EP. 105 — Gossip

OFFICE-105 – Gossip

Jenna [00:00:04] I’m Jenna Fischer.

Angela [00:00:04] And I’m Angela Kinsey.

Jenna [00:00:06] We were on The Office together.

Angela [00:00:07] And we’re best friends.

Jenna [00:00:08] And now we’re doing the ultimate Office rewatch podcast just for you.

Angela [00:00:12] Each week, we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind the scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you.

Jenna [00:00:19] We’re the Office Ladies. Hello, everyone!

Angela [00:00:24] Hi you guys, I hope you’re having a great day.

Jenna [00:00:28] Today we’re going to talk about Gossip. It is the season premiere of season six.

Angela [00:00:34] Holey Moly, we’re at season six?

Jenna [00:00:36] Yeah, we’re going down the other side of the mountain. We hit the peak at 100 episodes. Now we’ve got one hundred more.

Angela [00:00:44] Downhill all the way.

Jenna [00:00:45] No, that’s not how I met that metaphor to be. I just meant we’re halfway to our destination.

Angela [00:00:52] (Sings Livin On a Prayer) We’re halfway there. Oh oh! No?

Jenna [00:00:59] Oh, I’m liking this. Listen, this episode was written by Paul Lieberstein and directed by Paul Lieberstein, and here is your summary. When Michael regretfully reveals that Stanley is having an affair, he sets out to cover his tracks by spreading a bunch of lies about basically everyone in the office. But what he doesn’t realize is that one of his lies turns out to be true. Before we get started on the fast facts, Angela, we have some gossip. Or maybe it’s not gossip. Maybe it’s true.

Angela [00:01:34] Maybe it’s the one true thing.

Jenna [00:01:36] OK. It’s totally real. It’s not gossip, guys. Our book cover for Office BFFs is out.

Angela [00:01:44] It is out. It’s official.

Jenna [00:01:46] Right now. You can see it.

Angela [00:01:47] It’s so cute. Can I say that? I can say it’s cute, right?

Jenna [00:01:50] I mean, I hope we think it’s cute. We picked it.

Angela [00:01:53] We protect you guys. I think you know this about me by now. I love a photo booth.

Jenna [00:01:57] This is true.

Angela [00:01:57] If I walk by a photo booth with you, you’re going in it with me. And Jenna and I went into a photo booth at the mall one day.

Jenna [00:02:04] This was years ago, 10 years ago maybe? Was it more than that?

Angela [00:02:09] Maybe more. I saved the photo strip from this mall photo booth. It’s been on my bulletin board for (coughs) number of years, and it’s the photo of our book cover.

Jenna [00:02:20] I’m realizing now that we chose a 15 year old photo for our book cover, probably because we didn’t want to pose for a photo. But actually the point of it was to show the depth of our friendship, the length of our friendship, because so much of the book is going over the growth and history of our friendship.

Angela [00:02:40] It is, you guys, it is our life through The Office and beyond. Best friendship journal with the backdrop of this amazing show and just a lot of our stories that we can’t get into as much in the podcast are in the book.

Jenna [00:02:54] Also in the book are 400 of our personal photos.

Angela [00:02:58] Can I just take a minute? 400. That was so hard to narrow down because we had like 2000 and they were like, You guys, your book cannot have 2000 pictures. They told us we had to narrow it down to like 200. Jenna and I were like, We got it to 400. Can we call it even?

Jenna [00:03:14] So these are truly our personal photos taken on our personal cameras even back then when you had the old timey cameras with film.

Angela [00:03:23] Yes, they knew where to go to the mall, to the kiosk.

Jenna [00:03:25] Yep. Those pictures all the way back to the pilot. Of The Office. The book is available for preorder now. We would appreciate it if you preorder it because it makes us look really good to our publishers.

Angela [00:03:39] I wish you could see Jenna’s face right now because she’s doing that really cute face that your kids do when they really want something at Christmas. So, yeah, preorder would be amazing. Thank you in advance.

Jenna [00:03:50] I know. The Midwesterner in me gets very shy asking people to do things like that, but you can find a link to order the book on Office Ladies dot com. We will, of course, put it on all of our social media platforms as well. So check out the cover.

Angela [00:04:05] Office BFFs. Check it out. We can’t wait to share this book with you. We’re super excited to take it out in the world and meet you all and sign copies and do a whole shebang.

Jenna [00:04:16] And I will wear a fake flower. You mark my words.

Angela [00:04:19] I don’t doubt it for a second. Should we get back to the episode?

Jenna [00:04:22] Let’s do it fast. Fact number one. Gossip, as I said, was our season six premiere episode. It aired on September 17th, 2009, and it was seen by eight point two one million viewers.

Angela [00:04:38] Wow, that seems like a lot.

Jenna [00:04:40] It was a lot. However, our viewership was down 18 percent compared to the season five premiere of Weight Loss. So I guess we took a little dip here with our premiere episode, but The Office was still the leading comedy on NBC at the time, and we were sort of the anchor for the other shows. I found an old promo.

Angela [00:05:05] Oh, I love an old promo.

Jenna [00:05:07] That was kicking off the whole like fall season, and The Office was very prominent in it. Will you guys play it?

Announcer [00:05:17] Here’s why summer being over is a good thing, because now we get new comedy on NBC Thursday. That’s cool. We’ll finally confirmed the big baby news on The Office. And we welcome back Parks and Rec, 30 Rock and SNL in prime time. Plus the new comedy Community. A perfect fit on Thursdays. You ready, amigo? Si. And it always ends with Jay. All your favorite comedies are back on one great night. Thursday, September 17th on NBC.

Angela [00:05:47] Oh, man, I missed those promo guys. Those guys, they crack me up every time they’re like, all your favorites in one place. They kind of do a breathy thing.

Jenna [00:05:59] Well, when I saw this promo, it made me think of something.

Angela [00:06:01] What?

Jenna [00:06:02] Well, they say summer is over. You know, we’re back.

Angela [00:06:04] Yeah, yeah.

Jenna [00:06:05] Why did the documentary film crew stop filming us every summer? There’s always a time jump.

Angela [00:06:13] Lady because they’re a fakey film crew.

Jenna [00:06:15] I mean, why not film us in the summer? We jump ahead in time. It’s been several weeks since Pam and Jim got their pregnancy news. And now, you know, she’s quite far along by this episode. I just I’m like, why? Why did they? Why do they take a break? All right. Fast fact number two. Gossip was the first episode to feature Ellie Kemper as a full cast member. It was also the first episode of The Office to air since the release of The Hangover, starring our very own Ed Helms. This movie was a huge hit. Huge. If you don’t know it, it’s the story of these three guys who go to Vegas for a Bachelor party, but they lose the groom and they wake up from this night of intense partying. The groom is gone and they have to retrace their steps and try to find him, and Ed was one of the stars. This movie made four hundred and sixty nine million dollars at the box office.

Angela [00:07:18] What the heck?

Jenna [00:07:20] Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Ed Helms became superstars. Ken Jeong was in this movie. Superstar.

Angela [00:07:29] I went to The Hangover DVD release party in Las Vegas with Rachel Harris.

Jenna [00:07:36] What? You didn’t.

Angela [00:07:37] I did.

Jenna [00:07:38] Because Rachel Harris was in the movie.

Angela [00:07:40] Yes, she played Ed’s girlfriend, the sort of persnickety girlfriend I went as her plus one and lady guess where this big party was in Vegas.

Jenna [00:07:50] I don’t know.

Angela [00:07:51] Caesars Palace.

Jenna [00:07:52] Oh, of course, because the movie.

Angela [00:07:54] Club Pure. I found some red carpet photos.

Jenna [00:07:58] No, you did not.

Angela [00:07:58] From this evening, and I cannot wait to show them to you. Hey-oh.

Jenna [00:08:05] Oh, Angela. Angela has on boots that go up to her knees.

Angela [00:08:09] Black leather Go-Go boots.

Jenna [00:08:11] Oh wow, look at you.

Angela [00:08:14] I was in Vegas. You got to like, bring out your boots for Vegas. So, yeah, I went to The Hangover DVD release party.

Jenna [00:08:22] Well, we want you guys to know that Ed was a horrible person after he became a big star.

Angela [00:08:28] No, he wasn’t.

Jenna [00:08:29] He was just even more Ed. He never changed. What a sweet guy. We were so happy for this big success. He went on to make more Hangover movies and more movies.

