Office Ladies - Two Weeks

Episode Date: October 27, 2021

This week we’re breaking down “Two Weeks”. Michael puts in his two weeks notice at Dunder Mifflin and when he learns finding a new job is hard, he decides to start the Michael Scott Paper Company. The ladies celebrate Michael’s new endeavor by trying his drink of choice, Scotch and Splenda. Is it drinkable?! Angela points out a deleted scene that reveals why Michael has a big tub of cheeseballs, Jenna describes how the monster sounds were made for Monster.com and the ladies also drink to how this episode was unbeknownst to them, Pam’s last day as a receptionist. So if you dare, put in your two weeks notice, make yourself a Scotch and Splenda and enjoy this episode! Teapot & Sprinkles Wine Glass Set: https://www.podswag.com/products/office-ladies-teapot-sprinkles-wine-glass-set?_pos=7&_sid=b1c7b93e6&_ss=r

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. Good. I always want to say good morning. I know you do because it's 9.30 a.m. for us. And I'm having a cup of tea. I'm having a cup of coffee. Hi guys! Today we are talking about two weeks, which is season five, episode 21, written by Aaron Shore and directed by Paul Lieberstein. As we were warming up today here in the

studio, literally warming up because it was very cold. Yeah, it's freezing in here. And we were waiting for it to warm up. We were talking about how much we love writer Aaron Shore. Yes. Aaron, you are delightful. We are enjoying all your emails and just reconnecting with you. And you have the best stories. The best stories. It's no wonder they use so many stories from his real life in episodes. Here's a summary. At the end of the last episode, Michael told David Wallace he was quitting. And guess what? It's true. Yeah. He has given his official two weeks notice. And he has also given up on doing any work. Have you ever given a

two weeks notice? I have. So have I. It's the most awkward two weeks when you're at your job, but everyone knows you're quitting. Yes. And it's true. You kind of coast. I mean, I didn't walk around with, you know, scotch and splendor, but you kind of phone it in. Well, I gave two weeks notice at a job. And in that two weeks, it was my job to hire my replacement and train them. So I had to conduct interviews and put out a job posting and then create a handbook for my job for the next person. You had to do more work. I did. I did more work in my two weeks than ever before. I remember giving two weeks notice. And then when I

was finally done with the two weeks, I got in my car and guess what came on the radio? What? I'm free. Free fall. And I was like, it's a sign. Is that how you felt? Yes. Like in a good way. Not a bad free fall, like a good free fall. Yeah. You were done with that job. Sounds like you didn't like it. I did not like it. And you know what? I was a little bit of Michael Scott during my two weeks. Well, Michael is going to take a turn when he learns how bad the current job market is. He suddenly starts to panic. And in the end, he is going to start his own paper company. And he's going to start by trying to recruit Dunder Mifflin employees to work with

him. But pretty much everyone says no. Except Pam. Pam is the only employee who is going to join Michael in his new adventure. The Michael Scott paper company. I love this runner. I do too. Fast fact number one. When I was looking at the script for this episode, it aired on March 26th, 2009. That was my sister's 30th birthday. That same year, I turned 35 or five years apart. And I remembered what we did for our birthdays to mark these milestone birthdays. What? All right. This is a story where my family back home is like, I cannot believe this is your life. And I always say this is not my life. This is a moment. This is like

a crazy thing that happened. A club in Vegas. I remember this. This club in Vegas. And I am so sorry. I cannot remember your name. Oh, no. I'm so sorry. Because I know so very little about clubbing in Vegas. But this one time in my life, this club in Vegas reached out and they said that they would fly out my friends, family, whoever, give us an all expense paid trip to Vegas, a dinner. I remember this, Jenna, because I had a little baby. Yes. And I couldn't go. You couldn't go. And then you're texting me from Vegas. So I flew out my sister and her husband. And then I flew out Lee's brothers and sister. So it was like all of the

brothers and sisters in law met in Vegas and we partied hard. And it all kind of culminated in this club experience, which I'd never had before with bottle service, sparklers, sparklers and cupcakes with my picture on them. Crazy, crazy. I have to tell you. So I wasn't able to go. And then the next year, the same club. Oh my gosh, club in Vegas. We don't remember your name. We were so sorry. The same the next year. It was really fun. We'll figure it out and we'll definitely tag you in a photo in our stories. We'll figure it out. The next year, same club with like an accent on the E. Yes. Yes. Okay. So the next year,

the same club reached out to me and Mindy because Mindy's June 24th and I'm June 25th. And they said, we will throw you a joint birthday party in Vegas, fly you out the whole shebang. And Mindy and I were like, Oh my gosh, remember, Jenna talking about it? We should do it. Mindy, do you remember this? I remember this. And then whatever we couldn't do it because we just had too many moving parts, but there was a split second where Mindy and I were in here and makeup and we're like, should we go to Vegas for a birthday? Yeah. Oh my gosh, privé, privé. I think it's privé, privé. A delicious dinner, I have to say. Well,

dang it, dang it. Casino club area. It was pretty dang cool. That's a great flashback. Moving along to fast fact number two, you mentioned Scotch and Splenda. Yeah. Tastes like Splenda gets you drunk like Scotch. Michael first mentioned this drink in season three cocktails when he was having drinks at David Wallace's house. That episode was written by Paul Lieberstein. This episode is directed by Paul Lieberstein. So Paul clearly loves his Scotch and Splenda. I found a recipe for Scotch and Splenda and I thought we should have it today. Shut up. You're not. Wait, I haven't had, I didn't have much of a

