Second Drink: The Job Part 1 with Paul Lieberstein

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Hello, and welcome to your second drink of the job part one.

Paul Lieberstein joined us for the top of this episode.

You know, he wrote this episode along with Mike Scher.

What a dynamic duo, right?

This was a great interview.

We got to hear all about how he came to play Toby.

Yeah, and he gave some really fun facts about this episode as well.

So the job part one ran as a special hour-long season three finale episode along with the job part two.

But, you know, it was actually only 40 minutes with commercials.

Well, the super fan episode for the job one and two is over an hour long, a real hour, no commercials.

That's like a mini the office movie.

Yes, it's almost like they added a third episode.

And there is a very big thing that was added back to the cold open.

We kind of talked about it in our breakdown.

You know, in the job part two, when Jim is being interviewed by David Wallace,

and there's a little flashback to the beach games episode and Jim tells Pam why he left Scranton to go to Stanford yes yeah well when we first discussed this episode we talked about that flashback scene at the beach for Jim and Pam and we said that it was originally going to be the cold open

for this episode well we got it a little wrong lady it can happen

so give me the scoop well the scene during Jim's interview was always meant to be there

There was a different part of that scene on the beach between Jim and Pam that would have been the cold open.

And I didn't realize that when we first broke down the episode, they have put that cold open back into the Superfan episode.

It totally kicks off Pam's like new direct way of communicating.

You have to hear it.

Hey, I'm really sorry that I didn't come to your art show.

Okay.

Is that all you heard?

Because I said some other stuff.

Really?

How?

You know what's interesting?

I don't feel embarrassed at all.

I just feel good.

Good.

If you don't have anything to say, you don't have to say anything.

Or no, I take that back.

You have to say something.

Hey!

You guys, I'm doing it!

How can you even think about leaving that?

Hey, can anybody see this?

I mean, does he just sit there silent the whole time?

Yeah.

I really liked how she was like, is that all you're going to respond to?

Because I said some other stuff.

Yeah.

She does not let him off the hook.

Go Pam.

So I traded messages with Dave Rogers about these flashbacks.

And he said that this is one of his single favorite moments of the show because it's one of those rare things where even the way it was in the original broadcast really illuminated the creative freedom that the documentary filmmakers have when they are deciding what they want to show and when.

Sure.

I mean, they can tell a completely different version of a moment through editing.

And that's true even when you watch reality TV today.

Yes.

He said that they talked a lot about this in the edit that they decided to use, like the portion of this flashback footage that they decided to use in the job part two.

They really tried to put themselves in the mindset of the documentary crew.

Originally, they settled on just having the one little clip.

Also, in the episode, when Pam has her talking head at the top of this episode, you see just sort of like like a flashback to this conversation with no audio.

And Pam just says, Jim was nice, told me that he missed our friendship too.

And then they kind of hug and walk off.

And then Dave said again, when they had this bigger chunk of the scene, they had to discuss again, like, where would the documentary crew put this?

Where would it make the most sense to put this?

And they decided to put it back up at the top.

I just love Dave's insight on everything.

I know, lady.

I wrote him an email about it where I said, oh, can you tell me about these flashback scenes to Beach Games?

And the beginning of his email was, get ready for a Dave Rogers dissertation or just give me a call.

Well, I also wanted to share a scene that was added back to the Superfan episode.

I had mentioned it in our breakdown.

It's the runner of Dwight interviewing Andy.

Yes.

So the stuff that was included in the episode is so funny.

And I mentioned that there was a lot more in the deleted scenes.

We didn't play it before.

And I just thought it would be so fun to hear it.

So here are the extra interview questions that got added back to to the Superfan episode.

What is 879 times 413.7?

2,401.647 repeating.

Inventor of the cotton gin.

Eli Edison.

When is the Paleolithic age?

17 BC.

Who's the second man on the moon?

Trick question.

There was no second man on the moon.

Talk me through an appendectomy.

Step one, disinfection.

Step two, incision.

Step three, remove the appendix tenderly so it doesn't burst and spread toxicity everywhere.

Step four, the ectomy procedure.

Step five,

re-sutures.

Sutures, yes.

What is the origin of species?

How far away is Venus?

Define scorched earth policy.

How do you please a woman?

What is a scented candle?

What is the Dharma Initiative?

It is the source of all energy on this planet.

It is a corporation formed by aliens.

You just know our writers had so much fun.

I mean, especially that little section of where you're just hearing the questions.

I mean, I know that was like on the day pitches.

Oh, yeah.

I don't know how Rain got through that.

I'm sure he didn't.

I'm sure there's footage of him cracking up.

Well, finally, Angela, we talked a lot about the Jim-Pam-Karen relationship in this episode.

Yeah.

And we got a letter from Lindsay C.

who said, if there is ever a second drink episode of the job, I just wanted to throw out another possible point of view of Jim's reactions to Karen in this episode.

I feel like Jim has never been fully 100% committed to this relationship and was often put out with Karen and maybe even looking for ways to brush her off.

For example, right before Roy's attack, Karen is talking to him about how he'd rather stay home and watch a Phillies game than go out with her.

Like you've both said before, we all love Jim, of course, but a lot of times throughout this relationship, it really does bring out his worst.

So when Jim had the talking head explaining his haircut and Karen's snarky comment about him looking homeless, I think he was truly offended by it and holding on to a bit of a grudge.

Then, when in New York, instead of giving Karen any kind of answer about moving with her or about one too many people in New York, I think it's because he is truly conflicted.

He is on this trip trying to enjoy their relationship, but having to really search for the happiness that it should be providing.

So, then when he finds the beloved yogurt lid and Karen has just ditched him for her girlfriends, I think it was a real aha moment for him.

Huh.

I mean,

I can see the aha moment.

I rewatched this whole episode and there are so many glaring examples of Jim and Karen not being in sync.

And I also felt like Karen was like a really cool woman, but not the right woman for Jim.

Like he didn't see her.

She was cool.

She was making jokes.

They don't want to do the same things.

They are just like, they are not a match.

It was so clear to me when I rewatched this episode.

Because she's a catch.

She's a total catch.

She's not his person.

No, he's not like charmed by her the way he should be.

Well, there's like that thing, you know, where it's like, when you're really into someone, the littlest thing they do you think is charming.

And someone else who likes you and you're not into can do the same thing.

And you're like, ugh.

Totally.

He sent me flowers.

Oh, why?

Yes.

He's driving me crazy.

Like flowers every week.

And then like, if you like them, you're like,

he sent me flowers

every week.

Yeah.

You're right.

She's just not your person.

All right, everyone.

That's all we got.

Don't forget to grab a copy of Josh and Angela's cookbook.

You can make this.

Yeah.

It comes out tomorrow.

Yay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Also tomorrow, be sure to tune in and catch them on the Today Show.

Yes, we are doing a bunch of fun stuff.

We'll also be on the show, Sherry, hosted by Sherry Shepard.

And we kick off our book tour.

Josh is also joining us on Wednesday on Office Lady 6.0.

He's part of our top of show because, you know, it's the food episode.

We're going to talk all things food on the set of The Office.

We sure are.

And don't forget, everyone, the podcast, How We Made Your Mother is premiering on the Office Ladies Network today.

Yes.

All right.

Now please enjoy your second drink of The Job Part 1.

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.

Hey there, everyone.

It's Angela Kinsey.