Angela [00:08:43] And develop TV series, but he’s still the same old Ed.

Jenna [00:08:46] He is. Fast at number three I have titled, What did you do over that summer? Because I was like, This was like a life altering summer for Ed Helms. It was a life altering summer for Ellie Kemper because she was made a regular on this TV show. I realized I had a life altering summer as well.

Angela [00:09:05] What did you do?

Jenna [00:09:06] Two very big things happened to me over this summer. The first thing that happened was that my beloved Andy cat, you know, the one that was in the People magazine shoot with me,

Angela [00:09:17] the one that you had a voice for. You would talk is Andy.

Jenna [00:09:20] Yes, I would. We haven’t shared about that.

Angela [00:09:22] Oh, sorry, we haven’t?

Jenna [00:09:25] That’s OK. Everyone who knows me going all the way back to college knows I had a little voice for Andy. I’ll have, you know, Sonny has one as well.

Angela [00:09:33] Oh yeah. All of your animals have their own unique accents.

Jenna [00:09:37] They do. Because, by the way, I think Andy’s name was Andy, but he pronounced it Andy.

Angela [00:09:43] Yeah, that was a choice he made.

Jenna [00:09:45] Right? So anyway, sweet Andy passed away over this summer. He was almost 17 years old, but that was a big thing for me because he had traveled with me all the way from Kirksville, Missouri, all the way to Hollywood. And he was my love.

Angela [00:10:01] I know.

Jenna [00:10:01] Really and truly. So also that summer, though, Angela, Lee proposed to me.

Angela [00:10:08] Oh my gosh, that’s right.

Jenna [00:10:10] Yes, we were in Paris.

Angela [00:10:13] Oh ho ho. Paris.

Jenna [00:10:14] Paris. Paris. And he proposed by the river. We were having a little picnic with wine and cheese. We’re so Parisian.

Angela [00:10:22] What the heck? Is this a rom com?

Jenna [00:10:24] Well, then it got even more rom com because Lee and I were like, Oh, maybe we keep the engagement to ourselves for a little while. I mean, we told all of our close friends, we told our family, but we thought, like, maybe we don’t go public with the news for a while. I don’t know. Just keeping things private. Well, someone in this little Parisian restaurant overheard us telling another couple that we had gotten engaged. So while we’re flying back home, it hit the news. I mean, talk about gossip. Oh my gosh, this is so on theme.

Angela [00:11:01] You were gossip.

Jenna [00:11:02] All the gossip magazines. We land to like this crazy amount of emails and texts we were on, like Entertainment Tonight.

Angela [00:11:10] Oh my gosh.

Jenna [00:11:11] My extended family is calling me. It was so bonkers. But yeah, it was a big summer.

Angela [00:11:18] Well, my story isn’t that great.

Jenna [00:11:20] Oh no, I’m so sorry if I like- I told Angela, I was like, We’re going to share what we did that summer. And I guess I didn’t give it the context.

Angela [00:11:30] You didn’t tell me what you were going to share. Well, oddly enough, I also spent part of that summer with Ken Jeong.

Jenna [00:11:36] Oh my gosh.

Angela [00:11:37] This is when when we did that movie Furry Vengeance.

Jenna [00:11:39] Oh yes.

Angela [00:11:41] Yes. Where I play his, you know, sidekick. We had so much fun.

Jenna [00:11:44] You shared about your crazy adventure for his birthday walking to P.F. Chang’s.

Angela [00:11:48] Yeah, exactly. But you know, we filmed outside of Boston, and I’d never spent a lot of time in that city and I just fell in love with it. Two things that I remember that I loved is that I took my daughter to the Boston Children’s Museum. It was so fun. They have so many cool, interactive things in this children’s museum. And there was also a tall ship festival.

Jenna [00:12:10] Tall ship?

Angela [00:12:11] Yes, Jenna. They were like ye olde ships. You know that like the explorers had that like people came over-.

Jenna [00:12:18] When they’re like, is the world round or flat? Those ships.

Angela [00:12:21] Yes. Like the Mayflower, those looking like ships. And there were antiques. You know what I mean? But they call them the tall ships because they have those really, really, really tall maps, right for the saild. And there were like forty five of them in the Harbor and they do this transatlantic regatta. It begins in Spain, continues to Halifax, Canada, from Boston before finishing in Ireland.

Jenna [00:12:47] On the ye olds ships?

Angela [00:12:48] Yes.

Jenna [00:12:49] They still sail?

Angela [00:12:49] Yes.

Jenna [00:12:51] Are they replicas or are they oldie ships?

Angela [00:12:53] Well, I don’t know, Jenna.

Jenna [00:12:54] Well, I mean, I just think they could be real old ships because I mean, the way they built those. I’ve read books.

Angela [00:13:01] Yeah.

Jenna [00:13:02] Do you like that? I have read books. I have read books.

Angela [00:13:04] Maybe they’re replicas, but I will tell you that it was 16 countries represented and about 1800 cadets.

Jenna [00:13:12] Wow.

Angela [00:13:13] So yeah, tall ships. Boston Harbor. I made Ken walk around and look at them with me. I have a picture somewhere of me and him standing next to one.

Jenna [00:13:21] That’s one of my favorite things about our job are the places I get to go and the things I get to experience that I wouldn’t normally get to experience. You know, growing up in the middle of the country, I was never close to an ocean. You know, I didn’t see the ocean until I don’t even know when. I think we did like a road trip to the Gulf of Mexico one year. It was just like, I don’t know. Sometimes I just pinch myself when I think about all the stuff I get to see and do because of our job. Oh, so cool. Tall ships.

Angela [00:13:53] Tall ships. Me and Ken walking around tall ships. You know what? I think we should take a break, and when we come back, you and I should try some parkour.

Jenna [00:14:02] Oh boy. Yes, OK. Parkour.

Angela [00:14:07] I tried to put my foot up on the desk and it hurt my back, so I didn’t do it. Parkour!

Jenna [00:14:14] Are you ready?

Angela [00:14:15] Are you going to parkour?

Jenna [00:14:16] I’m going to parkour.

Angela [00:14:16] Wait, are you going to do something visual in a podcast? Not me, you?

Jenna [00:14:19] I am going to do something vidual. I’m gonna parkour.

Angela [00:14:21] OK? Let’s do it. Don’t really do it. Don’t- oh my god! You shook the whole table. Jenna stop. Oh my God. Oh God, stop, stop. Stop. You guys. She pushed off from the table. It shook all the microphones. Then she ran over to the wall. And I want to say about two feet high, put her on the wall and jumped.

Jenna [00:14:44] I am out of breath. I’m out of breath.

Angela [00:14:45] Well, Michael and Andy and Dwight are taking their parkour skills in the office to a much more destructive level than what Jenna just did. They’re just jumping off everything. Jenna, do you remember the guys they literally wrecked the office?

Jenna [00:14:57] I do remember.

Angela [00:14:58] Stuff went everywhere.

Jenna [00:15:00] Yeah. You know, we had a fan question from Alice R. in Italy, how much of the parkour scene was scripted and choreographed? Well, I reached out to Paul Lieberstein, who wrote and directed this episode because in the script, it really just says they parkour through the office. And he said that the direction he gave Steve, Rainn, and Ed was just a basic route to move through so that the camera could capture everything. He said obviously, none of them had any parkour skills. They did no parkour training whatsoever.

Angela [00:15:35] What? I’m shocked.

Jenna [00:15:36] It was not choreographed. He just told them, You can’t do anything wrong, and your goal is to just mess up the room as much as possible.

Angela [00:15:45] Achieved.

Jenna [00:15:46] Yet, he said the first take was really kind of underwhelming. So they reset the office. And he said on the next take, he told them all to shout parkour as they went. So whenever they attempted a move, they were supposed to shout parkour.

Angela [00:16:01] So they would do like a sloppy somersault off the back of a desk and go parkour!

Jenna [00:16:06] Yes. And he said that ended up being the thing that gave it this really kind of weird energy that was very funny. So yeah, I thought that was great, actually, because I thought a lot of the comedy came from that the dichotomy between their very confident parkour and their horrible skills.

Angela [00:16:26] Well, Jim has a great talking head that sort of explains what’s happening, and he’s like, You know, this was this internet sensation of 2004. It was in one of the Bond films. Lady. I think it was in Casino Royale. Hear me out. I love Daniel Craig.

Jenna [00:16:39] Yeah, same.

