880 Up to fail. 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:53.319 They gave us this episode that's like goofy and different 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:54.720 from the rest of the show. There's like a fight 0:11:54.760 --> 0:11:57.320 in a dojo, like they don't want us to do well, 0:11:57.720 --> 0:11:59.800 and then when we handed a bad script, they'll fire 0:11:59.880 --> 0:12:01.959 up us. This is what we were convinced of. I 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:04.760 think we didn't. I think we didn't feel confident that 0:12:04.760 --> 0:12:07.520 we weren't going to be fired until three years in. 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:10.640 I'm not kidding. Every single time, Like when we wrote 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:12.520 the Secret, we were like, they gave us the secret 0:12:12.520 --> 0:12:14.840 because there's not a lot of time, and then we 0:12:14.880 --> 0:12:17.679 won't deliver and then they'll fire us. That's all we 0:12:17.720 --> 0:12:20.079 went through the first few years. What Wait, We liked 0:12:20.080 --> 0:12:23.480 everyone eventually, but we were terrified. It wasn't like a 0:12:23.520 --> 0:12:26.240 culture of fear. It was just two insecure guys. 0:12:27.120 --> 0:12:31.880 You were just worried about yourself. Oh, we were terrified. Yeah. Wow, Yeah, 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:35.400 I'm really sorry to hear that. Thanks. I mean, it 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:36.240 doesn't surprise me. 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:39.600 You're a bit neurotic, but I've monetized the neuroses. 0:12:39.760 --> 0:12:40.680 That's all that matters. 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:41.640 Yeah. 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:47.199 Well, sure, I'm glad that they didn't quit or get fired, 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:52.280 because without them we wouldn't have had such delectable masterpieces 0:12:52.280 --> 0:12:57.880 of cringe as Scott's Tots or even Dinner Party. In fact, 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:03.040 every writer contributed their own special element to the show. 0:13:03.120 --> 0:13:06.200 But I wasn't there, at least not for that part. 0:13:06.320 --> 0:13:10.600 So I'm gonna let Moe's shrewt. I mean, Mike, sure, 0:13:11.080 --> 0:13:14.400 tell you all about it. So Lee talked about this. 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:18.240 I was talking to him about if there were specific 0:13:18.840 --> 0:13:23.400 strengths because the episodes were different, were there ways that 0:13:23.679 --> 0:13:26.080 either interested people or that they were better at And 0:13:26.120 --> 0:13:28.760 what he said was that he felt like he and 0:13:29.000 --> 0:13:34.600 Gene were much more in the sort of cringe comedy. Yeah, yeah, 0:13:34.600 --> 0:13:36.800 which you know, if you look at Dinner Party, that 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:40.839 certainly fits that bill. And what they said about you 0:13:40.960 --> 0:13:44.120 was that you were much more optimistic. Do you feel 0:13:44.120 --> 0:13:44.800 like that's true? 0:13:45.120 --> 0:13:45.440 Yeah? 0:13:45.520 --> 0:13:45.839 I do. 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:52.840 I feel like my sweet spot on the show was, well, 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:57.880 Christmas Party's pretty optimistic episode. But like the episode Branch 0:13:57.920 --> 0:14:03.440 Closing that I wrote that story because Jan walks in 0:14:03.480 --> 0:14:06.319 on the first page of the episode and says, we're 0:14:06.320 --> 0:14:10.240 shutting a branch down, and Michael has a complete collapse 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.760 and then he says, no, I'm not letting this happen. 0:14:14.120 --> 0:14:15.800 I'm going to do something about this, and he and 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:18.880 Dwight head off and they go to David Wallace's house 0:14:18.880 --> 0:14:21.160 in Connecticut and they're just like, I'm going to confront 0:14:21.240 --> 0:14:23.360 him and I'm going to make him see that this 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:27.000 is not the right decision. It is utterly ineffectual Wallace 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:30.160 Network shows up. They just end up sitting there and 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:34.200 are miserable and completely unbeknownst to them, through a variety 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:37.640 of other machiness, the branch ends up getting saved. But 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:40.240 there's a scene in the end where Michael and Dwight 