It's Jenna Fisher.

And we are here to talk to you this week about the job.

Yes, it's the end of season three, Angela.

This is the season three finale.

I can't believe we're already at the season three finale.

I can't either.

I can't either.

I was saying to my husband the other day, I was like, babe, Jen and I have talked for a year now about the show, and it doesn't even feel like any time has gone by.

I mean, I think we just really enjoy hanging out and talking with each other and also talking about the show.

Well, this is actually the job part one.

This is an hour-long episode finale.

So we're dividing it into two episodes of Office Ladies so that we can really cover everything.

This was written by Paul Lieberstein and Mike Shore and directed by Ken Kwapis.

Jenna, do you know it was also co-edited?

Not only co-written, but it was co-edited with Dave Rogers and Dean Holland.

Wow.

Because it was such a big episode.

We put everyone on this.

All hands on deck.

Well, here is a summary for part one.

Before leaving for his interview, and confident he already has a new job at corporate, Michael names Dwight as his replacement at Dunder mifflin scranton

angela could not be more excited oh yeah

but before michael can leave jan pays a surprise visit she shows michael her new breast enhancement and says she wants to get back together

jim and karen leave early as they are also interviewing for the job at corporate dwight makes andy his number two since andy is the only person who would interview for the position and that's just just the first half.

There's more to come.

Yeah.

Well, listen, to kick off this finale episode, we have a surprise guest.

We're so excited.

Writer, Toby himself, Paul Lieberstein.

Toby is in the house.

Well, you know, in the Zoom house.

Toby's in the Zoom house.

Oh, well, we asked him all about being Toby and all about this episode.

Sam, will you play the interview?

Hello, Paul Lieberstein.

Welcome to office, ladies.

Hello, Jenna Fisher.

Hello, Angela Kidzie.

Thank you for having me.

Oh, thanks so much for being on.

My pleasure.

We're so excited to have you today.

Thank you.

I'm excited to be here.

Good.

We were texting, and I know you were texting with Angela as well.

And you told us that you have not seen an episode of the show since it aired, but that you were going to watch the job today.

How was that experience for you?

I'm dying to know.

It was really interesting.

I felt like there's moments that really, really shined.

And then there's the writer part of me is like, oh, okay, I think I would have done that a little differently now.

But I didn't think there was anything that was like embarrassing.

No,

you are so hard on yourself.

This is an amazing, delightful episode.

I know you, and you're such an amazing writer, and I can see you watching things through the filter of like, oh, and you're a producer and you direct.

So I imagine you're watching it through all those different layers.

Yeah.

Yeah, you know, there's everything.

It's like framing.

It's like, okay, should we have fun?

Or that was repetitive.

We already said that.

Paul.

We didn't need to do it again.

But then I get really impressed with some other stuff.

Well, we do always like to start by asking people how they came to be on the office.

You are one of our original writers and you were with us the entire nine seasons.

You were our showrunner as well for a period of time.

How did it come about that you were on the show?

Well, I had worked with Greg Daniels before and known him a very long time.

And we did King of the Hill together.

And when

they started the show, I, you know, I stopped by the pilot.

You know, I had nothing to do with the pilot, but I stopped by a few days and it was,

I just kind of loved what was happening.

And it was, you know, I loved the British.

And so then

when it got picked up,

I was psyched that he asked me to come on.

So this was like kind of a very traditional thing that writers and actors are kind of separated on a TV show.

you know, and they're kind of asked not to talk.

And he, at this point, was questioning a lot of those like rules and why was this happening and does this really make a better tv show so we talked about roles for it was mindy and bj and myself and mike

um and then there was a couple consultants there was lester and larry um so the four of us each got like little roles i guess mike's didn't come on

most didn't start that season but um

so we talked about just doing a little thing to kind of have the experience of being an actor and hopefully it would inform

our writing.

So here he wanted to kind of like break that down together.

So

I feel like, I'm not sure how Toby happened, but I feel like I left the room and I came back and I said, you're going to

play this part.

And it was one line.

you know, in Diversity Day about, you know,

I say this one line and get kicked out of the room.

Now, I heard, Paul, and you tell me if this is true.

I heard that at the table read, they had you read that line, and that Steve, as Michael, jumped on you so viciously, and everyone erupted in laughter because you sort of almost reacted a little bit as yourself, and a little bit maybe how you thought Toby might, you know, but you still didn't know who Toby was at that moment, right?

You're still discovering who is Toby.

There were early table reads where it was just for like weird contractual reasons, just the main main five actors.

And I was reading Kevin.

Yeah, you read a few roles.

Yeah.

And I think I did well.

I think I got laughs this game.

I think that the supporting cast wasn't there because you were guest stars and you were not series regulars.

So in a series regular contract, you're required to do the table read.

It's part of your acting deal.

But I think they have to pay you more.

Oh, to attend those.

If you don't have that kind of contract.

That sounds right.

Yeah.

You know, it's interesting because I, as a guest star, they, they say you're invited.

Yeah.

Right.

Not required.

You're invited if you would like to come.

And I always do.

But I think you're right, Jenna.

It wasn't until after Booze Cruise that we started coming to Table Reads.

Yeah.

So, Paul, you read a bunch of roles and everyone laughed when Michael jumped on you as Toby.

And I feel like that helped seal the deal.

But we also didn't expect that part to come back ever.

Oh, that's how they got you.

That's what Mike Scher, that's what mike sure said about moz it was just so supposed to be a silly photo you know yeah yeah that's right you started as a photo that's what and then years later he had to walk around with that beard for like a whole year a whole season because greg wouldn't let him use a fake one

and it all started because he was just going to be in a photo and then the fake one looked better i think yes and then he was furious because he had had that huge beard and the fake one worked just as well

Well, Paul,

how was that experience?

Was Greg right?

Did you feel like you learned from the experience of being an actor?

I absolutely did, but it took a while to get there.

I don't know if you remember, but we were doing this kind of room bit about like my acting school.

I do remember your acting school bit.

Okay, so imagine going into acting, knowing nothing about acting.

And the first thing you're being taught is take your water bottle off your desk and put it underneath your desk so because the label isn't cleared.

All right, that's now the first thing I know about acting, you know, and it was like things like that that made up my acting school.

I remember.

Also, I remember Rain would just ride you so hard.

Like you go, hey, Kate.

And she goes, Hey, Paul.

And you were like, dang it.

Because

she was supposed to be married at the moment.

You're in a scene.

And I remember Rain would like tease you so hard.

Yeah, there was very little acting I was doing.

There was a breakthrough moment for me.

They kept saying, talk louder.

And I wouldn't because like, no,

I'm talking to a person right here.

Why would I talk louder?

You just rolled out multicams for yourself, but that's okay.

Yeah, and theater, all the theater.

And then, so I was, we were doing a kitchen scene and they kept telling me to speak up.

And then Brian said, why don't you imagine like this room is artificially quiet because they turned off the refrigerator, right?

Because

sound.

Why don't you imagine that the refrigerator's on?

And you have to talk about.

Oh,

an actor does that.

You know, it put this like, and it wasn't just like one little thing.

It was like, oh, an actor has to

put all these, all those little details.

It has to justify anything that needs to be done.

They don't just do what feels real.

They have to like find a way way to do what they need to do and make it feel real.

I love hearing that.

Is this something that you've brought to other projects, Paul, as a writer, showrunner, creator of shows?

