Office Ladies - “The Office BFFs” Book Q&A

Episode Date: May 18, 2022

This week is a special episode of “Office Ladies,” Jenna and Angela answer fan questions about their brand new book, “The Office BFFs: Tales of The Office from Two Best Friends Who Were There.�� The ladies talk about how they came to write the book which included finding a perfect system that worked for their different writing styles. And the ladies share another part of their audiobook! Have you grabbed your copy yet? Because the book is here!! Link to AudiobookLink to Book, Ebook, Audiobook

I'm Jenna Fisher and I'm Angela Kinsey. We were on The Office together and we're best friends. And now we're doing the Ultimate Office rewatch podcast just for you. Each week we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind-the-scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you. We're The Office, ladies. Hello! Hi, you guys.

We're really excited today. We're so excited. We can't wait to share this episode with you. This episode's all about The Office BFF's Our Book because... We are in New York City right now for the launch of our book. Oh my gosh, this has been such a long journey. You guys have been with us every step of the way, truly. Yes, your support means so much to us.

And Jenna and I were talking about reading part of our book or sharing part of our book and where we would do that and we were both immediately like, we have to share it with our Office Ladies family first. And you guys sent in so many great questions about the book. We're going to answer them today. You know, we've been doing a bunch of press for the book and one of the things I did was the Gold Digger podcast. Oh, you loved that one.

I loved it with Jenna Kutcher and you know what she said to me, and we keep saying launch of our book and she said, do you know why it's called a book release? Why? That's what I said. And she said, because you release your work into the world. And you let it go. You have to let it go. You work on it.

You make it the best it can be. And then you release it and you have to release it. You have to let it out. Let it go. Oh, I love that. I love that. Right? I did.

I love that. Well, you know, even though this is a special episode of Office Ladies, we still have to have fast facts. I need my structure. You know me. I'm going to do a summary too. Oh, I didn't write a summary. Sorry to disappoint.

Let's do fast facts. I have one. Our book was printed in Willard, Ohio. Okay. And I thought, well, gee, if our book was printed in Willard, Ohio, I want to know a little bit about Willard, Ohio. What you got? Here's what I got.

I went to their official city website, www.willardohio.us. Here are things I wanted to share. The town was founded in 1874, but it was named Chicago because it was the train junction for the Baltimore and Ohio railroads line to Sandusky and the Branch West to Chicago. But guess what? What? People would get confused. I would get confused.

I would be on the train and I would be like, did I make it to Chicago? Illinois? And they would say yes, but I wasn't in Chicago, Chicago. You were in Chicago, Ohio. So they decided to change it to Chicago Junction. Okay. I think I would still be confused as a traveler. I have to be honest with you.

In 1917, to finally rectify the confusion, the town changed its name to Willard after the then president of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, Daniel Willard. And then Willard became an official city in 1960. Then as of 2019, 6,041, and here are a few things from their website. Their slogan is Proud to Call Willard Home. Listen to how they describe their city, a community where people enjoy living and working, ideally situated with easy access to Ohio's interstates and rail lines. Willard is in the heart of the Midwest manufacturing region, abundant land and utilities, a solid

work ethic, and a progressive local government make Willard the perfect choice for growing a business. We have to go. We have to go. Not only that, here are a few things that are happening just this month in Willard. They honor their hometown heroes. They started doing this in 2018. Each week, a different hometown hero will be recognized on the electric sign at the Willard

City Park as well as through the city's Facebook page. Very good. They have the Willard Tree Program. In partnership with the Willard Moose Lodge 2153, the city of Willard is offering a tree planting program to help property owners plant trees. They also have the Downtown Spring Festival is returning this year featuring the mother of all pickleball tournaments. I love pickleball.

I know. Wait. Cornhole, craft vendors, touch a truck, bike rodeo, and more. Angela, it's becoming very clear to me that we need to go to Willard, Ohio. I know. And that's where our book was printed. Thank you, Willard, Ohio. Thank you, Willard, Ohio.

I also have a few bookstats. Oh, well, you know I love stats. You and Dr. Tipito. Yes. Here are all of our The Office BFF's bookstats. There are 336 pages in our book. There are 440 photos or images in the interior, 440, Jenna. So there are more photos than pages.

There are 16 photos in the endpapers. Okay, so I did not know what endpapers were until we started making this book. That's the part of the book where you open it up and it's like... Part of the cover. Right. It's the back of the cover and then the next little page. And we put all of these amazing black and white photos from the show. I love the endpapers.

They're so special. That we took, by the way, all the photos in the book are our personal photos or photos that were shared with us from our friends on the show. Yes. There's another stat I love. There are 41 pieces of memorabilia in the book. That includes ticket stubs, fan art, posters, brochures, photos of papers and objects and sketches.

All of these things we saved over the years from the show. So one of the pieces of memorabilia is in my chapter, Jam. I have a chapter where I wrote all about Jim and Pam. Lee, my husband, saved his lactation consultant badge. As the nurse. As the lactation nurse. And we scanned it and put it in the book. Love it.

A lot of you wrote in and asked us where all the book will be sold, what countries. We don't have a precise number yet, but definitely United States, Canada and the UK, as well as various English-speaking countries. But as soon as I know all of those countries, I'm going to let you know. The book is also going to be translated into other languages and as we know where it will be coming out, we'll let you know. Well, lady. My fast fact number two is all about the audio book.