breakfast. Here's Scotch. Oh my god, Jenna. Wait, Sam, did you know about this? Cassie? Cassie's getting the ice. Here's the Splenda. Cassie, did you guys know? I didn't. Okay. And then I found one pancake for breakfast, only one. I thought we could drink it out of our own office ladies glasses. I love these, look. Okay. Oh my gosh, everybody. You can have sprinkles. I'll have the teapot. Okay. Sam and Cassie can have some dundies. This is me opening the Splenda. Oh my gosh. All right. You guys, it is 9.57 in the morning. All right, so here's what you need. You need one packet of Splenda. Okay. Oh my gosh. Two ounces of Scotch and some ice. I mean, I

don't know what this is gonna taste like. We're gonna be here for a bit. All right, I'm gonna open the Scotch. It's really happening, guys. I thought this would be fun. Only Cassie knew because she had to get the ice. I was like, do they have ice here? Here we go. That's ice going in. Stirry, stirry. Okay. Just so you guys know, this is what my parents think my job is. No, don't say that. Here we go. I'm certain this is disgusting. We're gonna let you know. Is everyone ready? Wait one second. Drink responsibly. Okay, ready? Here we go. Everybody try it. Cheers. Cheers, everyone. Cheers. Oh my god, you guys, it's not bad. I don't hate it. I don't hate it. Yeah, Splenda,

I don't have anything snarky to say. I don't hate it. It's really nice. I don't hate it. I would totally drink this if you served it to me at a bar. I am maybe gonna ask for this the next time I go out. It tastes like something Applebees would have. Okay, wait, Jenna, if If you ask for Scotch and Splenda at a bar, I hope it shuts down. Oh, we need to go to Chili's and ask for Scotch and Splenda. Yes. Oh, my lord. All right, guys.

Cheers. Cheers, everyone. All right. To chunking it. To chunking it. Sam, bringing back the chunk. Wow, it's really kind of good. Michael Scott was onto something.

I truly believed it was going to be awful and I like it. I like it too. Some things we should do a spinoff podcast called Scotch and Splenda. I can't wait to see what we talk about on that podcast. All right. Fast fact number three. Shortly after this episode aired, the NBC office website sent out a mass email to all subscribers from Michael Scott about the fact that he was quitting Dunder Mifflin.

Yes. And this is what it said. It said, as the manager of Dunder Mifflin Scranton, I learned two things. Everything about the paper business and that Dunder Mifflin is a sucky company. I am taking that expertise and creating the Michael Scott paper company. I cannot promise success, but I will promise you the best effing time of your life. So anyone who has subscribed to the website got that email. This is so in the vein.

I know it's going to come later, but when Jim's like, you know, this is an industry on decline and Michael's like, I practically invented the decline. Like this is the kind of energy he's going into his new business with. Oh, well, listen, that's all I've got for fast facts. A story about Vegas, a little Scotch and Splenda and a surly email from Michael. It's one of my favorite fast facts we've ever done. The Scotch and Splenda might have had something to do with it. Well, why don't we take a break and we'll come back and get into this episode.

Let's do it. All right, you guys, we are back. Michael is holding court finally in the kitchen. He has everyone's attention. He's telling them the story of how he quit, how he went to New York and quit and told David Wallace, I want you to know this is called the purple cold open. And the Kinsey Chronicles of the office. Why is it called the purple cold open?

I will tell you, Jenna, Angela Martin is wearing a purple turtleneck and a purple cardigan. Pam is wearing a purple top under her cardigan. Kelly is wearing a purple stripe button down shirt. Oscar has purple squares on his tie and sort of faint purple stripes on his shirt. Stanley has purple stripes on his shirt and purple flowers on his tie. And Kevin also has purple stripes. I will have you know, when I saw this cold open, I noted the numerous jewel tones, but I did not break it down like that and I applaud you.

I just was like, what happened? What was Alicia like? Where was her? She was in sort of like a, I don't know, a spring awakening mode of her life. Everyone had purple on in this whole kitchen scene minus Michael. Everyone else had purple on. Just saying. I found it fascinating.

Now the episode is going to start. Michael is walking around with one of those gooey, stretchy hands, you know, your kids get them at a county fair and then they smack them on the window and that leaves the gooey residue. Michael's walking around, smacking pieces of paper, yanking them back. He messes with Phyllis's hair. I remember Phyllis broke on that. I did too.

That's why you see her from the back cause she was laughing and I love how he tucked it back in his suit pocket and just the hand like hung down sadly for the rest of the scene. This is also when Michael is drinking his Scotch and Splenda. We reached out to writer Aaron Shore, the writer of this episode, because we were very curious who wrote tastes like Splenda gets you drunk like Scotch. Yeah, we gotta know. I mean, it's just too good. And he said that that line was created in a pre-table draft pitch session.

So what that means is the writers, they would kind of typically work together to make an outline of each episode and then a specific writer, in this case, Aaron Shore, would go off and write the whole episode based on that outline and they usually got like about a week. Well, they would turn in their draft, they would get notes and then they would also have these pitch sessions. Right. They'll get notes.

Sometimes a few of the writers will be put in a pod to pitch on a certain element of the script. Yes. And that is exactly what happened with Scotch and Splenda. A few writers got together and they said, we want a really funny joke for this moment when Michael is walking around with a drink in his hand. And Aaron had saved all of the pitches. Stop it.

Oh my gosh. All of the... Oh my gosh. What were they? Okay. So, Kevin says, is that Scotch? Yeah. And here are the various pitches that Michael would reply.

Yup, from a fire truck shaped bottle in my office. Or better, southern comfort. Or nope, diet Pepsi and water and ice and Scotch. Or it's non-alcoholic Scotch. And finally, the one they went with, Scotch and Splenda, tastes like Splenda, gets you drunk like Scotch. And then that is the joke that they ultimately picked for our table read draft, which is the draft that all the actors got and that we would read out loud.

I love it. My number two would have been a bottle shaped like a fire truck. I liked bottle shaped like a fire truck as well. Because I remember like my dad had like a novelty liqueur that I think it came in a stagecoach. I don't know. But like it just sat on the shelf. Well, the cool thing about those extra lines was then at the table draft, if it...

