Office Olympics w/ Paul Feig

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I'm Jenna Fisher.

And I'm Angela Kinsey.

We were on the office together and we're best friends.

And now we're doing the Ultimate Office Rewatch podcast just for you.

Each week, we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind-the-scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you.

We're the office ladies.

Hello, everybody.

Hi, everyone.

Welcome to season two, episode three, Office Olympics.

Guys, if I sound grouchy today, it's because I'm in hour four of a cleanse.

I've never done one before.

I think they're stupid.

I don't know why I'm doing it.

Angela, what are your thoughts on my cleanse?

It's a bad idea.

Why am I doing it?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Whatever.

I don't want a bunch of people writing in like to us being like, you guys, cleanses are good for you.

But you know what?

I just think they sound like a big pain in the ass.

Here's the thing.

I was running out of the house this morning.

I was late.

I didn't have time to make my usual breakfast of scrambled eggs and sliced strawberries.

I eat that every morning.

Oh, man.

I love it.

Didn't have time.

But I remembered that about eight months ago, I ordered this five-day cleanse at the advice of one of my friends.

Who's like healthy or something?

Super healthy.

Looks amazing.

Skin is amazing.

And I thought, well, maybe today's the day.

Maybe this is a sign.

So I just grabbed day one of the cleanse.

It's like a little pre-packaged.

You know, I had a nut bar for breakfast.

She looks like she's going into outer space, you guys.

She has a little box.

She's mad.

You've got like, it looks like compressed food.

Everything's freeze-dried.

Compressed food in this little foil packets.

I've already, I guess, cheated.

I hate that.

I hate that I'm shaming myself over this thing already, but I'm having coffee.

You're not supposed to have coffee on the cleanse.

You're supposed to have tea.

It's not even caffeinated tea.

What am I supposed to do?

What is wrong with these people?

That's what I'm saying.

And I already decided I think I'm going to eat a full meal for dinner.

I don't know.

Well, I won't tell you what I brought for lunch.

What?

Pasta?

I brought pasta.

Oh, my God.

Like a

freeze-dried soup to eat.

I know.

I know.

You're going into outer space.

You're eating your packets.

Why am I even saying I'm doing a cleanse when I've already planned to eat dinner tonight?

I'm not doing, I'm kind of doing a cleanse.

I hate to bring it down.

You're not doing a cleanse.

You were rushing and you grabbed your NASA packets because you bought them and you feel bad that you bought them and they've been sitting there.

Yes.

And also what I'm learning about you, Jenna, like I already knew this about you, but boy am I learning it now being your business partner is that if your routine gets thrown, you love routine, it sends you into this like spiral where all of a sudden you're like, like if you're like, oh, I didn't get my scrambled eggs and my strawberries, you know what I'm going to do?

I'm going to move to Arizona.

What?

It's so true.

I'm so thrown that I start to make really wackadoo decisions.

Yeah, you make some big swings.

Okay.

All right.

Well,

let's see how it goes today.

Yeah, on that note.

This episode, as I said, is Office Olympics, written by Mike Scherr and directed by Paul Feig.

Yay!

Let me give a summary.

In this episode, Michael has to leave the office for the day to sign papers on his new condo.

He's becoming a homeowner, everyone.

Dwight goes with him, leaving Jim in charge, who decides to use the day to stage Office Olympics with the employees.

Fast fact number one: Office Olympics was inspired by the King of the Hill Office Olympics.

Yes.

The writers on Greg's show, King of the Hill, created a real office Olympics, and that is what inspired our episode.

Actually, Jenna, it wasn't the writers that invented the Office Olympics for King of the Hill.

It was Tim Croston, Greg's assistant.

Oh.

Tim Croston was Greg Daniels' assistant.

Tim was also a longtime friend of mine.

I've known him for years.

And Tim and two other assistants are who set up the whole Office Olympics at King of the Hill.

The writers, yes, participated, Jenna.

Okay.

They participated, but it was, Tim was the mastermind.

He was the self-appointed commissioner.

Oh.

Yes.

And I.

He was the gym.

He was the gym.

And I talked to him last night.

We traded text messages.

And Tim, sorry if I woke you up at 11 o'clock at night in North Carolina, but thank you for responding.

They had a whole opening ceremonies.

They had a torch.

They had shirts for different teams.

What?

Yeah, they marched through the hallways.

They had like a banner each team carried.

They had a full opening ceremonies.

And you know the doves that you see at the end for our closing ceremonies?

Yes.

They had that.

They had doves that went across.

They had several games that they had to play.

It took a day and a half, this Office Olympics.

What were they not doing during this day and a half?

I know.

Well, Tim said that we wasted a full day and a half on this, and I won the award for wasting the most office time.

So he said, so overall, I'm very proud of my time on King of the Hill.

He said some of the games they had were mini golf through the office,

Kerplunk, which was like this game, I guess, where they had like sticks like in like a tube and you drop marbles down and you had to twist it.

I don't know.

And then it went kerplunk.

Tim's favorite game that they had though was Guess the Elevator.

And that made it into our episode.

Yes.

So someone went down to the lobby and then came up and you had to guess which elevator they came out.

So he said that was his personal favorite.

They also had a Twinkie Eating contest and Paul Lieberstein came in second.

Go Paul.

Because Paul was working on King of the Hill at the time as well.

But he said they really got into it.

They went all out and he said one of the things that blew him away was Chuck Mangioni.

He is a famous musician, composer, Jenna.

He actually played a recurring character on King of the Hill as himself, as the celebrity spokesperson for the Megalomart.

Yes.

And he flew himself out on his own time to play.

He plays the flugel horn and the trumpet to play at the opening ceremonies because he, in fact, actually played at the Olympics in Lake Placid, New York.

This is crazy.

How many years did they do this?

Do we know?

This was an annual thing, right?

I don't know that.

I don't know that.

I think, I mean, from what Tim texted me, they definitely went full out one year.

I don't know if they could sustain this because I think they did waste a lot of time not working.

And here's a random piece of trivia for you.

I did a voice on King of the Hill.