We got a lot of people who asked, does the audio book come with access to those 440 photos? No, no, we do not have one of those supplemental PDFs that you sometimes get with an audio book. But we have a bunch of fun audio surprises. So many cool people really showed up for us for this audio book. They did. Reed Bratton wrote an office BFF's song for us, which we used to kick it off. It makes me happy every time I hear it.

I love it. Rainn Wilson wrote and reads a special forward that is exclusive to the audio book. You can't even read it in the hard copy book. You don't want to miss that. And then we have some fun clips along the way from Oscar Nunez, Brian Baumgartner, Kate Flannery, Ellie Kemper, Ed Helms, Steve Carell, and Jennifer Garner. Yes. Kyle H. from Western Mass said, I saw on one of your posts that Jennifer Garner is on

the audio book. How is she connected to the office? Well, Kyle, I don't know if you remember this, but during the pandemic, her and her kids watched the office for the first time from beginning to end. Yes. They cared about it on her Instagram, like their rewatch of it. And when they got to the end for the finale, she had a real good cry. And she posted a video on Instagram, and she agreed to let us interview her about that

experience for the audio book. It's in the chapter finale. She is just delightful. And I love talking to her. She was so gracious with her time. All right, Andrew, you ready for fast fact number three? Yes. It is a fan mail flurry.

What? We really need a sting for fan mail flurry. Sam, what was it, Ange? You were going to make a sting. I'll add it to the list. All right, thank you. We had a lot of questions. Sorry, what was that, an impression?

I don't know. To me, it was like. It's mail coming through a mail slot. Yeah, it's ye olde mail slot. So not magic birds. Yeah, or magic birds. We got a lot of questions about our book tour. Well, let me say this, we are kicking things off in New York City this week.

We are going to be on Late Night with Seth Meyers, the Today Show, live with Kelly and Ryan. And tonight, Wednesday, May 18th, if you are in New York, we will be doing a live event at Town Hall to celebrate the release of the book. But we are so excited for the book tour as well. We are in planning mode. As soon as we have all that locked in, we will let you guys know first. But we're going to spread it out.

We're going to be coming for you till the end of the year is what I'm going to say. Yeah, we're going to enjoy it. We are. It's going to be like a little BFF, like weekend road trip. Yeah, every time we want to get away as friends, we're going to pop up in another city. And the last thing I want to share with you all, because you've been on this journey with me as well, it is official. I have finally figured out my outfits for this book launch.

And there is not going to be a fake flower. Not one. Not one. You know where you're wearing that fake flower? Where? To Willard, Ohio. Yes. We have to go to Willard, Ohio.

And I'll wear a flower. There you go. Before we go to break, Jenna, I'm just sitting here holding our book. We have our books right here. We do. It just looks amazing. And I just want to say a big thank you to Renata. Renata was who was in charge of our book layout.

And Jenna, it's stunning. It's absolutely beautiful. I love the texture of the cover. I love the weight of the pages. These were all things that we had to do virtually. Normally, if you put together a book, not in a pandemic, you get to travel to view the pages. Yeah.

You have a layout meeting. You see what the photos will look like. You do it all over a Zoom. And to see how beautiful it looks in person, I just can't stop thumbing through it. I feel the same way. Thank you, Renata. You really, really knocked it out of the park. Home run.

All right. Well, let's take a break. And when we come back, we are going to answer your questions. And then we're going to read a section from the book. Woohoo! We are back, and we are going to kick things off with Andrea from Virginia. Andrea asked, growing up, did either of you want to write a book? Andrea, I have written two books, and growing up, I never thought I'd ever write a book

at all. I never daydreamed about it. I'm so tickled to be an author, but I didn't think that that would be part of my resume at all. Andrea, I always wanted to write a book. I was obsessed with writing even from an early age. I won a competition at school where I wrote about a lightning bolt. I don't know why we had to write about a lightning bolt, and I got to go up on stage, and I got

a little medal for my writing, and I've always had the writing bug. You've written, like, five television shows. I have, but this was just a culmination, I think, of a dream I've had since I was really little, so it's so special. I have a question from Kate C. in Albany, New York. She says, were both of you equally excited to write a book, or did one of you have to convince the other? Okay.

Okay. That's opening a can of worms, isn't it? Boy is it. Kate, I did not want to write this book. I had written a book, a book that I felt like I had to write with all my soul. That was my book, The Actor's Life, A Survival Guide. That's so good. When I finished it, I said, that's it.

I did it. I'm never doing that again. Done. She did. She did. She told me I am never writing a book again, and so when we had this idea years ago, and we'll get into that, Jenna was like, no, no, no, I can't do that again. I can't do it again.

And I was very naive. I admit it, Jenna. I was just like, what? We'll just sit down and we'll do it. I know what I kept saying. I just prayed it. Angela, I know. I thought the first time, too, it is so much harder than that.

You have no idea. You said, Ange, it will be years before we hold this book in our hands. And I was like, Jenna. Well, that leads me very nicely into our questions from J. Ben R. in Queens, New York. How long did it take you guys to complete the book? And Kristen D. from Grand Rapids, Michigan. What was the entire length of the process from start of book to publication date? Guess what I did.

I went through my digital clutter. Oh, well, lady, I thought since I had a digital clutter sting that you should have one, too. Woo, here it is, my digital clutter. Jenna's digital clutter from her digital pockets. Ah, I feel like I've made it. You have. I love it. Thank you, Sam.

Welcome. This is what I found out. So you guys know that after the office wrapped, we always wanted to work together again. But at a certain point, we started to get really serious. And you probably remember, we were trading messages about it. We traded a series of emails where we made lists of what we could possibly do together. For a job? Yes.