Have you asked your writing staff to act at all?

I did.

Let's see, I'm Ghosted.

I had

Blitz's brother, Andy Blitz, and I created a part for him.

Well, I have to say, and Jenna and I have talked about this a lot.

We talked about this when Greg came on as well, that we loved that we got to be around the writers.

We loved when we got to go up into the writers room.

Sometimes we would shoot over in the warehouse and there was that back stairwell that went up where your kitchen was with your snacks and we would come up and hang out.

And it was really fun for us to have you guys on set.

And

it's hard for me to imagine other shows now without that creative.

collaboration and that feeling of safety and trust.

And we've all worked on other shows where it is not the case.

And it's, it's something that I really cherish.

Yeah, me too.

Greg was right.

Breaking down that wall

made us understand each other a lot better.

And we all worked together.

Well, speaking of having to team up, for this episode, The Job, you teamed up with Mike Scherr.

You guys co-wrote this episode.

How did that work?

I have kind of a memory of, you know, this was at the end of the season and a long season.

And a lot of episodes are lit, they're written different ways.

So it wasn't that Mike and I went off into a room together and then came out with this show.

I think that we both were running

the process of writing this episode together.

You know, and we would, we beat it all out

with some writers would come in and out, but we would be the two people always there making sure, you know, the episode was what we wanted.

And then he would go take a scene, I would take a scene, or he would take a few writers to take a scene, and I would do the same.

I think that's basically how this one worked.

It's funny that you mention working in groups like that, because I remember there were times on the set where Greg would

call me offset.

He would say, Jenna, are you in the scene?

Are you in the scene?

Okay, I've got three writers talking about Jim and Pam.

I want you to sit in on that.

Go in there.

Go in there.

Oh, my gosh.

I would get so excited.

I would be like, oh, I can't wait.

I can't wait.

And I mostly just listened and sometimes I would throw out ideas, but that was so cool because you guys would kind of divide up a script and like a group of three people would go work on Dwight's stuff.

And then another three people would work on some other aspect of the story, at least from my

little bit of experience in the writer's room.

Well, it was, it was episode by episode, you know, and some came in, some were really like conceived by the writer and went straight all the way through and some were extremely collaborative but um even when a writer did it by himself herself there was you know there was tons of discussion about what was going to happen

well a big storyline in this episode is that jan and michael get back together and jan has had breast augmentation

and we're so curious about this storyline like how did it come about did you talk to to Melora about it and working with Melora and Steve?

What was that like?

I think there was a card on the wall for a long time that said, Jan gets a boob job.

And we were kind of looking for the right place.

And then so we had to break up.

She gets a boob job.

And because of that, they get back together.

It was something that happened during Cocktails.

Jan did this super long talking head.

on the lawn of the

yes in front of David Wallace's house.

Yeah, in front of David Wallace's house.

And in writing that,

we kind of discovered how Jan was on the road to self-destruction.

Yes.

Like that crystallized it for us.

It's like, oh, she's taking herself down.

Once we got that, this was like a stage in her

spiral.

Well, it's so brilliant.

I just thought Malora and Steve just, once again, their dynamic as.

Jan and Michael to me is just so good.

It was so good.

I could watch them all day.

My favorite part of the episode was when she came back in for the first time and

he's just looking at her and Jenny, you're right there and you're looking down.

Yeah, he's like,

why privately?

Why privately?

I loved how I was put right in the middle of the two of them.

Yeah.

It could have been just such a normal little dud of a scene, you know, but he walked this line of

of being like mean and trying to be polite and shocked and freaking the F out.

Freaking out and making it all real at once.

Yeah.

It was so funny to see him do that.

I have to ask you

who is responsible for Creed Thoughts?

I think that was a Mike talking head.

And then Jason Kessler did it on the blog.

He He did a blog of Creed Thoughts on npc.com, I guess.

And he was your writer's assistant?

Is that right?

Yeah, yeah.

And then he kind of took over the

digital media stuff.

I texted Creed about it this week.

I was like, Creed, do you remember Creed Thoughts?

Your whole blog?

He's like, Yeah, yeah, that was fun.

I didn't write any of that.

But that went on for a year, that blog that Jason wrote as Creed Thoughts.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So this episode introduces the shrute bucks, which are hilarious.

And who came up with that?

And also, I saved one.

I have a shroot buck.

You do?

Yeah.

To frame?

No,

I guess I guess I should frame it.

It's probably, it's like in a scrapbook bin that I haven't gotten to.

Well, that'll do it.

Is it a large one or a small one, Angela?

It's the large one.

Okay.

And I don't know if you guys remember, and I think it's a deleted scene, but Creed tries to flood, flood the

value of the dollar, try to flood the market.

So he has this deleted scene where he's photocopying like crazy and he's looking around, make sure no one's seeing him.

And then he wheels in to Dwight, like Dwight's new office, this whole cart full of thousands of shroop bucks.

And he's like, I'm going to flood the market with these babies unless you pay up.

So my memory is they were everywhere on set.

We had stacks of them.

I forgot about that scene yeah it's not it didn't make it but it's really funny yeah that is funny i think

that justin spitzer thought up shrootbox oh he's so funny not 100 yeah he's great and he loved he loved dwight there was a lot of dwight stuff over the years that came out of him well justin did twin absorption we found yes yes

yeah that brings up an interesting thing to me paul is that i remember over the years there'd be different writers that would just really love a specific character.

Like Mike Scher loved to see Angela Martin fall apart.

I could always tell when it was one of his scripts, my character would spiral out.

Did you have a character that you loved to write for?

I love doing everybody, I think.

But Creed was always fun.

Kevin was

always

fun to just push to the limits.

Yeah.

So eventually doing one where he didn't know the alphabet.

I remember going that far with him.

It just, I was laughing so hard during while he was doing it.

Michael.

I still

sometimes,

like, I'm driving and I think of like a Michael talking head.

I want to write, you know, it's, it's, his voice is just so clear in my head.

It was so distinct.

And yeah.

You know, I miss a character.

I was writing for him.

Well, Paul, do you have like a favorite scene or moment from this episode or anything you want to share?

Like a favorite moment?

It doesn't even have to be from this episode, but if there was one.

I really laughed out loud when Hunter, when he was telling Hunter,

tell her I want to squeeze them.

Yeah.

She'll know what I mean.

It's coke.

And then tell her,

yeah.

Now I looked in the script and the second part was not in the script.

I had a feeling.

Oh, good.

I'm glad you checked it out because I was wondering.

I bet he.

But the first one was the teller, I want to squeeze him, she'll know what it means, was in there.

Yes.

And then I loved when Jan finds out she's fired and she storms into Wallace's room.

They have this kind of screaming match and he tells her off.

And I loved how strong David was.

Like he was just so collected.

And I felt like, yeah, that was just really solid character to have.

Because so many people are just kind of scared or inhibited to say the truth on that show.

Okay.

So then there's this moment after she leaves

where Michael's standing behind the dorm frame and says, I didn't tell her.

She wasn't doing something like, it wasn't me who told her.

And he can't even look.

And he's, he's, the way Kwapis framed it was he was kind of like, the door frame was right coming down in the middle of his face.

I loved, I loved when, you know, Jan is just like letting David Wallace have it.

And Michael is in that same spot you're talking about.

And for one moment, he's like, yeah.