I had one, like a one line in the mega lomart where I said, said, we don't sell super squatters no more on account of their dangerous.

So there's my, there's my connection there.

Can you believe that?

They really went all out on King of the Hill for their Office Olympics.

And that was the inspiration for Office Olympics on the office.

I love all of that information.

That was amazing.

Also, this episode ended up inspiring offices around the country to do their own Office Olympics.

I mean, this got even bigger than just our TV show.

Tim, you've really started something.

Thank you for that legacy and thank you for letting me text you until almost midnight last night, your time.

Fast fact number two, writer Mike Schur makes a cameo appearance in this episode.

Oh, yeah.

Appearing in a photograph as Dwight's Amish cousin, Moe.

Moe's was actually based on a character in the UPN show Amish in the City.

It came out in July 2004.

Jenna, I went down the rabbit hole last night and I watched the pilot episode of Amish in the City because I wanted to see what the character of Moe's, there is a guy named Moe's.

First of all, the premise for the show is crazy.

They take five Amish teens who are on their rumshpringa.

You know, they can go and live in the world for a year.

In the non-Amish world.

Right.

And then they decide if they want to actually take the Amish way of life, right?

So they take five Amish teens and they put them in a house in Los Angeles, like right off Ventura Boulevard, overlooking the city, and they put five mainstream American like teenagers.

And now I think just taking five Amish kids to Los Angeles is enough.

You got to throw in, there's a guy from Boston who's like, all I want to do is like get a laden party.

Woohoo!

And you're going to put him with Moe's?

Moe, who like brought his wooden puzzles that he made himself?

I mean, there's a whole scene where he's like, do you like puzzles?

And the Boston guy's like, nah, I don't like them.

And he's like, oh, that's pretty much all I brought.

Oh my gosh.

This, okay, sorry.

Your explanation of Amish in the City is making me want to watch Amish in the City.

I'm very invested in Moe's.

I feel like I'm going to have to go back because I'm like, what happened to Moe's and his puzzles?

How's he doing?

Well, I guess the writers were obsessed with Amish in the City as well.

And the entire first season of The Office, they would all talk about it.

And so finally, when we got a season two, they, that was their way of honoring their love of Amish in the city, was this character of Moe's that Mike Scher,

I think he thought he was just appearing in a photograph.

Little did he know he would go on to play this character for nine years.

For nine years, and then probably would have been in the spin-off, the farm, had it happened.

True.

He would still be playing Moe's.

Of course.

We also introduced another recurring character in this episode.

It is the realtor.

Yes, Carol Stills.

Carol Stills, played by Nancy Carell, Steve Carell's wife, who is hilarious.

Nancy is hilarious, and we will talk more about her scenes with Steve as we get into this episode.

Fast fact number three,

this was our first time working with director Paul Fieg.

Yay!

Who is undoubtedly one of our favorite directors?

Paul is so brilliant, and what I love is he's kind.

He's just a delightful person to be around.

We've talked a little bit about how he and his wife Lori would host our viewing parties, but this was our first time working with him.

And I'll never forget when he walked on set because he was wearing a full suit and tie.

Oh, he is so dapper.

Which he wore every day.

Every day.

Every day he wore a suit.

A lot of them were like vintage suits.

So they were also super cool.

They weren't stuffy.

I mean, they were like

super hip.

No, he and his wife Lori are like, they're like a smart looking couple.

Yeah, they look like people who read The New Yorker, don't they?

Like they're super smart.

They've written, they can read the long articles because those articles are super long.

They're really smart.

And their house, I remember, was like decorated, like so lovely.

Like they had art.

Yes.

Yes.

But they're not stuffy people.

You know what I mean?

They're incredibly approachable.

They're not flashy.

Yeah, not flashy.

They're just really nice people.

And Paul was one of my absolute favorite directors we ever had.

You are in love with his Instagram.

I am.

His Instagram.

She is obsessed with his Instagram.

I love his Instagram.

It makes me want to travel and dress nice and have a cocktail.

Yes.

Yes, this is true.

Paul Feig, before this, had worked on Freaks and Geeks, which I was a huge fan of.

And actually, Freaks and Geeks is the very first television show I ever auditioned for.

I wondered if you auditioned for that.

That seemed like right in your wheelhouse.

I did not audition for one of the regular characters.

The show had already...

happened, but I went in for a guest appearance.

I think just three lines.

And this was because Allison Jones, who cast The Office, also cast Freaks and Geeks.

This started my relationship with Allison Jones.

I went in, I auditioned for Freaks and Geeks.

I did not get the role.

That's all right, lady.

That's all right.

It happens sometimes.

She called me back later for a TV show called Undeclared that was produced by Judd Apato, and I did get that part, just one line.

And then, you know, five years later, she called me to audition for The Office.

Wow.

That was all Alison Jones.

But I almost worked with Paul Feig on Freaks and Geeks, but it didn't happen.

But it was meant to be.

Our paths would cross.

Little did I know.

And they did.

But, you know, Paul also directed Bridesmaids.

Oh.

One of my all-time favorite movies.

So, so funny.

I remember going to that premiere because, you know, we were so excited to support Paul and to support Ellie and the whole cast was just phenomenal.

And I was so happy for him.

And, you know, Paul is the type of guy, the minute he sees you, this huge smile comes across his face and he gives you a big hug.

And he's just, he's just such a giving person of hisself you know and i was so happy to support him and so happy that it ended up being such a huge hit i want to call your attention to paul figs many books that are amazing okay he wrote kick me

which

is i guess it's like his autobiography for the first chapter of his life because i feel like about his adolescence yeah i really feel like he could write a whole bunch more.

But he's so funny.

The book is amazing.

And then he also wrote this book called Superstud or How I Became a 24-Year-old Virgin.

It's also amazing.

So you guys, really, if you, if you want to dive deep on Paul Feig, I recommend these books.

Guess what we did?

We called Paul Feig for this episode.

Who is singing?

What has this cleanse done to me?

It's turned me into you.

It's turning you into me.

And you're about to make some crazy life choices.

Should we go to a bar right now?

No, God, no.

We should not.

