TRANSCRIPT
OFFICE LADIES | EPISODE 50 - PRODUCT RECALL
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:04] I'm Jenna Fischer.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:05] I'm Angela Kinsey.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:06] We were on The Office" together.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:07] And we're best friends.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:08] And now we're doing the ultimate "Office" rewatch podcast just for you.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:12] 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.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:19] We're the "Office Ladies". Howdy, Ang.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:26] Bonjour, Jenna.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:27] Oh, oh, that's gonna kind of come up later in this episode. There's gonna be some accents later.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:33] There are. Oh, it's fun Accent Day.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:36] Oh, no. People are turning us off.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:38] No, no, no.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:39] They're like, "Oh no. It's Accent Day".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:41] Guys, it's OK. We won't go crazy. Yeah. This is a fun one, Jenna. Tell them what we're doing today.
JENNA FISCHER [00:00:46] We are doing "Product Recall", Season 3, Episode 20, written by Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester and directed by Randall Einhorn.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:57] Randall, I was so excited when Randall got to direct. We'll get into that. But, you know, Randall was our cinematographer, so this was really fun for him and fun for us.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:06] Did you know that Randall directed the most episodes of "The Office"?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:10] No, I did not.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:12] Crazy, right? I think he did 15.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:16] That is so wild. Well, I love that even more.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:18] Well, I am ready for a summary, Angela. But I've got a little special something. Sam?
STING [00:01:30] [Summary Jingle plays]
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:34] That is so adorable.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:36] Isn't that so cool?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:38] It's so cute.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:39] That was sent in by Joey Moesika. And he said he recorded all of the parts himself, just like Andy.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:45] I was gonna ask because there's like a doo wop part.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:49] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:50] That's so cool. Thank you, Joey.
JENNA FISCHER [00:01:51] All right. So here is the summary for "Product Recall". "Dunder Mifflin is in crisis mode after paper with an obscene watermark, goes into circulation to customers". Oof.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:06] Oof.
JENNA FISCHER [00:02:07] "Michael organizes a press conference and apologizes to a client when the client demands that Michael be fired. Michael recruits Pam and Dwight to help him make an apology video. The accountants learn how to make customer service calls from Kelly and Creed, who is determined to save his job, pins the blame on an employee at the paper mill".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:28] Poor Debbie Brown.
JENNA FISCHER [00:02:30] Oh, poor Debbie.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:32] This was such a fun episode. I loved rewatching it. I had so many fun memories.
JENNA FISCHER [00:02:38] Same. Oh my gosh. I feel like Steve is in rare form in this episode.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:43] I also personally think some of the best quotes of the whole Season 3 are in this episode.
JENNA FISCHER [00:02:50] Oh yes. It's so many. We'll get to it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:53] And I just want to share one of my favorite quotes of the whole entire series is in this episode.
JENNA FISCHER [00:02:59] Oh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:02] [Animal noise]
JENNA FISCHER [00:03:02] This is also the episode of animal noises or non-verbal reactions.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:07] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:03:07] Accents and nonverbal.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:10] Someone just hit fast forward.
JENNA FISCHER [00:03:12] Oh, no. Well, Fast Fact Number One, I mentioned that this episode was written by both Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester. I should probably clarify that there are some writers who work in teams.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:25] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:03:25] Like we've mentioned before, Gene and Lee.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:27] They were a writing team. They were hired together as a duo. But Justin and Brent were not a writing team. They were hired separately. So this was interesting that they were co-writing this together.
JENNA FISCHER [00:03:40] Well, we reached out to both of them to hear what it was like to be paired together on this episode. So they said that Greg just paired them together because he thought it would be kind of fun. And Justin told me that they basically just split it down the middle, that Brent took a pass at Act One. Justin did Act Two and then they split Act Three. And then they came together one afternoon and they kind of went over it. And since Brent was the senior writer, he kind of took the lead on a kind of a dual rewrite. And then they turned it in and it was kind of, you know, punched up by the staff like every other episode.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:04:17] I could see Greg doing this because he loved pairing together people to see what would come out of that pairing, whether it was characters or writers. You know, he loved to see what happened. Even our editor sometimes were paired up in different ways.
JENNA FISCHER [00:04:30] Well, Brent said that it's true that Greg did make it clear that he was the senior writer and that he had final decision on what went into the draft, but he said right from the start he could see that Justin scenes were just so good that it would be a terrible mistake to put, quote, "my grubby fingers on any of it", end quote. So he said that they didn't change any of each other's work. They ended up turning it in just as they had both originally written it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:04:59] Well, that is so fun.
JENNA FISCHER [00:05:00] All right, Fast Fact Number Two, I asked these guys what was the inspiration for this episode? Was this based on anything in real life? And Justin told me that he couldn't remember exactly where the idea came from, but he's pretty sure that it just came out of one of those pitch sessions in the room. So it wasn't like one writer had the idea, but it was sort of a collective, one of your group mind things, Ang.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:26] Oh, I like group mind.
JENNA FISCHER [00:05:28] Well, he said he does have a very distinct memory as they were circling closer and closer to something that felt like an episode, Lee Eisenberg suddenly blurted out, "A product recall! It's a product recall"! And after Lee said that they knew it was gonna be like a defective product and a mini scandal. But here's the thing, Ang, here is why I asked. I did a little Googling. This episode aired in April 2007. And the crazy thing is that in August of 2007, there was a massive historic Mattel toy recall. A huge product recall.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:06:07] What did they recall?
JENNA FISCHER [00:06:09] They recalled 19 million toys.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:06:12] What was it?
JENNA FISCHER [00:06:14] Some of them were recalled because they had lead paint.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:06:17] Was it a G.I. Joe?
JENNA FISCHER [00:06:19] No, I don't know what it was. A bunch of toys that were shown to have lead paint. And the other was because there was a tiny magnet that kept falling off. And it posed a choking hazard. But also in 2007, there was a massive crib recall. One million Graco and Simplicity cribs were recalled. And I even read an article that called 2007, quote, "The year of the recall".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:06:46] Well, that's crazy. I wonder if it was in the Zeitgeist. It was in the group mind of the world. And it went into Lee's brain and he shouted into the writers' room and it became an episode of "The Office".
JENNA FISCHER [00:06:59] Major group mind.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:07:00] That some global group mind.
JENNA FISCHER [00:07:02] OK, lady, I'm going to move us along to Fast Fact Number Three. I'm calling it "Location Alert".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:07:08] OK.
JENNA FISCHER [00:07:09] As part of this episode, Jim and Andy go to a local high school to apologize for the obscene watermark and Kentapedia let us know, because we got some mail. People wanted to know, was this the same school where we shot "Diwali"?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:07:22] People love to know about locations. They love it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:07:25] I know. This was filmed at a different school than "Diwali". This time we filmed at St. John Paul Academy in Burbank. In real life, it is a private Catholic STEM immersion high school. The school colors are white, blue and red. And the real students at the school wear uniforms. For our shoot, we hired background performers to play the students. We did not use the actual students of the school.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:07:53] I feel like that is a thorough answer to this location question.
JENNA FISCHER [00:07:58] Yeah. You know, I went to a Catholic high school.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:01] I know this.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:01] It was not coed. It was all girls. And I wore a uniform and our colors were green and white and gray and navy, I think were the colors we were allowed to wear, and yellow.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:14] That's a lot of colors.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:16] It's really only five. And you're only allowed to wear those colors.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:20] Seems like a lot. Scale it back.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:23] Do you? Do you wear? How many colors do you wear?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:28] I just grab whatever's, you know, there. I-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:33] Right. So imagine you're getting dressed in the morning and you have to limit it to only these five colors.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:38] Well, listen, a friend of mine did that thing. Remember when ladies would get their colors done? Do you remember?