And then David Wallace is like, excuse me, like just with a look.

And Michael's like, nope, nope.

Okay.

Okay.

I just bet.

Nope.

Nope.

Well, we got one question from a fan, Paul.

And I have to ask, this is from Sarah McGinty and Zhu Yi Wang.

They want to know, why didn't Karen get the job at corporate?

Because you set up that one of the requirements for the job was sales experience of four years.

But Ryan, we don't think has worked there for four years and he's never made a sale.

Why did David Wallace choose him?

They want to know, did you do this so that you could get BJ off the set and into the writer's room so he could do his writing job?

No,

probably the opposite.

It was,

I think we felt we would get a lot of fun comedy out of putting Ryan as Michael's boss for a while.

You know, he was the temp that came in.

He's clearly

a really good bullshitter, but it's but incompetent, you know.

And I think that's how he got it.

You know,

I think we say he went to management school for a little.

He got an MBA, right?

That was one of the things.

I'm not sure how he did that, maybe at night.

But I mean, the reasoning in the real world, you know, I could have been he just really kind of dazzled David with the MBA and said all the right things.

So

I could see it happening.

But the real reason was like, you know, it was, it was time for Karen to leave the show.

And,

you know, what we were doing with Jim and Pam

for season four.

And then

we thought it would be just a fun dynamic switch.

I think it's a we were always looking for these pairings, you know, switch people up.

Who hasn't been together in a while, you know, so we have all your pictures up.

And what about you and you?

Have we done a scene with you and

what if you were his boss, you know, in your most like stat, you know, status games and improv or power dynamics, you know, just switching them up.

I loved it.

I just loved it so much.

I could really see why Ryan at corporate would just be, it's almost Shakespearean, you know, it's like

Michael thinks of himself as the king and this like lowly like peasant just just went right past him, you know, on the food chain.

And I love that he was like, give me a coffee, you know?

And then, and then now, now Ryan just jumped right over him and is going to be at corporate.

And just the way he says goodbye to Kelly, he's like cold.

He's cold-hearted, but you can see that there's going to be some fun there.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He's like, we're done.

Yeah.

Paul, is there anything when you look back and you think to yourself, I wish we had done this scene?

Because I remember there was a card on the writer's room wall for years and years and years that never got made, and it haunts me.

And it said double date.

And it was going to be a double date with Jim and Pam and Dwight and Angela.

And I always wish we had seen that double date.

And I even remember being in the writer's room and hearing you guys try to justify why Jim and Pam would agree to go on a double date with Dwight and Angela.

How could

Angela ever attend?

And I I think dinner party

was

sort of that, right?

We all did go out on our kind of double, triple date there, quadruple date, really,

since Dwight brought his babysitter.

Were there any cards that you remember that you had to leave on the wall?

You had to leave them behind?

I'm absolutely sure there were.

Double date would have been fun.

Sometimes it's finding the killer joke.

Like we maybe, you know, we should have just been pitching on

what is the hysterical thing that's going to happen.

Because then we find that, and you're like, oh, we'll do whatever it takes to justify it.

Paul, thank you so much for coming on Office Ladies.

We were just thrilled to have you.

And thanks for having me on.

Yeah.

Well, thanks, Paul.

It was really good to see you.

And I hope that we can have another get together really soon.

I hope so too.

All right, Paul.

Hugo.

All right.

Take care, guys.

Bye, Paul.

Bye.

Bye.

Well, that was just too much fun.

I love it when we have writers on the show.

And Paul is the writer actor.

He brings such a cool perspective, right, Jenna?

Yeah.

Well, listen, we want to give Paul a shout out here.

He has a really funny new project coming out spring of 2021.

It's going to be on Audible, and it's a show called Captain.

He said it's like an old-time radio show, and it's a sci-fi, but it's anti-sci-fi.

I love this description.

It's anti-sci-fi.

Jenna's like, I'm on board.

It has Will Forte, John Malkovich, Rain Wilson, Adam Scott, Wyatt Sanak, Gillian Jacobs, lots of funny folks.

Be looking for it.

Spring 2021.

Captain on Audible.

Yeah, he said it's like they're all out in space, but there's nothing sci-fi happening to them, which I just thought was so funny.

I can't wait.

I can't wait.

Well, listen, guys, we will take a break.

And then when we come back, we will start breaking down the job.

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All right.

So this episode opens with Michael at corporate for his interview, which is tomorrow.

Yeah, he got the day wrong.

And now he's got to cover his butt.

Yeah, he's trying to save it.

And he does a horrible job.

Yeah.

And I wanted to point out something.

While him and David Wallace are talking, I looked at reception.

No plants at reception corporate.

Oh my gosh, now you're now you're tracking the plants at corporate reception.

What's wrong with me?

But at 33 seconds, there is a really good shot of some dried brown sticks in the back.

It's like sticks, big tall looking sticks.

I mean, they're not really alive, right?

This is some kind of decor.

Well, clearly.

The receptionist at corporate is doing something right.

She doesn't have to keep any plants alive.

She's just got a jar with sticks.

I like it.

Pam could learn something.

We should get into the episode.

So

Jim arrives to work.

And Jenna, Jim has a new haircut.

He does.

Meredith thinks it looks sexy.

Oh, yeah.

And Kevin thinks he could look worse.

Andy immediately says, you're no longer Big Tuna, you're big haircut.

Well, we got a lot of fan questions about this, Angela.

Samantha Patino, Kayla O., Katie Nolder, Jess Kahn, Natalie Payne, and many others wrote in to ask, was Jim's haircut a writer choice or was there another reason he got the haircut?

It was both.

It was both.

It was both.

It was in the script, but it had to be in the script because John got a haircut.

Well, John was doing a movie with George Clooney and Renee Zillowiger called Leatherheads, and it was like, it was set in a different time.

And so he had shorter hair, but it worked out perfect for the story because I think it's great that Karen's like, like, you need a haircut.

You're going to interview for corporate.

And Jim did kind of have this shaggy hair, you know?

So I liked that Karen as a girlfriend was like, you got to clean it up.

But there were a few episodes this season.

Some of you guys have asked that

as John's hair was sort of transitioning back from that haircut of the movie that he did wear a wig.

Yes.

And we have not talked about that, which is so crazy to me.

But yeah, after he got the super short haircut for the movie, he came back to the office and he had to wear a wig for a while where his hair grew out.

And then finally, for this episode, I think they felt like it had grown out enough that it looked like a more modern day haircut.

So they, John is, this is John's real hair, folks.

Yes, yes.

You guys, I went to the Leatherheads premiere and I met John's family and I could not believe it.

I walked up to the group of them and John was like, hey, guys, this is my friend Angela.

And they turned around and they were the tallest people.

John is the shortest of his brothers, guys.

And he's like 6'3 ⁇ .

He's 6'3.

He's the shortest.

I was like, oh my gosh.

It was like, it was like we're from two different planets, but they were so lovely.

And that was so fun to be able to go support him like that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That was really cool when he was shooting that movie, actually.

We would get excited for each other when we would get these jobs.

And we'd be like, tell us all about it.

I know.

I was like, George Clooney, come on.

I know.

I wanted to point out something, though, with his talking head.

You know, he says that Karen suggested he get a haircut for his interview.

And Jenna, this is a major girlfriend moment.

I mean, A, it shows that Jim is actually really listening to Karen.