Oh, Angela is having a sip of Scotch and Splenda. That's the ice that you hear. Because I was like, well, we are talking about Scotch and Splenda. It wasn't a joke, folks. We're really drinking it. Sipping. Sipping it. We're really sipping it.

That's your, you are sipping. But what I was going to say is the interesting thing is that those extra jokes, the ones they didn't put in the table draft, they would save in that candy bag document. And then if a joke didn't land at the table read, they might go over there and replace it when it came time for the shooting draft. Sure they would have us do it on set on a different alternate. Right. Sometimes I think the writers just wanted to hear them just for fun.

Even though they knew we weren't going to like use any of them, they would hand you a page. And if we had time that day in our shooting schedule, we would just do a whole bunch of alts. And it was always so fun. So fun. Stanley thinks Michael should start looking for another job. Michael says he has a job to which Andy points out for four more days.

Yeah. Andy's like, you kind of got to get your act together here. Well, Michael has a talking head where he is not worried. I mean, what's he going to do? He's going to do a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and he's going to stop worrying about calories. So during this whole montage of like people giving Michael advice, there was a scene in the shooting draft that didn't make it.

And Kelly walks into his office and she's like, Michael, what are you going to do? You know what I would do? I'd move to Mexico. I'd live on the beach. I'd be naked. I'd make jewelry, have amazing sex, drink lots of margaritas. She just kind of goes off on this whole thing. And while Kelly is rambling on and on about what she would do, he is carving into his

desk. Michael was here. Oh my God. And he really carved into the top of the desk. I was like, did we trash a desk for this like scene that never even made it in? And I wasn't the only one that noticed. Olivia C wrote in and said, in the deleted scenes, they're on the DVD box set, guys. We see that Michael has carved Michael was here on the desk.

Did Steve really carve that into the desk? Olivia, I had the same question, but guess what? Randy Cordray had the answer. He said our production designer, Michael Gallenberg, created a matching desktop out of the exact same similar wood. Wow. I know that was laminated over the actual desktop because we were shooting scenes out of order and they couldn't have different stages of Michael carving into his desk in

the episode because then it wouldn't match. So they just had this laminate top they would put on top and then they would take it away. Now let me ask you this question. That means that Vada, our script supervisor, would have had a chart and on that chart for each scene, it would say carve desk, no carve desk. She would have tracked when we should see the carving. But they didn't know they were going to cut this scene until later. So is it possible that we can see this carving on his desk throughout the episode?

Maybe. You'd have to be close, right? Like over his shoulder. Yeah. But I mean, probably what a headache for Vada. It's like keeping track of all that. And then it didn't even make it in. I'll have you know, Angela, at two minutes, 48 seconds, we had a fan catch from Flora

Kay. There is a blooming plant at reception. Flora! Good catch. I knew it would make your heart happy. I saw it too, Flora. You know, the last time we had a blooming plant at reception was beach games. So you think this is connected to Pam?

Pam is going to have her moment here. She's going to have another moment. She's going to bloom again today, like in beach games. Now I know we talked to Steve Dusharer, who told us that it was a coincidence, that it was a blooming plant for beach games, but Steve, Dusharer, again, with the blooming plant, Pam is blooming. I think it was subconscious. This is that group mind thing.

That's what I was going to say. This is creative group mind. Well, Michael is now going to move into the kitchen. I guess he's hungry. So he's looking for some food. He's a little tipsy and he's going to go like raid the refrigerator. Who hasn't been there? Come on.

In the script, it just said that Michael takes out a container clearly labeled Phyllis. But you know how he's eating it and then he's like, Phyllis, none of that was in the script. Oh, really? Nope. Steve just improvised that. Oh, that's so good. Andy comes in and he wants to give Michael some wine as a farewell gift.

It's actually a really nice gesture. It is. And Michael just doesn't give a crap. Michael would love it if Jim came in and gave him a bottle of wine. I know. But, you know, it's Andy. So he's like, I already have wine. This next scene I loved because Michael is sitting on the couch by front reception and

a man walks in. He's interviewing for Michael's job. Yeah. Michael is kind of on the couch reading a novel. I zoomed in on it. I tried to see what it was. It's like a woman in a martini glass. It's clearly like a sort of…

A romance novel? No. It seems like one of those like books for women about, you know, claim your space sort of book. Yeah. Yeah. Like a motivational… Yes.

That's what it looked like to me. So a couple of things. At four minutes, 16 seconds, the blooming plant is on the move. It's been moved to the other side of the reception desk. So you can see the couch better. Yeah. The man who's interviewing for the job is named Mr. Isaac Sylvie. And Aaron Schur told us that he was named after Aaron's kids, Isaac and Sylvie.

Isn't that so cute? Yes. He had originally named the character Mr. Engbritzen. But Paul Lieberstein told him, no, name him after your kids. So that's how he got the name Mr. Isaac Sylvie. He was played by David Grant Wright, who has appeared in several episodes of Better Call Saul, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and pretty much every soap opera you can imagine.

David is an incredible actor, and I read his bio. He is a 27-year cancer survivor. Oh, wow. He wrote a one-man show called With Flying Colors about his cancer experience, which he has performed for the last 25 years, raising thousands of dollars for cancer patients. Good human alert. Yes. Good human alert.

That's fantastic. Well, in this scene, Michael finds out that Isaac has driven all the way from Philly. And Michael's like, gosh, that's a heck of a drive. And Isaac said, yeah, well, this is one of the few places hiring. It's rough out there. When you sort of see the realization coming over Michael's face, Jenna, there was more to the scene. It was so good.