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:44] Oh, yes. And you find out if you're like fall or spring.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:46] Yes. A summer or a winter or something. My mom did this.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:49] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:49] My mom was a summer.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:51] OK.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:51] So a friend of mine recently did this. It's sort of-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:08:55] Wait, they're still doing this.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:56] They're still doing it. It sort of went out of fashion but whatever. She did it and she found out that she's like shades of blue and coral and white and, and she just filled her closet with those colors. She's always in those three colors.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:11] So what, do you know what she is? Is that summer?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:14] I don't know.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:15] Coral, blue and white.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:16] I don't know what it is. Maybe spring. But listen, it's a commitment to stay in those three colors. I'd have a hard time.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:23] Oh, my God. This is literally what I was saying. I said I could only wear five colors. And you're like, "Ha, that's a lot of colors. I don't see what the issue is". And now you're like, "I would have a hard time only wearing a few colors".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:34] My point was, if you're going to have a school that has uniforms, you can't have a lot of options.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:42] Why?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:43] Because you're already-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:44] You can't have personal expression within uniform?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:47] No.
JENNA FISCHER [00:09:48] Oh my gosh. You're taking a stand. You clearly not thought about this at all because you are taking multiple positions on this one subject.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:57] What's the point of having a uniform if you can have multiple colors and freedom of expression? There's no point. Either have a uniform or don't.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:06] All right. Well, we had to all wear the same skirt. It was the same. There was no choice. Or navy pants.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:13] Or a yellow shirt or a green shirt or a white shirt. We, we have to be done talking about this.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:18] Alright. On top, you could wear the different colors.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:22] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:22] But they had to be a collared shirt and you couldn't have any like-.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:25] Logo.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:26] Logos. No logos, not even like, you know, some people, they would try to sneak in like a little polo on their lapel. And that would be a no.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:37] Well, look it up.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:39] Because that, yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:39] Lock it up, uniform, lock it up. Lady, where are we?
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:44] Well, we're ready to take a break and then we're going to come back and break down this episode.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:47] Well, before we take a break, I want to just share one thing about this episode. Well, I'll just get to it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:10:57] What is it?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:58] I had the hugest zit on my cheek and I remember being really bummed out because I had a nice big storyline and I woke up with an enormous zit on my cheek and they tried to cover it with makeup. Jenna, they didn't splurge for CGI and scootchy it out. It's in the whole episode. There's so much makeup on it. It's like an orange patch on my cheek.
JENNA FISCHER [00:11:21] I did not notice it one time in watching this.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:11:23] It's on my left cheek.
JENNA FISCHER [00:11:24] Do you have time codes for it? Is that something we can look forward to after the break?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:11:29] Yes. Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:11:31] Well, there you go, guys.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:11:31] If you want to close up. Well, listen, I'm sure you're riveted now. You can't wait to come back. We're going to take a break, and come back with this episode. OK, so we start off this episode with a very funny cold open, I think it is one of the classics of all the cold opens on the whole series.
JENNA FISCHER [00:11:57] 100 percent.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:11:58] It is Jim dressed as Dwight, acting like Dwight, and it makes Dwight crazy. And some of the best lines right here in this cold open.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:09] Lady, I remember filming this episode and John Krasinski was so funny. We could not hold it together.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:16] Well, we all knew how great he was at impressions. And so when he got to actually flex that a little, we were just like, "Ah! I can't wait to watch".
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:23] Well, Angela, I think this cold open has two of our most quoted moments.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:30] For sure.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:30] Number one, "Bears beats 'Battlestar Galactica'".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:35] I mean, how many T-shirts is that on? It's on everything.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:38] And also, "Identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:45] That's right, that's right.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:46] I see that all the time. "Identity theft is not a joke". Don't we sell pencils that say, "Identity theft is not a joke"? Don't we have a pencil pack on OfficeLadies.com?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:56] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:57] And we have that quote, right?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:59] We have that quote.
JENNA FISCHER [00:12:59] And we also have "Bears beats 'Battlestar Galactica'".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:02] It's just one of my favorite quotes. It is not my favorite quote of the whole episode, though. We'll get to that. But this couplet is so fun. And I have seen people like at conventions and stuff say this "False. Black bear". Like the whole thing.
JENNA FISCHER [00:13:17] Oh, yeah. Let's, we should play it. Sam?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:19] Yes, let's play it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:13:20] Can you play this clip?
JIM HALPERT [00:13:21] Question what kind of bear is best?
DWIGHT SCHRUTE [00:13:26] That's a ridiculous question.
JIM HALPERT [00:13:27] False. Black bear.
DWIGHT SCHRUTE [00:13:29] Well, that's debatable. There are basically two schools of thought.
JIM HALPERT [00:13:32] Fact bears eat beets. Bears beats "Battlestar Galactica".
DWIGHT SCHRUTE [00:13:38] Bears do not. What is going on? What are you doing?
JENNA FISCHER [00:13:44] I love it so much.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:45] I want to know, what are the two schools of thoughts about bears? We never find out.
JENNA FISCHER [00:13:50] We don't. Listen, we had a fan question from Ashley Trick, Emily Dennis, Faith L., Rianne Holub and Terror Laport. Basically, they all said the same version of this, "Please, please, please tell us everything about the cold open. It is one of the best sequences on television ever. How long did it take John and Rainn to get through it"? Here's what I found out, Angela.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:14:14] OK.
JENNA FISCHER [00:14:15] Kentapedia thinks we only did about eight takes of this. He said it went a lot faster than we may realize.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:14:24] Well, it was a quick beat. You know, it was a quick scene.
JENNA FISCHER [00:14:28] And then I asked Justin and he said that he and Brent did not write this cold open. They wrote a cold open where Michael is getting scammed by a telemarketer. But during the rewriting process, Gene and Lee are the ones who came up with the idea for Jim to come in as Dwight. And they wrote the cold open. And it was Mike Schur who pitched the line, "Bears beats 'Battlestar Galactica'".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:14:57] Applause. Applause.
JENNA FISCHER [00:15:01] This is why you need a whole writing team. Look at that. That's how the magic happens.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:15:07] It's a collaboration, people. I have two other observations about this cold open, not as popular as the obvious ones, "Bears beats 'Battlestar Galactica'", all that. But I have you know, there is a new plant at reception.
JENNA FISCHER [00:15:22] No, get out of here.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:15:25] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:15:25] What is going on?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:15:26] I am telling you, I don't know when I'll have time to do this, but I am going to screengrab every plant on reception for the whole series.
JENNA FISCHER [00:15:34] What is it this week?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:15:36] It's a real sad looking plant. It's only got a few leaves on it. It's in a purple pot with, it looks like some polka dots and it is through the whole episode. I notice it's in the cold open, the tag and the whole episode. And in Jim's talking head, where he says he created that whole look for 11 dollars.
JENNA FISCHER [00:15:53] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:15:53] We have an old tech alert. Old tech alert. We have the old calculator watch.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:02] Oh yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:02] Now, I know that Dwight always wears one. But just to see Jim actually use it, like you, you hear the beeping as he's adding on it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:09] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:09] I just thought it was really fun.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:10] How often do you use the calculator on your phone?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:13] Surprisingly, a lot.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:14] Same. Same. I see why they made a calculator watch.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:17] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:18] Because you, you know, I use it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:20] I mean, I remember like because I'm 100 years old that, you know, boys would have it at school and they would be told in math class they could not use it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:28] You know, I spent a year where I refused to let myself use a calculator and I had to do all of my math problems by hand. It was just a weird commitment I made to not, you know, I don't know.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:42] To struggle.