You're horrible.

It's 11 a.m.

also.

Probably defeats the purpose of your cleanse.

Guys, we called Paul Feig and we interviewed him about Office Olympics.

We even included some of your questions.

So after the break, we're going to talk to Paul Feig.

We're going to ask him some questions.

He's going to tell us about Office Olympics.

I can't wait.

All right.

Stay tuned.

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All right, we are back and we are going to be talking to Paul Feig.

Sam, dial him up.

Hello.

Hi, Paul.

Hey, Paul.

How are you?

I'm good.

How are you?

Are you somewhere fancy, Paul?

No, I'm in New York, actually.

Yeah, but are you somewhere fancy?

Well, my apartment's very fancy.

Because I'm very fancy.

Thank you so much for doing this, Paul.

It really means a lot.

Oh, my God.

I'm so excited.

I'm so happy that you guys are doing this.

And I wish I could be in the studio with you.

It would be so much even more fun.

Well, you're always welcome to come back.

We've got 200 episodes to talk about.

And you directed a great deal of those.

Oh, good.

I'll talk on all of mine.

We'll hit you up for that.

We actually reached out to some fans to talk to you today, and there were people who had so many questions.

Yeah, so we're going to include some of their questions with our questions.

Very good.

I'm excited.

Well, to get started, Paul, how did you get involved with the office?

It was my great agent at the time, Renee Kurtz, who was steering me towards it.

Honestly, I was offered several years before the chance to develop the office, you know, the British office, into a series.

And I was like, oh, forget it.

There's no way you can do it.

It's too scary, you know, because it's such a great series.

So I, you know, I just didn't even take the bait.

But then when Greg did it, you know, I was really, you know, amazed by that.

And I actually, the funny thing is I was making a pilot

at the same time that that Greg did the pilot for the office.

And I remember we were sh we were both working at like some studio and he was editing there.

And I remember him coming over to us to Rodney Rothman and I, whose pilot it was, and he's like, hey, come in here, come in here.

I got to play you a couple of different options for the opening theme song for this show that I just directed.

And so he played us a couple of different versions, including

the now infamous piano one.

So

I was definitely there right at the very beginning.

When the show got picked up, my agent called me, Renee, and she was just like, they'd like you to direct an episode.

And so

I watched the first six that you guys had done and thought they were so hilarious.

You know, as soon as I saw Diversity Day, I was just like completely in.

I just thought it was so great.

Yeah, I came to that first table read.

I don't know if you remember, they did kind of a bunch of episodes all at once.

And I remember you guys were reading the Dundees

and all that.

And then we read Office Olympics.

And so

I was in.

Did you get to pick Office Olympics from that table read?

Or was it assigned to you?

Yeah, that was the one that was assigned to me.

Because I remember having a moment going like, oh, I want to do the Dundees.

That seems really fun.

But then I just saw the potential of the Office Olympics

was just going to be such a blast.

I mean,

that was just such a fun thing to kind of put together.

I remember just what an interesting, I don't know, what an interesting feeling it was on the set for that.

Because, I mean,

if you remember, that was sort of, you know, aside from the Olympics part of it, that was the episode that kind of started to turn everything because that's where

Steve's character started to become slightly more sympathetic.

And I don't know if you remember or not, we really, that kind of got found on the set.

Because remember, we were doing the whole thing where we were presenting, you guys were presenting Michael with the, you know, the, with the medal,

and Steve just made this decision to kind of start crying.

Yeah.

You know, getting all choked up.

And I remember just going like, oh my God, Steve, that's so great.

Like, keep going with that.

And that was, I think that was kind of the turning point where his character took that left turn from Ricky Gervais's character and became more sort of the lovable, you know, misfit who's trying too hard for everybody to like him.

But also, Paul, I remember in that filming of that scene that you directed all of us to be genuine.

And you can see it on our faces that we are genuinely clapping for Michael.

We're not mocking him.

It was this collective moment with everyone in the office enjoying supporting one another.

It was really sweet.

It makes me tear up every time I watch it.

I cried when Steve did that.

Yeah.

Oh, no, it really gets me too.

And because I think, you know what it was?

It was just Steve's performance was so sincere that it felt if we were kind of being snarky or, you know, laughing at him, that it made us such, it made you guys such villains to do that.

But it wasn't anybody's really instinct to do that.

And so I just kind of encourage you to go along with what you were already doing, which is we were all really being affected by Steve.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It still gets me.

Well, we have a fan question for you.

Reed wrote in and said, I know, ooh, Reed says, when filming a mockumentary, do you storyboard or do you have a shot plan?

Neither.

What you do is you basically kind of go through the script and I would walk around with Kelly, our AD,

you know, the day before or whatever, and we just basically kind of go, okay, what's the bet, where would we put the cameras for this scene?

So that we would be cross-shooting it and the cameras could avoid seeing each other, but where the documentary crew would actually be.

And so you were always just kind of going, Okay, you know, for me, it's like I always wanted to have depth behind us, so I never wanted to shoot into walls whenever I could avoid it.

And so, just to kind of go, okay, they would be, you know, one would be over here by this desk, and then on the opposite side, something, you know, Matt would be over there, and Randall would be on the other side.

And really, that was kind of it.

Then you'd also go, like, okay, is this going to be a spy shot where you you guys don't know you're on camera?

Well, we'll be shooting through you know the blinds or through a crack in the door

and then that was kind of it and then then we would just get there and just play out the scene for me this is it's the greatest way to do TV comedy because it just every time we shot the scene we had the full scene and so it just allowed us to just play and go like okay this time try this you know and you know and just the fact that Greg and everybody let us play around so much with these great scripts that we already had and then had the confidence to keep that stuff in.

Because I'd worked on other shows where the cast was really brilliant at kind of improving or tagging something or just kind of taking a little left turn in the middle of the scene, but the showrunners just wouldn't put it in because they were so in love with their scripts that they just wouldn't use it.

But, you know, just, I mean,

the shining example of that was when we did the next episode, the Halloween episode, where we had that thing where we found where Rain was doing, you know, playing the Emperor and talking to Michael and kind of goading him.

