Mike Schur is Back!

This week on Office Ladies 6.0, Jenna and Angela welcome back their pal Mike Schur for a deep dive into his time on The Office. Mike revisits episodes he wrote, revealing the challenge of making Michael Scott (occasionally) appear competent, the tricky business of writing Karen, and why Rashida Jones was so perfect for the role. Plus, Mike talks about his new book, Big Fan, which explores the strange and wonderful world of fandom, and shares what he and co-author Joe Posnanski discovered while traveling the world to understand what makes us love the things we love. So grab your favorite team jersey, embrace your inner superfan… and enjoy! Office Ladies Website - Submit a fan question for Around the Town, Chit Chat, and Second Drink favorite moment:https://officeladies.com/submitaquestion Follow Us on Instagram:OfficeLadiesPod https://www.instagram.com/officeladiespod/ Follow Us on YouTube https://youtube.com/@officeladiespod?si=D0oKJwFJuK9txzFM Follow Us on TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@officeladiespod?_t=ZT-8y1gqTrJyOs&_r=1

• 0:04Speaker 00

  I'm Jenna Fischer.

• 0:05Speaker 01

  And I'm Angela Kinsey.

• 0:06Speaker 00

  We were on The Office together and we're best friends. And now we're doing the ultimate Office Lovers podcast just for you. Each week, we will dive deeper into the world of The Office with exclusive interviews, behind the scenes details, and lots of VFF stories. We're the Office Lady 6.0.

• 0:25Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 0:26Speaker 00

  Hello there.

• 0:27Speaker 01

  What's up?

• 0:28Speaker 00

  What's up with you?

• 0:29Speaker 01

  I don't know, you're kind of got that look that, I don't know, is something going on? You have that look, you're like, ew.

• 0:35Speaker 00

  No, I'm just excited to be here because we're coming back from a little bit of a vacation.

• 0:40Speaker 01

  It's so funny.

• 0:41Speaker 00

  And so I'm just like excited to be sitting here, face to face.

• 0:44Speaker 01

  You're just happy and I'm like, what's going on?

• 0:46Speaker 00

  No, I know. What have you been up to? I haven't seen you in two weeks, lady.

• 0:51Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh. Well, okay, our kids are doing these summer, like, college programs where you go to a university. They had to apply and they go to a university. Isabel and Jack are doing this. They live in a dorm for four weeks. They take a course. They get three college credits out of it. You know, they're going to be seniors in high school next year.

• 1:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 1:14Speaker 01

  But this is like a true, like, hey, here's what college is going to be like, a little bit, right? It's a little practice run.

• 1:20Speaker 00

  Because you like moved them into the dorm rooms. Like, they're getting a whole dorm room thing.

• 1:25Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. They each have roommates that they didn't know until they got there and signed in. They found out who their roommate was. You know, we had to do that thing where we got bins and we labeled everything and we packed it all up and we got there and the two different dorms they're in, one of them, the line for the elevator to move in was so long because everyone showed up with their parents. So Isabel's on the fourth floor. Josh is like, let's just take the stairs, lady.

• 1:53Speaker 00

  What?

• 1:54Speaker 01

  Yes. We moved her in, just walking upstairs all day, carrying things. And Josh is very fit. I am not as fit, so.

• 2:04Speaker 00

  You are fit, but there's a difference between like, like you have a type of, like, tennis. Fitness.

• 2:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:11Speaker 00

  It doesn't translate to like.

• 2:13Speaker 01

  Carrying heavy things. And climbing.

• 2:16Speaker 00

  Right.

• 2:16Speaker 01

  Anyway, so I am sore today, but we got them moved in. By the time you guys hear this, they will have completed their program. But that's what I've been up to. I've been packing up two teenagers and taking them off to this college and getting them moved into a dorm room. And now they're there. And like, we get calls, like Isabel's like, I'm gonna do laundry, but they don't take coins anymore. I'm like, what? How do you do laundry? I would save up my coins.

• 2:42Speaker 00

  Of course, a Ziploc bag full of coins for the parking meters and the laundry.

• 2:47Speaker 01

  I didn't even think about it. It's all an app now. There's like the laundry app.

• 2:51Speaker 00

  Get me started.

• 2:52Speaker 01

  Do you know how many apps they've had to download? There's so many apps.

• 2:55Speaker 00

  We don't want to look at our phones that much, but like you need an app for everything. We got a garage door. And the garage door guy was like, do you want it an app on your phone to open and close your garage door? I said, I don't. You know what I want? I want a freaking button that I hold in my hand.