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:45] Yes. It was a weird commitment I made because I felt sort of like I should be able to add 26 and 97 without a calculator. Like just, you know, carry the one or whatever.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:56] How old were you when you made this commitment?
JENNA FISCHER [00:16:58] I was in my 30s.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:59] Really?
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:02] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:02] I was really expecting you to say I was 24.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:06] No, I just got disappointed in myself for relying on my calculator for simple math problems.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:13] So did I know you when you made this commitment?
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:16] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:16] Because I knew you in your 30s.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:17] Yeah, I guess you did.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:20] My best-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:20] I guess I never added anything or subtract anything around you.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:23] My best friend in her 30s took a year off from calculators and didn't tell me.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:30] Yeah. I do weird stuff like that sometimes. What is that about me?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:33] I think you like to make hurdles for yourself.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:38] What? This is horrible. I should speak to a therapist about this. What am I doing? Why am I making me life harder?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:44] You know what? You get, you get into a real cushy stride. You're like, "Hey, things are clipping along, I'm having a great run here. I'm going to give myself a hurdle".
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:55] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:56] I don't deserve-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:17:57] Life is too easy. I'm going to stop using a calculator.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:00] I don't deserve this cushy stride right now. I'm not allowed to use a calculator.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:07] Oh, my God.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:08] Lady.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:09] Alright.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:10] It's OK to use a calculator.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:12] Well, I use one now.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:13] Well, good.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:13] I mean, that was one of the dumbest things I've ever done. That was one of my dumber goals.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:18] I'm sure there's a mathematician out there somewhere that's like really into that, Jenna, that's like, "Yeah, way to go".
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:26] You know what I'll say? At the end of the year, I was no better at adding, subtracting or multiplying than I was when I started.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:33] You can't say that. That can't be your button. You have to say-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:37] There was no skill gained.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:39] Oh, my god.
JENNA FISCHER [00:18:39] There was no speed. Nothing, I was still, you know, counting on my fingers to carry the numbers. I mean, it was like, it was for nothing.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:50] You just had a year where you were slightly more irritable. OK, let's get into this episode. Speaking of people being irritable, everyone is on the phone with very upset customers. I want to share with you that there are a lot of delicious deleted scenes and one of them starts off in customer service with this speech and Kelly repeats it over and over, and Ryan is like dying inside because he's right behind her and it cuts to a talking head of Ryan and he's got it fully memorized. But this is what Kelly says, right at the top of the episode, had it stayed in. "Customer service. This is Kelly. Oh, my God. I am so sorry. That is so messed up. Everyone here is so upset, you have no idea. And rest assured, your voice has been heard. OK, I'll be thinking about you all day". "Customer service. This is Kelly. Oh, my God. I am so sorry. That is so messed up. Everyone here is so upset, you have no idea. And rest assured, your voice has been heard. OK, I'll be thinking about you all day".
JENNA FISCHER [00:20:02] Wow.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:03] She says it on a loop. And Ryan looks like he wants to just explode.
JENNA FISCHER [00:20:10] Well, Michael has a talking head where he explains what happened, why everyone is so upset, why everyone's on the phone. I guess a disgruntled employee sent out 500 boxes of their standard paper with a pornographic watermark. Of two cartoon characters engaging in a sex act.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:34] Yes, he said it's a beloved duck doing something to a mouse.
JENNA FISCHER [00:20:39] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:39] Now, was he talking about Daffy Duck and Mickey Mouse. Because he says, "Never been a fan, not a fan".
JENNA FISCHER [00:20:46] Well, I think he would be talking about Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:50] Oh, yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:20:51] Because Daffy is part of the Bugs Bunny.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:55] Oh, I can't keep my ducks straight. I just like the idea-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:02] That is, that is the quote of the day. "Ah, I just can't keep my ducks straight". There's so many.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:10] There's so many. There's so many.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:12] So many cartoon ducks who can, Scrooge McDuck. There's so many.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:14] So many ducks. But I love the idea. It just makes me laugh that Michael has never liked Mickey Mouse.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:22] I know. Not funny enough for him. I don't know.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:25] I guess not.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:25] Not edgy enough.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:25] Not know enough jokes. Well, Michael holds up the piece of paper to the light and shows the watermark.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:34] Mmhmm.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:34] And guess who did a little bit of a deep dive on watermarks?
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:39] You? Because it wasn't me. And we're the only two people on this podcast.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:44] Sam? Codi? Sam? Codi? Anyone? No one? No, it was me, folks.
JENNA FISCHER [00:21:48] It was you.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:48] It was me. And listen, I don't know if this is going to be interesting. I found it fascinating. I'll do a quick overview. OK? So we all know what a watermark is, right? A watermark is basically this image that's applied to a piece of paper. Right? And you hold it up to the light and that's how you see it. The term watermark comes from the way these designs are created. It's during the wet paper stage of making paper. Right? It's almost like a damp-, I know, it was really fascinating. A damp water spot. Here's where it gets interesting. Ready?
JENNA FISCHER [00:22:20] Yes.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:22] Did you know that watermarks were first introduced in Fabriano, Italy and 1282.
JENNA FISCHER [00:22:31] Yes, I did.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:32] You did not!
JENNA FISCHER [00:22:34] Of course, I did not know that.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:37] Why did I believe you? I wholeheartedly believed you. Like somehow-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:22:39] I think my delivery was very good.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:42] You're a very good actress. You should have won that Emmy that year. I was really mad you didn't, I curse on national television.
JENNA FISCHER [00:22:48] Me too.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:49] OK, so, and they're not really sure why exactly watermarks started in Italy, then it could have been, you know, to show like maybe it was the service of the king or to convey a secret message or prove authenticity of a message. Right?
JENNA FISCHER [00:23:03] But now wait. They were deliberately invented. So one thing I'm curious about is that the watermark was not an accident that happened one day in the wet paper making stage of papermaking. And then people were like, oh, my gosh, what if we did this on purpose? Someone purposely watermarked.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:23:23] Well, Jenna, I don't, I don't have, you know, the fellow's journal from 1282. It might have been a thing where he was like, hey, that's my thumb. Hey, that's cool. We should do that. Oh, I bet the king would like this because then everyone would know it's his paper.
JENNA FISCHER [00:23:37] I love how this, I love how this paper maker in Italy in the 1200s journals exactly like you.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:23:44] Exactly.
JENNA FISCHER [00:23:44] "Oh, my God, my thumb! Oh, hey, I should tell the king about this".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:23:49] "He might like to have his official paper. Oh, man. Gonna have a glass of wine. OK".
JENNA FISCHER [00:23:54] "Aw, look at the hummingbirds. XO".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:23:57] "XOXOs".
JENNA FISCHER [00:23:58] "Paper Maker Guy".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:23:59] "Smiley face". So Cartiere Miliani Fabriano claims to have innovated three techniques which are still a part of papermaking today. But here's the fun part, Jenna, put this on our bucket list. You and I can go and visit the Paper and Watermark Museum of Fabriano in Italy.
JENNA FISCHER [00:24:22] Oh, that is 100 percent happening now.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:24:25] How much fun would we have? Walking through that, getting a tour? How perfect would it be? These two people who were on a show about paper going to one of the oldest paper mills in the world?