Oh, this is so us. We do, you guys. We make lists. Oh, Jenna. What did it say? Things on the list were talk show. No way. Podcast.

Oh. Uh-huh. We also talked about writing a sitcom for ourselves. And one of the things on the list was book. Wow. I'm sure I immediately said no to that. It was October 19th, 2018, when we were trading these lists. I remember that time.

I remember because we just so desperately wanted a job together. Uh-huh. We kind of write about it in the book. Our last chapter is called Boss Ladies. And it's all about transitioning away from these acting jobs that were taking us all over the world and away from our families into work where we could be home. And these emails were the beginning of that brainstorming. Was Rosé on that list?

No. No. Putting out our own Rosé was not on that list in 2018. You guys, I keep pushing this and I make little labels. Whenever Jenna invites us over for something, I print out a little Office Ladies label and I tape it over like a label on a bottle of Rosé and I give it to Jenna. It's like my subtle hint every time. It's like, you know, it's from the episode with Michael being like, I can manage that.

I can manage that. You're like, you're some Rosé. Right. I'm like, Kelly, you wanted me? Yes. You wanted me? You wanted some Rosé? Yeah.

So, and it was the next year that we did our big garage clean out and we found just the bins of photos and our journals and all of our scraps of paper and ticket stubs. Well, this is when we decided finally to tackle all of our clutter. Yeah. We had been putting it off. Hey guys, tip. If you have clutter and you just don't want to go through it, make your best friend do it at their house too and you will hold each other accountable.

I'd be like, Jenna, I got through three boxes today. I know. And I wouldn't have done any. I'd be like, oh boy. You gotta get on it. Get out there. Well, that is when the idea of our book came up again and we got so serious about it that we called my book agent, Aaron Malone, at WME and said, we might be interested in writing

a book together. Now, this was like a step that we had to our advantage. I had a book agent because I had written a book, so that was very helpful, very time-saving. Very time-saving. And we went into her office. I remember we coordinated outfits. Jenna, I remember we were so excited about this meeting that we even filmed a slow-mo like walking down the hallway.

Do you remember? Yeah. Except I had a boot on my foot because I had hiked my way into a boot. I remember that. So many memories. So she said she loved the idea and told us to write up a proposal. She sent us some sample proposals from books that had dual authors. Do you know how long it took us to write our proposal, Angela?

I took the date on my digital clutter from when she sent us the samples to when we emailed her hours back. Okay. I'm going to guess, five weeks? Eight months. No. Yeah. Why did it take us so long?

Because by this point, we started our podcast. Oh, we had other stuff. We were busy. Yes. We had already gotten to podcasts on our list of possible jobs together. It took us eight months to write a proposal. Eight months just to write the proposal. I bet Erin was like, yes, sure, you guys are going to write a book.

Exactly. Yes, sure. Well, it also took us three solid years to write the book. We even had to push our publication date back twice. I know. So from the first mention of the word book in that email to our publication date, it took us four years and seven months. Wow, Zers.

Mm-hmm. Well, what does that teach you? If you have an idea, don't give up on it. It might take years for you to see it come to completion, but don't give up. Yeah. Well, Jenna, as you were sharing all that, I have this memory of being on my family farm in Texas there with my family. And we were on the phone going back and forth about which publisher should we go with.

We ultimately ended up going with Day Street, which is a division of Harper Collins. But it was a really tough decision. We really loved a lot of the people that we met with that wanted to do this book with us. And when we got off the phone, I walked outside and there was the most gorgeous sunset. Hmm. And you know me, Jenna. I see stuff like that.

And I'm like, oh, this is a sign. We're on the right path. And I have that picture of the sunset. I made Josh take a picture because I was like, I want to remember this moment. Well, Angela, I remember that moment a little differently because I had a pit in my stomach from that moment of decision. I was like, well, we've done it. We've done it.

Angela talked me into it. Oh, no. And now we have to write this book. And I knew, I knew. You had a pit. I was like, look at the sunset. But this is why we're a good team because we trade that back and forth. One of us always sees the sunset when the other one has the pit in their stomach.

Oh, I like that. And that's true. Yeah. Up next is Macy from Lincoln, Nebraska. Macy says, I'm curious what kind of writing rituals you each have. Are there certain times of day, favorite working spots, drinks, or snacks you need? Well, I'll say one thing we have in common is that we both snacked a lot while we were writing this book.

Yeah. As in my pants don't fit anymore. I had to get it. I sized up a pair of pants after writing a book. Same. So if you decide to write a book, snacking is a big part of it. But other than snacking, there is almost nothing about our writing rituals that line up.

Nothing. Except we're both very thorough, but we come to that place very differently. So I like to work in the morning, right after school drop off. That's when I get my best work done are those first morning hours. And you know, just like how you stretch out your body before you work out. Well, I like to kind of stretch my brain. So I got these tips from a writer friend of mine, Laura Tremaine. I love them.

The first thing I would do in the mornings after I got my hot cup of coffee and I sat down at my desk, set a timer and do 15 minutes of reading. It could be fiction reading, nonfiction, it didn't matter. But one of my favorite things that I liked to read was Stephen King's book on writing is very inspirational. It put me in a zone. So then I would set a timer for 15 minutes and do handwritten journaling. Then I would start writing.

I just felt like my brain was ready after those two things. But another thing that I do while I'm doing my warm ups and while I'm writing is I keep a pad of paper next to me. And if I think of a to do item, I write it down on that pad of paper and then I have to keep going because that is a big thing for me is distraction, especially writing at home. I'll think of a chore. I'll think, oh, I have to fold the laundry.