• 3:12Speaker 01

  Give me a clicker, please.

• 3:13Speaker 00

  He was like, settle down, lady.

• 3:15Speaker 01

  I couldn't believe it.

• 3:16Speaker 00

  I triggered you, asking you about an app, but I was like, well, you did.

• 3:20Speaker 01

  I know. Everything's an app now.

• 3:22Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 3:22Speaker 01

  Anyway, it's good to see you. How have you been?

• 3:25Speaker 00

  I've been good. You know, Lee's movie Nimrods comes out very soon.

• 3:29Speaker 01

  I know.

• 3:30Speaker 00

  And we are trying to figure out our red carpet looks, because lady, the whole family is walking the red carpet. And we've never done this before. So number one, I'm just trying to wrap my head around that. Like, what is that? How do I prepare them for that experience? What's the impact of that experience gonna be? But then also, what are we wearing? Like.

• 3:51Speaker 01

  Are you gonna coordinate?

• 3:52Speaker 00

  I, these are the questions we're asking. I don't think so. That feels too complicated.

• 3:57Speaker 01

  It feels like a.

• 3:58Speaker 00

  Too precious.

• 3:59Speaker 01

  It feels like a Christmas card.

• 4:00Speaker 00

  Right.

• 4:01Speaker 01

  Right? You, you don't need to be a Christmas card tableau. And I love a coordinating Christmas card. Don't get me wrong.

• 4:06Speaker 00

  Oh, I know.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  But maybe for the red carpet, you all have your own look.

• 4:10Speaker 00

  Well, we all have our own ideas. I know Isabel did a red carpet once and you gave me her dress that she wore. It's beautiful. And you were like, one day, if Harper ever needs it. And she was around this same age.

• 4:22Speaker 01

  Yes, my friend had produced the movie Mulan, the live action.

• 4:26Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 4:26Speaker 01

  And we went and saw it, me and Isabel and Jack. And Jack wore a suit and Isabel wore a dress. It was really cute. We got it at the mall. It's really a cute dress.

• 4:34Speaker 00

  Oh, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. Well, unfortunately, the dress doesn't fit.

• 4:40Speaker 01

  I was worried about that because I gave it to you like two years ago and I'm like, I don't know if it's gonna fit her.

• 4:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, I don't even know where to get clothes for myself for the red carpet.

• 4:47Speaker 01

  I know.

• 4:48Speaker 00

  I don't know what we're all gonna wear.

• 4:49Speaker 01

  I hate red carpets.

• 4:50Speaker 00

  I know.

• 4:52Speaker 01

  I'm excited for the movie. I will be on the red carpet with you.

• 4:56Speaker 00

  Yes, you will.

• 4:57Speaker 01

  I don't have an outfit.

• 4:58Speaker 00

  No, we should really be thinking about this because it's happening.

• 5:01Speaker 01

  I know, it's exciting.

• 5:02Speaker 00

  The movie comes out August 14th, everybody, in theaters worldwide.

• 5:06Speaker 01

  Worldwide, global.

• 5:08Speaker 00

  Global release. Oh, but also, lady, they are doing special early screenings of Nimrods in select theaters. It's happening on Tuesday, August 11th. So, everyone, check the listings at your local theaters and see if they have one of the early screenings. My folks, my sister, and some of my high school friends, they all got tickets to one of the early screenings in St. Louis.

• 5:30Speaker 01

  Aww.

• 5:31Speaker 00

  I know, I'm so excited for them to see it.

• 5:33Speaker 01

  Well, it's such a fun movie to see with a group of people in the theater.

• 5:37Speaker 00

  Yes, in the theater, because of course, there's all the great music in it, too. You wanna hear that and see that on the big screen. So, everyone, please, grab your friends and check out Nimrods.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  That's so fun. We're gonna be in a movie, lady.

• 5:50Speaker 00

  Together.

• 5:50Speaker 01

  Together, in the theaters.

• 5:52Speaker 00

  Very exciting.

• 5:53Speaker 01

  It's so exciting. We've been on a TV show together.

• 5:56Speaker 00

  Yep.

• 5:56Speaker 01

  We have written a book together.

• 5:58Speaker 00

  Uh huh.

• 5:59Speaker 01

  We have done a podcast together. We have never been in a movie together.

• 6:03Speaker 00

  Oh, my gosh.

• 6:04Speaker 01

  Ah!