JENNA FISCHER [00:24:38] I can't wait. That is bucket list, for sure.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:24:40] Let's get back.
JENNA FISCHER [00:24:42] Well, let me tell you what Brent told me about this obscene watermark.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:24:47] Oh, yes. Let's hear it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:24:47] Brent, our writer, told me that this watermark for our show was faithfully created by our prop department and that it really did look like a blank sheet of paper. But when you get up close, you can see this little caricature. And he said after the episode, he asked the prop department to have one of the sheets of paper. And he framed it. And it hangs on the wall of his office. And he says people come in all the time and they say, "Why do you have a blank piece of paper framed on your wall"? And he says, "It's a keepsake from 'The Office'. Look closely". And then they leaned forward and they inevitably say, "Oh, my God". Because, you know, on the show, we put the little black bar up to hide the real obscene part. But on the actual piece of paper, I think.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:25:36] It's there.
JENNA FISCHER [00:25:37] It's all there.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:25:39] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:25:40] There you go.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:25:40] And that was, that was Phil Shea's job that week.
JENNA FISCHER [00:25:43] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:25:43] That was his job. How was your day? Well, I had to have a duck and a mouse do some stuff. Anyway, how was your day?
JENNA FISCHER [00:25:51] Exactly. I want to point out something before we get too far. Remember we said at the very beginning of this episode, everybody's on the phone and they're talking to customers and they're like really trying to do damage control. I wanted to point out that at 1 minute, 55 seconds, Creed is holding the phone up to his ear, but he isn't saying anything. It's a little bit of foreshadowing, I think, for the fact that Creed knows he's responsible. He's just, he's pretending to be on the phone with a customer, I think, but not really.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:22] It could also just be Creed being Creed.
JENNA FISCHER [00:26:25] Yeah. Not doing his job again.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:29] Yeah. Exactly. So Michael gets everyone in the conference room. You know, this is like crunch time. And he, he says, "Creed, you really messed up".
JENNA FISCHER [00:26:37] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:38] "You're Quality Assurance". So I feel like we, we officially hear Creed's job title.
JENNA FISCHER [00:26:43] Quality Assurance.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:44] Creed says every week, he's supposed to stop by the paper mill, give it a check. The one year he blew this off.
JENNA FISCHER [00:26:51] So good.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:52] So he hasn't gone for a whole year.
JENNA FISCHER [00:26:56] Well, I know I said at the beginning of the podcast that Michael is in rare form in this episode and he truly is in this conference room scene. But also Creed absolutely crushes it in this episode, as well.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:08] He does.
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:09] So we get back into the conference room. Michael has just great stuff. He's, you know, he was speaking in acronyms.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:15] "Crimmins Squaw, FNC".
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:18] Not saving any time, as everyone points out.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:20] And he's really, I mean, Michael is really freaking out. He tells everyone this is "Threat Level Midnight".
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:27] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:28] "Midnight, Oscar".
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:29] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:29] "Threat Level Midnight". This is such a fun callback to "The Client".
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:34] Yes. And everybody gives a little looks to each other because of it too.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:37] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:38] Well then Michael says, "Today, Kelly will be training everyone on how to do customer relations".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:46] Oof.
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:47] And Angela, you have a talking head where you just take a pill and you say-.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:54] Well-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:27:55] You don't have a headache. You're just preparing.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:59] Yeah. I loved, I loved this back-to-back talking heads because Mindy is Kelly is like, "This day is bananas. B-a-n-a-n-a-s". And she's so perky and happy. And then it cuts to me just taking an aspirin.
JENNA FISCHER [00:28:13] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:13] And my kids were really hung up on this. They really wanted to know, was that a real pill? Did I have to take it? They were like, "Tt looks like you take it, you swallow water".
JENNA FISCHER [00:28:22] Oh, Angela. We got so much mail about this. OK, Carlos L., Taya C., Emily W., Angela B, and Lily N. all said, "What did you take instead of a real pill"?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:34] Well, I will tell you. I did a few takes of that talking head and I had to take sugar pills.
JENNA FISCHER [00:28:40] Wow. So I guess that's a props thing. I've never had to take fake medicine on a show before, so that's weird.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:48] Yeah. Phil Shea brought it to me. He said, listen, it's just sugar. It's like a sugar pill. So you'll be totally fine. So I guess I just had a little spike in sugar that day.
JENNA FISCHER [00:28:58] So also, during this conference room scene, Angela, we find out that Jim's client is a high school and they printed their prom invitations on this paper.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:10] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:29:10] So Michael tells Jim he has to physically go to the high school to rectify the situation. He says you have to bring someone. Ryan volunteers, Michael says, "No, you have to bring Andy".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:25] "William Doolittle at your service, aka, Will Do".
JENNA FISCHER [00:29:29] And there we go. We said we were bringing you accents. We didn't lie.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:35] And Jim is like, "Yeah, I'm definitely going alone". And Michael's like, "No, no. I need two men on this. That's what she said. No time! But she did. No time"! That is like such fantastic dialog.
JENNA FISCHER [00:29:47] Is that your favorite quote? Is that the one?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:49] No.
JENNA FISCHER [00:29:50] Still not yet?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:52] Still not yet.
JENNA FISCHER [00:29:53] Well, I remember John could not keep it together in this conference room scene. And anytime John starts to laugh, it is a very bad sign for the rest of us because you just know that we're never gonna make it through. But Steve does something in this conference room scene that makes John lose it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:11] I'm going to guess. I have no idea what you're about to say.
JENNA FISCHER [00:30:14] OK.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:14] I know people can't see me, Jenna.
JENNA FISCHER [00:30:17] OK.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:17] But, oh, my God, Sam's filming. This is what Steve does at 4 minutes, 2 seconds. Just to mess with all of us.
JENNA FISCHER [00:30:24] Yep. There it is. Angela just put her foot up on the table and then leaned in to her crotch.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:33] Do you know how, do you know how hard it is to lift your head, let this high when you're short? Like that table's kind of high.
JENNA FISCHER [00:30:41] Yeah, Steve took his foot and he put it up on the conference table. And I remember the first take he decided to do that. John lost it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:51] Yeah, because we had no idea.
JENNA FISCHER [00:30:53] Anytime Steve did that, Steve used to do that to John's desk all the time.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:57] Yes, he would. And you know what, Jenna? I remember in this scene when I lost it, I completely lost it when Michael goes, "Here is your headline. 'Scranton Area Paper Company Dunder Mifflin Apologizes to Valued Client. Some Companies Still Know How Business is Done".
JENNA FISCHER [00:31:19] That's what I'm saying. It was, it's like, it's like the greatest hits of Michael in this one conference room scene, in this episode. It's so good. Well, now Michael reveals that he is invited Barbara Allen, one of Dunder Mifflin's oldest customers, into the office. He's going to offer her a personal apology. He says if the press wants a story, we'll give them a story.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:42] Yeah. There's a great deleted scene of Dwight calling CNN.
JENNA FISCHER [00:31:47] Oh, yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:47] And like no one, no one will take his call. It's really funny.
JENNA FISCHER [00:31:53] Oh, my gosh. I love it. I love that Jim is like, "Did the press ask for a story"?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:00] Nope. Nope.
JENNA FISCHER [00:32:02] No. No. Michael explains in his talking head, when a company screws up, the best course of action is to hold a press conference.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:10] You've got to control the spin.