Angela [00:16:40] And he had this great scene with actor named Sebastian Fokahn. And I mean, it was so cool. Talk about a choreographed fight scene.

Jenna [00:16:52] Well, isn’t so much of The Matrix kind of rooted in parkour? Am I crazy?

Angela [00:16:59] What part?

Jenna [00:17:00] What part? They’re leaping all over stuff. No? Is it because in true parkour, you’re really doing it? You don’t have cables and stuff.

Angela [00:17:12] Yeah, and you can’t suspend time as a bullet goes past you.

Jenna [00:17:16] Right. That’s not parkour. Well, I talked to Randy Cordray about this, and he said that that video that Jim is playing, that was a clip of an actual amateur filmmaker student from UCLA doing parkour. They licensed it for $300. And then we had a new graphic artist for season six named Ryan Cosgrove, and he built a fakey YouTube esque computer background. And so that’s what you’re seeing. He built that video into like a fakey video player.

Angela [00:17:56] Nice.

Jenna [00:17:57] And that’s what plays on Jim’s computer.

Angela [00:17:59] I think that kind of stuff is so cool. I clocked a bunch of props in this episode. I feel like Phil Shea was busy. In the cold open alone we have the Apple laptop that Jim is using. We have the handheld camcorders that Michael, Dwight and Andy are using, Meredith’s deodorant spray. A wooden ladder, boxes, wooden pallets, dumpster, trash bins in the parking lot. And then as we get into the episode, there’s so many more.

Jenna [00:18:25] Well, you mentioned that handheld camera. We had a question from Chris W. in Liverpool, England, who wanted to know if that camera was actually recording. Yes, it was recording. When Phil Shea bought that camera he first consulted with our cinematographer, Matt Sohn, and he got a broadcast, acceptable, I guess, format for this camera. It was 1080 progressive at 24 frames per second. So anything they recorded on that camera was suitable for broadcast.

Angela [00:18:59] 1080P.

Jenna [00:19:00] 1080P. Yeah, I see that on my TV sometimes.

Angela [00:19:04] Yeah.

Jenna [00:19:05] Right, right.

Angela [00:19:06] That’s what that is.

Jenna [00:19:08] Oh, OK. Ultimately, we only used two images from that camera. One was at one minute, 10 seconds, which is a close up of Ed Helms when he’s on top of the Vance Refrigeration truck, and then one at one minute, 14 seconds, showing the back of quote unquote, Andy, as he jumps off the truck.

Angela [00:19:32] So good. These are the little details I love. I love that the camera was actually recording and that they used some of the footage.

Jenna [00:19:38] I know. We had more fan questions on this parkour opening Ange. Leah B from Raleigh, North Carolina, said, Hi Office Ladies, I’m Leah B and I’m 11. I’ve watched The Office series three times and I was just wondering, did Ed Helms get a stunt double for the shot where he jumps off the delivery truck and lands in the refrigerator box? Was there padding in the box and how many shots did they do in order to get the scene?

Angela [00:20:09] Well, there was most definitely a stunt double.

Jenna [00:20:11] There definitely was. Our stunt coordinator for this whole sequence of jumping off the truck- because that, by the way, was completely 100 percent planned and choreographed.

Angela [00:20:22] Also, just those three guys being on top of the truck was like a safety thing. There was like a safety meeting.

Jenna [00:20:27] Oh for sure. Our stunt coordinator was Wally Crowder and his son, Sean Crowder was Ed’s stunt double. Eric Sulky was Michael’s stunt double and Scott Lieva was Dwight’s double. But until they were up on that refrigerator truck, it was all our guys, even that scene when they’re running across the cars in the parking lot, those were our real guys. And in fact, I guess they dented some of the hoods of those cars. They had to be repaired. But it was Sean Crowder who jumps off that truck into the cardboard box. The box was full of foam rubber. I guess they had enough supplies to do three takes. They only did two takes and they used the first one in editing.

Angela [00:21:15] He nailed it.

Jenna [00:21:16] Nailed it.

Angela [00:21:17] Leah, I love that question. I love always finding out the behind the scenes of how they did all the stunts. So thanks for sending that in.

Jenna [00:21:25] So listen, one more thing about parkour before we get into this episode. Paul reminded me that after we shot this cold open, do you remember this? Our camera assistants, Chris and Ed and some of the other crew guys would walk around the stage and shout parkour from time to time. Like when he told me that, I was like, Oh yes, I remember that. It would just be like, parkour.

Angela [00:21:49] I remember we all were doing it.

Jenna [00:21:51] Yeah.

Angela [00:21:52] Like we would open the fridge and go, parkour.

Jenna [00:21:55] Yeah, OK, that’s all my parkour stuff.

Angela [00:21:59] I liked it. Well, this episode starts with a little bit of hazing.

Jenna [00:22:04] Yeah, we have interns. Summer interns. We didn’t film them all summer, but here they are on their last day.

Angela [00:22:11] Yeah, we’re going to get them on their last day. Dwight asked them for a cup of water, which he then chugs and then says, OK, see the files behind Kevin’s desk? I want you to put them all in random order and then come back for your next assignment concerning their order. Can I just tell you that this hazing continued throughout the episode, but it was deleted?

Jenna [00:22:31] Oh.

Angela [00:22:32] Yes, as it continues, you see Ryan having them make a bunch of photocopies for him. One of the interns is like, You know, you’re not supposed to talk to us. And then it cuts to Dwight saying, Yes, I’ve been managing the interns since Ryan’s incident. And then we find out that Ryan’s incident is he had him go to the bank and get a couple hundred dollars in pennies and made them spread them all out on the conference room table to have them search for rare old coins. So then Dwight gets put in charge of them.

Jenna [00:23:03] That feels like something Dwight would make them do, actually.

Angela [00:23:06] I know. Ryan is like, How is that any worse than what Dwight made them do? And here’s what Dwight had them do. He set up an inter-office messaging system where if you had a message, he would write it on a note and then he would make the intern walk it over, let’s say, to Andy or to Phyllis. And so these interns were just standing by, waiting for Dwight to write a note that then they would have to walk over to whatever department. So there was a lot of intern hazing. It’s deleted. It’s on the DVDs.

Jenna [00:23:34] Well, I can give you an intern breakdown. An actor breakdown. So we have Mori, who is played by Kelly Imiyata. Angela, he was born the year I graduated from high school.

Angela [00:23:47] Oh, well, there’s that.

Jenna [00:23:49] He’s now 30 years old.

Angela [00:23:51] He’s a young’un.

Jenna [00:23:52] Yeah. I found that. Humbling. Well, Meghan was played by Elvy Yost. She goes by just Elvy now. She has been in the TV series Resident Alien and Mildred Pierce. And then Eric was played by Max Carver. Now, Max would go on to play a recurring role on Desperate Housewives as Preston Scavo.

Angela [00:24:17] Oh, you loved Desperate Housewives.

Jenna [00:24:19] Oh yes. He was on with his twin brother. He has since been on The Leftovers and the series Teen Wolf. When I saw him on Desperate Housewives, I was like, It’s the intern! I know him! I like was so geeky that I had a connection to someone on Desperate Housewives. So I slid into his DMs.

Angela [00:24:40] Did you really?

Jenna [00:24:41] I did. And he was nice enough to send in some audio clips about what it was like to be an intern on our show. And of course, we had to ask, how did he get his job on The Office? Here’s what he had to say.

Max Carver [00:24:53] Hey, it’s Max Carver here. I’m super happy to be on the show. I remember I went in for casting for The Office, and I really I never had any experience with comedy at the time. I just I just read it and thought just go in and be an intern. And the casting process was fun, I remember Alison was so sweet and and we just had a laugh. I read it a couple of times and then I was so excited I couldn’t believe I got the job. It was one of the first jobs I ever got in Hollywood. I was well aware of the show and a huge fan of both the British version and the American version, so it was a dream come true.

Jenna [00:25:38] So, Angela, when I hear his voice in that audio clip, that is exactly how I remember him on set. He was just kind and

Angela [00:25:45] they were really sweet.

Jenna [00:25:46] All really nice.

Angela [00:25:47] They were just young, nice, sweet folks.

Jenna [00:25:49] Well, I also asked him, did he have any memories from his time on set? Here’s what he said.