And I would want to get up and go do it. But no, I would write down fold laundry or, oh, I got to get my mom a birthday present. Cannot leave my seat, can't go shop online. I just write it on the pad of paper. Those were some of my little tricks to stay focused. I love all of those. So I write best in the evening. Once everyone's gone to bed and my house is finally quiet.

I love that time just because it's so quiet and I don't have as many distractions. And I turn off my phone and I can feel good about turning off my phone because all my little chicks are in the hen house. They're all asleep in bed and I can just really focus. So here are some of my rituals. First of all, I always had peanuts and M&M's, salty peanuts and M&M's, I had a bowl. I love salt and sweet guys. I would get a cup of tea.

I loved Darjeeling. I would do two tea bags guys, wake up, we're about to write. And then I would have an outline, Jenna and I would work out an outline, sort of like our writing assignment for the day. So I would know what my goal was. I would start my goal, start my writing and then I would do what I would call the big net. I would tell Jenna I'm going to cast a big net.

That meant I had everything in the outline. I had all the information, but now I was going to try to think about all the bigger things that would color in that moment. I would look through old emails, I'd look through journals, I would look at some of the photos and memorabilia and I would just try to uncover every little rock, you know, that reminded me of exactly this moment I was writing about. And then sometimes as I was remembering a story, I would get up and pace, guys, I'm a pacer.

I would talk out these moments that I was about to write as if performing stand up. For example, Jenna, when we talked about the finale of that very last scene that we filmed that was going to wrap the whole entire series. When I wrote that paragraph, I just got up and I talked it out as if I was giving it as a speech. Then I would record voice memos. I often would send them to you. I would say, hey, I just had a brainstorming burst.

I'm going to write this out, but I'm going to talk it out here so we both have it and we can re-listen to it. So those are some of the things that I did. And I actually really liked once we figured out our system because that was a process because you were getting emails late at night and messages from me and I was getting emails early in the morning. Once we figured out how to trade that information, I actually really liked it because I would have all of your thoughts.

You would leave me all your emails and messages as I started writing and I could process everything that you had done that day. And that would inform me of my writing assignment and then the next morning, you would wake up to emails and information from me and you would respond to it as you started your writing process. Yeah. But it took us a while to understand how to trade all of that without just like feeling like we were constantly inundated.

Yes. Well, and through that process, we were also producing our podcast each week. And homeschooling because this was during the pandemic, guys. Our kids were home. I mean, every 30 minutes, I was helping someone, you know, with a math problem or get art supplies or... I mean, all I did during the pandemic was give my children snacks. So many snacks.

So hungry all the time. I know. I found that to be like a sign of like just, you know, unspoken anxiety. We all just wanted to snack all the time. The thing you shared that I think I want to highlight, Ange, is how much non-writing writing involves. Mm-hmm. Like you would spend 90 minutes going through emails and videos and journals.

That is writing. It wasn't words on the page, but that's part of the writing process. Right. The research. Yeah. I would have one day where that's all I did. All I did was like gather, gather, gather, and then make notes and gather, gather. And then it would be the next day that I could then start to form it into a story.

My husband Lee is a writer-director, and most of his day is taking walks, thinking, imagining. You know, he has to create stories from scratch because he writes screenplays. And he's writing when he's doing that. And he's, you know, listening to music for inspiration. That's writing. So many times we left each other messages because we were like, oh my gosh. So it came to me in the shower.

I got it. Oh, showers are a great place for inspiration. I don't know why. And road trips. I remember being in the car. Driving. Driving. I'm playing out these scenes in my mind of like what we want to share.

And I'm like, I got it. And thank goodness for audio memos on your phone because you can say it, I would leave myself notes all the time. So many. Well, Angie, I'm glad we're talking about this because we got a lot of questions from other writers. Mariah P. from Modesto, California said, I love to write, but I get stuck about halfway through a book every time.

What advice can you give for pushing through those writing blocks? Because they can be real self-confidence destroyers sometimes. And Sierra G. from Kansas City, Kansas said, did either of you ever struggle with self-doubt while you were working on your book? And how did you overcome that and find the courage and confidence to even try something new like writing a book or creating a podcast? She also said, thank you in advance for sharing your insight and any practical tips for boosting confidence.

Sierra, I have to tell you, I've written a lot of things by myself, but writing with Jenna was so healing for me because a lot of times when you write by yourself, you're in this vacuum and you can question yourself, like, is this any good? But Jenna was like this constant soundboard for me, but solid and honest, you know? And one of the things I love about our friendship is that we can be constructively, compassionately critical. I remember so vividly, there was one chapter we were working on, we worked really hard on it, and then we ended up throwing it out.

We're like, it doesn't work. It doesn't work. And you had done so much research for it. It was like we were throwing away days of your research. And likewise, though, you had done a lot of work on it too, and we both mourned that, but we knew it was the right decision. I remember we were trading notes and you were like, it just doesn't work. And I'm like, no, it doesn't work.

It doesn't work. Dang it. And I knew it didn't work. But I think having someone you trust that can be a soundboard during your creative process is so important. I also think knowing that you're going to write a bunch of crap. Yeah. Like I don't ever want to go back and read our first attempt at chapter one, Job Opening.

No. Because I've seen glimpses of it, and it is not at all the chapter that it is now. We had to find it, and you have to be able to read your stuff and be like, wow, that's crap. Yeah. And throw it out. And throw it out. It can't be precious.