JENNA FISCHER [00:32:11] You've got to control the story. Well, this had me look up crisis management, Angela, because that's a whole thing now. Now, I did a very shallow dive on it. All I found out was that this really became popular in like the 1980s. And this idea of getting ahead of the story is all part of the Crisis Management Public Relations' handbook. So Michael has it a little bit right here, but he has it wrong in the sense that literally no one knows about this right now.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:43] Yeah, if Michael had not made a big to do, it would have just gone away. But no. He's going to blast it and it's going to blow up in his face.
JENNA FISCHER [00:32:51] Yeah. So now we see Creed is trying to do his own kind of damage control.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:01] I mean, Creed says that this job is the only thing separating him from being a homeless man because he was a homeless guy.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:09] Yeah. I have to say, Creed calling up this paper mill and asking who wasn't there last week, so that he can then pin it on this employee is kind of genius.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:24] Oh, Creed's a survivor. I mean-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:26] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:26] He's smart. He's actually, he's very smart. He's cunning.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:31] Yeah, I was actually impressed.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:34] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:35] I was like, wow.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:37] Wowsers.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:38] Who thought of that?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:39] It's exactly how I got my internship on Conan O'Brien, by the way.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:43] How did-? Wait, what?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:45] You know this story.
JENNA FISCHER [00:33:47] Oh yeah. You called up and-.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:49] I just kept. I would call and I would get like an answering machine, you know, because I wanted to do an internship at 30 Rock. And in New York. And you, and back in the day, before, like big Internet message boards and things like that, because I'm 100. You would have a phone number you would call and it would, I would say "Hi". It'd be like, "30 Rockefeller Center" and I'd be like, "Hi. I would love to apply for an internship". "Hold one moment, please". Transfer you to a machine. "If you would like to apply for an internship at 30 Rockefeller Center, please leave your name and phone number and someone will call you". I got that message every day for three months. And so one day I called up, I got the woman, "NBC". You know, "30 Rockefeller Center". I said, "Yes, I was just speaking to a woman about my internship and we got disconnected". She said, "Oh, Barbara"? I said, "Yes, Barbara". She said, "Let me transfer you". I said, "Thank you". Got to Barbara. Barbara's like, "Hi, Barbara". I was lik, "Barbara, I was just talking to someone about my internship and got disconnected" and she was like, "Oh, were you talking to Nancy"? I was like, "Yes, I was talking to Nancy". Transfers me through to Nancy. Nancy answers. "Hello". I'm like, "Hi. I was talking to someone about my internship", and she goes, "How did you get my number"?
JENNA FISCHER [00:35:08] Did you tell her?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:35:09] I told her. I said, well, for three months I called and I got your voicemail. And no one called me back. So today I called and I lied. And I said that I was talking to someone and that person transferred me to Barbara. And then I told Barbara a version of that lie. And she transferred me to you.
JENNA FISCHER [00:35:25] And did Nancy say you're hired?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:35:28] Nancy said, "Can you be here Monday"? And I was in Texas. It was a Friday. I was in Archer City, Texas, very rural area, three hours from a big airport. I said, "Sure thing. What time"? She said, "I'll see you Monday at nine". I said, "Great". I got off the phone. I said, "Mom, Dad, I got to go to New York"!
JENNA FISCHER [00:35:47] Lady, that is what it takes. That's what it takes.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:35:51] I think you just like, when you're starting out and especially when you're like the lowest person on the totem pole, you got to have a little hustle.
JENNA FISCHER [00:35:59] Got to have a little hustle. Guys, you heard it from us.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:03] Get that hustle. OK, so there is a whole bunch of deleted scenes with Kelly in accounting. There's like a whole runner. It's really fun. I mean, at one point, Kelly and Angela get into this huge fight. And Kelly says, "You look old enough to be my mother". And Angela then calls her a slut.
JENNA FISCHER [00:36:23] Oh, my gosh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:24] I know. And then they make up. Kelly apologizes. And then she's like, "Oh, my God, we're best friends". And Angela's like, "I don't know about that". It's like. But there's a whole other journey that Kelly and Angela have that you don't see.
JENNA FISCHER [00:36:37] Well, now, should we go into the car with Andy and Jim driving to the high school?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:43] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:36:44] Is this it, Angela?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:45] This is leading up to it. Here are some things we learned on this road trip with Jim and Andy. Number one, we learned that Andy says "Beer me" when he wants something. Beer is like a verb, like, get me that, beer me that water, right?
JENNA FISCHER [00:36:58] Yes.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:58] We also learned that Karen is one of Andy's oldest friends? What?
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:04] I think-.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:05] I don't think so.
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:06] That's just because they worked together at Stanford.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:08] Yeah. Yeah. And we learned that, do not ask Andy to play music.
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:13] Because he just, he just sings.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:15] Like some acapella version of "Drift Away".
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:18] Well, this "Beer Me" line is another one of our most quoted. And Jim even says, "Lord, beer me strength".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:24] That's my favorite line.
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:27] That's yours?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:30] Of, of, almost, like I think about lines from the whole entire show. And one of my favorite lines from the whole entire series happens at 7 minutes, 51 seconds. And it's, "Lord, beer me strength". I love it so much. I love it, I don't know if it's because growing up, there's been so many times where I've been like, "Lord, give me strength". And just to have "Lord, beer me strength", it just tickles me. I just love it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:37:56] Well, I reached out to Justin and Brent because I was very curious. Who wrote this "Beer me" joke.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:03] Oh, I would love to know. All right. They told me that their memory is that Ed Helms had a friend in college who used to say "Beer me". And it was Brent who expanded it and wrote the joke, "Beer me a water". But this was based on a story from Ed Helms. They said he also had this friend that would do the "Retadida doo" and Ed confirmed that.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:26] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:38:26] Right? Ed said he had a friend who would do like a gibberish thing to cut people off.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:30] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:38:31] All right. Well, I texted Ed and Ed is like, "I don't know what they're talking about. I don't have any memory of a friend".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:38] What?
JENNA FISCHER [00:38:38] He was like, "Yeah, the 'retadida do"'. But I have no memory of a friend saying, 'Beer me'. I don't know".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:42] Oh, my gosh. This is like that moment where, you know, something happens and you ask five people what happened. And they all have a different story.
JENNA FISCHER [00:38:50] Yeah. Yeah. The one thing we know is that Brent did write the joke, "Beer me a water".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:57] So Jim has sort of suffered through this car ride with Andy. Now they're in the high school and they're walking through. And Andy's like, "Oh, my God. What's my girlfriend doing here"? And Jim's like, "oh, is she like the counselor or something"? And he's like, "No, she works part time at the frozen yogurt place".
JENNA FISCHER [00:39:16] Yeah. She's that girl standing by her locker.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:21] Her locker.
JENNA FISCHER [00:39:22] Yeah, and Jim's like, "Oh, Andy".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:25] Oh, Lord.
JENNA FISCHER [00:39:26] So Andy goes up to confront her and she's like, "I have to go to Spanish class". Andy's mind is blown. He had no idea that she was a high school student. Andy does let us know that they did not do anything illegal except knock over a few mailboxes with her friends.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:44] There's also a deleted scene where Andy talks about how they met in a talking head. And he was at like a convenience store and she asked him to buy wine coolers for her and her friends.
JENNA FISCHER [00:39:55] Oh boy. Well, the actress who played Jamie was Shira Scott Astrof. And lady, she was a contestant on "The Bachelor" Season 16.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:09] What?
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:09] The one with Ben. Bachelor Ben.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:12] I don't, I've never watched "The Bachelor".