Max Carver [00:25:56] One of the memories I have from being on set is that everyone there is just an improv master. So it’s there’s just not enough time on TV for all the amazing stuff that we saw. I think we probably shot an hour worth of content and unfortunately you only get to see twenty two minutes. But at one point I remember Dwight was lecturing us interns about an experience he had with the lobester. Which is a lobster, for the record. And I just. I could not keep a straight face. I don’t think that scene ever made it to air just because every time the camera panned over to me, I was… I was I just couldn’t keep a straight face. But Dwight was so funny. Rainn, Rainn just knew exactly what would make me laugh. So every take, he just turned it up another notch and another notch and another notch. I don’t think he even cared if we got the scene. He just wanted to make me laugh. So I will. I will never forget that.

Angela [00:27:01] That scene is in the deleted scenes on the DVD, and it’s very funny. You know, Dwight is basically trying to impart his wisdom to the interns, and he has a huge speech. I’m going to paraphrase it, but he’s like, I’m going to tell you a story about a young salesman who went out to a restaurant and he ordered a lobester- because he had never had lobster before, and he mispronounced it and called it a lobester. And he goes on and on to tell the story.

Jenna [00:27:27] Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, that’s amazing. Well, the last question I asked Max was, does he ever get recognized for being the intern, Eric on The Office.

Max Carver [00:27:40] In terms of being recognized? Yeah. You know, I think fans of The Office are probably the most hardcore fans in the world. I’ve worked on a number of other shows but The Office Is the one that keeps coming up, and it’s always people like, I know you, I know you. You’re from season six, episode one, which just blows my mind. But it’s fun to be a small part of that cannon. And yeah people, people remind me about (UNCLEAR) sheets and Alan Thicke so thanks for that.

Jenna [00:28:18] Max, thank you so much for sending in these audio clips. You made my day.

Angela [00:28:23] It’s great. Well, you know, Jenna, I read the shooting draft of this episode, and the interns actually had some different names. So Mori, who is Mori, was actually spelled Mori.

Jenna [00:28:37] OK?

Angela [00:28:37] And then in the episode that aired, you’ll see it quoted as Maurie. But it was actually spelled Mori in the shooting draft. And then Megan’s name was actually Maria. And Eric was Eric. So all through the shooting draft, I was reading it and I kept being like, Who is Maria?

Jenna [00:28:59] Well, the interns are going to spark some gossip.

Angela [00:29:04] They are, and I have two background catches in this scene. We have Oscar, Meredith and Kelly speculating about this relationship between Eric and Megan. If you go to two minutes, thirty four seconds, I am calling this the green scene. Because Kelly has on a green sweater, Meredith has on a green cardigan, Megan has on a green blouse and there is a turquoise green lunch bag on the table.

Jenna [00:29:29] Oh, green scene.

Angela [00:29:30] Green scene.

Jenna [00:29:31] Green in the break room.

Angela [00:29:32] Green in the break room. And then at two minutes, 34 seconds, Megan and Eric are at a file cabinet by this back door, sort of on the other side of the partition by Kelly’s desk clump. That file cabinet has never been used.

Jenna [00:29:46] Are they using it for the first time?

Angela [00:29:48] Groundbreaking moment, everyone.

Jenna [00:29:49] Wow.

Angela [00:29:50] First time file cabinet usage.

Jenna [00:29:52] So what happens here is that people are speculating if Eric and Megan are going to get married.

Angela [00:29:58] And if they are hooking up.

Jenna [00:30:00] Right.

Angela [00:30:00] Yeah.

Jenna [00:30:01] And Michael starts to feel very proud because he introduced them.

Angela [00:30:06] Wait, wait, can I just say I have my favorite line of this whole entire episode in this scene?

Jenna [00:30:12] I can’t believe it’s in this scene because I have a favorite line and it’s later. Go on.

Angela [00:30:16] Well, Kelly is like upset at the idea that they might get married before she would, right? Michael walks in, says, Who’s getting married? Pam says nobody. And here’s my favorite line. Michael says, If somebody doesn’t tell me, I’m going to start screaming.

Jenna [00:30:31] Oh, that is good.

Angela [00:30:34] I was just like, who says that? And you know, they know he will.

Jenna [00:30:37] Ultimately, Phyllis, says, Michael, there’s nothing really to know. It’s just gossip. Well, of course, Michael is now going to tailspin that-.

Angela [00:30:47] He’s been left out.

Jenna [00:30:48] Yeah. Other people know gossip he didn’t know. But before we move on to that, I have some background catches in the break room as well. It’s called What is everyone eating?

Angela [00:31:00] Phyllis is having a salad.

Jenna [00:31:02] She’s eating something with a fork. I am definitely eating a salad with a side of grapes. Oscar’s food is blocked, but I think it might be a sandwich. Meredith is eating yogurt. Stanley has a very substantial sandwich and chips and a Fuji water bottle with the label facing away from camera.

Angela [00:31:23] You’re obsessed.

Jenna [00:31:24] I’m obsessed. But the food I want you to concentrate on is John Krasinski’s food.

Angela [00:31:30] Did you screen grab it?

Jenna [00:31:31] When I first saw it, it looked like a container of shredded chicken.

Angela [00:31:36] What?

Jenna [00:31:37] But it’s not. There’s no fork. So I really zoomed in. And what it is is it is a sandwich that he has picked out the middle of and left the crusts. It’s like he ate it from the inside out. It is the weirdest thing.

Angela [00:31:59] Are we finding out right now that Jim is actually the person that eats like a squirrel and not Angela Martin?

Jenna [00:32:05] I think so. But, you know, for a scene like this, it would just say in the script, they’re in the break room having lunch. And Phil Shay would have to go around to all of us and ask us what we wanted to eat in the scene. And for me, depending on how close it was to actual lunch, I would either pick a substantial meal or something small. So I’m eating a salad and some grapes. That is not a meal to me, so we must have shot this after lunch because I was like, You know what? I will have already eaten, just give me something light.

Angela [00:32:38] They were always very mindful that my character was a vegetarian, so I often would be eating fruit or a salad or some kind of veggies or chips or something. I’m going to need a picture of that Jim sandwich. Thank you very much. Got to take a picture of it for me.

Jenna [00:32:53] I’ll show you. It’s so odd. We’re going to now have a Pam and Jim talking head where basically what we’re doing here is we are confirming that what you knew from the season finale episode, that Pam is pregnant. But they’re also going to let you know they have not told anyone in the office.

Angela [00:33:13] Yeah, I loved it when Jim was like, You know, the yakety acts in this office, they’ll have a field day.

Jenna [00:33:18] So this is true, but they’re keeping it to themselves. That’s what you need to know.

Angela [00:33:23] Michael’s determined to get to the bottom of this gossip. He goes to Dwight and Dwight knew all of it. Oh, this is going to make Michael’s spiral even more. He has this great talking head. And Jenna, Steve could not get through this.

Jenna [00:33:39] The one about the poop ball?

Angela [00:33:40] He couldn’t get through it. And Steve rarely broke. Here’s the blooper. It just makes me laugh hearing Steve. And you hear Paul Lieberstein laughing.

Steve Carell [00:33:51] I hate, hate, hate being left out. Whether it’s for a sport or like not being picked for a team or being picked for a team and then showing up and realizing that the team doesn’t exist or that the sport doesn’t exist, I should have known. poopball.

Angela [00:34:17] Is that so great?

Jenna [00:34:19] They’re like little kids.

Angela [00:34:21] I know. They couldn’t get through the word poopball.

Jenna [00:34:25] I loved it every time Steve got tickled like that.

Angela [00:34:28] Me too.

Angela [00:34:29] Michael is now going to corner Mori in the kitchen. Mori is making coffee. He has to know about this rumor about Eric and Megan. So he’s like, Was it hard to be the third wheel on their group date? And Mori’s like, no.

Angela [00:34:45] And Michael’s like, you know, my mom said the third wheel is what makes it a tricycle.

Jenna [00:34:49] My gosh.

Angela [00:34:50] Oh, Michael.

Jenna [00:34:51] So basically, what happens in the scene is that Mori is going to reveal that Stanley was also at this club with his wife and that Mori tried to wave at Stanley, but Stanley didn’t wave back. Well, this is new information. Michael is thrilled. He knows something. Stanley was at a club. Big news.

Angela [00:35:12] Big news. Not just any club, but Tinks.

Jenna [00:35:17] Yeah, Tinks.

Angela [00:35:19] Tinks club. Michael would have had a talking head here that got cut. It was in the shooting draft where he says, I know Tinks. I go there every Friday night. Well, I wait in line there. You meet a lot of fun people on line. I’ve never been inside, but I went-.