You know,

changing your look, especially when you've had the same haircut or same look for years and years, that's a big deal.

And so he took her advice and I thought, oh, wow, their relationship's really solid.

Like I was believing it.

I'm like, wow, Jim's all in.

And then I thought it also shows that he really wants to get the job.

Well, in this episode, there are going to be a ton of misdirects.

We do not show our hand for what the end of this is going to be at all.

And coming back from beach games, it was like, what is going to be the repercussion of Pam's confession on the beach?

And so to open this episode with Jim and Karen stronger than ever, Pam is like, listen, it went great.

It was fine.

She has that whole talking head where she's like, I know it only took me three years to summon the courage to tell Jim my feelings, but, you know, I'm glad I did it.

And now it's over.

We're all moving on.

That's how we open this episode.

We're all moving on.

Jim has a haircut.

He likes his girlfriend's advice.

I was really,

I don't even know the word, like in awe maybe of Pam's talking head about how she was like, I have no regrets.

It needed to be said, and I said it because I would have been horrified.

I would have been so embarrassed.

Like that I have this huge, like, emotional speech in front of all of my coworkers, but then you got to show up to work the next day with everyone in the bright fluorescent light.

Yeah.

Well, they do tease her a little bit.

They're a bunch of deleted scenes.

There's a runner and we'll see one later, but you do get made fun of a little bit, but lovingly by everyone.

Yes.

Well, next up, Michael is in his office.

He calls Dwight in and he explains, it's time for me to name my successor.

He hands Dwight an envelope.

Yes.

And inside, there is a written note from Michael that says, Dwight, congratulations, A Wipe.

Don't screw the pooch.

This brings Dwight.

It begins sobbing.

It brings Dwight.

Sobbing.

Sobbing tears.

I listened to the DVD commentary and they said in the commentary that Rain as Dwight went on and on so long sobbing, they just let him just sob.

Ken Kwapas just let him go and let him go.

And Ken said it went on for so long and Steve started saying, you know what, just forget it.

Give me the letter back.

I take it back.

Well, we had a fan catch in this scene.

Which is really delightful, Angela.

Christina Juarez and John Sperry wrote in to say in Michael's office when he hands Dwight the letter, you can see an outlet on the wall behind Michael and it is upside down.

What is going on here?

And oh my God, Angela, it is.

It is right around three minutes, 11 seconds by the coat rack behind Michael.

It's an upside down electrical outlet.

Like the little hole part is on the top and then the two lines are underneath it.

I know I know what an upside down outlet would look like, but thank you for

walking us through it.

Well, if you want to see one, go to three minutes and 11 seconds.

Well, that's a great catch.

You guys know I will go back and look for it.

Here's something, Angela.

Of course, we know that that outlet didn't really work.

It was just, you know, a fake outlet cover, but it did get me wondering.

So I went to the website familyhandyman.com.

Oh, Lord.

And it says that there is actually no right way to install an outlet.

You can install it,

quote, upside down.

You can install it sideways.

It will not affect how the outlet works.

It actually said, quote, it's up to you.

There's no standard electrical outlet orientation.

So there's really no such thing as an upside-down outlet.

Well, that makes sense.

It does make sense.

I found it interesting.

I feel like I definitely need to tell my dad about familyhandyman.com.

Oh, your dad will love it.

I also want to say before we move on, that I noticed that there are also two light switches in the middle of Michael's wall underneath a giant framed picture.

Now, that is odd.

Why would you put your light switches

there?

I guess it's because when you walk in the door, he has like glass.

So you can't, but he has to walk real far into his office to turn on the lights.

I will say.

you know what?

He never has to do it because Dwight gets there early and sets up his office for him.

Yeah.

Michael doesn't even know where those light switches are.

He's never had to turn them on.

Well, they're right there under the picture.

You know what, Angela?

You spot plants.

I'm going to be on the lookout for outlets.

Well, between the two of us, look out, world.

That's right.

Well, next up,

oh, this scene.

between Pam and Karen.

Oh my gosh.

I thought Rashida did such an amazing job because she

had to react to so many things as Karen.

First of all, she's graciously, I think, trying to let Pam off the hook.

She's like, you know what?

It happens.

Sometimes we just have those moments.

We say things we don't mean.

And then Pam is like, oh no, I meant it.

I've thought about it a long time.

And Karen, the look that comes over her face, She's like, oh, that's how it is.

Yeah.

And then she has her talking head where she's like, Pam is kind of a bitch.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I would be ticked off.

I would not be happy with Pam.

Well, here was my thing as the character of Pam, because in watching it as an audience member, I, it, that, it was rude.

Like, Pam is not being great in that scene.

But not being great in that scene.

She's also flirting with Jim in front of Karen.

It's like, all bets are off with Pam now.

She walked across these coals.

She's feeling empowered.

And when did she flirt with Jim in front of Karen?

Hi.

I like your haircut.

I like it.

Smile.

Come on.

Come on.

Okay.

Right out of the gate.

And then later, when he's leaving for corporate, she's like, good luck.

Oh my gosh, you have such strong feelings.

I didn't know.

I feel like Pam is openly flirting with Jim in front of Karen in this episode.

Okay.

My backstory as Pam,

it's one of those things where when you finally get your voice, you just say everything.

You lose all of your editing for a period of time, right?

Because you have to try on this new way of being and you're going to, you're going to mess it up sometimes.

She's, the pendulum has swung in the other direction and Pam is really living in, oh, I'm sorry, I hold nothing back now.

I give, I give zero Fs.

I say it all.

And y'all are going to have to live with it.

That's the world Pam is in right now.

Yes.

She hasn't auto-corrected to sort of like a happy medium.

She's just swung real hard one way.

She has.

Well, then Karen suggests to Jim that they leave for New York tonight and they should get a hotel room and hang out in the city.

Oh, yeah.

Karen is like, let's get out of here because that bitch behind reception is coming from a man and we need to go.

Well, Ange, we actually had a fan catch from this scene.

Anna Owen and Ishawn Vissant both wrote in to say: at four minutes 43 seconds, when Karen suggests leaving early, Jim says he has too much paperwork to do, and then he signs a document in pencil.

Who does that?

Did you notice?

He signs his name in pencil.

Such a good catch.

I did not notice.

I did not notice, but I sort of just feel like

none of them do any real work all day.

Hannah Settle also has a fan catch for this scene, and it involves you.

Oh, what am I doing?

At four minutes, 33 seconds, Angela and Kevin are talking together in the background.

And she wants to know what are some of the things you guys would talk about during scenes when you were in the deep background.

Because I watched this scene twice.

One, so that I could watch Jim sign in pencil, and then two, so that I could watch you and Brian in the background and lady

and just you and Brian just chatting.

I know, I know, I know.

I actually, I actually chuckled to myself when I saw this scene because, you know, they had us standing there so we would be in the shot.

They would often do that.

They would put Brian and I at a file cabinet, and Oscar could stay at his desk because he was in the line of sight.

But they would have to pull Brian out and me out.

So we would stand at those file cabinets back there.

And you guys, we are just shooting the shiitake.

We are just like, you know, just like, oh, hey, do you guys want to grab dinner?

Or yeah, what's up?

And Oscar's job was to be our lookout.

Okay.

He didn't sign up for this job.

We just made him do it.

So he would, under his breath, say, guys, camera's swinging around over.

Camera's swinging over.