• 6:05Speaker 00

  The last thing would be like if we did a piece of theater together.

• 6:08Speaker 01

  Oh, that would be so cool. I don't want the lead. That's too much pressure, I wanna tell you right now.

• 6:14Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 6:14Speaker 01

  You can be the lead. I would just like to be someone that makes a lot of entrances. I think those are so fun. Like, I love it when I go see a play, the person I wanna be is like, like, let's say you're at a restaurant and it's the waitress that comes in and out. And she has a little business and she says something, then she's back out.

• 6:31Speaker 00

  Uh huh.

• 6:32Speaker 01

  And she's back in with some more, you know, something else she's carrying and saying. I wanna be that person.

• 6:36Speaker 00

  You know, when we were in New York, I saw this play called The Ballisters.

• 6:39Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:40Speaker 00

  Oh, my gosh, lady, it's so funny. It's about like a neighborhood association meeting. It happens in like a living room. And it's a series of meetings and it's all about whether or not they should put a stop sign on a road or not.

• 6:54Speaker 01

  I would love that.

• 6:55Speaker 00

  It does not disappoint and it's so good and it's filled with all these amazing characters and there are like two characters that like in another 15 years you would be so perfect as great entrances, just like drop mic comedic timing. You'd love it.

• 7:13Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 7:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 7:14Speaker 01

  I'll put it on my list.

• 7:15Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 7:16Speaker 01

  15 years.

• 7:17Speaker 00

  There's like two older women in this and I think we could pick which one we each want to be and that we can be at a play together when they revive The Ballisters.

• 7:24Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 7:25Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 7:25Speaker 01

  There it is. We figured it out. You guys, we had a lot of banter here because we haven't seen each other, but we have a fantastic episode today.

• 7:34Speaker 00

  Yes, we had the most amazing conversation with writer, producer, director, and author, Mike Schur. He was in studio with us and we cannot wait for you to hear this interview.

• 7:47Speaker 01

  It's so fun. He's so smart. It's great. We talk a lot about The Office. So you know, you guys, last time when Mike was here, it was in 2022, episode 107 of Office Ladies. It's a great listen if you haven't heard it. He zoomed into the studio. We didn't actually have him in person that time, so it was really fun to be sitting across the table from him today. And in that first interview, we talked with him about how he got his job on The Office. We talked a lot about him playing the character Mose.

• 8:16Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  And what that was like and also what he learned in the writers' room and what he learned from Greg Daniels about writing comedy. That is a great interview. I didn't think we could top that with him. And then today, we dive into his episodes that he wrote.

• 8:30Speaker 00

  Yes, we asked him if we could just sort of take him through some of the episodes that he wrote and his memory for detail.

• 8:38Speaker 01

  For lines.

• 8:39Speaker 00

  And specificity and just how a story was crafted or how a joke was crafted. Oh my gosh. And he was so generous with his time. And then we had an amazing conversation about his book that just came out. It's called Big Fan. He wrote it with his friend, Joe Posnanski, who is a sports writer, and they just traveled around the world. Trying to discover what makes you a fan of something like sports, music.

• 9:09Speaker 01

  TV.

• 9:10Speaker 00

  Yes. And what that phenomenon of fandom is to us as human beings.

• 9:15Speaker 01

  It's a great conversation.

• 9:17Speaker 00

  Yes. And in the Mike Schur way that he is, he just has a way of understanding people and what makes us human.

• 9:27Speaker 01

  He's a great observer.

• 9:29Speaker 00

  Yes. Yes. And so we just can't wait for you to hear it.

• 9:33Speaker 01

  Well, why don't we take a break? We will save our chit chats and around the town for our next episode because we thought we were going to chat with Mike for about 25, 30 minutes. You guys, we talked for an hour, but it's so good and you're gonna love it.

• 9:46Speaker 00

  We want you to hear it all. So we'll take a break and we'll be right back with Mike Schur.

• 10:01Speaker 01

  Here we go.

• 10:02Speaker 00

  Hello.

• 10:02Speaker 01

  Hi, Mike.

• 10:03Speaker 02

  I am so happy to see both of you. How have you been? How is everything?

• 10:06Speaker 01

  Ah, we're good.

• 10:08Speaker 02

  Yeah?

• 10:09Speaker 01

  Yeah. How are you?

• 10:10Speaker 02

  I'm great.

• 10:10Speaker 01

  It's so great to see you. You look literally the same.