And we just found that funny angle that looked like the Emperor from Star Wars where you just kind of see his face.

And we just, you know, him just taunting it.

And that went on and on.

But Greg, I think, jettisoned some other kind of storyline just so we could keep that scene long because it was just so funny.

And, you know,

that takes a lot of confidence and sort of, you know, yeah, well, self-confidence really on the part of the showrunner to let those moments moments play out like that.

I love that.

Me too.

I love hearing everything that went into how it ended up on screen.

We were just acting.

You did all this planning.

I know.

You put all this thought into it.

Without you, we are nothing.

Without you, we are nothing.

I'm wondering if you can talk a little bit about picking the condo location in this episode, because it's almost like another character.

It features so prominently.

What was the criteria for picking the the condo?

You wanted something that had enough flow to it and openness that you weren't going to be stuck in little rooms, you know, with just basically walls as your background.

And so, what I really liked about it is it had that kitchen that went through to the back patio.

So, you know, we were in the kitchen shooting Michael kind of having his breakdown, which is still possibly, I think, the hardest I think I've ever laughed on a set.

Yes.

When Steve just was having that thing where he's having the breakdown, he kind of puts his hand on the stove and picks up the thing and then goes outside.

He goes, is this supposed to come off?

And he walks out with it.

Oh, I mean, that is like just, that's the genius of Steve.

I literally thought I was going to die when he was doing it.

And every time we do a take, you do something different.

Did we use that same condo in dinner party?

Did we manage to keep that same place?

It looked very familiar to me, didn't it to you?

I thought it was the condo.

Yeah.

That's amazing.

Well, what was fun about that is being able to go in and

turn it into Jan's place.

Yeah.

And that's, that was, I mean,

I don't want to jump episodes, but I mean, for dinner party, that was the most fun of like, how do we see how Jan's woman's touch went in with kimonos on the wall and that kind of stuff.

Oh my gosh, Paul, you have to come back.

You have to come in.

We will have so much fun with that.

I was talking to Mike Schur about this episode.

He was the writer of this episode, and he shared with us your choice of using a wide-angle lens when filming steve for this episode can you talk a little bit about that yeah it would just you know we really wanted him to feel lost in this in this thing because you know it's so much about him being overwhelmed yeah i had a very similar experience when i first met lori my wife and we were going to move in together you know and she had found this place and i came over it was under the guise of i was just going to like look at it and see what it's about and little did i know she kind of had the realtor there and everything.

And like, I had to sign the papers

to pull the trigger.

So suddenly I went from being like this kind of weird, lonely bachelor to like committing to moving in in front of all these people.

And I just kind of freaked out.

And I just remember that feeling of like suddenly the house felt very like abstract and like you're in a horror movie a little bit.

You're having a panic attack.

And so I wanted Steve to kind of feel that being, you you know, in that house of like, it's almost like, you know,

I forget there's an old movie, not obsession, but something where this woman's going crazy in this house.

I just thought it'd be kind of funny to give it that feel.

Oh, my gosh.

I love that story.

Lori, you go, Lori.

I'm telling you, I know.

Look at that.

You know, we celebrated our 25-year anniversary, wedding anniversary, so it worked the most.

Well, we got a lot of questions also about the yogurt lids.

This was maybe the thing people are most curious about these yogurt lids oh my gosh they went crazy about the yogurt lids paul mel wanted to know

how many metals were made casey wants to know were any other items considered for metals before landing on yogurt lids literally any information you can give us about these yogurt lids anything about yogurt lids people want to know wow because i i remember that so distinctly just because i remember thinking it was it was not at all what i thought we were going to make the medals

and i remember Phil, remember good old Phil Props coming up with those.

And I remember him rigging that up

with the paper clips as the chain and hanging that on there.

And I had moments of going, like, I don't know if it's substantial enough because they're so light.

But then thinking, but this is kind of brilliant too.

And so going with this, I have some weird memory, and I don't know if this is accurate or not, of like a cottage cheese lid.

Oh, it would be larger.

It would be very like and bigger.

Yes.

but I think I think we might have said they were too big and also I think they didn't stay on the on the paper clip.

So but that that's just a kind of a hazy memory.

Steve Gordon asked, this is just kind of a fun question, which one of the freaks and geeks could work in the office?

I think it'd have to be Lindsay.

I think only Lindsay could really go together.

Inappropriately navigate that maelstrom.

I hear that.

I think that is the right answer.

I think that is correct.

And then, okay, Paul, we have to bring up, because Jenna and I love this about you so much, that you wear a suit every day with a tie and that our crew loved it so much.

On Friday, a lot of times on a set, the crew will wear Hawaiian shirts.

It's Friday.

But when you would work, they would all wear a tie on Friday.

And so we were wondering, when did your origin of the daily suit start?

It was after Freaks and Geeks, because I'll flash all the way back just briefly.

When I was a kid, I used to wear suits and ties all the time.

I loved that.

It was kind of like starting at like eight years old.

Like I got my mom to buy me my first three-piece suit

and I wore it.

Oh, my dad was so mad because he's like, you're going to grow out of it in six months.

And he was right.

But oh, what a six months I had walking around in these suits.

So so it was always in me, but then when I got into my twenties and I became a stand-up comedian,

I used to wear a suit on stage and then I realized I wanted to be more, I don't know, of relatable to the audience.

So I started wearing like jeans and bowling shirts and that kind of thing.

And then when I did Freaks and Geeks,

even though I didn't dress this way in high school, I started dressing just like kind of t-shirts and jeans because I was trying to get in the head of like the freaks

and stuff.

And so grew my hair really long.

So if you see pictures of me from

then, my hair was super long, like down to my shoulder, I think.

So then it was after Freaks and Geeks was done, and I was going out and pitching new shows and taking all these meetings, that I was in the meetings, and all the executives would be in suits and ties.

And I was there in jeans and a t-shirt, and I just didn't like it.

I felt like really identifiable as sort of the prey, if you will, in that room.

And so I remember going, like, well, screw this.

I'm going to go back to what I used to do and wear suits and ties.