I read it in the shooting draft. He has his resume out, Isaac, and Michael's like, can I see that? Michael is so blown away. He finds out that Isaac was the president of the company he used to work at. Wow. Yeah. And now he's driving all the way from Philly for a regional manager position. Michael is so blown away by his resume, he says, can I keep this?

And then he really starts to spiral. And he goes to see Toby and asks Toby for resume advice, like how to beef up his resume. This made it into the deleted scenes. It's so good. Can we hear it? Hey, Toby, I have a real quick question for you. It's about a resume. Sure.

So we might start with, so your most recent thing, you know, summary of achievements. What have you done here at Dunder Mifflin? Regional manager, Dick Watt. Okay. So, you know, how would you actually describe what you did? Change things. Ushered in a new era of love and comedy in the workplace. Hired many, fired none, made money, lost money, learned to stop counting.

This is our moment. This is our time. This next part should be sung if possible. That made me laugh so hard. The scene continued. Toby said, how would you describe what you did? And Michael has this speech and it didn't make it in. This is Michael talking about himself.

Michael Scott always had a strange recipe for success, two cups of spirit, a half a thing of inspiration, two spoonfuls of love, a water bottle of danger, a pinch of praise, a dash of hopes, a sprinkle of cinnamon, two pats of butter, a box of cake mix, and a little bit of cooking oil, preheat oven. Wait. What am I describing? It made me laugh so hard. That's his description of what he did.

Okay. That talking head is very funny, but I have to say what I think I can tell you. It's the biggest scotch because it's so funny to me. Is it not that funny? No, but I've shared a drink with you before, Angela, and you're getting into that. I'm tickled. You're getting into that, yes, that territory where you giggle. I haven't even had a full scotch and splitter.

No, no, you haven't. And I just have to say one more time. It's so good. It's really good. I know. All right. All right. Let's move on.

Yes, let's. We need to talk about this new copier. I guess we have this whole runner about copier or chairs. We never saw them get their chairs, but they have gotten a new copier now. I did love that for the whole beginning of the episode, it was wrapped in the blue sort of packaging and no one said anything about it. I just love how things are in the backdrop like that. I do too.

Pam has a talking head where she says that they delivered this new copier, but they didn't set it up. So Pam's job today is setting up this copier. This would do me in. Yeah. I wouldn't be able to do it. I don't like reading instructions. I don't like manuals.

When I get any kind of appliance and it comes with the manual, I just stash the manual in a corner. This is reminding me of the document that we got when it was time to do the layout edit of our book. You guys, it was like building a small Cessna. Are we allowed to take a picture of that and put it on the pod? Because to me, it looked like some sort of scientific formula. It was all of these instructions for how to make a comment on the PDF.

And when I looked at it, my brain exploded and you got on the phone with me and said, I can't do it. I can't do it. Lady, I can't do it. I will mess it up. So we got on the phone together and every time you had a note, I read the document and I carefully made the note on the PDF. So if you buy our book, OfficeBFFs, just know that we now know how to, well, Jenna knows

how to do a note on an elaborate layout craziness document and I learned how to build a Cessna airplane. Yeah. But we cared and we put that love and care into our book. I'm buzzed. I know. While Pam is going to be putting this copier together, Kevin is constantly bugging her and there's a lot of Pam sass here.

I loved shooting this scene with Brian. We shot it first thing in the morning. They would do this when there were scenes at reception in particular that didn't feature the rest of the office. That meant nobody had to be in the background and you guys didn't have to come in so early. So Brian and I came in first thing. It was probably 6.37 in the morning when we shot this scene, but I loved it. We had so much fun and I got to sass him.

I think that we learn that in the accounting department, Kevin is tasked with all the menial tasks. Like, go make photocopies. Go do this. You're so right. That's why he cares so much about the copier. It's his one job. When Pam talks about how a copier goes through a lot, I loved the runner of things that happen

to this copier. Oh, yes. We didn't talk about that. It's so great. First of all, Creed puts coins into it. Right there. Creed is probably messed with all the mechanisms and Oscar's like, I think it's 75 cents. So he keeps feeding coins into it and then, of course, band it, choose on the wires and

then Kevin dumps a whole cup of coffee over the entire copier. It's no wonder this thing doesn't work. I know. I had a question for Randy Cordray at five minutes, 12 seconds. When we see Bandit chewing on the copier cord, I was like, Randy, do we know who the cat actor was because you have this whole list of the cat actors? It looked like Bandit. Well, Bandit was played in this scene by the ever reliable milkman.

Oh, milkman. Oh, milkman. Randy said it took several days of training to get milkman to actually chew on the cord, which was painted with sardine oil. Oh, wow. The training of the cat, the labor, the transportation cost, the cat rental for this episode, for this very simple three-second insert shot cost us, any guesses anyone? Three seconds, a cat licking a cord.

Any guesses? Cassie? She guessed $2,000. Sam? I'm going to go big and say $10,000. I'll hit it in the middle at seven. $1,710. Oh.

Cassie gets it. Cassie wins. Close us without going over. And once again, we use Bob Dunn's Animal Rentals from Somar, California with Denise Sanders, our lead cat trainer. Once again, a simple little three-second joke took somebody a week to make happen. We are going to go to Jim's desk and over his shoulder, we can hear monster sounds coming from Michael's office.

And I love this line when Jim says, it's monster.com singular. He knew. He knew. We actually got a lot of mail about this bit. OK. People wondered, where did we get the monster sounds? Well, as it turns out, it was none other than our post-production supervisor's voice, Jake Oust, making monster sounds.

Get out. Yes, Jake. I guess he just recorded monster sounds into a microphone, and then our sound supervisor, Bobby Maxden, took the recording, added some reverb and some scary special effects, and that is how we got our fakeymonsters.com website. Jake, really good job with the monsters. I agree. This leads us into a Michael talking head, where he says, if you work in paper long enough,

you get to know the players, and he's going to start calling some paper companies to maybe get a job. Well, we find out there's only one on his list. Are you ready for the saddest outgoing message ever? Yeah. Here it is. Hi. You've reached Prince Paper.