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:14] OK, well, she's a part of Bachelor Nation. So I looked her up on Insta and I slid into her DMs.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:22] Oh, my gosh. What'd she say?
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:24] OK, well, first of all, Shira and I have a mutual friend in common, and it's actor Michael Rosenbaum. So I think it was slightly less creepy when I slid into her DMs because I saw on her instead that she was friends with Michael. So I was able to lead with that.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:41] That's good.
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:41] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:42] Don't be creepy.
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:42] I'm always trying to find the least creepy way to slide into someone's DMs.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:48] Hey, what's up? What's happening?
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:48] Hey, remember when you were on "The Office", you want to talk about it?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:51] I haven't talked to a while, but what's up? OK.
JENNA FISCHER [00:40:54] OK. So we e-mailed her. She e-mailed back and she told me all about her time on the show because, Ang, whenever there are these scenes that happen on a location and we weren't there, I like to get details. I want to know a little bit about it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:41:09] No, I love it. Every time we reach out to someone in scenes like this, it's always so fun and it just kind of fills in the picture for us.
JENNA FISCHER [00:41:16] All right. So here is what she told me. She said that when she got the audition for this, she had never watched the show before.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:41:24] Really?
JENNA FISCHER [00:41:24] Yeah. So she said she watched one episode and then went to her audition. It was a cold read, meaning they would not give her the material ahead of time because they didn't want the storyline to leak.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:41:36] Oh, that's so hard. So she had no idea.
JENNA FISCHER [00:41:38] But then she got the job! And also she told me, because she had never really watched the show. She thought that she was going to be playing Michael's girlfriend. So when she got to set, she was expecting to see Steve Carell. And that's when she met Ed and John. Now, here is the thing that I found absolutely fascinating. In this episode when she shot this, she was three months shy from turning 28.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:08] Oh, my gosh.
JENNA FISCHER [00:42:08] She was 27 years old. She said she was older than John Krasinski and only five years younger than Ed Helms.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:15] Baby face. Oh my goodness.
JENNA FISCHER [00:42:18] Yes. She said she had the absolute best time filming this episode. It is still one of the best experiences she's ever had. And after she filmed it, she went home and watched every single "Office" episode from Season 1. She totally binged it. And so she was super excited by the time her episode finally aired. She was like a super fan.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:38] That is so fun.
JENNA FISCHER [00:42:39] But she said to this day, people still write her about being on the show. And she's so proud to say that she was part of "The Office". Well, listen, guys. Shira was so lovely to tell us about her time on "The Office". She has a new film coming out called "Half Brothers". She's also going to be in a pilot on Amazon called "On the Spectrum". Her Instagram is at ShiraScottAstrof. But here's the plug I can't wait to give.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:09] What?
JENNA FISCHER [00:43:09] She is the founder of an animal rescue organization called the Animal Rescue Mission. They rescue abused and neglected dogs and cats in Los Angeles and all over the world. She just rescued like 70 dogs from death row in Tijuana.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:27] Oh, my gosh.
JENNA FISCHER [00:43:28] And placed them in homes.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:30] Aw.
JENNA FISCHER [00:43:31] So she said if anyone wants to adopt an animal or donate, you can go to the Animal Rescue Mission.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:38] Well-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:43:38] And check them out.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:39] I love that. We have four rescues. I love little rescuing animals. That makes me so happy.
JENNA FISCHER [00:43:46] I know. Should we talk about Dwight preparing for the big press conference back at the office?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:53] Oh, yeah. Well, you know, he equates this to beet sales. You've got to put the money beets. Those are the attractive beets. You got to put them up front.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:01] That's right.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:02] He has set up the conference room for a giant press conference. All for one man.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:11] Mmhmm.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:12] This is Chad Lite from the Scranton Times.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:15] He does the lighter side of life.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:17] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:18] And the obits.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:19] Right.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:20] And there's a great deleted scene with him and Creed, where he recognizes Creed. He's like, "Wait. Creed Bratton from the Grass Roots". Jenna, he basically calls Creed out as himself.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:32] Oh, my gosh. And it got deleted again.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:34] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:44:34] This, the origin of Creed keeps getting deleted. It got deleted out of "Booze Cruise". It got deleted out of, what was the other episode where we found out that he stole his name from someone in prison? "The Convict". And now again.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:46] So Chad Lite goes, "Creed Bratton from the Grass Roots"? And Creed's like, "Yeah". And he goes, "I wrote your obituary". And Creed was like, "Oh, yeah". Creed has this great talking head that he faked his death so he could get like an insurance claim or something. He gets money. And so yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:45:05] Amazing.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:06] Amazing.
JENNA FISCHER [00:45:07] Well, Chad Lite was played by Anthony Russell. And I found this in Anthony's bio, which I thought was absolutely so charming. It said, "As a child, he played harmonica, ukulele, guitar, trombone and piano. He worked his way through college, singing in a show band. And after he graduated Montclair State College with a major in trombone and a minor in piano. His band was booked as a Las Vegas lounge act for many major hotels".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:39] Well, I played the trombone.
JENNA FISCHER [00:45:46] What? No, you didn't.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:47] Oh, yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:45:48] Stop it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:49] When we-, yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:45:49] What are you talking about?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:50] Yeah. When we moved to Archer City. It's very small town, like in football, it was Class2A, super small town. So to have a marching band, pretty much everyone had to participate. And so all my friends in the town was you know, I graduate with like 34 people. So my friend Shannon was like, "Are you gonna play in the band"? And I was like, "I don't know how to play an instrument". She goes, "It doesn't really matter. We just need people". And so I was like, "Well, what do you play"? Now my best friend was 6'3, guys. She was like the star basketball player. I said, "What do you play"? She said, "I play trombone". I was like 4'10. I was like, "Yeah, OK, sounds good. I'll do what you're doing". Because I wanted to be able to sit next to her. There was only three people in the trombone section, Shannon, Bill Crutcher and me. And I said, the first day I sat next to Bill and I said, "Bill, what what are you playing"? Because I, all I could hear was like beeeee. And he goes, "I just play letter F the whole time". I said, "OK". So Shannon was the only one that could really play. But I did learn how to play "Tequila".
JENNA FISCHER [00:46:53] What's that?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:58] [Does instrumental of the song, "Tequila"].
JENNA FISCHER [00:46:58] Oh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:59] Yeah. I learned how to play that. It's really fun on the trombone because you can, you do this big slide. And then I could never reach the the last position. You know?
JENNA FISCHER [00:47:08] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:09] Seventh position because I was too short. My arms didn't extend. Jenna, you wouldn't, you wouldn't use a calculator for the year, I was in a band playing a trombone for a few months of my life. Very poorly, by the way, very poorly playing the trombone.
JENNA FISCHER [00:47:27] I'm speechless.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:28] I know.
JENNA FISCHER [00:47:30] Where are we?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:31] Oh, God. I don't know if anyone even is listening anymore. Well, listen, I'll tell you where we are. Chad Lite has gotten level three security clearance. Don't get excited. It's level three out of 20. And they're getting ready for this big press conference. Meanwhile, Kevin, Oscar and Angela are busy apologizing to customers and it is not going well.
JENNA FISCHER [00:47:52] Well, because Angela refuses to say the words, "I'm sorry". She will not apologize. She keeps saying things like, our official position is one of apology. Like she's like, will not just say, we are so sorry.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:06] I love it when, like, Kelly is just patiently trying to coach her to say, like just to make conversation. And she's like, "Where are you from? Ohio. That's nice". She just does not want to be talking to these people.