They kind of thought I was an idiot for doing it, but I just remember going, like, I like the power structure of this better, of me in a suit, like as an adult, and just decided from that point on, I was like, I'm just going to wear a suit and tie all the time because I enjoy it, and it makes me feel like an adult, and also makes me feel in charge.

And

I look better in a suit than I do in jeans, so there you go.

Well, and Paul, without your suit, I wouldn't have my favorite hashtag you do, which is drunk funkle on your Instagram.

Thank you.

I live for it, Paul.

I love your Instagram so much.

I want everyone to go follow Paul Feek.

And also, Paul, I'm so excited about last Christmas.

I am so excited to see it.

I can't wait.

And, you know, I loved, I loved Game of Thrones.

So, of course, Jenna doesn't watch Game of Thrones.

It drives me crazy.

So, Amelia Clark's in it.

I'm still an Amelia Clark fan, even though I didn't watch Game of Thrones.

So, this is very exciting to me because I get to see her and not Game of Thrones.

Yes, exactly.

And then, of course, like Emma Thompson, I cannot get enough of that woman.

I just live for her.

So, and Henry Golding and all of it.

I can't wait to see it.

I love, love holiday movies so much.

So everybody go see Last Christmas.

Yay!

You'll love it.

You'll laugh, you'll cry, and it's one of the most beautiful things I've ever shot.

It's just absolutely gorgeous to look at.

Oh, I can't wait.

I cannot wait to see it.

Paul, thank you so much for taking the time to do this.

Thank you.

Thank you, Paul.

Thank you.

It's so much fun.

I'm so glad you guys are doing this because the show was so special to me.

I mean, honestly, I just...

I have to pinch myself that I got to be involved and be involved with so many episodes and so many kind of the bigger ones, too.

And it will just always be one of my proudest, proudest moments.

And working with you guys was just one of my great joys.

You were just such a wonderful cast to work with.

Every day was really fun to come in, and just every take was fun and different.

And

I mean, I just couldn't have had a better time.

So thank you for that.

And I love you guys very, very much.

Oh, Paul.

Thank you, Paul.

Okay, guys, we're back.

And now we are going to break down Office Olympics.

Yeah.

That was so nice talking about that.

That's so great.

All right, let's get into this episode scene by scene.

We start with Michael's talking head.

He explains that he has come in early and we learn that Ryan had to come in early to bring Michael a sausage, egg, and cheese biscuit.

Ryan is so pissed.

Angela, I noticed a little bit of Ryan sass.

Yeah, Ryan had some sass.

Can I get Ryan sass from you?

Yeah.

Do you have a card that says Ryan sass?

I don't because the only person that bumps me with sass is Pam.

I knew, I knew it was targeted.

I knew your sass was not universal.

I knew it was personal.

See, I just proved it.

I also remember that Steve had to eat all of those egg and cheese biscuits and he had a bucket under his desk because he would spit them out because remember, he had just gotten in this amazing shape.

And I feel like season one, Steve, might have enjoyed eating all of those, but season two, Steve, was like, I'm not doing that to my body anymore.

Also, though, I mean, listen, here's the thing.

When you have to eat that much food, like the same food over and over, maybe 30 takes of that food, it turns on you.

It does.

You don't need that sausage egg biscuit turning on you.

It's true.

I'd spit it out.

All right.

So then there's another scene that has the thing that I love so much, which is when we start on Michael speaking to camera and we widen to reveal Dwight lurking over his shoulder.

It is one of your favorite, favorite talking heads.

And this is when Michael reveals he is buying a condo, going to become a home homeowner.

Yeah.

Big day for him.

And then we swoop into the main office.

And did you notice this, Angela?

The photo on Jim's desk?

I have two note cards about these opening shots in the bullpen.

At a minute 48 seconds, do you know what Jim's screensaver is?

What?

It's a deserted island in the middle of the ocean.

I think that's a little foreshadowing to the fire.

Which is coming next.

Coming next, that desert island.

At a minute 51, John's desk right next to his computer, there's a photo of him holding a baby.

Do you know who that is?

It's his nephew.

It's his nephew.

So when we had to personalize our desk, that's one of the things John brought in.

He was so proud to be an uncle.

I know.

He's adorable.

He was so excited to put that picture on his desk.

Then we go to the scene where Jim and Pam are throwing things into Dwight's cup.

This is when Pam has to revive Jim because sometimes he dies of boredom.

I remember shooting that.

That was really fun.

John and I got really into seeing if we really could throw stuff in the cup.

Like, sometimes that happens where it's in the scene, but then in real life, you actually really enjoy it.

That was a moment.

Well, I have a little something from that scene.

At two minutes, four seconds, boom.

The boom drops in the scene.

The

operator.

Yeah, we got a little bit of boom and they left it in because, as you know, it was a mockumentary.

So when that happened, they let it stay.

They wouldn't let it ruin a take.

But there's a boom in that scene.

What about dwight's mozart butch cassidy talking head

this to me is such a sign of mike schur's writing i think if you go back and look at every amazing dwight talking head most of them were written by mike schur mike is brilliant he is brilliant and he's smart and i mean i feel like i would wear a t-shirt that says mozart and butch cassidy

You're going to get a bullet in your head thanks to Butch Cassidy if you mess with Mozart, everybody.

I'm not messing with mozart no

again michael's list of magazines he lists off all his magazines he asks pam if she has forwarded cracked an american way magazine to his new condo i just want to point that out his magazines are small businessman maxim american way

cracked And then the fine arts, a fishinado.

Yeah, the one he made up.

Yeah, the fake magazine.

We also get to see Michael's car in this episode for the first time.

Is it for the first time?

I think it is.

Well, I have a pretty big note card before we get to the Seabring.

I think.

Oh, well, at what minutes?

I don't write down minutes.

That's your thing.

It's weird.

I like a good list, but you're really obsessed with these minutes.

You know what?

You and your cleans can suck it, Fisher.

All right, my background people who love background stuff.

At four minutes, 52 seconds, Jim is talking to Oscar, and Oscar's desk faces the partition that is between Angela and Kevin.