And then sometimes he would like suddenly snap back into character.

And then sometimes he wouldn't catch it.

And then all of a sudden, Brian, and I would love it if there was one moment.

during the run of the show that it was on camera he would flick me you know he'd like flick my arm like stop talking.

That's amazing.

We're just, you know, we're just the idiots back there just chatting it up and accounting.

Well, speaking of accounting, we have a very strange scene now where Kevin asks Jim who he thinks is hotter between Karen and Pam.

I called this the Kev Perv alert.

Yeah.

Kevin starts listing off all of what he believes to be the various attributes of Karen and Pam.

And Jim,

Jim is like, eventually he's like, you know what?

I think you should take the rest of the day, try to figure this out and get back to me.

Well, at five minutes, 37 seconds, you see Jim kind of put his hand up to his chin like he's considering this.

Hmm, right?

Hmm, kind of thinking about this.

In the DVD commentary, John said that was his Mike Shur impression.

That right in that moment, he was being Mike Shur.

Yes, that's really good.

He snuck in an impression in the episode.

I love that.

So now Pam goes into the break room and you guys, there are more of these scenes where she gets teased, but this one made it in.

Oscar teases her and everyone kind of laughs about her big speech she made to Jim.

And Stanley's like, it's the most I ever saw you speak.

I mean, I thought, is that Kelly?

And Kelly's like, no, that was pathetic.

Like, that's, no, I would never do that.

No offense.

And then Meredith is like, well, you know what?

Everyone was drunk.

No one remembers that.

And Creed goes, oh, I do.

I blogged about it.

and now we find out that creed bratton has a blog

yes ryan explains in a talking head that last year creed asked him how to make a blog but ryan just opened up a word document and told him this was a blog

and he said that um he did that in order to protect the world from creed's thoughts yeah because he said even for the internet they're pretty uh scary so then you see creed working on his blog.

And of course, you guys, I had to screen grab it and see what he wrote.

So the top of his blog says www.creedthoughts.gov.ww backslash Creed Thoughts.

And this is what the screen says.

Creed Thoughts.

Heyo, everyone out there in Cyber World, cyber spelled with an S.

It's all,

it's old Creed Bratton coming at you again.

So we get to see his last name, which I love, Jenna.

Yes.

Yes.

Yeah.

So it says, it's old Creed Bratton coming at you again here from my perch as a quality assurance manager at Dunder Mifflin Paper.

Just a few observations on the world around me.

What do you guys think is the best kind of car?

To me, you can't beat motorcycles.

They're small and dangerous.

I got into a car, and that's all you see.

And

I have to say this to Ryan, fictional character Ryan.

I don't think that's so scary.

I'm like,

why can't Creed blog about that he likes motorcycles?

Well, there obviously is something that we're not seeing.

I guess so.

Well, we talked to Paul a little bit about this, and he mentioned that Jason Kessler, our writer's assistant, actually did write for a little over a year the blog of Creed Thoughts for NBC.com.

And by the way, if you would like to look for it, you can still find it.

It is at blog.nbc.com backslash creedthoughts.

I looked at it.

There are so many amazing things.

He has a whole story on there about how he stayed late one night at the office and he found a squirrel in Michael's safe.

That's one of the stories.

What?

Yes.

Yes.

He says he's so glad that he figured out the combination of Michael's safe because it ended up saving a squirrel's life.

He would like to know why Michael put a squirrel in his safe.

That's one of his entries.

Creed, did you really put it in there and then you forgot about it?

It's possible.

It's possible.

But you can check it out.

It's still there.

That's so fun.

That's so fun.

I didn't know it was still active.

That's so fun.

Well, now Michael visits the accounting department and he's talking about his new job and how he's already sold his condo.

And

they're like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, what's what?

What?

And I love this scene.

I remembered when we were doing the scene at the end of the scene, we improvised all of that.

And when I was watching it, I was remembering that.

And then I went to the DVD commentary, and Ken Kwapas said, Yeah, he was like, the scene didn't really have an ending.

So I just asked the accountants if they would improvise, sort of reacting to Michael.

And that's how we went out of the scene.

I think this scene is such a great example of the three of you as an improvisational trio.

You guys work so well off of one another.

Your deliveries are spot on.

And I noted it when I watched it, Angela, and I went to the script.

And Ken Kwapis is right.

It really just ended with Michael giving the news that he's already sold his condo on eBay.

That was the button.

But I think this scene is brilliant because of your reaction.

And I'm so glad they left it in.

Well, I love that it made it in.

And I really loved our little accounting pod.

We so clearly knew our characters and how they would react to one another at all times.

And we were rarely ever on the same page.

But in this moment, all three of us have similar reactions.

I say, who gave you that advice?

You know, and then Kevin and Oscar all chime in.

And for once, the accounting department is all on the same page.

Well, we had a fan catch in this that I absolutely love from Adalia L,

who said,

You guys have mentioned that Phyllis was constantly looking at fences for her home.

Please tell me she caught the fence on her computer.

At about seven minutes, 20 seconds, I think she's looking at fences on her computer in the background of the scene.

Angela,

this is is amazing.

Because you know how you were mentioning that sometimes you would check to see if you were in the background?

Yeah.

At seven minutes, 10 seconds, Phyllis looks over her shoulder to accounting.

And I swear that what she's doing is sneaking a look to see where the camera is.

And I think she thinks she's not on camera because right after that, she clicks on a website to look at fences.

Yes, that's exactly what she was doing.

Yes, it was amazing.

You guys, Phyllis looked at fences for

like a year.

Yeah.

Like, like for months and months, trying to, and, and we would, you know, she would want our opinion and we'd go over and we'd look at fences with her.

Yeah.

So many fences great.

So many fences.

Well, now, Angela, speaking of scenes that I just absolutely love, this next one with Dwight and Angela in the kitchen.

And Dwight is telling Angela about his new promotion.

He is going to have Michael's job.

Oh, it's so good.

So good.

It's one of these Shakespearean moments between Dwight and Angela, Barry Macbeth, right?

And once again, they're not facing each other, you know?

So Angela doesn't even see his face.

And at the end, Angela, you say.

Goodbye, Kelly Kapoor.

Oh, yeah.

That was not in the script, lady.

I know, I know.

So, so I got to improvise a little bit right there.

And, and, and my memory is that I improvised that.

And when I listened to the DVD commentary, Dave Rogers said, I'm pretty sure Angela improvised that line.

So, um, I just figured she would just be consumed with her own power.

And, you know, Dwight has said if he if he takes over, she gets to be in charge of the women.

So, it's sort of a callback.

Um, and you know, Kelly Kapoor has been on her list for a long time.

Well, I think this is also a callback to product recall.

I think that Kelly went to the top of Angela's list after she had to sit through that customer service training.

Well, no doubt.

No doubt.

She tried to kiss Dwight at a Christmas party, and then there was Diwali and then product recall.

So Angela's like, see you later, Kelly Kapoor.

Yeah.

Who's next on Angela's list?

The list is long, lady.

The list is long.

Kevin?

Maybe Kevin.

Oh, for sure.

For sure.

And maybe she gets her way in the finale of just saying, okay, we're not there yet.

Okay.

Well, in this scene, Dwight and Angela have this really fun couplet of dialogue.

Dwight says, how would you like to spend the night with a regional manager of Dundromifflin Scranton?

And Angela goes, no, Dwight.