• 10:13Speaker 02

  I was thinking the same thing about you. I don't know if you're supposed to say that to people. No, I, look, we all are aging exactly the same rate, one day per day. And when I see people from the office, I think like, yeah, that looks, that's how the person looks. Like if you've known the person continuously, they just stay the same in your brain.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  But you know what's crazy? So I was cleaning my SAG Award the other day.

• 10:34Speaker 00

  You were what?

• 10:35Speaker 02

  First of all, incredible way to start a sentence.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  I know, right? I've never cleaned mine. I don't know.

• 10:40Speaker 00

  I was dusting.

• 10:41Speaker 02

  You've never cleaned your SAG Award? Did you not consult the manual for proper maintenance?

• 10:48Speaker 01

  And also it has a tush, so you know.

• 10:50Speaker 00

  It does.

• 10:51Speaker 02

  Is it like, like, like taking care of an infant a little bit?

• 10:54Speaker 01

  I don't know. I haven't thought about it. Go on, Jenna.

• 10:58Speaker 00

  I was moving things on my bookshelf in my office and, you know, so I was cleaning my SAG Award and I looked at the date on it and it said 2006. And I was like, wait. That was 20 years ago?

• 11:13Speaker 02

  20 years ago.

• 11:14Speaker 00

  What?

• 11:14Speaker 02

  Yeah. I know, we're passing all those milestones now where you see things on social media that's like the 25th anniversary of something and it's hard to believe.

• 11:23Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 11:23Speaker 02

  I mark this every June 1st, because I moved to LA on June 1st, 2004, to start working on the show. And so every June 1st, I'm like, oh, wait, how many years has it been that I've lived here? And now it's 22 years that I've been here. We started working on the show, I think, like, right after July 4th weekend, maybe. The writers met for the first time. And that is inconceivable to me. I mean, it feels like both forever ago and also yesterday.

• 11:48Speaker 00

  Yeah. Well, listen, the last time you came on the show, we talked a lot about like, how you got your job on the show and how you became Moe's and all those things. But we didn't get a chance to dig into some of the specific episodes that you wrote.

• 12:02Speaker 02

  Great, let's do it.

• 12:03Speaker 00

  So we were thinking, maybe we could talk about a few. So, speaking of the early days, The Alliance.

• 12:08Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:09Speaker 00

  It's season one of The Office, and you guys are trying to establish, what is the American version of this?

• 12:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 12:16Speaker 00

  How do we make it our own thing? Can you take me back to that time?

• 12:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, so that first season, it was just me, Mindy, and BJ were the only full-time writers. And then the late Lester Lewis, R.I.P., was a consultant, and Larry Wilmore was a consultant, and Paul Lieberstein was a consultant. And it was a very small crew. And in classic Greg Daniels fashion, we came up with 270-episode ideas to make five episodes. And I want to say, The Alliance, one of the things that is going on in the first season of The British Office is the threat of downsizing, and the threat of consolidation and a branch closing and that sort of stuff. It sort of runs in the background. And Greg wanted to maintain that because it was and is such a part of like corporate life, that

• 13:03Speaker 02

  you're always like, is someone going to buy our company? And are we all going to lose our jobs? And so, he wanted that theme to run through the season in a low-grade way. And the simple nugget of the idea was that in this kind of vague threat of something bad happening in the office, that, because Survivor was such a big deal at the time, like, people forget, like, Survivor had debuted, I think, in the year 2000 or something. And around 2004, it was like, the biggest deal. It still is a huge deal, but it was the biggest deal. And-

• 13:35Speaker 02

  I want to say it was BJ, my memory might be failing me, who pitched the idea of just Dwight asking Jim to form an alliance with him Survivor-style. And we liked that idea. Obviously, like Jim and Dwight, famous antagonists, but the breakthrough was that someone pitched, I'd like to take credit for it, but I don't know if I can, that Jim's response was, "Absolutely, I do." Like instantly.

• 13:57Speaker 00

  I was gonna ask you about that, because that's like such a famous couplet that comes back later.

• 14:02Speaker 02

  That, and it was, "Absolutely, I do." And then, the talking head that comes after it is, "Anytime Dwight asks me to do anything, my response is absolutely." You know? Because Jim's sole goal in life in that moment is to like enjoy this mundane business environment in any way he possibly can.

• 14:21Speaker 00

  Just escape the boredom.