And I think also just know that the more you do it, the better you get. That is really true for you and I. The more we tinkered on these chapters, because that was the thing I wasn't really prepared for. Because when you write a script for television, you might do a few revisions, but with the book we did revision after revision, years of revision, it felt like. And you told me, gentlemen, when we started this process, Angela, you're going to read this chapter so many times.

Like you're going to read this book so many times. And we did. How many times did we read this book? Hundreds. Hundreds and have notes. And so I just think knowing that where you start and where you finish, there's going to be such a huge learning curve. Our next question is from Jeffrey in Denim Springs, Louisiana.

What's up, Louisiana? Jeffrey says, when we read the book, will it be obvious whether Jenna or Angela wrote it? Yes. Yes. Very obvious because we rotate paragraphs. We really struggled with how do we tell these stories and we decided to tell them the way we share with you here in this sort of back and forth dialogue.

Yeah. The book is a conversation. So you'll see one paragraph will say Jenna and another will say Angela. And there are times when our memories of a certain event do not line up and we both get to tell how we remember it, which is really fun. Really fun. When it's time for Jenna's paragraphs, her name is above it in blue. It says Jenna.

My paragraphs above it, my name says Angela in orange. And my husband, Josh, wanted me to point out that that's Denver Bronco colors. And was that intentional? And I said, no, babe. We didn't pick those colors because of the Denver Broncos. We actually looked at a bunch of different color combinations and those just both popped together. Mm-hmm.

We liked that combo. Mm-hmm. Well, Melissa S. from Trenton, Ontario and Heather A. from Virginia both wrote in to ask, how will the book differ from the podcast? Will the book have different stories and things we haven't heard before? Yes, it definitely will. You know, this book is our chance to dig a little deeper maybe and especially to dig deeper into our friendship story.

Yes. It's way more intimate and personal. Not only do you have all these great pictures and things that we saved, it's like we're giving you our scrapbook of our time on the office and our best friendship and the journey of all of that. We're able to go into detail into such wonderful moments that I'm so glad that my kids will have this book. I talk about the time my dad was my date to the Emmys.

Mm-hmm. It's such a special part of the book for me. And there's a lot of moments like that. It is very different and I'm so proud of it. All right. Well, our next question comes from Natalie in New Jersey. Natalie says, which chapter was the most fun to work on? Jenna and I both answered at the same time to this one, Natalie.

Award shows and Hollywood parties. We have a whole chapter about navigating the life of Hollywood and going to these award shows as best friends, all of our hits and misses. There were a lot of misses. When we were brainstorming writing this, we would sometimes have a writing session. That's something we should share. We would get over FaceTime or on a Zoom where we could see each other and we would talk out some chapters, talk out memories.

There were things we definitely wanted to make sure we shared and we would just talk out all of our memories and form that chapter. Award shows was one of the ones we did that. Our next question is from Sally Jane from Fayetteville, Arkansas. What were your favorite and least favorite part of writing the book? I know mine. What are they? My favorite part was just reliving some of these wonderful moments in a way that I might

not have. You know what I mean? All of these pictures sharing with you, I laughed so hard I cried at a few of the things that we wrote together, Jenna. I don't think I would have written any of that down. I wouldn't have any of this to share with anyone in my family had we not sat down and done this together. That's one of my favorite things is that we have this tangible, amazing scrapbook memory

of our time on the show and our friendship. My least favorite is easy. All the revisions, all the flippin' revisions. Really? Yes. I like revisions. I know you do. Thank God.

But whenever we would get this email, we would get an email that would say, hey guys, here's the book back to you. It would be like a Wednesday and they would say, we would love all your revisions by Friday. I would think immediately I'd be like, I have two days of reading from the minute I wake up to the minute I go to bed. I'm just going to be reading and making notes. I did not like the time crunch pressure of revisions, but I will say my least favorite part of writing is staring at a blank page and having to start a chapter.

That doesn't bother me as much. That to me is the most terrifying part of writing, going from a blank page to something. Because once I have something, then I can sink my teeth into it. Then I can take away or add or edit. I don't mind editing, but my favorite part of this process and was the first time they sent us the layout of the book, because that's a whole phase. After you lock the manuscript, then they send you your book all laid out in a PDF with all the pictures and seeing it, it's written in the font that it's going to be in.

That was such an exciting day. I loved that. Moving on, Sid from Logan, Ohio says, out of all of the pictures of the two of you, you feature in the book, which is your favorite? I have to say, Sid, not only are all the photos amazing, they're such personal behind the scenes photos. They're not like anything you've seen. They're not stylized.

There are pictures. So, in one of them, and Jenna knows the one I'm talking about, we're having lunch in her trailer, my eyes aren't fully open. It is not an attractive picture. It's in the book. It's the only one we had of us eating lunch together. In your trailer. In my trailer.

So, I was like, it's got to go in the book. It helps tell the story. But in addition to the photos, one of the things I love are some of the sketches that made it in. My post-it note, where I drew a little cat and invited everyone to Sprinkle's birthday party in the parking lot, is in the book. The original one. Well, my favorite photo in the book, I just realized, was my favorite when we did our

very last pass of the book, because I noticed a detail about it. What? There is a picture of Angela in Curler's, sitting on the steps of her trailer. And if you look closely, she's got half a donut in her hand. And we didn't notice that? For two years. We did not notice the donut. Two years of looking at layouts.