Jenna [00:35:34] Online or in line. Sorry.

Angela [00:35:36] Online.

Jenna [00:35:36] OK, sorry. Sorry, go ahead.

Angela [00:35:38] OK. You meet a lot of fun people online. I’ve never been inside, but I wouldn’t want to. It’s for people half my age. Part of me just wants to give up online dating altogether. I really hate when Friday night rolls around.

Jenna [00:35:51] Wait, there’s so much there.

Angela [00:35:53] He thinks online dating is you go and stand in a long line at a nightclub.

Jenna [00:35:58] Oh my gosh.

Angela [00:36:00] Come on. Isn’t that so good?

Jenna [00:36:03] That is so good.

Angela [00:36:04] Between Mori talking about Tinks and me reading about this deleted talking head where Michael talks about Tinks. I had to know, is Tinks a real place? And by the way, it is. It was a total hotspot, Jenna. But here’s the thing. While I was researching that, I got so fascinated with the history of the building that Tinks was in. I have to share about it. I took a picture. I’ll put it in stories. Look at this place, Jenna. Right there in the middle. That’s where Tinks would have been.

Jenna [00:36:36] This looks very I feel like I’m looking at a picture of London.

Angela [00:36:40] I know it looks old, right?

Jenna [00:36:41] It looks old English to me.

Angela [00:36:43] I found a great article on the Scranton Times tributes website written by Brian Fulton. Brian, I loved all your info. Here’s some of it, OK? The location of Tinks is five one nine Linden Street in Scranton. It was constructed in 1909.

Jenna [00:37:02] It looks old.

Angela [00:37:03] I know it was the Courthouse Square garage which sold Studebakers and EFM Automobiles over the years. It would be a series of dealerships. It went on to be an electric appliance store, sporting goods stores. In the mid-twenties, it became the Scranton recreation. It offered a bowling alley, a billiard room on the third floor. Thirty years later, in the 50s, Renee Dress operated on the building’s second floor. Then the Linden Dress Corporation bought the whole building, expanding to the third floor with retail and dining establishments on the ground floor. In 1988, it was going to have an open air cafe and new banquet hall that could seat 150 and the creation of a dinner theater. The first dinner theater production to take place was called Nifty Fifties, a musical revue. Then they started offering live music on Tuesdays and Sundays. In 1994, they sold Tinks to John Paul and Angela Cooper, operators of Cooper’s Seafood House in Scranton.

Jenna [00:38:17] Oh!

Angela [00:38:18] The venue remained a popular nightspot in Scranton. It was a hub for live music for years. All these amazing bands would come through. And then in the fall of 2015, it became levels on Linden, and they closed March of this year. But it started out as a car garage selling Studebakers.

Jenna [00:38:39] I’ll tell you that I got really stopped. You know, when someone’s telling you a story and you hear a part of that story and then your brain kind of goes in another place? When you said Nifty 50’s musical revue,

Angela [00:38:54] you could only think of Andy Bernard.

Angela [00:38:56] No, I could only think of you and I… doing the Nifty 50s dinner theater musical revue and what that might be. And I’m going to be honest with you, I went off on that for a while in my head. But I made it back to hear that the Cooper’s people bought it.

Angela [00:39:16] And then it was a series of nightclubs and it closed this year. So I guess it’s available.

Jenna [00:39:20] So it’s available!

Angela [00:39:24] For Angela and Jenna’s musical theater review.

Jenna [00:39:27] I’m just saying,

Angela [00:39:28] Oh my gosh. Nifty 50’s.

Jenna [00:39:31] Nifty 50’s. I mean, has anything been more made for us?

Angela [00:39:36] Well, I just turned 50. I think we wait for you to turn 50 in a few years, and then we go, do the Nifty 50’s.

Jenna [00:39:43] Yes! That’s all- that’s all I’ve been thinking about since you said it.

Angela [00:39:48] I love the history of old buildings. I absolutely love it. I love to think about the different people that came in and out of that space. And the memories that were made, whether you were buying your very first car and it was a Studebaker or you were doing dinner theater.

Jenna [00:40:05] Or you were getting a dress made.

Angela [00:40:07] Yes. Or you were meeting your lady love for a rendezvous, Stanley.

Jenna [00:40:15] Well, when Stanley leaves the office, Michael is so excited to share what he thinks he’s learned, which is that Stanley is having a midlife crisis. Because he was out at this club. But Dwight says no. Stanley is way past the middle of his life. And Phyllis is like Michael, what you’re saying isn’t true because Teri is out of town and Stanley hates crowds. He hates music.

Angela [00:40:40] He hates kids. You should check your facts. We got some Phyllis sass.

Jenna [00:40:44] Well, Michael’s going to march up to the interns.

Angela [00:40:47] He’s fired up. Jenna I want you to know this scene started differently in the shooting draft. Michael is still going to march up, but the interns are gossiping as he arrives. Uh-Huh! It says interior break room Mori, Eric and Maria, because that’s what she was called in the shooting draft, are in an assembly line style unstapling and collating and stapling. Michael barges in. Mori says, You see what Erin’s wearing today? Eric: I’m more of a Pam kind of guy. Maria: the warehouse guys were saying she’s dated like everyone in the office.

Jenna [00:41:28] Oh my gosh!

Angela [00:41:30] And then at this moment, Michael says, You stupid son of a bitch, you set me up.

Jenna [00:41:38] Well, this is when it finally occurs to Michael after much explanation that perhaps Stanley was there was someone other than his wife.

Angela [00:41:50] The amount of time it takes Michael to clue in on something.

Jenna [00:41:53] Oh my gosh.

Angela [00:41:54] Is one of my favorite things.

Jenna [00:41:56] Yeah.

Angela [00:41:56] Well, now Michael really has some gossip, and he is so excited to share it. He does not at all understand the gravity of what he’s sharing and the damage it could do to multiple lives. He’s just giddy to have a little tidbit of info.

Jenna [00:42:11] He runs over to the biggest office gossip, Kelly, and he says Stanley is having an affair.

Angela [00:42:16] She’s like, what?

Jenna [00:42:17] We had a fan catch from Sara G in Ottawa. At around six minutes, 30 seconds, when Michael tells Kelly about Stanley’s affair, there’s a whiteboard behind her desk that reads people’s names and numbers. It says sales, quarterly sales and HR performance. Sarah notes one, Pam is not on there, even though she is a salesperson now, but Creed is. Sarah wants to know, why is that? Sarah, I do not think that this white board has been changed in like two seasons.

Angela [00:42:50] For sure.

Jenna [00:42:51] Because I remember seeing this white board in season three. Andy is at the top and I don’t think I’ve seen this change in years.

Angela [00:43:00] Well, to be fair, we were rarely over in that corner, so it might have gotten overlooked. Michael is determined to keep spreading this information. He is now trying to get Kevin to guess.

Jenna [00:43:13] Yes, he’s playing that word guessing game, hangman. Kevin’s not getting it.

Angela [00:43:19] No, Kevin’s not getting it.

Jenna [00:43:20] Lady. This reminded me of Wheel of Fortune because Wheel of Fortune is based on this game. You guess a phrase. My family was obsessed with Wheel of Fortune. We had the home game. The Wheel of Fortune home game and my mom, bless her heart, was a horrible guesser. Just horrible. Our favorite family example, you know, when you have those things that happen in your family that go down as like your family lore?

Angela [00:43:51] Sure. Sure.

Jenna [00:43:52] OK. We were playing this game. My mom’s trying to guess the phrase, and she screams out of nowhere where I’ve got it! I’ve got it! Gold tooth tiger, gold tooth tiger. We’re like, mom… Gold tooth tiger? What is this famous phrase? Gold tooth tiger? I don’t remember what it was. It was not gold tooth tiger.

Angela [00:44:16] No, of course not.

Jenna [00:44:18] So anyway, now that’s like.

Angela [00:44:19] A catchphrase.

Jenna [00:44:20] Yeah, my sister and I can be like gold tooth tiger, mom. But my sister and I became obsessed, and we researched the most common letters in the English language.

Angela [00:44:31] Wait, isn’t one that you’re always supposed to guess like s or t?

Jenna [00:44:36] T is one. I’ll tell you, here are the 12 most commonly occurring letters in the English language, from most to least. E. T. A. O. I. N. S. H. R. D. L. U. So if you’re ever on Wheel of fortune and you’re going to buy a vowel buy an E, if you’re going to guess a consonant, the first one you should guesses T. And the second one is N.