• 14:23Speaker 02

  Just escape the boredom. And it's one of the great lessons of writing that I've learned 100,000 times, which it's a classic improv thing, right? It's like, yes and it. Like, just say yes. If you say no, the story ends. If you say yes, you get a story. So, as soon as we came up with the idea that Dwight makes an absurd request of Jim, and Jim's immediate response is, "Yes", then, okay, we're off and running. So that was the like, simple nugget of the story. And then it became like, how does Jim enjoy like torturing Dwight and enjoying his life in this boring day? And sharing it with Pam, of course.

• 14:59Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 14:59Speaker 02

  My favorite scene that came out of it is the one that's sort of a spy scene from up top, looking down at them in the parking lot. And they're standing outside, and it was, as it always was in the valley, 111 degrees.

• 15:13Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 15:14Speaker 02

  But it was supposed to be like, November in Scranton. And so, the two of them just are grabbing their arms in the classic pose of person-

• 15:21Speaker 00

  I'm cold, I'm cold!

• 15:23Speaker 02

  Which we would then do 50 more times over the course of the first couple of seasons. And having that like, private kind of Survivor-like conversation about like, you know, how to play things and what they've learned and all that stuff. So that was it. It was what made that show so special to me was like, that's what you needed for a story. You didn't need a gigantic, huge plot. You needed one- One of the ridiculous characters to make a request of a sane character and have the sane character decide to go along with it for the day. And that was it.

• 15:52Speaker 01

  That's a really great way to look at The Office now. Like, the next time I watch an episode, I'd be like, okay, who's the ridiculous character asking the sane character to do something?

• 16:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, and it's usually Michael is the ridiculous one, asking Pam or Jim or someone to do something, go to Hooters or whatever it was. It was either a sane person doing something sane and watching the lunatics respond, or vice versa. Like a lunatic doing something lunatic, and then the sane person's responding.

• 16:19Speaker 00

  You also wrote Valentine's Day.

• 16:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 16:23Speaker 00

  And this puts the character of Michael Scott in New York City.

• 16:26Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 16:27Speaker 00

  There are so many funny moments. What was it like to do that? Like, you're from the East Coast, and so seeing New York City through Michael Scott's eyes.

• 16:37Speaker 02

  So that was season two.

• 16:39Speaker 00

  Season two.

• 16:40Speaker 02

  And it was the beginning of Greg wanting to expand the world of the show occasionally, rarely, but saying like, we can break out a little bit of the rule we had stuck to, which is every episode happens in one day, and every episode happens inside the walls of the office or on the grounds of Dunder Mifflin. So we had this idea that he would go to New York. There were two really important things that I think came out of that episode. The first was like, let's take a skeleton crew to the city, walk around with Steve Carell, and just do a bunch of jokes. In the room, I remember, we called it Michael Scott's New York. That's how he thought of it, was like, because his whole thing is I'm an expert on everything.

• 17:20Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 17:21Speaker 02

  And so we thought it would be really fun to put him in Manhattan, a place where like, you've got to, you know, spend a lot of time in Manhattan to be an expert on it, and he is not. So the joke I wrote that's probably the most famous joke of that episode is the one where he talks about taking the camera crew to his favorite pizza place.

• 17:39Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 17:40Speaker 02

  And it's a Sparrow.

• 17:41Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 17:42Speaker 02

  It's the one that comes back to me the most still to this day.

• 17:43Speaker 00

  I mean, people post online pictures of themselves in front of Sparrow.

• 17:48Speaker 01

  In Manhattan.

• 17:49Speaker 00

  Yeah, and saying, you know.

• 17:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, gotta get a New York slice, yeah.

• 17:54Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 17:55Speaker 02

  That episode is largely about him and Jan.

• 17:57Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 17:58Speaker 02

  And him believing that he has a relationship with Jan that he does not actually have. But this was the other really important thing about that episode from a like a world building point of view was a question that had been asked many times of the show by critics and fans and all sorts of people was how did this dummy get this job, right? How did Michael Scott get this job? And Greg had thought it out very carefully. It was a living example of what's called in corporate structure, the Peter Principle, right? Yes, we know the Peter Principle.

• 18:28Speaker 00

  We've discussed.

• 18:29Speaker 02

  We've discussed, right? People who do a good job at their job are then promoted to a position in which their skills have run out and are no longer applicable. Right, non-qualified. But it was still a question of like, okay, even given that, this guy has done a lot of ridiculous stuff, so how do we justify it? So the whole point of this episode was we were like, we're gonna see four guys, including Michael, who have Michael's job at different branches. Two of them are gonna be demonstrably more competent than him, and one of them is gonna be less competent. And like, we are going to absolutely show that there are people who have his job who are dumber than he is. And that was that character who just was like, I thought this was more of like a meet and greet kind of video. He's very funny, too. Yeah, he's very funny.