It wasn't until the final pass, I was like, oh my God, I'm holding a donut. It's officially my favorite picture. All right, we also got a question from Amro in Palestine, were there any specific moments that made you emotional to recall when you were writing them? I actually cried writing the story about my dad, because my dad has passed away. And just remembering taking him with me to the Emmys, look, I'll cry right now. It was just really special that he got to go with me, and I love that I can share that. And also just reliving what it was like to be in an award show through my dad's eyes

also tickled me, because he had some really funny sidebar commentary, because he was a little confused about what all was happening. It just really means a lot to me that that's in the book. Well, there's a chapter in the book called Big Preggs, Little Preggs, Fake Preggs. And that chapter is all about our time being both real and fake pregnant on the office and in real life. We share about what our friendship went through when we became moms. And in that section, I share about going back to work five weeks after having my son, which

was a C-section. And I was not physically or emotionally ready to go back to work. And I explain sort of why I had to go back to work after such a short period of time in the book. But I also share about what Angela did to support me through that time. And it was really emotional for me to recall that time, because I was struggling. And so that was a very vulnerable process for you to just remember it all and put it back down on the page to kind of have to access that again.

But I'm so glad we shared about it, though. Me too. It was actually very healing, I have to say, I think because I got to recall all that support as well. Yeah. Well, Miguel from Mexico sent in this question. Miguel says, we're familiar with your process to deep dive and source from your journals, but still, how can you remember so much?

Well, Miguel, we have a lot of people who help us out. For example, with this book, we did long interviews with our hairstylist Kim Ferry, our costume designer, Carrie Bennett. I traded a gazillion emails with Randy Cordray and James Carey when I was writing about going to Niagara. Yeah. And James and Randy shared photos that they had taken. Guys, the photos in this book you have never seen them.

James Carey has a photo of all of us in our blue parkas on Made of the Mist. Randy has a photo that John and I took as Jim and Pam holding up our hands with our wedding rings on right after we did the marriage scene on the Made of the Mist. I'd never seen that photo before. I said, oh, Randy, can I put that in the book? And he said yes. Amazing. Same with our producer, Steve Burgess.

I was trading all of these emails with him about the finale, remembering all the details, and he had a photo from our final table read from a different angle that showed the whole room that I'd never seen before. He graciously let us put it in the book. I love it. We went to dinner with Michael Gallenberg, our production designer, and he gave us some photos of things that we didn't have in our personal collection. And looking through some of his photos jogged so many memories.

Oh, my gosh. He was amazing. Yes. And we included a few of his, Aaron Scherr, Kent Sabornack, Alicia Raycraft, Greg Daniels, Ken Quapas. I mean, guys, we cannot thank you enough for your support, but that's how. It's not just our memories and our journals. It is the relationships we have with other people and their willingness to share their

memories with us. That's how we remember so much. 100%. Kate Flannery and I bless her heart. I can't even tell you how many crazy texts I sent her. Like, Kate, do you remember at the award show when we pretended to have a fake fight? Oh, yeah. We put that in the book.

I found all our photos of our fake staged fight at an award show. And then, you know, little things like I would text Steve. I said, Steve, what did you do in your office when you were in there? All alone is Michael Scott. And he gave me little details. So I mean, it just, we can't thank people enough. And Miguel, yes. We have definitely gone to our journals and old emails, but what I realized in writing

this book is the type of phones we had back then. You didn't really text each other as much. Remember, it wasn't as easy. So what we would do is we would send each other like email updates about our week, our day. We found so many of those. Jenna, remember the amazing one Naomi sent? Yes.

My manager, Naomi Odenkirk, when we were writing our chapter, Death Bus, about how the entire cast of the office almost died, Naomi found an email that I had written her about the shoot day where we all almost died three times. And she sent it to me and I was like, oh my gosh. It had so many details in it. Things I didn't remember. Amazing. I mean, hard to believe I didn't remember those details, but I hadn't.

So thank you, Naomi. So yes, you guys, it took a village basically. That's right. All right. Final question before we go to our next break. We got a lot of questions about our friendship. This book is about our friendship. Ruth from Galt, California said, all right.

Have you guys ever had a big fight or drifted apart? We got a lot of questions like this, Angela. People are like, listen, we know your friends, but don't friendships have bumps in the road? People want to hear about them. Of course they do. Well, guys, we do write about this in the book because we did have a big time when we did drift apart. It was right after Angela had her daughter, Isabel.

We write about it in our chapter, Big Preggs, Little Preggs, Fake Preggs. Our lives were just going in two different directions. Yeah. Jenna was entering what I call the sexy life, and I was home with a newborn. And I did not know how to be a good friend to someone with a newborn. I mean, you just sometimes, I don't know, you can't know till you're in it. And we talk about in the book this period of time when Angela was a parent and I was not yet a parent.

And I think that was the point in our lives when we were most distant. We were most distant, but it was all sort of circumstance. It wasn't our heart. That's right. You know? So we found our way back. But yeah, every friendship has bumps. I mean, even learning to build a company together, we've had bumps.

Learning how to really and truly how to merge two very different working styles, but at the same time, what we realize is how rich it is. Once we get through that bump and on the other side, we're so much the better for it. So something that is interesting about when we have bumps or when we have conflicts. You know, Angela, you're my person that I vent to about everybody else. I know. Same. So if I'm frustrated with you, oh, it's terrifying.

I have to just tell you because you're the person I tell everything to. So we've had moments where I'm like, listen, I got a vent and here's what it is because it's probably me, but this thing is driving me crazy. Right. I'll say that. Like, listen, I know I'm half of this, okay? But the other half is you and we got assorted out. Yes.

Yes. But it's so true. I, you know, Josh knows our friendship so well and he's so thankful for it because you get hours of venting that he doesn't have to sort out. And he often will say to me when we've had those bumps, he'll be like, you got to sort it out with Jenna because you're not right. Like you're not quite right. Oh, well guys, thank you so much for sending in your questions.