Angela [00:45:09] I didn’t know that, but I feel like some of it just mushed into my brain because my grandmother faithfully watched Wheel of Fortune every single day. It was one of her favorite shows. She was so good. She could guess way before everyone else. We used to joke, Grandmother, you’ve got to go on Wheel of Fortune. She’s like, Oh no, I am not going to be on television. No. And she loved Pat Sajak and Vanna White. They could do no wrong. And she knew everything about them.

Jenna [00:45:37] Yes, same. My family was obsessed.

Angela [00:45:40] I love it.

Jenna [00:45:41] Just to close this out, I can also tell you the most difficult words to guess.

Angela [00:45:47] Oh, really?

Jenna [00:45:48] Yeah. This was according to a 2010 study conducted by John McLune for Wolfram Research. Why Wolfram Research decided to conduct the survey? I don’t know.

Angela [00:46:01] I don’t know, but I appreciate it.

Jenna [00:46:02] But the five most difficult words to guess in a word guessing game are jazz, buzz…

Angela [00:46:12] Two z’s.

Jenna [00:46:15] (UNCLEAR) Fizz and fuzz.

Angela [00:46:17] People are not good at guessing Z words.

Jenna [00:46:19] I guess not. Yeah, I guess you can use that information if you want, and they will not help you to guess E.T.A. N. S. H. R. D. L. U.

Angela [00:46:29] I mean if the caption is like Hot Fuzz judging jazz, you’re like,

Jenna [00:46:38] Well, no one’s going to be able to guess that.

Angela [00:46:40] Nope.

Jenna [00:46:40] Make that your phrase. That’s your gold tooth tiger right there.

Angela [00:46:43] That’s your stumper. Michael is going to try to intercept Stanley as he’s on his way to meet with a client. He asked him if he knows a beautiful woman who can dance for a movie Michael is casting. It’s going to pay $5 million. Some nudity required.

Jenna [00:47:02] Stanley leaves and then Jim comes to the window and he’s like, Michael, you need to stop. You have to stop this. You have no proof that Stanley is having an affair. You might be ruining Stanley’s life. We had a fan question, Angela, from Alice R in Italy, who said at around seven minutes, 10 seconds, when Michael is talking to Stanley and then Jim through the side window of his office, Erin is sitting in the background.

Angela [00:47:28] The whole time!

Jenna [00:47:29] And then Ali W from Canada said, Is there a deleted scene that explains why Erin is there?

Angela [00:47:35] There isn’t one on the DVDs, but I can tell you in the shooting draft at the end of this scene, Erin had one line.

Jenna [00:47:43] What was it?

Angela [00:47:45] As Michael considers and runs out, passing by Erin, Erin says, Is that the end of the letter?

Jenna [00:47:51] Oh, so she was in there.

Angela [00:47:54] Possibly he was dictating a letter to her to write to someone.

Jenna [00:47:58] Oh, so good. Lady, I think we should take a break because the scene coming up when Michael runs out and gets in Stanley’s car, I have a lot to say. It’s so good.

Angela [00:48:07] It’s so good. We’ll be right back.

Jenna [00:48:11] Michael runs into the parking lot. He stops Stanley from driving away by throwing himself in front of Stanley’s car. And then he says, Are you having an affair?

Angela [00:48:21] Cut to now he’s in the car.

Jenna [00:48:24] Right. And believe it or not, Stanley admits he’s having an affair with Cynthia, his nurse.

Angela [00:48:33] They had long walks on the treadmill together.

Jenna [00:48:35] You know, Teri’s been traveling so much. He’s been lonely.

Angela [00:48:39] Michael is still not getting it.

Jenna [00:48:41] But then Stanley is like, I’m actually on my way to break it off with Cynthia right now. And Michael’s like, Wait a second. You said you were going on a sales call. Do people do that all the time? Do they tell me they’re going on sales calls and they go somewhere else?

Angela [00:48:54] Oh, Michael.

Jenna [00:48:55] And then Michael is like, Wow, it’s true.

Angela [00:48:58] He finally gets it. And Stanley’s like, Listen, you cannot tell anyone about this, please. I’m counting on you.

Jenna [00:49:06] So in the shooting of this scene, Angela, I counted four cameras. We usually only have two cameras, but I counted four different camera angles.

Angela [00:49:17] Give it to me, lady, where did you see them?

Jenna [00:49:18] To cover this scene. So the first one is shooting from up above. Out of the office, down onto the parking lot. Then we have the bulk of the scene, which is shooting either through the window on Stanley’s side or the other side, shooting through the window on Michael’s side.

Angela [00:49:39] So that’s three.

Jenna [00:49:40] But then for one second, right around eight minutes twenty seven seconds, there is this spy shot that is straight on. And it’s sort of through some leaves. Well, Randy told me that this was a trick. There’s nothing there.

Angela [00:49:58] Fakey tree?

Jenna [00:49:59] Fakey tree. Yes. They took a leafy branch and they put it on a grip stand, and then someone would shake it a little bit to make it seem like there was a breeze. And Matt composed his shot to include some of those leaves so that it would look like a spy shot.

Angela [00:50:18] Why in my brain do I hear someone like on a walkie talkie going, Shake it a little less. That’s too much moving. You’re shaking too much shaking. Shake it up higher.

Jenna [00:50:30] Now, I don’t know if Randy was teasing me, but he told me the technical term for this is called a branchaloris.

Angela [00:50:36] Come on!

Jenna [00:50:37] He said it’s often used in outdoor shooting.

Angela [00:50:40] Come on. Is that true?

Jenna [00:50:41] I don’t know.

Angela [00:50:42] Randy, a branchaloris?

Jenna [00:50:44] Is he listening to our podcast and he’s like, they bought it! Branchaloris!

Angela [00:50:49] That’s so fun.

Jenna [00:50:51] If I’m ever directing, Randy, and I call for a branchaloris and people don’t know what I’m talking about, I’m calling you.

Angela [00:50:58] Well, Michael is going to promise Stanley that he won’t say anything, but we already know it’s too late for that. So now he comes up with this crazy idea that what he has to do is diffuse that one piece of information by just throwing out all kinds of rumors. He finds Kevin in the kitchen making cookies?

Jenna [00:51:17] Yeah, he’s making cookies in the toaster oven.

Angela [00:51:21] Michael says, Have you heard about Angela dating an 81 year old billionaire who owns a Quiznos?

Jenna [00:51:27] Then he goes up to reception, and he tells Erin that Kelly is an anorexatic.

Angela [00:51:32] Did you notice that ten minutes, 25 seconds that Erin’s little desk area has a Keystone College little banner?

Jenna [00:51:40] Yes.

Angela [00:51:41] And a teddy bear with a red hoodie.

Jenna [00:51:43] I got real interested in her reception desk, Angela.

Angela [00:51:46] Oh, did you?

Jenna [00:51:47] You and I obviously were thinking the same thing because when I saw that Keystone College banner, I was like, Hold up. I want to know more about Erin. What will her desk reveal?

Angela [00:51:58] What did you find?

Jenna [00:52:00] Well, Keystone College is a real private college in northwestern Pennsylvania. And not only does she have a stuffed dog with a little sweater. That little sweater, says J. Rob. And then she has a pink ski boot mug that she has put her pens and pencils in. And that also says J. Rob.

Angela [00:52:19] What is J. Rob?

Jenna [00:52:22] I googled it, and it is a wrestling camp in Pennsylvania.

Angela [00:52:26] Get out.

Jenna [00:52:27] I don’t think this is correct. Why they would sell a ski boot. I looked at all their merch for this wrestling camp. I don’t even think the logo is the same.

Angela [00:52:36] Did Erin go to wrestling camp?

Jenna [00:52:38] I am very stumped on this one. I don’t know. But Erin also has a candy dish with some individually wrapped lifesavers in it.

Angela [00:52:46] Phil Shea, what is J Rob?

Jenna [00:52:47] What is J Rob? And then I was like, Is it J RBB? JRBB or is it JROB? I googled both. But there is a wrestling camp in Pennsylvania called J Rob.

Angela [00:53:01] OK. Michael is going to continue his rumor mill. He is going to tell Kelly that Erin isn’t a very good worker and may not last long at Dunder Mifflin and that Andy is gay.

Jenna [00:53:12] He tells Meredith that Pam is pregnant, so he’s really throwing a lot of stuff out there. Of course we know, oh my gosh, Pam is pregnant.