Okay.

And on that partition is a post-it note.

It's a drawing that Oscar drew.

And after this episode, he gave it to me.

And I still have it.

And I, so here's what I'm saying.

Why is it?

Okay, so Oscar is a very good drawer.

He's very good.

And he would make these doodles.

And I kept a lot of them.

And he often would draw Kevin, Angela, and Oscar, our characters doing crazy things.

I have a drawing one of one where we're on a moped.

Oh, I've seen that one.

That's so cute.

Okay, so this post-it note is a drawing he did.

It's one of my personal favorites.

It is Angela as a dominatrix.

She is getting a shoulder ride from Kevin.

Okay.

She has a whip in her hand, like she's cracking the whip.

And on all fours, being dragged behind them, is Oscar by a leash.

Wow.

Yes, that is what's on the post-it post-it note on his partition.

And it cracks me up.

Like the detail that he drew are costumes, our dominatrix costumes.

He has like a spike collar on.

He definitely would do all these drawings of the accounting department.

And my character was always invoking pain in some way.

But it is one of my favorite things I own is this post-it note that he drew.

And it's there on the partition at four minutes, 52 seconds.

I about fell off my couch.

I was so excited.

But then after that, he gave it to you after this episode, and we know you would never see it again on the show.

It just lived there for the first time.

It lived there.

He drew it clearly that day and stuck it up there.

Yeah.

And I now have it.

Oh, I love that.

And then also at four minutes, 52 seconds, because we were allowed to personalize our desks, right?

There is a photo that Oscar brought in of himself and his dog in a frame.

Oh.

Yeah.

So there you go.

I want to talk a little bit about Michael's car.

Okay.

He has the Sebring convertible.

I think this is the first time we really see the car.

It's certainly the first time we drive in the car.

It is the first time it's featured.

And BJ told me that they picked this car very carefully.

They felt like it was the flashiest car Michael could afford on his salary.

It's a convertible.

Yes, and he's very, very proud of it.

And when Michael and Dwight leave the office and they're shooting that scene, Randall Einhorn, our director of photography and also our main camera operator was shoved in the back seat in order to get those shots.

Randall is a big guy and that is not a big back seat.

No, he told me that his knees were up by his ears.

He was contorted in this weird position.

I traded some messages with him and he said though that whenever they had to get in the most painful position, they usually got the best shot.

So he was like, you knew you were getting a great shot if you were hurting.

And I also, the back window of the Sebring broke in this episode.

And Randall has been blamed for this on the internet.

Really?

Yes, the internet says that Randall broke the window and it had to be replaced.

It cost almost $900 to replace.

I know, because, you know, we rented these cars.

We didn't buy them.

I asked Randall about it and he said, actually,

the window did break.

He said, this I thought was interesting.

He said he thinks it's because they

left a camera battery pack on the back shelf.

And then when they put the convertible top down, it crunched it.

Crunched it.

But who's they, Randall?

Who is they?

Would that be film crew?

Would that be you?

Camera?

Camera?

So he said they, but yes, it did break in that scene, and we had to then replace it.

Okay, so I have a little story about the Sebring.

I have a time code.

Now we're jumping ahead, but since you're talking about it, I'm going to bring it up, Jenna.

Is that all right?

I'll allow it.

Oh, Lord.

At 16 minutes, 39 seconds, there is proof of what the actual outside temperature was because there is a full-on camera shot of the dashboard and the Sebring.

It says that they are going east and that it is 91 degrees.

Yes, because we shot this in the middle of summer.

In the middle of summer, we had to have coats on and pretend to be cold.

But there you have it.

It was 91 degrees.

Okay, Angela, I have a question about hate ball.

Oh, I have a note card about hate ball.

All right.

Your hair.

Yes.

In hate ball.

Yes.

Your.

Will you please talk about the braid headband thing?

I have been wanting to.

Okay, so at five minutes, 42 seconds, there is a great shot of me through the partition because obviously I hate what they're doing.

So they say hate ball and they cut to me and I'm frowning.

You see the classic headband braid that was created by our hairdresser, Kim Ferry.

She did my hair every day on the show.

She actually is an amazing braider.

She can do any kind of braid.

And all of my intricate braids and hairstyles of Angela Martin were by Kim Ferry.

So she called this the headband braid and what she would have me do is she would flat iron my hair straight.

Okay.

She would have me flip my head over

and then she would start at one side of my ear and do this like inverted braid over the top of my head ending at the other side of my ear leaving the back of my hair straight.

So it would only braid like basically like a headband that went over like the top of my head.

Did it hurt?

It did not hurt, but I did have to sit with my head kind of contorted.

In order to get this.

In order to get it.

But it was like one of our favorite things.

Greg Daniels loved it.

The first time he saw it, he was like, oh my God, yes, yes, this is Angela Martin.

And it went on to be featured in a lot of episodes.

We even did a behind the scenes for NBC.com because so many people asked if that was my real hair.

It was my real hair flipped upside down, inverted braid, and it made it look like a headband.

The headband braid did not hurt.

Like you would far prefer this over a bun.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It was just like having a part of your hair braided, but it wasn't tight or pulling at the back of my head.

To me, that is classic Angela.

Yeah, the headband braid.

Yes.

Speaking of hair.

Yes.

At six minutes, 15 seconds, you go in the back of the office because they're playing Dunderball.

Yes.

And you see that Kelly still has an updo.

Still an updo with Kelly.

But it's a little bit looser.

There's like a little piece kind of dangling in the back.

It's like a loose braid.

It's starting to come down, Jenna.

You know what?

I think,

and I'm going to to predict because we have not watched all the episodes.

We really are watching them in order.

I think her hair comes down in Casino Night.

I think it's the first time her hair comes down.

I'm going to predict it.

So let's see if I'm right.

Let's continue to rewatch because I know her hair is down in Casino Night.

So remember.

The bun is getting looser.

We're heading there, folks.

It's interesting.

It's her.

Hair comes down

the closer Jim and Pam get to kissing.

Sort of, I don't know.

You know what that correlation is?

What?