We're going to take a break and when we come back, we are going to play an excerpt from our audio book. It's from the chapter, big pregs, little pregs, fake pregs, which is pretty perfect because it's all about our real pregnancies and our fake pregnancies for the show. And next week we're going to be breaking down the delivery. I like it. Chapter 10, big pregs, little pregs, fake pregs. Oh my goodness, Kate Flannery just walked in and she has a piano.

I think she's going to play a song for us. Big pregs, little pregs, fake pregs, babies. Wow, that was so great. Oh, and now Kate's leaving. Bye, Kate. Oh, bye. She just has a piano on her hip. Does she walk around like that?

Maybe so. How talented is she? What a great way to start this chapter because we couldn't write a book about our best friendship without sharing about how we navigated our transitions into parenthood. As anyone with children can tell you, becoming a parent is life-altering. Schedules change, priorities change, and as a result, sometimes even friendships change. We definitely had some bumpy moments once we became moms. We're going to give it to you straight with all the details because that's how we do

it. Also, as you listen to the next chapter, be prepared to hear a lot about wedgies and bodily fluids. You've been warned. While shooting season four of The Office, I was pregnant in real life, but my character of Angela was not, so we had to hide my belly behind all kinds of crazy things. In season six of The Office, Pam was pregnant but I was not pregnant in real life. I wore a prosthetic belly for the show that we affectionately called fake prigs.

In season eight, Angela Martin was pregnant and I was the one who was fake prigs. In season eight, Pam gets pregnant again but this time I was also pregnant in real life. This back and forth of one of us being real pregnant and one of us being fake pregnant became a source of confusion for everyone. One day on set, our script supervisor, Veta, looked up from her notes and said, wait, who is fake pregnant and who is real pregnant? The journey of our real and fake pregnancies and the way our friendship evolved during those times is the subject of this chapter.

Big prigs, little prigs, fake prigs. I got pregnant first. It was the summer of 2007. I was so excited when I found out and I couldn't wait to tell Jenna. It took everything I had not to call her the second I knew but I wanted to deliver the news in person so I decided to tell her at our lunch. Since we usually ate lunch together in Jenna's trailer, I knew that was my best shot at getting her alone.

As soon as I walked in, Jenna launched into a long story about her cat, Andy. This was a common lunchtime subject. Her cat was always doing the craziest things. Oh my god, lady, listen to this. When I went into my kitchen this morning, all the bottom cabinets were open. Like all of them, lady. This story went on for five minutes, you guys. Jenna loved that cat.

Long story short, Andy had learned how to open the cabinets. I listened, laughed at her story and waited. When she was finished, I blurted out, I'm pregnant. I vaguely remember a thud and shrieking and then after an epic bear hug, Jenna yelled, why did you let me go on and on about my cat? This is accurate, but let me explain the thud. I had been sent to lunch early because we were shooting something that didn't involve front reception.

By the time Angela got to my trailer, I was finished eating and had gotten up to do some exercise. I kept five pound weights in my trailer and would do bicep curls or push-ups from time to time and called out a workout. I was trying, okay? So I was pumping iron and droning on about my cat as Angela listened patiently. Mid-curl, she told me she was pregnant. I dropped the weights to the ground, causing the loud thud, then screamed for joy and hugged

my best friend. Our production assistant knocked on the door to ask if everything was okay. Yes, we yelled through our tears of joy. I knew how very much Angela wanted a child. I knew she would make a wonderful mother. I was just so happy for her. In the weeks ahead, I shared the news with the rest of the cast, crew, and writing staff. Everyone was so excited.

The writers started discussing how they might work the pregnancy into the show and what that might mean for Angela Martin. Then, something crazy happened. The entire television and movie-making industry shut down due to the writer's strike and our show went on hiatus. No one knew how long the writer's strike would last. We had already filmed the first part of season four, and I wasn't showing then. When we finally started production again, four months later, I was seven months pregnant.

I had a very obvious, very huge belly. The characters and storylines of the show were meant to pick up right where we'd left off. There was no way Angela's character could be pregnant out of the blue. We knew we'd have to hide it, and for that, we had to get creative. Angela did a lot of scenes standing behind the copier or the ficus plant in the bullpen. My personal favorite belly hide was during dinner party. Andy Bernard and Angela Martin arrive at Jan and Michael's party together.

The writers were puzzled as to how to disguise her pregnancy as they entered the condo. There was no copier in Michael's apartment. They came up with the idea of having Angela enter with a bouquet of flowers as a host gift. Pam brings wine, Angela brings flowers. They're themselves, right? Oh no. On the day of shooting, the prop team had to keep adding flowers to the bouquet until

it was enormous. I mean a truly ridiculous bouquet. But that's how we hid the belly. Angela was the first regular cast member to be pregnant on set, so it was as if we were all having that baby with her. Everyone was so protective, making sure she got enough to eat, drank enough water, sat down often enough. The crew even threw her a surprise baby shower in the set parking lot.