And I don't care if that's how they consolidated power in ancient Rome.

And he's like, I mean me.

Well, listen, lady, I think maybe we should take a break.

And when we come back, we're going to see what this new power does to Dwight.

Oh, well,

get ready.

Get ready for his bed and breakfast in hell.

All right.

We'll be right back.

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All right, we are back and Dwight is taunting Jim about his new position at Hotel Hell.

And he's doing one of those hand, um,

what are they called?

Those hand exerciser things.

What are those for?

Why am I exercising my hand?

So your grip gets really strong.

So I can hold heavier weights while I'm lifting weights.

Is that what that's for?

Or maybe.

What do I need a strong hand for?

Maybe, maybe if you wrestle, you can grab someone and hold real tight.

I don't know.

I don't, I've never understood why I would want my hands to be super muscularly.

Muscularly?

Muscular.

I feel like my husband has one.

And

I know with baking, like he's kneading all kinds of dough and bread and doing stuff.

And I feel like, I feel like he's got real strong hands.

Oh, wow.

Do I need one of those?

Maybe.

So that I can knead my dough better?

Maybe.

Then you'd have like super dough kneading strength.

Anyway, maybe I, maybe I should ask for one for Christmas.

Dwight is doing this throughout this whole ridiculous.

I don't even know what it is, a dream or fantasy of his of this insane hotel hell.

And then Jim just takes him to task so calmly.

He's like, Wait, wait, you're the manager?

You don't, this is your fantasy.

You don't even own it.

And he's like, I co-own it with Satan.

Yeah.

And he's like, I just want to make sure I'm clear that your wildest fantasy has you as the co-owner of a bed and breakfast with Satan in hell.

And, but you only make $80,000 a year.

Oh, yeah.

Dwight's like, wait, wait, wait, I haven't told you the best part.

Yeah, the best part.

I make $80,000 a year.

Now, Jenna, so here's the thing.

I, I saw online that fans of the office were like, you know, if you divide 80,000 by 12, you get like 6,666 points six, six, six, six, six, seven or something like that.

And I was like, oh my God, did the writers do that on purpose?

They must have.

They had to.

They must have.

Well, what a brilliant little layer they gave that then.

We had a lot of people write in about that.

Rebecca Womack, Beth Jones, and Paulina Jay and Jake Moss all all also noticed that $80,000 a year is $6,666.66.

That's pretty cool.

I mean, that's a little, I mean, I like little details like that.

I think that's fun.

You know, if that were my salary, I think I would be a little bit weirded out.

I don't think I would want to have a salary.

I wouldn't want to get checks.

I mean, I guess you take out the taxes and everything, your check wouldn't really say that.

But even still in my mind, I think it would weird me out.

Because do you know what I had for a very long time?

What?

What?

I had a credit card.

And you know, you have your little three-digit secret code.

My secret code was 666.

Oh, no, no, no.

I'd say, get that away.

Uh-uh.

I'm not having any of that.

I would be on the phone trying to buy something.

Like, let's say I'm ordering a pizza.

And they'd be like, what's your credit card number?

And they'd be like, and the security code.

And I would always be like, it's,

666.

And what would they say?

People would be like, what?

They would laugh.

It was, and I'd always have to be like, I know, I know.

And I wanted to like

just intentionally get rid of this card so they would issue me a new one.

Now that's not my security code anymore.

But I imagine that's like layered because it's like, on the one hand, that's creepy.

It's creepy.

And then you have to say these creepy numbers.

But then you also now have chitty chat.

When you just want to order your pizza, now that person's hearing it for the first time.

So they're like, oh my God, that's weird.

Yeah, I know.

Oh, are you going to change it?

I'm going to try.

But like over and over for two years.

Two years.

Well, then Dwight has a talking head.

He says his first order of business will be to demote Jim, which means he will need a new number to his first choice would be Jack Bauer.

Yeah.

You know, from 24, but he's fictional and unavailable.

This was a nod to Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant.

How so?

They loved 24.

Loved 24.

They were obsessed with it.

They both got cameos on 24.

I went,

yes, and I watched them.

So Ricky Gervais was in the sixth season.

His scene did not make it, but you can find it online.

And I guess it's on like the DVD box set or something.

And he's having this comedic moment in the Oval Office.

It's totally random because, you know, 24 is such a drama.

The stakes are so high.

But he's in the background with his longtime girlfriend, Jane Fallon.

They got to be in the show.

And then later on, Stephen Merchant makes a brief appearance.

He doesn't have a speaking role, but he's a CTU worker.

He wasn't credited on the episode, but he is there.

He's in the background when they cut to CTU.

So he made it in.

He made it in.

He has no lines, but he made it in.

But I guess this little reference to Jack Bauer from Dwight was a little nod to Ricky and Stephen from the writers.

I love that.

Well, now

something major happens.

Two major things happen.

Jan shows up at the office unannounced.

And we talked about this scene a little bit with Paul, where Jan and Michael are standing at reception with Pam between them.

And Michael is trying so hard to have boundaries.

Oh, I loved it when she walked in and he goes, Why are you here?

And Malora is being that very, very scary,

sane version of a crazy person.

Oh,

for sure.

Like in the horror movies, right before they turn on you.

Yeah, no, it's that moment where you're like, hi, lovely.

And then it's like,

Yes, like you're wondering, wait, are they a cyborg?

Yeah.

I made you coffee, honey.

Wait, wait, wait, with a knife.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Super creepy she goes into his office and michael is like i need all my ladies def content conference room def content pam

immediately except meredith who's an alternate yeah

well so now pam has to go tell everybody right so she goes up to karen and she's like hey michael needs us jan's here he's freaking out and karen is so passive aggressive in this moment she's like okay um listen, before we leave, would you make, you know, copies of our sales reports?

Would you go make some copies?

Would you photocopy some stuff for me?

Oh, and for my boyfriend, whom I, I'm about to go to New York with for the night.

Will you make us some photocopies?

That's the subtext.

Yeah,

I know.

I'm just going to, I'm going to take a minute and I'm going to put you in your place, miss receptionist.

Yeah, she does.

That's true.

And then, though, Pam, Pam, leaning hard into this new, new, like, I'm going to say stuff when I want to say it, looks right at her and goes, I hope you get the job.

Yeah.

Little Pam's sass.

I want your ass out of here.

I'll make your copy.

I want your ass gone.

I'll make you 12 copies.

How about that?

You can shove them where the sun don't shine.

Okay.

So

Jan explains to Michael, she gives her plea.

She says that after their breakup, she went on vacation.

Another vacation.

Yeah.

But she's made some big changes and she really, really misses him and she wants to get back together.

Michael runs out of the office and into the conference room.

DEF CON 20.

And all the women in the conference room are like, Michael, no, do not get back together with her.

You have to stay strong.

She doesn't make you happy.

We are, we're good.

We all agree.

Michael's like, yes.

Yeah.

So now he feels empowered.

He's going to go in and tell Jan, no, no, we are not getting back together.

But he walks back in his office and Jan has taken off her jacket to reveal that she has had breast augmentation surgery.

She is wearing a white, very tight little knit sweater with a plunging neckline.

Yep.

And she's got a bodacious set of tatas.

She does that are like, hello, in his eyes.

He walks in, he's like, what?

My gosh, because he's such an adolescent.

He cannot take his eyes off her chest.

And she knows it.