A cleanse correlation.

Oh no.

That's cleanse logic for you.

That's cleanse logic.

Let us talk about Michael's condo, please.

Yes.

He gets to his condo and like we said in our Fast Facts, the realtor is played by Nancy Carell.

So our casting director, Allison Jones, pitched Nancy for this role.

She thought Nancy would be perfect.

I emailed with Allison and she said that she had always been a huge fan of Nancy's and she was looking from day one on our show to find a place for her and she thought this was perfect.

She loved being able to pit Nancy and Steve against one another in this way.

Mike Scherr told me that Steve was positively giddy.

when Nancy was on set.

He was just giggly and delighted that they're so cute together and we know they're so cute together.

Yeah, she is hilarious and so smart.

But Steve, you want to meet a man that loves you the way Steve loves Nancy.

For sure.

Because he just, he's just delighted by her.

I love when Michael starts to spiral out because he realizes, you know, and Dwight is not helping.

Dwight's like, you know, you're going to be 75.

You're basically buying a coffin.

Yeah.

If I bought a coffin, I'd buy one where I couldn't hear the other dead people.

But Michael, as he's spiraling, has this line that I love where he's like, I was promised hot people.

Where are all the hot people?

Like, what, in this condo development, you were promised hot people?

But Nancy's reaction to that is really what makes it.

Angela, you have a three-star card about the condo.

Well, it's at six minutes, 58 seconds.

It's not so much about the condo, but it's what information we find out at the condo, which is that Dwight has a 60-acre beet farm.

Yes, this is the first mention of his beet farm.

Yes, and you mentioned that we see a photo of Moe's, but this is when we learned that Dwight is a landowner.

He has a working beet farm.

Yes.

And this brings up a fan question, Angela.

Stan wrote, in this episode, Dwight says that his parents left him a 60-acre beet farm, but in the farm in season nine,

Aunt Sally leaves the farm to all three kids if they move back into it.

Jenna, did this discrepancy happen because you stole the show Bible?

Stan, I have the show Bible right here.

I'm referring to page 31 of the show Bible.

And it says that in Office Olympics, Dwight says he has a 60 acre working beet farm left to him by his grandfather.

And also, Stan, if you want to go to six minutes 58 seconds, Dwight has a talking head to camera where he says, my grandparents left me a 60 acre beet farm.

Yeah.

So Stan,

I do have to say this still does bring up the question of why in season nine do we say that it's his Aunt Sally who has the beet farm.

I don't know.

I need to revisit season nine because I know an aunt Shirley because she slapped me and called me a kitchen witch.

Yeah.

But I don't know who Aunt Sally is.

Well, he has a number of relatives.

Oh, I know.

You guys, I do want to say that to find this reference in the show Bible, I had to read something like five pages of facts about Dwight Schroot.

And I think that if they only published the Dwight Schroot section of the show Bible, it would do very well.

Every single one of these bullet points is gold.

Just pick one random one and read it to us.

All right.

From the show Bible, the chapter is Dwight.

Thinks wolves are a major threat to office workers.

Thinks wolves are a major threat.

Yeah, season three, episode 20.

He says that.

He has a bomb shelter.

It cost him $1,200.

He performed his own circumcision.

No.

No.

He can sneeze with his eyes open.

These are amazing.

He thinks Triceratops is the lamest dinosaur.

I kind of want you to make that.

I mean, I could go on and on.

Uses deer penis as an aphrodisiac.

Oh, God, poor Angela Martin.

Appears to be a fan of wrestling.

Just fakes it.

Not sure.

Just for appearances.

This one made me laugh out loud.

His farm is non-organic.

He uses pesticides?

I guess so.

In some episode, he must.

brag about the fact that his farm is non-organic.

He has $30,000 buried very deeply and under someone and he doesn't want to dig past them to get it.

Guys, I mean, I really.

The Dwight.

We could do a whole episode where I just read you Dwight Schroot from the show Bible.

That is amazing.

But yes, six minutes, 58 seconds, huge information, which is that Dwight owns a 60-acre beet farm.

This is one of my favorite things that they came up with for a character on our show because we are just going to continue to mine gold from this fact forever.

Forever.

I have a little card here.

At 8 minutes 36 seconds, there are the opening ceremonies.

Yes.

There's a banner.

There's the lighting of a candle.

I wanted to share a little behind the scenes story for you guys.

So whenever we had a lit candle, we had to, by law, have a safety meeting.

Yeah.

And I used to crack up because I would think about shows that had car chases and explosives and things.

And on our show, you had a safety meeting about a candle being lit.

And our second AD Kelly Cantley would go safety meeting we will have a lit candle yes that is real fire everyone on the set please be aware of your sleeves and elbows around the candle a lit candle everyone.

Okay, safety meeting adjourned.

And it's funny because I would go on to do shows or projects where we would have safety meetings and they would be said with sort of that same bravado, but they would really be like everyone pay attention a car will be exploding at two o'clock yeah

so please keep your distance do not go toward the car after it has exploded as it will be hot but on our show it was we will have one candle

it will be lit with a lighter

a very long lighter a very long lighter to protect john's hands safety meeting i want to say in that same scene with the opening ceremonies, I really drew the sign that says games of the first Dunder Mifflin Olympiad.

You drew that?

I drew it.

Did you color it in?

Yes.

You made the sign.

Yes.

What the hell, really?

I made it.

Those are my bubble letters.

I drew it.

I also put together a lot of the yogurt lid

things.

I did it as part of your method acting.

No, it's not part of my method acting.

they gave me some paper clips and yogurt lids and they had some shots of me putting together the metals at my desk we never used it but i did do it and then i also made that sign myself now did they want you to make that sign i don't remember did you volunteer in your method acting ways you know i feel like phil shea came up to me and said do you want to make the sign since pam made it and i said sure why not there were times where they would ask me you know angela your character is going to hand this piece of paper do you want to write out all the things so it's in your handwriting?

And we always did.

We always would sort of do that kind of thing.

I liked that detail.

Continuing our conversation about the Office Olympics, we should talk about the game Flonkerton.

Yes, we should.