JENNA FISCHER [00:48:20] No. No. And also, by the way, in the meantime, Creed has found out that Debbie Brown did not show up to work last week and he spends a whole tale for Dwight. He says, well, now she told me that she had an emergency dentist appointment. And Dwight gives a look to camera, which I think is a little bit of a callback to his lie to Michael about his dentist appointment, remember Crentist the Dentist?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:50] Yes. Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:48:53] But then he says, well, then Debbie told the people at her work that she had the stomach flu. So she's clearly just making things up to avoid taking responsibility for this watermark. He's really laying it on thick.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:06] Creed is vicious.
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:07] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:08] Well, Miss Allen arrives. And before we get into this really embarrassing press conference, why don't we take a break?
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:15] Yeah. We need a moment before we get to this.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:18] We promise we're kind of just talk about "The Office" for the rest of the show.
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:22] Why would you promise that when we know it's not true?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:25] Oh.
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:26] We'll try. We'll try.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:28] We'll try.
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:37] All right. So we are back. We are laser focused.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:42] Mmhmm.
JENNA FISCHER [00:49:42] And we are in a press conference. Oh, it is not going well. No, Michael apologizes to Mrs. Allen and he offers her a giant certificate, which, you know, he loves. Remember, in "Casino Night", he was like, "Toby, are we going to have one of those giant checks"? He's so-.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:00] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:50:01] I mean.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:01] It's a novelty check, is what he calls it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:50:04] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:04] It's a novelty check. It's big, huge. It says, "Six free months of paper or 25 reams, whichever comes first". And Mrs. Allen does not accept the apology. Mrs. Allen "gives zero Fs", as the kids say.
JENNA FISCHER [00:50:17] Oh, yeah. She literally says, "I do not accept your apology". It's so good. Michael doesn't know what to do with it. And, you know, Chad is back there, taken up all the notes on this press conference. He's ready to write his article.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:31] Oh, he's, his hand is flying across that notepad, he's jotting everything down. So this back and forth between Mrs. Allen and Michael, it just starts to escalate. And then he just asked her to leave and she just storms out. And says she's gonna call the Better Business Bureau. And Michael's like, "Oh, yeah, well, I'm going to call the ungrateful biatch hotline".
JENNA FISCHER [00:50:51] It really, really did not go as planned. I mean, I don't think there's any other way to say it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:56] I don't know, it could have gone worse. I really don't.
JENNA FISCHER [00:51:00] Well, lady, Mrs. Allen, the woman who played Mrs. Allen so very well was Lisa Darr. And she has done a ton of stuff like "Curb Your Enthusiasm". She was a regular on "Life as We Know It", and "Popular". She also had a recurring on "Strong Medicine", which is the show that I had a one day guest role on where my brain melted. But I found this very fascinating because I ended up doing a deep dive on her IMDB page. This is crazy. Are you ready?
ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:32] Yes.
JENNA FISCHER [00:51:34] She appeared in three episodes of "Murder, She Wrote". But each episode was in a different season and she played a different character. And then she was in two different seasons, playing two different characters, of "CSI". So she is such a good actress that she can appear multiple times in the same television show playing a different character each time. I felt like that was very telling of her talent.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:02] It is. But also, would she change her look?
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:05] I don't know, because I didn't do that deep of a dive. I didn't like YouTube all of her appearances. But, I mean, I found that significant.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:15] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:15] And unusual.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:17] Yeah, unless, I feel like that happened more back in the day, like on "Bewitched", weren't there two Darren's and like it was never explained or something?
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:25] Well that's like a major character change. This is like a guest role.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:30] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:31] Right? But they hired the same actress in three different guest roles.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:35] They loved her.
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:36] Clearly. Clearly. Well, I loved her, I thought she was great on our show.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:41] She was so good and she really just, I mean, pushed Michael over the edge.
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:46] Oh, my gosh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:48] You know, Jenna, I did say what could have made this press conference worse. And I, and Dwight, once again, does not help.
JENNA FISCHER [00:52:55] No.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:55] He said he thought both animals were smiling. There is a fantastic Dwight talking head where he talks about growing up on a farm and he has seen a lot of animal action. And he says really matter of factly, whoever drew this got it exactly right.
JENNA FISCHER [00:53:11] Yeah. He tries to tell Mrs. Allen that the cartoon did seem to depict a consensual sex act.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:19] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [00:53:19] Because they were smiling.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:20] And Dwight would know.
JENNA FISCHER [00:53:21] Right.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:22] Because of his farm life.
JENNA FISCHER [00:53:23] Right.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:24] Well, well, Michael is really upset, he starts to vent to Pam. I mean, that things got out of control. It's gonna be a national story. She's like, "Michael. This is the Scranton Times". And he's like, "No, it's, we need, we need to do an apology video". Well, then Michael pulls out the video camera and Jenna, the look on your face as Pam is so brilliant. It's so brilliant, Jenna. It said so much history. How many videos has Pam had to film of Michael apologizing for things? I will tell you in the deleted scenes, there is a runner of videos and they're fantastic.
JENNA FISCHER [00:54:03] I was going to say that. That we shot a whole bunch of former apology videos and they didn't make it in the episode. I will tell you that shooting this scene with Steve and Rainn and then also these old apology videos is some of the most fun I ever had on the show. It was so hard to get through these. It was so difficult.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:54:30] I don't know how you did it. And, and everything about your expressions, Jenna, are perfection. You don't give away much, but it says so much about what Pam is thinking. I just thought you did a phenomenal job. And I loved these scenes. I loved seeing the deleted ones. I want to see more. I could just see a clip show of all these videos that you guys had to do. And I loved the small touches. I loved the American flag behind him. Clearly made out of four pieces of paper taped together.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:01] Yep.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:01] And I loved that from 15 minutes, 55 seconds to 16 minutes, 5 seconds, Dwight is just spraying Michael's hair.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:12] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:14] 11 seconds of silence, except for, [spray noise], while he sprays the hair.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:21] I couldn't get through that. I laughed so hard. I broke constantly. It was very, very difficult to get through that.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:28] When you think about the real estate of a show, like every little moment counts, you're trying to just jam it with as much as possible. And I loved that our show would take these beats like this.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:40] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:41] 11 seconds. No one saying a word, just an aerosol can.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:44] Longer than you have to stay on a bull.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:47] That's true. Thank you for bringing my measurement of time back to bull riding.
JENNA FISCHER [00:55:53] Well, also, I don't know if you noticed in this scene. I kept my gaze on the camera. I never looked up to Steve. And I did this for two reasons. One, because it just felt like I'm in charge of operating the camera, and so I was going to make sure he stayed in frame and that just seemed like sort of my job. But the other reason was because I could look at the little plastic corner and then I wouldn't have to actually see Steve. And it was easier for me not to laugh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:56:27] I wondered about that. I was like A, it looks like you're really operating a video camera. But how lucky were you that you didn't have to make eye contact? Because you were to burst into laughter.
JENNA FISCHER [00:56:36] Also, when Rainn drops one of the cue cards and it makes a thud on the ground, that made me laugh. It was like when I was rewatching this scene, just I was breaking constantly. Those poor guys, I mean, they must have been like, "Jenna, you need to leave the room".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:56:54] Well, there is a, a deleted scene of, you know, Michael does the first video and he's not happy with it. Right? Well, in the deleted scenes, Jenna, there is his second take at the video. You know, you guys shoot the first one.