This is going to appeal to Michael.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

She knew what she was doing.

Well, we had some people ask, did Malora

get

a breast augmentation for this episode?

No.

No, she didn't.

They designed this crazy bra for her that was filled with like a gazillion little cutlets.

And then they did this like makeup shadowing on her chest to create even more illusion of like swollen cleavage and all of that.

And I do remember poor Melora from this point forward would have to put that on for every episode now.

I listened to the DVD commentary and Ken Kwapas and Melora were part of this commentary.

And they said they had a meeting to discuss her boob job storyline with Greg.

So it was Ken, Melora, and Greg.

And they really had a like earnest conversation about what size they would be.

Like, how big would Jan go?

And how much of a visual joke would this be?

And Melora said this whole storyline was just a lot of fun, that they, they just, it was just a really fun thing for her character and just part of that journey that Paul was talking about of Jan really starting this spiral.

And she did say that for a long time, people would come up to her and ask if those boobs were hers.

Oh, I know.

Poor Malora.

Poor Malora.

Oh, my gosh.

Well, it works.

Michael gets back together with Jan.

He says it was not for the boobs.

No.

It wasn't for the boobs.

No, of course not.

But he's so.

He said that would be shallow.

And this is actually emotionally magnificent.

Yeah.

So, yeah, he's going to give this relationship another try.

Yeah.

Well, Jan walks out into the bullpen.

Oh, by the way, I can't believe I forgot to bring this up.

In the very beginning, when she shows up, Michael goes, Janet.

And I was like, what?

I forgot her name was Janet.

It is?

Yes.

When she enters the office, and I'm sorry to take us back a minute.

He says, hello, Janet.

And I'm like, Janet, that's my sister's name

and but is that just michael doing michael no no i looked it up her character's name is janet and her nickname is jan

wow yes wow

there you go janet levinson gold drop the gold she's not with gold anymore no and so she walks into the bullpen and now everyone sees her new boobs and everyone is having their reactions.

You know, Meredith is like, waste of money.

I find that guys are way more interested in the back of you than the front and her experience.

And I thought Kate did such a great job with that talking head.

She just throws that line away.

She doesn't put too much on it.

Yeah.

And she did a brilliant job.

And Pam, once again, trying to flirt with Jim.

It's like, oh my God, they're so big.

And he's like, I know.

She's just trying to flirt.

She's trying to flirt.

She wants to be friends again.

She's being friendly.

She wants to be be friends with benefits.

Well, she wants to be more than friends.

Yeah.

While everyone is reacting to the boobs, we have another pretty big storyline, which is Dwight is going to start interviewing his new number two.

And the only person who signed up was Andy.

Yes, which leads to this amazing interview scene.

Between Dwight and Andy.

It's like a rapid fire QA session.

Yes.

And it's so great.

We had a fan question from Seth Jason Tan and Zhu Yi Wang.

How much of the dialogue between Andy and Dwight was scripted when Dwight is interviewing him for assistant to the regional manager?

Well, guys, everything you see in the episode was scripted, but there was so much more in the script.

Angela, is that stuff in the deleted scenes?

Because it was so funny on the page.

There are great deleted scenes, Jenna, from this scene.

And apparently, there's even more that we're not even getting to see on the DVDs.

I listened to the DVD commentary and they said these guys went on and on and on.

And then they went past the scripted stuff and they just started improvising.

And Ken Kwapa said Rain was just throwing the craziest stuff at Ed and Ed did not miss a beat.

Like, like, all right, walk me through an appendectomy.

And, and, and Ed is Andy is like, all right, you sterilize the area.

You make an incision.

You know, he just you know did this whole thing there are great deleted scenes on the dvd but i think there's even more that we don't get to see it was amazing i absolutely loved it and dwight has no choice this is his only choice yeah

which is so great well we're gonna end this part one of the job with Michael finally leaving for his interview.

He is holding Jam's breasts.

Well, they've shut the blinds, but they've only shut them on one side of his office.

They left them open on the other side.

And so the camera gets this little, I used to call it a peep shot.

That's not what it's called.

Sneaky shot, spy view, sneak, spy, spy shot.

You got it.

You got there.

A spy shot.

I found it.

I found it.

I got there.

Thanks for

sticking with me.

Michael's just cupping them.

He's just holding them.

He's like so happy.

Just holding them in his hands.

And then he has this crazy talking head where he says, Two weeks ago, he was in the worst relationship of his life.

And now he's in the best relationship of his life with the same woman.

Isn't love a mystery?

Angela,

I mean, can you get a breast augmentation and heal from it in only two weeks?

Is Is that enough time?

I know.

I thought she was gone longer, too.

It seemed like to me they hadn't been dating for quite some time because he has.

I thought there was a bigger passage of time.

I do too, because when he walks over to accounting, he's like, I haven't talked to Jan in ages, right?

Well, I know that women's appreciation was two episodes ago,

but I thought there was more time in real life that had passed.

So that bumped me when he said two weeks.

I was like, wait, what?

And also, like, I just would think her boobs would still be so sore.

I mean, I don't know.

Should I look it up?

I think this was maybe a continuity error in writing, but I think he said a longer passage of time when he went to accounting.

Well, according to plastic surgery.org.

Yeah.

Most surgeons agree that full recovery can take an average of six weeks or so, but that many women notice they feel fine after about only one week.

So there you go.

But I still think this is a continuity error because of what he said in accounting.

I think so too.

Well, Michael goes to Pam and he says, Pam, you gave me great advice, but Jan's was bigger.

Yeah,

Jan's advice was bigger.

So Michael's going to say his goodbyes.

You know, he really believes that he's leaving for the very last time.

He believes he's going to go to this interview and get a job at corporate, and he and Jan are going to live happily ever after.

He sold his condo.

The man is leaving in his mind.

He plays exit music, and he bids everybody a good night and a good luck.

Yes, he plays Natalie Merchant on a tiny little tape recorder.

And after he leaves, Dwight

slaps his name on the door and says, Who's ready to work?

And guess who's smiling?

Oh,

she's so happy.

This is a big moment for them.

This is a big moment.

Well, we will end there for this week.

Next week, we will keep breaking down this episode.

Jim, Karen, and Michael will all arrive in New York for their interviews.

Dwight fully takes over Dunder Mifflin with Pam as his secret assistant to the regional manager.

Oh, yeah.

It's all next week.

Oh, yeah.

It's a good one, guys.

Thank you so much for listening in.

And thank you, Paul Lieverstein, for being our guest.

We will see you next week with job number two.

It's a date.

Thank you for listening to Office Ladies' Second Drink.

This episode was initially created in collaboration with Earwolf.

Office Ladies is a presentation of Odyssey and is produced by Jenna Fisher and Angela Kinsey.

Our executive producer is Cassie Jorkins, and our audio engineer and associate producer is Molly Nugent.

Odyssey's executive producer is Leah Reese Dennis.

Office Ladies was mixed and mastered by Bill Schultz.

Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.

We want to talk to you guys a little bit about new Ego Protein Waffles.

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Yes, Ego protein plus waffles provide the same great taste of eggo that you know and love plus 10 grams of protein per serving i made the new egg o protein waffles for my kids the other day they didn't even know that they were protein waffles they're just the ego waffles that you know and love they're just i know they have protein they're just yummy waffles yes i mean listen I know we're talking about breakfast, but I have shared this before.

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