We are sad to inform you that after 40 years of serving the community, we are no longer in business. Thank you for your support, and may God bless you. Bye. Yeah. Oh, that was harsh. That was Prince Family Paper, the small family-owned paper business that Michael and Dwight have clearly put out of business.

The little girl at the end. Bye. I'll have you know, they were uncredited, but we brought back the original cast members of the Prince Family to do the voices. That is Dan Desmond as Roger Prince and Emily Ray Argenti as his granddaughter Rebecca Prince. When I heard that again, I mean, I knew it was coming, right? I knew it was coming, but still, I was like, in his voice waivers, I was like, oh, I know. Well, Michael needs to now figure something out.

So at 16 minutes, 49 seconds, he's going to start throwing stuff at Jim to get his attention so that Jim will come in his office. Yeah. He's going to call Jim, but instead he's going to throw a kush ball at him. Well, Jim goes in his office and Michael's like, close your eyes, because I'm going to tell you something. And Jim will not close his eyes. And this is when Michael reveals he's going to start his own paper company, leading to

your favorite couplet that we talked about earlier. Yeah. Do you know how the industry is in decline? Do I? I practically invented decline. He goes on to tell Jim he has a name for the company and he wants Jim maybe to be a part of it. He's very excited.

It's a big no from Jim. I'll have you know, at six minutes, 44 seconds, I spotted something. What? The desk? No. Oh. Do you remember in season three, the job part one, I noticed that the outlet in Michael's office, the one under the big photo on his sidewall, was upside down.

Correct. And in that podcast, we learned that you can install outlets any way you want and they still work. You can put them sideways, you can put them up and down. I also said in that episode that I would be tracking outlets. I'll have you know. You didn't forget. I didn't forget.

And if you look at that outlet, it is now facing up. It is facing the correct way. Ta-da! I kept my word. Well, you did. And the outlet is now up and down. There you go. Outlet tracker, Jenna Fisher.

Mission accomplished. Charles is going to interrupt. Jenna is taking a drink of her Scotch and Splendid. I've been drinking water. Busted. What? Yeah, I just saw you drink. Charles is going to come in and once again, Jim is in the wrong place at the wrong time

and he breaks up their meeting. Yeah, because he says, Michael has given his two weeks notice. Jim, did you also give your two weeks notice? And Jim's like, nope, nope, I'm going to go have a seat. We just need to find a way to get to drink. So I literally just said, I just want to say something. We need to, I was going to say, we need to find a way to get to break. But you said to get to drink.

That's what I said. We need to find a way to get to drink. You guys, I want you to know it is 1048 AM. Maybe we should go to break and drink some water. I think we should go to break and drink some water. We'll be right back. Okay, we are back. We have hydrated ourselves.

Angela's eating some cheese. Mm-hmm. Jenna drank some water. We're going to be very serious podcasters now. We're serious. Don't worry. By the way, I wanted to start before we jump back into the episode, I just want to give a big plug to BJ Novak's new show on Hulu called The Premise.

It is so good. I've seen every episode, BJ, you are killing it. Every episode is standalone. It's like an anthology show with a different cast. He's directed many of them. He's written them. You know what I didn't expect. So I just saw the first one.

BJ starts it. Yes, he has an introduction moment. Yeah, and I was like, oh my god, BJ, I didn't expect to see you. Well, they're great. BJ is one of the smartest people I know, him and Mindy are just- Two of the smartest people in the room. Yes, always. And he has this way of articulating complex thoughts in a really relatable way.

And brilliantly funny way. Yeah. Relatable way. And brilliantly funny way. Yeah. He's the guy who wrote Diversity Day. That's all you need to know. He's also the guy that wrote the book with no pictures.

It's one of our kids' favorite books, and we've read it to them over and over over the years. The sort of scope of BJ's brilliance is really amazing. Yeah. BJ, we love you. We love you. We love your show. Check it out, The Premise on Hulu.

And if you have a young and the book with no pictures, you will love it. Back to the episode, Pam is on the ground with this copier manual. And Dwight comes over. This is a really cool shot. This was directed by Paul Lieberstein. This was his idea to put the camera on the floor with Pam. I thought it was a really great idea. You know, at a certain point, there's only so many ways to shoot this documentary.

And he found a new one. I think Paul liked to have some of the artsy shots, because do you remember when Jan goes to comfort Michael, and he's sitting in the train, like you just saw the faraway shot of his feet? Yeah. So I think Paul likes those interesting shots. In the next scene, Michael goes up to Pam, kind of sneaky. He wants her to help him make a order form for his new company, which is basically Dunder

Mifflin's order form, but with Michael Scott Paper Company in the corner in place of Dunder Mifflin. Right. She's like, okay. All right. Let me think about this. And she comes up with this way that they could kind of do this, scan it. And he says, I was thinking maybe we would just tape it, put a little piece of paper

over it, tape it. She's like, okay. I feel like this is the moment that starts Pam's storyline of feeling very easily replaceable, because she's been studying and studying this manual and thinks she's kind of had this great idea about how to use this new information, and it's just like that replaced. With some tape. At eight minutes and 41 seconds, I want you to know on Pam's desk, Nick is still in the office all day.

Well, the post-it is still there. Nick has been in the office for three episodes now. Nick in office. Nick in office. All right. Now we're going to get into this really wonderful scene in the conference room. The Angela Kelly rivalry is going strong. Kelly is talking to Charles about how she has to leave early on Tuesdays to pick up

her little sisters from school, because, you know, they're kind of like the Kardashians. Angela's going to come in because she wants to show Charles that brochure for the accounting seminar she was telling him about. Yeah. The brochure, he has a degree in accounting. Charles is like, did Michael just allow anyone in his office at any time? Okay. So this was in the script.