• 19:13Speaker 02

  Craig Anton, I think, is his name? And so, Michael does something kind of important, too, in that episode, which is, he has made a ridiculous video. The CFO, David Wallace, has asked him to make a presentation about his branch, numbers, facts, revenue streams, stuff like that. And instead, in classic Michael Scott fashion, he decides to make a video that's like a heartstring tugging, kind of like, these people matter to me. And he presents that video, and David Wallace's reaction is like, wow, but also, do you have the facts I asked for? And the key thing is that he does. That was like a big deal. He passes out these like really nice, like spiral bound.

• 19:56Speaker 02

  Yes, and it was a demonstration that like, even though he's an absurd person, he's not incompetent. He knows what he has to do, and he also, he was hoping that David Wallace would like start crying, because he was so moved by his video, that he would see what Michael sees in the incredible people of Dan Dundermuth. So that was the whole purpose of that, besides, obviously, advancing the Michael Jan relationship was like.

• 20:18Speaker 00

  Cause she gives him a kiss at the end.

• 20:20Speaker 02

  She does indeed. She's like surprised by his maneuver, that he like owns up to the relationship and takes the fall for it and protects her. And she's so, you know, sort of like pleased with how he handled it, that she ends up giving him what he hoped he was gonna get, which was like a romantic Valentine's Day New York moment. There's another very important thing that came out of that episode, for me and for America. When we auditioned people for that role that Craig Anton did, and it was very funny, and one of the people we saw was Nick Offerman.

• 20:53Speaker 00

  Oh.

• 20:54Speaker 02

  And he auditioned for it, and we were like, that guy's really funny. But then it immediately came to us, before we could, I think, even offer him the part, maybe, that he had a conflict. And the conflict was he was shooting an episode of Will and Grace at the same time, cause he is famously married to Megan Mullally. So I wrote the name Nick Offerman on a Post-it note and stuck it to my computer as a reminder to me that like this guy had auditioned was really funny. And then three years later, when Greg and I were developing Parks and Rec, I was like, oh, that guy, that guy's really funny. And he came in and read for a bunch of parts and ended up playing Ron Swanson. And when the show ended, I saved the Post-it note.

• 21:37Speaker 00

  Nice.

• 21:38Speaker 02

  And I had it framed. And it had, in the intervening time, it had like been, it had fallen off my computer and been stepped on, so there was like a footprint on it, and someone, some random phone number was also written on it or whatever. But I saved it and like put it in a frame and gave it to Nick as a present at the end of the show. But that was where, that was where I first saw him.

• 21:56Speaker 00

  Oh, I'm so glad you told that story. For any like aspiring artists out there who have gone to an audition and then they don't get the part, but like, you might be on a Post-it note on someone's computer, like that might grow into something in three years.

• 22:12Speaker 02

  Yeah. It was wonderful, the way it all worked out, and it taught us a really important lesson, which was, and I think this started at the office, if it didn't, it definitely started at Parks and Rec, or we took it. Parks and Rec, we used to have a folder on our computer that called Good for Something. And it would be like, we would audition people for roles. And then if we didn't cast them, but we liked them, we would just take their audition and throw it into that folder. And then in a future episode, if it was like, oh, who can play this part? We would go through that folder and look at all those auditions. And we go, oh, that lady was funny. We'll get her to do it. And people would constantly on Parks and Rec show up and be like, I didn't audition for this. Like, how did this happen? And we're like, well, we auditioned for that thing a year ago and we found you and, you know, saved, we liked your audition and saved you.

• 22:57Speaker 02

  And most of the actors always had that same reaction, which was like, thank you so much.

• 23:02Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 23:03Speaker 02

  But for me, it was like, well, why wouldn't you do that?

• 23:05Speaker 01

  Right.

• 23:05Speaker 02

  It's like, you like an actor, they did a good job. Like, actors don't grow on trees. Like, save them and use them in something, you know?

• 23:12Speaker 01

  Two things. One, I think it's very Michael Scott of you that you stuck it on your computer.

• 23:17Speaker 02

  It is very old timey.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  I usually, I did tidy up, but I normally have post-it notes and I open my laptop in there here because I don't want to, like, forget. But then also you said, you know, actors don't grow on trees, which made me think of Branch Closing, because I watched it this morning and I-

• 23:35Speaker 02

  Did you really?