Angela [00:53:20] Yeah. Well, now the rumors are just traveling all crazy throughout the office.

Jenna [00:53:25] Yes. And now people are going to start hearing the rumors about themselves. Andy hears this rumor that he might be gay.

Angela [00:53:32] From Kevin, and he’s like, Was this Broccoli Rob? Was it someone in high school?

Jenna [00:53:36] This sends Andy on an existential crisis, and he’s going to confront Oscar in the break room.

Angela [00:53:43] Oscar has such a great talking head after that scene with Andy, where he’s like, What, it’s my responsibility to comfort the insecure heterosexual men? That can’t possibly fall on me. I’m paraphrasing it, but it’s something like that. It’s so good.

Jenna [00:53:56] When Andy is describing this scenario where Brad Pitt is like coming on to him.

Angela [00:54:03] At like a beach cabana.

Jenna [00:54:04] And Brad Pitt is trying to kiss him and and Andy resists, but Brad Pitt keeps coming for him. Oscar has this amazing line where he says, So if you resisted Brad Pitt a little bit, he would still need to get to you? Lady. The mention of Brad Pitt made me very randomly think about how I have had recurring dreams about Brad Pitt making me soup.

Angela [00:54:30] Uh oh. What?

Jenna [00:54:31] He makes me soup.

Angela [00:54:32] What does this mean?

Jenna [00:54:35] Recurring dream.

Angela [00:54:36] Like over your life?

Jenna [00:54:37] Yes, like since college.

Angela [00:54:39] What?

Jenna [00:54:41] And Brad Pitt would make me a warm, comforting bowl of soup, and it would make me happy. And he was my friend in my dreams.

Angela [00:54:49] Was he fully clothed?

Jenna [00:54:50] Yes, he was. It was just a wonderful gesture. So I looked up, you know, dreams and meaning of dreams.

Angela [00:54:59] What does it mean if you have soup in your dream?

Jenna [00:55:01] Well. What a celebrity in your dream is, is that the celebrity is you. It’s like a version of you.

Angela [00:55:10] So you are Brad Pitt and you’re making yourself soup?

Jenna [00:55:13] I guess so. But more than that, I here’s what I determined it to be.

Angela [00:55:18] OK.

Jenna [00:55:19] Brad Pitt is from Missouri. He’s from where I grew up. So I think

Angela [00:55:24] he was the big local celebrity when you were growing up.

Jenna [00:55:27] He went to Mizzou, which was the college about an hour and a half away from my college. He didn’t finish. But then he went off and he became a big star. You know, I’ve never met him. I’ve never been able to geek out with him about our Missouri roots. But it was a big deal, like when you’re from Missouri and someone else from Missouri is super famous, like everybody knows it, you know?

Angela [00:55:49] Oh man, I can never meet him now.

Jenna [00:55:51] Why?

Angela [00:55:52] Because I know me.

Jenna [00:55:54] You’re going to say something.

Angela [00:55:55] And I know if I meet Brad Pitt, I won’t be able to. It’ll be like a Michael Scott moment. I’ll say my friend Jenna dreams that you make her soup! It’ll just come tumbling out. I can never meet him. How can I ever meet him now when I know that my best friend since college has this dream that he makes her soup?

Jenna [00:56:17] Here’s what I think it is. I think he represents like whenever I felt homesick, I’ll have a dream where, like my hometown is making me soup. Like, that’s what I think it is. I think it’s like a homesickness dream.

Angela [00:56:32] I have never had a dream about Brad Pitt.

Jenna [00:56:35] Well, his soup is delicious. I just want to say. It’s homemade and it’s very, very good. And it’s always the soup is different. It’s been I remember very distinctly there was a vegetable and another time, a cream and potato.

Angela [00:56:49] I had a dream after I saw The Matrix that I could, you know, that I was like a badass with Keanu, and I was like, I could do all that stuff. Like I could fly a helicopter. It’s not quite the same.

Jenna [00:57:00] It’s not quite the same. I don’t know what that means,

Angela [00:57:03] and I also have never had it again.

Jenna [00:57:05] I don’t know. I haven’t had this dream in a long time.

Angela [00:57:07] Amazing. A.ma.zing.

Jenna [00:57:12] Where were we?

Angela [00:57:13] I don’t know. It doesn’t matter anymore. Brad Pitt makes you soup. OK. We are at the point where now rumors are really spreading.

Jenna [00:57:22] Oh, here we are. I know where we are, lady. We’re in the conference room and we’re giving the interns their letters of completion. And they’re going to get some school credit.

Angela [00:57:33] And there’s cake.

Jenna [00:57:35] Fan catch from Sophia M from Louisiana. Dwight is handing the interns a piece of paper to give them school credit, but in a job fair, Michael says they cannot offer credit. Can you explain this? Sophia, I cannot explain it. I don’t know.

Angela [00:57:50] Maybe once Michael put Dwight in charge of it, it actually got done.

Jenna [00:57:53] Perhaps. I loved that Dwight gives them his business card. He says, You can call me day or night. And then one of the interns says, Why would I call you at night?

Angela [00:58:02] Eric does. Yeah.

Jenna [00:58:04] And then he says, Now you can’t call me at all.

Angela [00:58:06] And Jim’s like, Well, good luck next time you’re stuck between a moose and a bear.

Jenna [00:58:10] Between a moose and her cubs.

Angela [00:58:11] Oh, and her cubs. Well, the rumors are coming out because people start commenting. For example, Erin says to Kelly, I’m so happy you’re eating again.

Jenna [00:58:22] Yeah. And then Andy congratulates Jim on little baby tuna.

Angela [00:58:27] Little Toro.

Jenna [00:58:29] Jim pulls Pam aside and he’s like, They know. I don’t know how they know, but they know. This brings us to my favorite line of the show.

Angela [00:58:38] What is it? Is it? I know what it is.

Jenna [00:58:41] When Creed says, someone is saying the rumor about Creed is that he has asthma. And if that gets out, they’re not going to let him scuba. And he has a talking head where he says if he can’t scuba, then what has all of this been about? What has he been working toward? I love it so much. I love the scuba talking head.

Angela [00:59:01] I’m pretty sure I remember John breaking, though, when Creed said they won’t let me scuba. Just Creed saying the word scuba. I would like to point out one thing in this scene. Many of you probably didn’t catch it unless you’ve ever had a really horrible time growing out your bangs. If you go to 15 minutes 07, you’ll see my hair awkwardly trying to be a ponytail. But it can’t really be a ponytail because I decided to get bangs and it took forever to grow them out. Look at the sad ponytail.

Jenna [00:59:36] I mean, I have to say that looks like Pam’s hair from seasons one through three. The little swoop that we used to do with my half bangs is what that reminds me of.

Angela [00:59:48] Bangs. Oh, bangs.

Jenna [00:59:49] Well, Oscar wants everyone to know he is not the voice of the Taco Bell dog. Toby is not a virgin. The conference room is abuzz. Everyone is trading rumors about themselves. Jim is like guys, has everybody heard a crazy rumor about themselves today? And Michael is like, You know what? Let’s just forget all of them.

Angela [01:00:07] Well, they start tracing it all back

Jenna [01:00:09] and guess where every rumor came from? Michael.

Angela [01:00:14] Who runs to the elevator because he knows.

Jenna [01:00:17] But the entire gang stops him, confronts him. Dwight cannot believe that he told people that Schrute Farms uses store bought manure when Dwight showed Michael where his manure comes from.

Angela [01:00:29] Oh my gosh.

Jenna [01:00:30] Eventually, Michael is going to admit that he started the rumors.

Angela [01:00:35] I actually love that Michael’s like, Hey, I’m a victim here, too. I mean, people were saying I was a J.Crew model.

Jenna [01:00:40] Exactly. But Michael says he had to start all the rumors because one of the rumors is true. He’s not going to say which one. He starts going around, and Jim and Pam realize pretty quickly what the real rumor is. That Stanley’s having an affair. But everyone’s insisting that Michael say what the real rumor is, and he’s about to reveal that. So Jim jumps in and says the real thing is that Pam is pregnant.

Angela [01:01:10] And right away Angela’s like, I knew it.

Jenna [01:01:13] I know. And then Kevin is like, I know it because Pam’s boobs were bigger.

Angela [01:01:18] Boobs. Boobs. Boobs. Boobs. Jims like, OK, buddy, OK.