JENNA FISCHER [00:57:07] Yeah. And he doesn't like it.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:08] He doesn't like it. And there is a deleted scene, and Jenna, it made me laugh so hard. Michael goes on to say, "I need this job. My mortgage is hundreds of dollars a month. With this job, I can barely cover that. I have a company car, but I still have to pay for the gas. Gas prices are high and I have no savings whatsoever".
JENNA FISCHER [00:57:29] Oh, Michael.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:30] What's kind of fun for this, for those folks who like to catch things in the background, is that deleted scene dialog is on the cue card. In their second attempt, it's right there, you can zoom in and see it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:57:42] Yeah, a lot of people wrote in to ask, "How come what Michael is saying isn't what is printed on the cue cards when they go back and forth"? It was just because we cut some stuff out, we trimmed out some stuff.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:54] Yeah, he actually said everything that was on the cards. We just had to lose some of it for time.
JENNA FISCHER [00:57:58] Yeah. Well, over in accounting, we had someone write in. Meghan Alman said, "17 minutes, 6 seconds, Kevin Sass".
ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:09] Yeah. Serious Kevin Sass. Like he's been holding it in for so long. He just couldn't wait. Now he's got something on her.
JENNA FISCHER [00:58:19] Yeah. Angela is critiquing Kevin's math skills and he then gives some sass by insulting your customer relations skills.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:31] Yeah, and then I call them "apes" and then Oscar is like, "Apologize for that", and I'm like, "Oh, I'm sorry, you're both morons". And they're like, "But you said 'sorry'". It's like it's like I'm sitting with my two, like, junior high brothers.
JENNA FISCHER [00:58:44] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:44] That's what they're like. And I want you to know that Brian and Oscar improvise their sort of little high five at the end and that they, they don't quite get it right. They were so tickled by that moment. They, they kept cracking up. Brian kept cracking up.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:00] I love that.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:02] They had, they like did a few different tries at it. And it just was like their favorite thing.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:08] OK. Well, I loved that moment. It made me laugh.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:11] Me too.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:12] Because why couldn't they have just high five? They were kind of doing like a Coronavirus high five where you don't actually touch.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:21] Well-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:21] And they were trying to do like a fist bump and air, but they're right there. They could have easily touched one another. But that's what it made me think of.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:28] I think they love the Jim Pam air high five, this is their dude version. Also-.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:33] It was very funny.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:34] It would have meant that one of them would have, would had to get up or lean over awkwardly. And so I just, they were like, "Eh".
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:41] Oh, OK. Well, I guess it was an optical illusion because it seemed like maybe they could have just made a connection.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:48] It would have required one of them getting up.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:50] I see. OK. There you go.
ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:52] And neither of them were up for it.
JENNA FISCHER [00:59:54] Well, maybe we should go back to the high school for a second because we forgot to mention that Andy and Jim do meet with the principal. And it doesn't really go well because Andy is so preoccupied by learning that his girlfriend is at the high school.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:14] Yeah, I don't really know. Did they get this account back? We don't know. It just seems like Andy's about to have a breakdown. And Jim is just trying to get them out of there.
JENNA FISCHER [01:00:21] Well, the principal was played by Jim Jansen, who also played Reverend Skinner on "Gilmore Girls". Little bit of trivia.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:29] Oh, oh, that is good trivia.
JENNA FISCHER [01:00:30] I know. And yeah, we don't really find out how that went. But as they're driving home in the car, Andy is still clearly bummed out. And Jim wants to cheer him up.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:43] I mean, Jim really, really goes for it here. He just starts going, [Sings instrumental of song, "In the Jungle"].
JENNA FISCHER [01:00:51] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:51] And Andy's fighting it. He's fighting it. But then he just, he can't resist. He's like [Sings instrumental of song, "In the Jungle"].
JENNA FISCHER [01:00:58] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:58] Like he can't not jump in.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:01] Do you remember that time on the show when we all sang that? In the bullpen? Was that for an episode or were we just doing that one day?
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:10] I think we just started doing it.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:12] Yeah. Because it is kind of infectious when someone starts it.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:16] Yeah, we were just a little loopy.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:18] I think so too.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:23] "In the jungle, the quiet jungle".
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:25] Yeah. Oh, one last thing now before we end this episode, and get to this amazing tag, is Creed.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:33] Yeah.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:34] Creed got this woman fired and he's going around the office collecting money for her. He's going to put it in a card, you know. "Why do bad things always happen to good people"?, ge asks.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:47] And then he tosses the. He puts the money in his pocket, Creed is diabolical.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:52] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:53] And we also find out that, in Pam's opinion, Michael made the best apology video ever.
JENNA FISCHER [01:01:59] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:59] That ended with an ultimatum. "You have one day". What?
JENNA FISCHER [01:02:03] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:04] And where are these videos going, Jenna? Where's that going?
JENNA FISCHER [01:02:06] Oh, they go nowhere. I'm pretty convinced that Pam never sends them anywhere.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:11] Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. Well, now we have such a fun tag and Rainn had so much fun doing this.
JENNA FISCHER [01:02:18] Yes. Dwight arrives for work the next day dressed as Jim. But it backfires a little bit because everybody just compliments him on how great he looks and he gets a little frustrated.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:31] Yeah. And he tries to do like the Jim look-to-camera.
JENNA FISCHER [01:02:34] Yes.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:35] But it's like so awkward
JENNA FISCHER [01:02:37] Yes. Well, I want to tell you that this was originally in the script as the alternate ending to the cold open. Dwight had a little talking head where he said, "To defeat your enemy, you have to become your enemy". And then he showed up to work dressed as Jim. But in the editing process, we split it up, which I think was genius.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:00] I love that. I love that we end with it.
JENNA FISCHER [01:03:02] I remember how much fun Rainn had doing this scene, but I also remember him talking with Randall, the director, about how Dwight couldn't be as good of a mimic as Jim. So whereas Jim could come in and just do this spot on impression. They sort of felt like Dwight's version of Jim had to be a little messier. But like, how do you thread that needle? Right? Like, how do you do an impression? But it's Dwight doing the impression because Rainn could do an amazing impression of Jim Halpert.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:36] Right.
JENNA FISCHER [01:03:36] But he had to do it as Dwight. So I remember them playing with that a lot on the set when they were shooting this.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:42] Yeah, I feel like those moments would come up for us where it was like your character steps out of his comfort zone a little bit to do something, but you still have to do it as your character and through that filter.
JENNA FISCHER [01:03:52] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:54] But it was fun. It was fun for us.
JENNA FISCHER [01:03:56] Yeah.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:56] To watch the those fellows do that. Well, you guys, that was "Product Recall". Thanks for taking that journey with us. We, we got off topic a few times. But, you know, there's some real nuggets in this. "Lord, beer me strength".
JENNA FISCHER [01:04:11] Ah, yes. And listen. "Identity theft is not a joke. Millions of families suffer every year".
ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:16] All right, guys. We'll see you next week.
JENNA FISCHER [01:04:19] We'll see you next week.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:21] Someone beer me a snack. I'm hungry. Thank you for listening to "Office Ladies". "Office Ladies" is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey.
JENNA FISCHER [01:04:32] Our producer is Codi Fischer, our sound engineer is Sam Kieffer, and our associate producer is Aynsely Bubbico.
ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:39] Our theme song is "Rubber Tree" by Creed Bratton.
JENNA FISCHER [01:04:42] For ad free versions of "Office Ladies", go to StitcherPremium.com. For a free one month trial of Stitcher Premium, use code "office".