I looked it up to see how much was AdLib and wasn't. And there was a prompt for Angela and Kelly to talk at the same time. And we did add a little bit more, but basically we both just were going to gush like, oh, yeah, he was like, come on in. I felt like this was super animated Angela. Well, you know, she is turning on the charm for Mr. Charles Minor. I know. She said there was a Sunday bar at the accounting seminar, but she didn't eat any, you know,

just a trim. And then Kelly shoes her out and turns to Charles and says, yeah, she's really special. You know, she's turning 50 this year. I was actually 37 when we filmed this. I am 50 now. You know, when we were trading messages with Aaron Shore, he wrote us about a prank that Idris Elba played on the writers before he came to set. Yeah.

Now he actually said, I don't know if this was a prank that Mindy played on us pretending that it was from Idris or if it was actually from Idris. But I guess they got this email that was like, listen, Idris gets really upset if you mispronounce his name and his name is pronounced Idris Elba. It's so ridiculous. And they wrote it out. Idris Elba. Yeah, they sounded it out.

But then a bunch of them were like, I swear, that's not right. And so for the first week that Idris was on the show, all of the writers were afraid to call him by his name. And then they found out that this was not true at all. Number one, that his name is Idris and number two, that he doesn't get mad if you mispronounce his name. But I thought that was really funny. Idris, was that you or was it Mindy?

By the way, Idris, we have tried to reach out to you. We don't know how to get ahold of you. We'd love for you to be on the show. We did find some of your peeps, but they said you're busy. Very busy, I guess. You're super busy. You're making two movies and you're promoting another movie. You're busy.

We're here for you, Idris. Idris, anytime. Anytime. If you would like a Scotch and Splenda. We're your gals. With two gals who loved at Google. We're here for you. Well, Charles has a talking head where he just kind of owns it.

He's like, look, I know the effect I have on women. That's a meme. Yeah. It's so funny. Well, Aaron sure shared with us, you guys, that that talking head was inspired from a real interaction he had. He said there was an actor he was working with, no names. He wouldn't divulge the name, Big Star, who they were pitching a joke to.

And the actor was like, this joke would never work because, I mean, I know the effect I have on women and Aaron saved that it went in his brain and Charles had it in a talking head. I really wish that we knew the actor, but Aaron, gentlemen that he is, did not say. Maybe if we took him out for a Scotch and Splenda, maybe he would tell us immediately after the scene. Kelly is not going to give up guys. And in the deleted scenes, there's a little bit of what I want to call a flirty in the

break room, excuse me, hello, hey, having a nice day here, great. You must be from drama juice. Oh, what's that? It's a juice company because you're a smoothie. Okay. I'm sorry. Why do I ever talk to shut up, shut up, shut up. So she has this really lame pickup line and then immediately just hates herself and goes

in the corner and is like, why did I do that? Well this leads us into a scene that I will call awkward in the kitchen. Oh, so awkward. Michael is still trying to recruit people for his business and Andy does that thing, you know, that people do when they're uncomfortable. They either sing their answer or they do it accent. I think I'm the accent person. I sing stuff.

Yeah. When you don't want to like really tip your hand. Yeah. So Andy's like, oh, oh, interesting idea, like he does some ridiculous accent, but you would be like, that's a very interesting offer. Yeah. I mean, the other day I did it while we were working together, when we were working on that document.

Oh yeah. I was like, this PDF editing is difficult. And then I was like, are you okay? Because it sounds like you're about to spiral. I was like, yeah. Well it gets only more cringey because now Dwight comes in, but Michael does not ask Dwight to join his company, but it is also clear that Dwight wouldn't say yes anyway. Yeah.

So he's like, I've got the farm and a thing and let's put a pin in it. Yeah. Let's definitely put a pin in that. Yeah. So we got a lot of mail about this kitchen scene. A lot of people felt like it was out of character for Dwight to not want to join Michael's paper company. And also people wondered why didn't Michael want him to join?

And I just didn't know if we wanted to discuss. I have my thoughts. Let me hear them. Dwight is a survivalist and he doesn't think Michael's company is going to survive. So ultimately, even though he loves Michael, he's not going to go somewhere where he won't survive, right? Yeah. So I think he's very practical, so he's not going to go with Michael.

But I'm not sure why Michael doesn't want Dwight. Do you have any thoughts? You know, that is a really good question. I definitely see why Dwight would say no, but why Michael doesn't ask, I'm not quite sure. Yeah. Do you guys have theories? Yeah.

Send us your theories. We'll revisit it. But Michael is going to ask Oscar. And the way he's going to do that is by putting a note in his sandwich, a piece of paper that he bites into. Don't worry, it's sterile. Just saying sterile doesn't mean it's sterile. I loved that line.

It's like just saying bankrupt doesn't mean you declared bankruptcy. Exactly. Michael gets Oscar to meet him outside. And Oscar immediately starts offering very practical advice about how most new businesses don't turn a profit for the first two years. And you know, can he afford that? Can he afford to make no money for two years? Right.

Well, Michael's like, hey, hey, stop convincing me, you got the job. With all your number lingo. But ultimately, Oscar's a no. And that means that he has to move on to Stanley, who he's going to stock outside the bathroom. Outside? He's inside. I guess outside the stall. I don't know how urinals work, but I imagine he walked up while he was just peeing because

Stanley's like, I'm urinating. Michael keeps talking to him. Stanley's like, no. Michael has then a very sad talking head where he's like, you know what? No one said yes to prom, but I still had a good time. Guess what? What? Pam, fix the copier.

After four hours, she did it. She didn't let it beat her. No, she did not. She knows everything about this machine. Phyllis is going to copy a piece of paper and Pam is like, did it work? How is it? And Phyllis is like, fine, fine. So this whole copier storyline felt very familiar to me.