Jenna [01:01:22] We had a fan question from Renata P from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. What are your thoughts about Jim’s revelation to the whole office that the rumor about Pam being pregnant was actually true? I know he was trying to protect Stanley, and it never really bothered me before. But in rewatching the scene yesterday, I was like, Hey, maybe he should have had a conversation with Pam before telling everyone. What do we think?

Angela [01:01:45] I actually think Pam and Jim were on the same page in this moment because the way Pam’s body language was and your dialogue, it’s like the two of you both knew, Oh no, oh no. He’s he’s about to destroy Stanley’s life. Oh no, we’ve got to do something. I felt like I saw that internal dialogue between the two of you.

Jenna [01:02:05] Well, I’m glad to hear you say that, Angela, because that was our intention. The intention was that Jim and Pam were going to both come to this realization, and this is like they share a brain thing. They’re a couple. And so.

Angela [01:02:19] It’s couple brain.

Jenna [01:02:20] Couple brain. So I totally get where Renata is coming from. Our hope was that you would see Pam’s permission in that moment in the way we’re-.

Angela [01:02:29] And her anticipation in the moment.

Jenna [01:02:31] And how we’re sort of giving each other eye contact was our intention.

Angela [01:02:35] Of course, Michael, though, is like, No, no, no, that’s not it. And you guys are like, ugh, will you stop it? Like, just like, ugh.

Jenna [01:02:43] So she has to go out and get her sonogram photo.

Angela [01:02:46] One of my favorite things is when you go get your sonogram photo is that Kelly says, we’re just all going to wait here? That was just Mindy. That was just Mindy.

Jenna [01:02:57] Well, we had a fan question from Ella R in England. Is Pam’s sonogram real? And if not, how was it created?

Angela [01:03:03] Good question.

Jenna [01:03:04] Our graphic artist, Ryan Cosgrove, he made this for us. He repurposed an existing sonogram from his friend’s wife. So somewhere out there, there’s a little baby.

Angela [01:03:16] A little baby who got some screen time.

Jenna [01:03:17] Yeah.

Angela [01:03:19] Well, when Pam presents her sonogram, Michael says, that’s the inside of her vagina.

Jenna [01:03:24] Yeah, it’s a picture of the inside of her vagina.

Angela [01:03:27] Very quickly, Jim and Pam talking head where they’re like, now it’s clear. It’s clear why we didn’t want to tell these people.

Jenna [01:03:34] Well, now Jim and Pam are going to be like in the principal’s office. Michael is devastated that they did not tell him first, that they did not tell him sooner.

Angela [01:03:42] They only just told their parents. In the shooting draft the line read like this: Did you piss on a stick? And I guess on the day they changed it to pee. But when I read that in the shooting draft, it was so jarring. I’m like, Why would he say, did you piss on a stick?

Jenna [01:04:02] Well, Michael has done something guys. He has called Stanley’s wife.

Angela [01:04:09] This scene is so brilliant. When Erin says Teri Hudson’s on the line, you guys, your faces are like, you called her? And Michael’s like, I got this. I can do it. I’ll tell her I’m redecorating my condo. And they’re like, No, Michael, don’t. you guys are like, Don’t, don’t.

Jenna [01:04:26] But he has this whole thing. It’s going to have to play out over months where he’s redecorating the condo. They’re going to get quotes, but then they’re going to get in an argument about the cost of things and eventually he’s just going to have to call it all off.

Angela [01:04:37] And he literally is like, I’ve got this. And Pam is like, Michael, please don’t. Michael picks up the phone and says, Hey, what up, Cynthia? I mean, just amazing. Jim starts to walk over and Michael is waving him off like, I got it. I got it. And then he goes, hold on a second, Cynthia.

Jenna [01:04:58] And then Jim just hangs up the phone. We had a fan question from Kelsey S from Chandler, Arizona, who says, This is my absolute favorite episode of all time. This is my comfort episode. I watch it all of the time, and I need to know if the scene where Michael answers the call from Teri, was it all improvised or was it scripted? Everything from Steve’s reaction to his hand movements on the phone is hilarious, and I love it. This entire scene played out exactly as scripted.

Angela [01:05:28] Minus the piss.

Jenna [01:05:30] Minus the piss. That’s the only thing that changed.

Angela [01:05:32] It is 100 percent on the page.

Jenna [01:05:35] Guess what? Teri was already suspicious about this affair, and this, I guess, proves it. Stanley is going to vandalize Michael’s car.

Angela [01:05:47] Stanley takes a crowbar to Michael’s car and destroys it.

Jenna [01:05:53] We had a couple of fan questions about this. One from Rohit R in Norman, Oklahoma. How much did the scene of Stanley smashing Michael’s car cost? And Monica F from North Carolina said, it’s so funny to me that Stanley had enough time to put on his sunglasses before smashing Michael’s car. Well, guys, Leslie did this smashing. Randy said he had a very good time. I would, too.

Angela [01:06:20] I would, too.

Jenna [01:06:22] He said that they had to establish him wearing the sunglasses earlier in the episode so that during this scene he would have eye protection in case anything flew up in his eyes. Randy said he smashed the heck out of that car. It was a one-er. Just one take. It cost over $4000 to repair.

Angela [01:06:42] I don’t doubt it. When he called up and started to mess with the convertible top, I was like, Oh no. That’s some cha-ching.

Jenna [01:06:51] Well, guys, that’s basically the end of this episode. The interns have a little talking head at the end where we find out that Michael just called them Jet Li, Julia Stiles and Alan Thicke.

Angela [01:07:01] And that Eric never really learned how many pieces of paper were in a ream of paper. In the very end credits at 21 minutes, 34 seconds, Randy Cordray pointed something out to us, and I want to share it to you. We see the name of our new unit production manager for season six, Steve Burgess. Steve was a very old and dear friend of Randy, and I loved Steve Burgess so much. He went on to be our line producer in the last seasons. We adore him. And it was so fun to finally see his name. Randy said when he brought him on board that Steve’s contributions behind the scenes were immeasurable.

Jenna [01:07:40] Yes, and we are still in touch with Steve today. So when we get to those episodes where he was the line producer, we’re going to get to hear from him.

Angela [01:07:48] Yay.

Jenna [01:07:49] Well, that’s Gossip. Do you think I’ll end up in the gossip magazines because of my soup dreams with Brad Pitt? Would that be so weird?

Angela [01:07:59] That would be such a full circle moment.

Jenna [01:08:01] I know.

Angela [01:08:02] Who’s going to write about it?

Jenna [01:08:03] I don’t know. Maybe no one. No one cares about my soup.

Angela [01:08:07] Your fake soup.

Jenna [01:08:09] My fake soup?

Angela [01:08:10] With Brad Pitt. Listen, if we ever hear from Brad Pitt about the fake soup… I will be so excited. If we ever hear from-.

Jenna [01:08:21] (GASP).

Angela [01:08:21] What?! What? You scared the heck out of me!

Jenna [01:08:21] Oh my gosh, what if one day what if one day I’m sorry, I’m having a dream.

Angela [01:08:27] I’m so sorry for anyone listening. I probably then scared you.

Jenna [01:08:32] What if one day we are doing Office Ladies and we get some soup delivered  and it’s from-

Both [01:08:38] Brad Pitt.

Angela [01:08:40] Come on.

Jenna [01:08:41] Could that happen?

Angela [01:08:42] And you know what? Guess who’s going to deliver it? Keanu? If Keanu Reeves delivered soup made by Brad Pitt

Jenna [01:08:49] and then all of a sudden, Idris Elba is going to like, bring some music in to it and we’re going to just have like a soup eating party.

Angela [01:08:58] What has just happened?

Jenna [01:08:59] I don’t know.

Angela [01:09:00] Well, save it for Nifty 50s.

Jenna [01:09:05] The musical revue.

Angela [01:09:06] And you guys, we hope you have a fantastic week. Once again thank you to Randy Cordray.

Jenna [01:09:12] Max Carver.

Angela [01:09:13] And all of you guys for sending in your questions and your comments. We hope you have a great week. We love you.

Jenna [01:09:23] Thank you for listening to Office Ladies. Office Ladies is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey. Our show is executive produced by Codi Fischer. Our producer is Cassi Jerkins, our sound engineer is Sam Kieffer, and our associate producer is Aynsley Bubbico.

Angela [01:09:39] Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton. For Ad free versions of Office Ladies, go to Stitcher Premium dot com. For a free one month trial of Stitcher Premium, use code: Office.