At that same time, I teamed up with Angela's sister-in-law, Suzanne Daniels, and we threw a friends and family shower. Angela's mom, sisters, and grandmother all flew to Los Angeles for the event. Celebrating Angela's pregnancy with this multi-generational group of women was moving to me. These women, who had raised children of their own, were bringing Angela into the fold. It was a beautiful thing. At the same time, seeing Angela at her baby shower really drove home the fact that I was

very far away from joining that flock. During the same month of the dual showers, Jenna was turning 34. I wanted to be there for Jenna as her birthday approached. She was doing so much for me. But to illustrate the different directions our lives were taking, Jenna wanted to celebrate her birthday at a bar in West Hollywood called St. Nick's. It's no longer in business, but during its heyday, it was a great dive bar. Dark interior, old pleather booths, a jukebox, the best greasy burgers, and a back room with

a dart board. Imagine being eight months pregnant and walking into that bar holding a sheet cake. Yes, I brought Jenna a sheet cake from the grocery store, and then I waddled to the back of the bar and ate half of it. Angela, I will never forget looking over at you as you happily ate sheet cake and sang at the top of your lungs to Leonard Skinner playing on the jukebox. You were super pregnant in a dive bar, getting all kinds of side-eye from the other patrons. You did that for me, and I am forever grateful.

Well, that is our excerpt for this podcast episode. This chapter was such a blast to write, and we're so excited for you guys to read it or listen to it in the audiobook. Speaking of audiobook, in case you missed it last week, we did a special feed drop, I guess is what it's called. We put the entire first chapter of our audiobook in the Office Ladies podcast feed so you can go listen to that. Yeah, I'll put a swipe up in stories if you missed it, but you guys, before we say goodbye

today, we have a few wrap-up questions. The first one is from Jill in Marshfield, Ohio. Jill says, obviously, you're best friends, but how would you describe the dynamics of Lee and Josh? Sometimes best friend's spouses are amicable, but there are also times that they just don't mesh. I would say our fellas mesh. So well.

Yes. And I would say they got along, and they were friends. We would do a lot of group activities together. Whenever we hang out with you guys, afterwards Josh always says to me, Lee's so fun to be around. I gotta hang out with Lee more. That's what Lee says about Josh. But I will say one thing, nothing bonded these men like us writing this book.

Because they are the only two people on the planet who know what it was really like in those trenches. Jenna, when I showed Josh the book, he was like, oh my gosh, babe, it turned out so great. He was so loving, and we got to the dedication page, and he said, it should just say for Lee and Josh, because we include our children, and he's like, no, it should just say Lee and Josh. Yeah. These guys did a lot of solo parenting on the weekends so that Angela and I could write.

They made a lot of space for us. They really stepped up. They were wonderful partners in this book. I mean, it wouldn't be here without them truly. Truly, and I will add this, Lee is a phenomenal writer. He is an amazing editor. I can't tell you how many times we took a chapter to him, and we were like, we think it's done.

We really do. Do you have any insight? Do you have any advice we think it's done? And he might have one or two small suggestions that completely changed it and judged it in a way we couldn't have thought of. Yeah. He did a lot of editing of this book, a lot of polishing. I'm sure he's read it dozens of times as well.

He has. And here's my shout out for Josh. Josh is just a technical wizard. Here's an example. We got the book back from Day Street from our publisher, and we wanted to be able to share the document so we could work off one active document. No one could seem to figure this out. Josh did it.

He made this living, breathing document that we could share in real time. He also helped us recover some photos and memorabilia that I don't know if we could have included in the book without his technical assistance. Like he helped us scan things and create a resolution that was shareable. And I mean, that just means so much to me. So our fellows really came through for us, and I'm glad that we're giving them a shout out here today. Me too.

Well, our final question is from Megan G in Iowa. What big takeaways do you want readers to walk away with and any thoughts you want us to have before diving in? Well, Megan, what I would say is when you watch the office, you're watching a group of people who are becoming good friends. And I mean the cast and the crew. And what we hoped to convey in our book is that intimacy of that group of people. So we have a chapter about holiday episodes on the office, but then we include all of

the ways that we celebrated the holidays off camera together because we're all real friends. Yeah. And I think also, Megan, this book for me is really about friendship. It's the friends we made on set, but it's also finding that friend in your life who builds you up and supports you and is just this unwavering champion for you. And I found that in Jenna and I'm so thankful for it. And I hope our story of our friendship inspires people not to give up, you know, because we didn't think we would make a friend this close and this meaningful in our 30s.

We thought friendships were sort of things you make earlier in life. And then by the time you're 30, you've got all your friends. But that's when we met. And I would say you just never know who's going to come into your life and to leave that space and openness in your heart. Yeah. I mean, ultimately, this book is about friendship. Yeah.

So guys, thank you so much. We hope that you like the book. It just came from our hearts and we're really proud of it. I'm sure you can tell. Thanks for going on this journey with us. Thank you so much. So many of you guys have sent in your questions and your comments and your words of support really meant a lot to us over these years.

And we just can't thank you enough and we're sending you big hugs. We hope to see some of you guys as we release this book into the world. And you know, a big shout out to everyone at HarperCollins and Day Street who helped this book come to fruition. Renata, we've already mentioned, Carrie, Chelsea, Rosie, Peter, Ali, Kel, Suzanne, am I, am I missing anyone, Jenna? Oh, Dennis and Jeremy. I mean, it's a big group.

We love you all. It's a big group. Yeah. Thank you. We'll see you next week with the delivery. Part one. Pam's having her baby, folks. It's time.

Except she refuses to go to the hospital. Oh my gosh. We'll see you next week. See ya. Thank you for listening to Office Ladies. Office Ladies is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fisher, and Angela Kinsey. Our show is executive produced by Cody Fisher. Our producer is Cassie Jerkins, our sound engineer is Sam Kiefer, and our associate

producer is Ainsley Bubaco. Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton. For ad-free versions of Office Ladies, go to StitcherPremium.com. For a free one-month trial at Stitcher Premium, use code, OFFICE.