Having worked many temp jobs, having fixed many copiers in my real life. And it just felt to me like it was written by someone who also had this personal knowledge. Yeah. So I had to ask Aaron, have you had experience with copiers? You know, cause so many of his real life stories have wound up in our scripts like running past the speed meter. Yeah. And this whole copier story has so many details.

So as it turns out, yes, yes. He told us that he tempt in a ton of offices when he was a struggling standup in New York and he quickly learned that if you could unjam the copier, you held the power. Yeah. And he actually said, quote, you were like an office magician, a David Copperfield opening the cabinet of mysteries. And only a person who has done the copier thing, I feel like totally gets it. So I totally get it.

He said that he would actually copy the user manuals and take them home and read them over the week. That's the part that really got me. He would like learn everything from the manual. Aaron, I feel you, thank you for writing this runner for Pam because I was able to draw on a lot of my real life experience when it came to performing this copier story. Well, I don't know, did Michael leave the fakey order form in the copier? Charles finds it.

How does he find it? We don't know. But he's going to get Hank and they're going to escort him out the building. I am sorry, I am not sure that there is a recurring character that I love more than Hugh Dane as Hank. I know. I know. When Michael's like, Hank, come on, escort Charles out and Hank's like, come on, man.

I know. Just come on. He's so good. So good. Michael really wanted to make a farewell speech. Charles is not going to have that. And everyone watches him as he leaves. And he's like yelling things from his car, right?

He's yelling from the parking lot and everyone's looking down and they're like, what's he saying? We can't hear what he's saying. This is what it said in the script. All right. Michael walks toward his car. Everybody watches from the conference room above. Michael stops at his car and looks up at the dundermifflin windows.

And then he yells this, this is it, this is goodbye, forever, it's such a nice day out here, freedom. I'm already so happy. I can do anything I want right now. I'm going to go for coffee. That is what was in the script. And then it says he screeches his tires and drives off. The camera follows his car.

Michael parks just a short distance around the corner, gets out of his car, sneaks back into the parking lot and into the building. We get to hear a lot of people's opinions on Michael leaving. My favorite is probably Toby. He says, Michael is like a movie on a plane. Not great, but something to watch. And then when the movie's over, you're like, now what? Yes.

BJ wrote that talking head, very funny, and we got a piece of mail about it. What? Someone wrote in, and I'm so sorry I did not write down your name, to say that a missed opportunity in this episode was Toby conducting Michael's exit interview. Oh, wouldn't you have loved to see that? And I mentioned it to Aaron, and Aaron said, ah, but he was escorted out. They like to believe that if Michael hadn't been escorted out, he would have had his exit interview with Toby before he left.

Plus they had written a pretty great Michael Toby scene where Toby helps him with his resume that didn't make it in. Yes. And as everyone is having these really funny talking heads, Creed had one that was in the shooting draft, and it didn't make it in, and I have to read it to you. Okay. Creed says, old Creedie outlives yet another boss, time to put a marble in the box. And then Creed pulls out a cigar box out from his desk and puts a marble in it.

There are four marbles in that box. What is that? What is that? Is that amazing? Well, like you said, Angela, Michael is not leaving. He actually army crawls through the front door, through the office. He goes over to accounting. This was a really fun scene for us to shoot.

It was really hard not to laugh. We played around with how I shut the drawer, and I ultimately shut it with my foot, and it was just like so fun. Steve really tore up his elbows and his knees, though, doing that. He got like a rug burn. Yes. And Randy told us that they offered him elbow and knee pads, and Steve was like, it's fine. I'll do it.

And he did two takes without the elbow and knee pads, and he totally tore up his elbows and knees. He was so committed. Also, Randy told us, you know, when he throws that highlighter at Jim? Yeah. Yeah. That was not a real highlighter. That was a fakey highlighter.

Oh, so it wouldn't like hurt someone? Yes. When Michael throws the pen at Toby's forehead, and Phil had to make a rubber pen, Phil had to make a rubber highlighter, and it cost $850. Whoa. Yep. Michael wants everyone to go with him, and he starts to pull at Phyllis' chair. And you see it from the point of view of Charles, right?

You see Phyllis kind of like lurching, right? Yeah. To the side. If you watch the bloopers, you guys, and I remember this happening. The first time we did this scene, Steve yanks on Phyllis' chair, and she fell right out of it. Oh, yeah. I remember that.

And they didn't stop rolling. You know, Michael just goes, oh my God, Phyllis, are you okay? Are you okay? And Phyllis kind of snorts, laughs, and she says, yes, yes. But it's in the bloopers, and it's great. Now, Charles is going to find Michael. Yeah. He comes out of his office, and they have this really awkward exchange.

Yeah, like where it's going to get physical. All right. In the deleted scenes, Jenna. Charles finds Michael stealing office supplies in a box, and chases him through the kitchen. Michael drops the box of supplies to like throw him off, you know? Maybe Charles will trip over it. And then he like, last ditch effort just grabs the big container of cheese balls and makes a run for it.

Oh my gosh. That's why we're going to have cheese balls later. Yes. In Michael's paper company. Because in the deleted scenes, that's what he leaves with, is the cheese balls. I love it. I know. I wish it had made it in.

But for me, when Michael's like, who's with me? Who's coming with me? This is his Jerry Maguire moment. Instead of a goldfish, it's a bunch of cheese balls. That is perfect. I thought we had to hear Jerry's moment, and then Michael's moment. This moment will be the moment of something real, and fun, and inspiring in this God-forsaken business, and we will do it together.

Who's coming with me? Who's coming with me? Who's coming with me? Who's coming with me besides Flipper here? I will go with you. And now, for Michael and Pam's moment. This is your future. Hello.