0:14:40.240 --> 0:14:42.760 are sitting in the car and that all hope is lost, 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:46.560 and Michael says, okay, top three favorite moments ever at 0:14:46.560 --> 0:14:49.280 the office, and Dwight says, like my first day when 0:14:49.320 --> 0:14:52.480 you sprayed me with the fire extinguisher, and when yeah, 0:14:52.520 --> 0:14:55.400 I got sick and you came into the MRI, you know, 0:14:55.440 --> 0:14:58.640 I got a concussion or whatever. And then Dwight says, 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:01.880 what about you? What are your favorite moments? And Michael 0:15:01.880 --> 0:15:04.960 says all of them, every single one, And then Dwight says, well, 0:15:04.960 --> 0:15:06.600 what about when Jan showed up and said the branch 0:15:06.680 --> 0:15:09.680 was closing? And He's like, come on, man, But that 0:15:09.760 --> 0:15:12.800 I remember just thinking like this, and that scene wasn't 0:15:12.920 --> 0:15:15.240 in the outline, and I remember writing that scene and 0:15:15.280 --> 0:15:17.320 thinking like that that this is like I locked into 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:20.520 that idea. And I think it's just because it was 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:22.920 like a moment of humanity between the two of them, 0:15:22.920 --> 0:15:26.120 where like the office is very meaningful. It's all Michael 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:29.040 has and him being able to just sort of express 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:32.160 in a sincere and human way what he loved about 0:15:32.200 --> 0:15:34.880 the place, like that kind of thing. I really felt 0:15:34.920 --> 0:15:39.760 like that was my jam. But yeah, I mean those guys, 0:15:39.800 --> 0:15:43.120 like Greg's theory was that writing staff should be like 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:46.280 The X Men, where he's like, if you have all 0:15:46.360 --> 0:15:48.600 people who are the same and have the same like 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:53.320 comedic power, you're gonna have one awesome thing about the show. 0:15:53.360 --> 0:15:56.240 But if if everybody has his or her own comedic power, 0:15:56.280 --> 0:15:59.040 then you get everything. And so yeah, I think Lee 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:01.320 and Jean were really into the like super I mean, 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:03.800 those guys are so funny, Like Scott's Tots was an 0:16:03.800 --> 0:16:06.760 episode they pitched very early on that Greg was like, 0:16:06.800 --> 0:16:09.640 we're never doing this, and then long after I left, 0:16:09.680 --> 0:16:11.720 I was watching him like, oh, I guess Greg gave in. 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:16.600 But yeah, they love that. Jen Solata was her superpower 0:16:16.680 --> 0:16:22.640 is just this incredible connection to Pam. She's also hilarious, 0:16:22.680 --> 0:16:24.440 but like she was like the beating heart of the show. 0:16:24.520 --> 0:16:26.960 I would say, not just through Pam, through all the characters, 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:29.680 but like the episode where the bird dies and Michael 0:16:29.680 --> 0:16:31.600 has the funeral for the bird. That was Jen from 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:35.120 beginning to end, and we kept like tinkering and tinkering 0:16:35.120 --> 0:16:37.160 and tickering, and she eventually was like, I think I 0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:38.960 just understand this and I just want to write it, 0:16:39.000 --> 0:16:41.440 and we were like, great, and then it's amazing. And 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:44.040 the part of it that she really liked into was 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:48.640 Pam Pam understanding what Michael was going through and giving 0:16:48.680 --> 0:16:51.320 the eulogy and trying to make Michael feel better by 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:55.360 talking about this dead bird. It's a really complicated emotional moment. 0:16:55.400 --> 0:16:58.320 But Jen just like understood it at some fundamental level. 