• 23:36Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh. Yes, it's always been one of my favorite episodes. And I was like, I haven't watched it in a bit since we, like, first broke it down. But did you write Stanley Doesn't Grow on Trees?

• 23:45Speaker 02

  I believe I did, yeah.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  Because you just said it, so it might be just deep within you.

• 23:50Speaker 02

  Show me that farm where, yeah.

• 23:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, where Stanley's and Phyllis's-

• 23:54Speaker 02

  With Stanley's and Phyllis's.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  Grow on Trees. It's such a good episode. I was, it like made my morning. I like watched it with a cup of tea.

• 24:01Speaker 02

  I remember thinking like, that's season three.

• 24:05Speaker 01

  Yes, it's season three.

• 24:06Speaker 02

  And I remember thinking, I remember watching that episode, watching Steve specifically in that episode and thinking like, this is an actor at the height of his powers. Like, it's a great showcase for him for a couple of reasons. One is the very first scene is Jan coming in and saying, this branch is closing. And he just is usually on the show, like, there's a little bit of a ramp in, you know? Like, starts with some slice of life and then Michael has some dumb thing and then whatever, eventually like a couple of minutes in, the premise has sort of sprung. That episode, Jan walks in and he's like going, "Jan Levinson Ghoul." Blah, blah, blah.

• 24:42Speaker 01

  He sings like Levinson in the morning.

• 24:45Speaker 02

  Just call me Levinson in the morning. And then she's like, "I'm here to tell you the branch is closing." And so 30 seconds in, he gets the worst news of his life. And that monologue, that talking head he gives of like, "Show me that farm," is so good. And it's like, he has so deeply internalized the degree to which This Office is his entire life. It's like an incredible performance. And I remember that was the year, not to divert the conversation too much into something that doesn't really matter, but that was the year that everyone was like, "Steve Carell is going to win the Emmy for Best Actor in a Comedy." It is a foregone conclusion. In fact, it was such a foregone conclusion that that year, they had Stephen Colbert

• 25:30Speaker 02

  and Jon Stewart present the category because it was going to be a Daily Show Correspondence reunion onstage and they were going to give it to their friend, Steve Carell. And then I believe Ricky Gervais ended up winning for the show Extras, which was a BBC show that HBO had just bought and like thrown on the air. And he wasn't even there. It was one of those deals where they showed a black and white photo of him on the screen and they were like, "Ricky Gervais isn't here." So instead, we're going to give this to our friend, Steve Carell. And then Steve jumped up and ran onstage and like bowed and everyone cheered. But I remember thinking, of all of the robberies that occurred from folks who worked on The Office over the years, that season three Best Actor in a Comedy was number one on my

• 26:13Speaker 02

  list because he was the funniest person in America and he was the best actor on a comedy in America by a wide margin. And I always think of that performance in that episode as Exhibit A in that argument.

• 26:25Speaker 01

  Yeah, he's fantastic in it.

• 26:26Speaker 00

  And he never won an Emmy for the role of Michael Scott.

• 26:29Speaker 01

  He never did.

• 26:30Speaker 00

  Never did. When I speak to acting classes, I remind them of that fact, that you can do the best work.

• 26:38Speaker 02

  You can be the very, very best at what you do. Yeah, I know. At this point, it's like, you can make a better cast and show out of the folks who've never won than the folks who have won, I dare say. And he's, you know, he's the lead.

• 26:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, they had a camera on us. I've told this story before. We were in a row together. It was like Jenna and John and me in the same row. And Steve was in front of us. And you know, when they're announcing the nominees, the camera guys just run right up.

• 27:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 27:06Speaker 01

  And they just put a camera on.

• 27:07Speaker 02

  Right in your face, yeah.

• 27:08Speaker 01

  Right in your face. And so it's right in Steve's face and then we're directly behind him. And when they didn't say his name, I guess I said, "Motherfucker."

• 27:18Speaker 02

  I mean, that's the correct response.

• 27:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:21Speaker 01

  And I had one or two friends say, "Did you say 'motherfucker'? I think I saw you say that."

• 27:26Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 27:26Speaker 01

  And I'm like, "Yes, yes, I did."

• 27:28Speaker 02

  It came out of me. I didn't have a choice.

• 27:30Speaker 01

  I couldn't believe it. I couldn't. And I, you know, so many of us couldn't because he was amazing.