This is your future. You are older, and you are very happy now, because you went with Michael Scott, right? So everybody, come on down. Now let's just crawl out of here together, all right? Come on. Are you doing your best here? Are you being the best that you can be? All right, everybody, who's going to go with me, I want you to stop your foot.

Oh no. What? I'm going with him. I mean, come on. Oh, it was so Jerry Maguire. By the way, I forgot about the goldfish in Jerry Maguire, and I'll have you know that when we get to Michael Scott Paper Company, not only do we have those cheese puffs, but Michael has a goldfish on his desk.

Come on. Yep. Well, fans were very split on this episode. A lot of people loved this turn of events of Michael starting his paper company and Pam going with him, but other people really thought that it was selfish of Pam to quit without talking to Jim first. Well, we talked to Aaron Sure about this, and he said two things. First of all, he said in a future episode, spoiler alert, Vikram from the telemarketing

firm is going to join Michael Scott Paper Company. Yes. I wrote this talking head for Vikram that got cut, but it explained why Vikram decided to join Michael Scott Paper Company, and it went like this. When you put your telemarketing career on the line, you haven't put much on the line. And Aaron said he felt like that kind of summed up Pam as well. Right. That Pam wasn't quitting much of a job at all.

Well, if she could be replaced by some invisible scotch tape. Yeah. Right. Yeah. There was also a line that Aaron wrote to explain this business of Pam not talking to Jim before making this decision, a little couplet of dialogue that got cut, where Jim said to Pam, shouldn't we have talked about this first? And Pam said, you blindsided me with a house, and Jim said, you're right, I'll bring your

stuff home. So he did address it, but it ended up getting cut. I think it was the right move to cut it, because it seems like, I don't know, a real thing Pam is holding on to that I don't think she is. No, I don't think so. As soon as Jim showed her the house, she loved it. She felt cared for and loved. She took it on, and I think she's been very happy ever since.

So I'm glad that they didn't pin that as some sort of lingering resentment for Pam. Yeah. Pam catches up to Michael in the parking lot. She says she's coming along, but she wants to be a salesman, not a receptionist. And Jim's kind of surprised by that. He's like, oh, okay. Yeah. And everyone is gathered again up in the conference room, and they're looking down as Pam and Michael

walk away. And as they're walking away, you can see the doubt. You see this change of them being from triumphant to kind of doubt. Right. Well, a lot of people liken this ending to the ending of the graduate, and spoiler alert to anyone who's never seen the graduate. But at the end of the movie, the character of Benjamin who's played by Dustin Hoffman crashes the wedding of his love Elaine, and the two of them are running away from the

church. They're laughing together, and then they jump onto this city bus, and it's always just so exciting. And they take their seat, and while they're sitting there, their expressions kind of slowly change. It's a really famous scene. It's so good. Well, in the script, our stage direction for this scene was this.

Jim waves as Michael and Pam walk out together. We stay on their faces as they transition from fantasy to reality. So I was not thinking of the graduate when we shot this. I was thinking of a different scene from the movie, The Heartbreak Kid with Charles Groton. Have you seen it? I mean, a long time ago. Well, again, I guess, spoiler alert, at the end of this movie, he's finally married the woman of his dreams, Sybil Shepard, he's been chasing her through the whole movie.

He sits down at a couch at their reception, and then you just see this sort of like malaise wash over his face, and he's like, what now? Because for him, it's all about the joy of the pursuit, but now he did it, and you can tell he's already restless. I thought of that moment, because I always think that's such a perfect moment of acting. I mean, he's so good in that movie. But anyway. Well, I will tell you that Tom Cruise and Renee Zellweger in The Elevator, holding

a goldfish, also have a moment like that because I rewatched the movie last night. Well, this episode ends with something I absolutely love. There's a conference room scene. Charles is telling everyone we've lost some employees, we're going to have to do some shifting around, and this is so great. Everyone's reactions are so good. He's like, you know what, Kevin, you're going to be answering phones at reception. Everyone in the room is like, what?

I know. Kevin? I know. I am very much in the foreground of this shot. That was on purpose, because they wanted me to react, obviously. And then he says he's going to put Stanley, who's doing his crossword, barely awake, in charge of productivity. Dwight is like, are you kidding me?

Kevin said he pitched that idea of having Charles put Kevin in charge of the phones, which is going to pay off beautifully in the cold open of next week's episode. But he said it just makes him giggle to think that, like, Charles' big power move after Michael leaves is putting Kevin in charge of the phones. Like, he's like, I got this place. Yeah, yeah. I know what to do. Speaking of the next episode, ironically, it did not air for two weeks.

Oh, no way. Yes. There was a break. I just thought that was really funny. People had to really wait. Two weeks. Yeah. This was a big cliffhanger.

Also, this is the last episode that Pam was a receptionist ever on the office. She never returns to the receptionist desk. Let's finish our Scotch and Splenda. To Pam, our IP receptionist. I know. Next up, Selzman. To Pam. I didn't know that either.

Wow. When we filmed this episode, I didn't know. I didn't know that you didn't know at the time. Yeah. Well, we didn't know what was going to happen. We didn't. Wow. I should have worn my t-shirt today that says I would save the receptionist.

Hmm. Yeah. Well, listen, there were a lot of other receptionists that come along, but Pam is always going to be our favorite. Well, thank you, lady. At least you're on office, ladies. Come on. Thank you so much.

That was two weeks. Next week is Dream Team. I can't wait to talk about it. Please don't bring any Scotch and Splenda. We can't do it. We can't have a Scotch and Splenda and do that podcast. You know what I'll bring next week? A giant pile of French toast.

Oh, gosh. Don't bring that either. Listen, thank you so much to Erin Shore and Randy Cordray for giving us all the inside details on this episode. We'll see you next week. Bye, you guys. 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 Bubicoe. 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. All rights reserved.