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:02.680 And you know, Paul was really into Michael's when Michael 0:17:02.760 --> 0:17:05.479 was at his absolute worst. Like Paul was super into 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:12.840 the Michael's worst instincts, right right, Mindy was Mindy's superpower 0:17:12.920 --> 0:17:17.640 was always the super absurdist stuff, the really like crazy 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:21.880 flights of fancy. You know, famously in the episode where 0:17:21.880 --> 0:17:24.840 Michael burns his foot on the George Foreman grill, when 0:17:24.840 --> 0:17:28.520 Michael burns his foot. I mean again, every episode that 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:33.359 everybody wrote was always rewritten a tremendous amount. But I 0:17:33.400 --> 0:17:36.560 will say that that first monologue Michael has where he's 0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:39.480 explained to the camera how he burned his foot. I 0:17:39.480 --> 0:17:41.240 don't think we changed a word of it. Like Mindy 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.320 turned in her script and that speech was in there 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:46.800 and it was really long and it's really complicated and 0:17:46.880 --> 0:17:48.880 it has it's a crazy roller coaster, and I don't 0:17:48.880 --> 0:17:51.080 think we changed a single word because she just like 0:17:51.160 --> 0:17:55.200 she would lock into just the the super absurdist stuff 0:17:55.359 --> 0:17:59.680 presented very straightforwardly, like yeah, I mean, everyone everybody had 0:17:59.720 --> 0:18:01.639 something they were good at. That staff is incredible. 0:18:02.119 --> 0:18:04.960 They sure, or we'll be right back. 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:26.080 One thing I heard from basically all of the writers 0:18:26.640 --> 0:18:31.480 was that Greg Daniels, our showrunner, producer, mastermind, fearless leader, 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:33.280 whatever you want to call him, he had a lot 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:37.400 of games or exercises or theories as he called them 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:40.800 that he instilled in the writer's room and used to 0:18:40.840 --> 0:18:42.280 help shape the stories. 0:18:42.560 --> 0:18:46.119 Characters are the whole world of the office. 0:18:46.400 --> 0:18:49.159 I'm not a writer, but from what I learned, this 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:54.040 is different from how your average sitcom writer's room is run. 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:58.200 Our writer Brent Forrester had also worked with him years 0:18:58.240 --> 0:19:01.199 before on The Simpsons and King of the Hill, so 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:05.280 he knew Greg's weighs very very well. 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:08.240 Here's Brent, do you consider Greg a teacher? 0:19:08.640 --> 0:19:12.040 Oh for sure. Yeah, he's a friend of mine forever now. 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:14.680 And we were in the trenches at the Simpsons ten 0:19:14.720 --> 0:19:17.840 am to ten pm every single day, so you know 0:19:17.880 --> 0:19:20.560 we're allD buddies, but for sure big time. 0:19:23.160 --> 0:19:26.800 Someone told us this exercise that he had something that 0:19:26.880 --> 0:19:29.520 if you were having trouble breaking stories, and he called 0:19:29.560 --> 0:19:33.560 it unlikely duos, And there were note cards on the 0:19:33.560 --> 0:19:36.520 wall with all the character's names, and the idea was 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:40.600 to pick two characters that you would not necessarily associate 0:19:40.640 --> 0:19:43.400 with each other together and then write a story on that. 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:44.320 I think that's. 0:19:44.200 --> 0:19:48.639 Always a great method. Early on, back on nurses for me, 0:19:48.760 --> 0:19:51.879 I asked one of the senior writers there what makes 0:19:51.920 --> 0:19:54.840 a story? And the guy called me into his office. 0:19:54.960 --> 0:19:56.159 His name was Bruce Ferber. 0:19:56.400 --> 0:19:58.720 He closed the blind, shut the door, locked it, and 0:19:58.760 --> 0:20:04.240 he said, is usually about two people, and then he 0:20:04.320 --> 0:20:08.239 unlocked the door and made me leave. It sounds so 0:20:09.000 --> 0:20:10.800 a commonplace, but it's actually the key. 0:20:10.960 --> 0:20:11.120 Right. 0:20:11.160 --> 0:20:13.199 Yeah, that's what's great is what's an unusual pairing. That's 0:20:13.200 --> 0:20:15.240 how I got my first Simpsons episode was I paired 0:20:15.480 --> 0:20:18.080 Homer versus Patty and Selma. It had never been done before, 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:20.320 so I got an episode, right but for sure, on 0:20:20.359 --> 0:20:22.840 any show, you know what, two characters have never been 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:23.080 in a. 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:24.680 Story together, do that right? 0:20:24.960 --> 0:20:30.680 Oh, that's genius. It's the small attention to details. When 0:20:30.760 --> 0:20:33.760 you know the characters and how the characters would behave, 0:20:34.280 --> 0:20:36.760