I got a lot of questions.

People asked, was Flonkerton scripted or improvved?

It was a written line, but I was told to deliver it like I was making it up on the spot.

Yes, that was scripted.

A lot of people also asked who came up with the term Flonkerton.

It was Mike Scherr.

Well, Mike said it was either him or Greg Daniels, but he is personally obsessed with the FL sound, the fle.

Yeah.

The fle sound.

He thinks it's very funny.

He said that is also how Toby got his last name, Flendon.

Flenderson.

That Mike was responsible for that.

So he's pretty sure he can claim having written Flonkerton.

I remember Phyllis had so much fun doing that scene.

She had so much fun.

Phyllis loves getting to play basketball, play Flonkerton.

To play games.

She wants to be a participant.

She did.

She was very excited.

I felt like, Jenna, I have two note cards here that I felt like we should outline a little bit of the games.

Let's do it.

First of all, there are the games that people played that weren't part of the Office Olympics, but were the inspiration for Jim when he was going around to everyone's like sort of desk area.

So Pam, of course, threw, you know, things into Dwight's coffee cup.

There was hate ball and accounting.

There was Dunderball and Human Resources.

Stanley said he plays Work Hard so his kids can go to college.

And then Angela Martin says she plays Pam Pong.

Yeah.

Oh.

That's some Angela sass.

That is some serious Angela sass.

I have a question for you about Pam Pong.

Okay.

Is this the first time that an office co-worker has called out

the Jim Pam crush?

Yes.

Right?

That's the first time someone's like, oh, I see what's happening.

You're not fooling anyone.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And Pam is super self-conscious about it for the rest of the episode.

Yeah.

So, and then, of course, we have Angela at 16 minutes, 20 seconds.

She's keeping score.

She comes over.

That's the only game she's playing, that's the only game she's playing.

But then the actual games that Jim makes up, Jim and Pam, right?

They make these up.

Are number one, Flonkerton, Phyllis being the winner of that.

Yeah.

Number two, how many MMs can you put in your mouth?

Kevin was the only

participant.

Only participant.

Three, guess the elevator.

Inspired by the Real Office Olympics.

And Ryan won that.

And then the final game that we see is this full coffee mug relay between Oscar and Toby.

And it disrupts when Michael and Dwight come in the office.

And we never see the outcome of that.

Well, we kind of do.

I think Toby's coffee is spilling at the end.

So you're right.

I'm giving it to Oscar.

You're giving it to Oscar?

Okay, okay.

But you have two medals hanging on your desk at 17 minutes, 32 seconds.

You have a gold and a silver.

Yeah.

So I wonder what Pam won for.

I don't know.

You're saying I don't deserve my medals, Angela.

No, Clinz, I'm not.

I'm just merely being a fan saying

I wonder what other games we didn't get to see.

Yeah, well, obviously something where Pam won a gold medal.

Oh my god, sash.

I just want to say.

Okay.

All right, Angela.

Maybe she won a gold medal at Pam Pong.

Oh.

Oh.

I see.

I see what you've done there.

Thank you.

I do have a fan question.

Karen asked, did you get to take home the medals?

Yes, and I still have mine.

I have a yogurt lid medal in my home office, and it is hanging on my Dundee.

And from this episode, I have the drawing Oscar did of Angela as a dominatrix pulling Kevin and Oscar around in costume.

We kept all kinds of stuff from the show.

We did.

We're a little bit of hoarders, guys.

Someday we joke that we're going to do a book and put them all somewhere where we can share them.

I think we should.

I think we should.

We should go through our bins and we should share all this memorabilia and our tons of photos.

I mean, we have so many.

So many.

And I also

want to finally get on that, please, Angela.

Can we do that?

Yes.

You guys would want that, right?

You would want a book of this stuff.

Do people want that?

Like a scrapbook.

A scrapbook.

Like our sort of BFF scrapbook.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think we should because I want to do it before I lose the stuff, okay?

Because I'm worried.

I'm worried about my shed.

Lastly, guys, I cannot not talk about the scene at 20 minutes, 53 seconds.

It's the closing ceremonies.

And we talked a little bit about this with Paul, and I agree.

Steve did such an amazing performance, whereas Michael, he tears up.

He's made this huge life choice to buy a condo.

He's feeling this love and support from his office family that he doesn't get from his family, probably, right?

The office family is his family.

And he's absolutely emotional.

And when we filmed it, we did not know that Steve was going to make that choice to get emotional.

And so we're all looking at him and he started to tear up.

And I, as Angela Martin, started, as myself, started to tear up.

Yeah.

It was so moving, just sort of his honest portrayal of this person.

And Steve, Steve is just amazing.

Yeah, when that happened in the first take that that happened in, Paul then said to us, this is the direction of this scene.

Yeah.

This is how we're going to do it.

So everyone, just

be proud of Michael.

Just play it real.

Play it real.

It was hard for me because I feel like Angela Martin did not want to participate in Office Olympics, probably thought this was a waste of time, also probably doesn't have really a lot of warm feelings towards Michael.

But for me as Angela Kinsey, watching my friend Steve do this performance, it was so hard not to get emotional and sort of know the fine line that was me reacting and Angela Martin how she would react.

I teared up when we shot this.

I tear up every time I watch it.

I also watched this episode three times in preparation for this podcast and I cried every time.

Yeah.

Isabel, when she watched it with me, she said, mommy, he's crying.

I said, I know.

I know.

It was a big moment in his life.

These are the things I love about this show.

Same.

Guys, that's Office Olympics.

That is Office Olympics.

Join us next week for the fire.

Yes.

You're going to hear all about how Angela was almost carried away by a giant bug.

And I might have hit John Krasinski.

You did hit John Krasinski.

All right, we'll see you next week.

Thank you for listening to Office Ladies.

Office Ladies is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fisher, and Angela Kinsey.

Our producer is Cody Fisher.

Our sound engineer is Sam Kiefer.

And our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.

For ad-free versions of the show and our bonus episodes candy bag, go to stitcherpremium.com.

For a free one-month trial of Stitcher Premium, use code Office.