• 27:36Speaker 02

  The other scene in that episode that I think of when I think of how great he was is the one where, so the plot is that he and Dwight decide that they're going to go to David Wallace's house.

• 27:44Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 27:45Speaker 02

  And just like stop him and like make their argument why Scranton shouldn't close. And he never shows up. They just end up spending the entire day outside his house. And he and Dwight are sitting there at the end when it looks like all is lost. And he just says like, "All right, top three, what are your top three moments ever? Your three favorite moments at Dunder Mifflin?" And Dwight names a couple. One or two things I think we've seen in the world of the show.

• 28:09Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 28:10Speaker 02

  Like the concussion, like when Michael took Dwight.

• 28:12Speaker 01

  It took him to the hospital. And Dwight gets a little emotional.

• 28:15Speaker 02

  Gets a little emotional. And then also one thing I think that we didn't see that was a reference to something that happened before the documentary started shooting. And then Dwight says, "What about you? What are your top three moments?" And he says, "All of them, every single moment, every single moment was wonderful and perfect and special." And it's really a beautiful moment. And then Dwight says, "What about when Jan came and told you the office was closing?" And he's like, "God damn it, Dwight."

• 28:39Speaker 01

  It was so perfect of Dwight, like just who he is.

• 28:43Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:44Speaker 01

  He's so literal.

• 28:45Speaker 02

  He's, he's saying, "Every single moment? Well, I can think of one that..."

• 28:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 28:49Speaker 01

  He also, they did this great thing where Dwight is going to practice being David Wallace and Michael's going to plead his case why they can't close Scranton Bridge. And Dwight's just very matter-of-factly is like, "Well, it's a dying business for one."

• 29:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 29:05Speaker 01

  It's like, it's, it just comes down to numbers. It's just math, like, and he's so matter of fact. And Michael's like, stop it, stop it. He's never gonna say that.

• 29:14Speaker 02

  Well, there's a wonderful moment that was improvised between the two of them. I think the way it ended was Michael was like, just start over and be more scared of me.

• 29:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:22Speaker 02

  And so Dwight goes back and he wasn't supposed to do this, but Rain walked up again. And Michael's was like, David Wallace, and Rain goes, ah! Like, and jumps backwards.

• 29:33Speaker 02

  And we had to cut it off, literally the frame where we cut it off is the last frame before they both started laughing. It's a good memory of that moment.

• 29:42Speaker 01

  Well, it was really fun to rewatch it. I highly recommend, guys.

• 29:45Speaker 00

  Well, since we're talking about season three, this is actually a question I wanted to ask you. The arc of season three is such an impressive arc. You have the whole storyline of Jim going to Stanford. You had to create this whole other branch. You had to fill it with people who were then going to come merge with the Scranton branch. And then some of them stay. Like, you had to cast Rashida Jones, you had to cast Ed Helms. It was this massive, ongoing storyline. Like, can you talk a little bit about how that was created? Like, some of the conversations in the room? And like, how far into the season did you get when we started shooting?

• 30:21Speaker 02

  It's a great question. This was a big swing that Greg decided to make, which was at the end of season two, after Jim and Pam kiss. And Pam sort of lets him down, in her mind, easy, but for him, not very easy. Greg was like, he's gotta leave. We can't just start season three with him, like, back at the office. It's not sort of following through on the story we've told. The story we've told is that Jim stays in this office because of Pam. And so if he makes a play for Pam and Pam turns him down, he's going to leave. So he had a general with Ed, I remember. Like, and we were all Daily Show fans, and so we were like, oh, Ed Helms is here, that's fun. And we came into that season and Greg was like, Jim is going to leave. He's going to go to another branch.

• 31:04Speaker 02

  We're going to meet an entire group of people who work in that branch. And then at some point early in the season, they're gonna fold together, the branches are gonna merge. So the important people were Ed's character, Andy Bernard. Rashida's character, who is gonna be Jim's new love interest, because Greg was like, when Jim comes back, he's got a girlfriend. That was a huge thing, too. And then the manager of the office, who was Josh, who was going to play an important role in the story in that he was going to seem like an incredibly competent, like, well-functioning, high-functioning manager, who was clearly better than Michael Scott at managing, but was also like, kind of a self-interested guy who didn't really care about the office and was going to like leverage this corporate upheaval

• 31:49Speaker 02

  for his own gain, which led to one of my favorite Jim lines, where when that is revealed, when Jim says like, "Say what you will about Michael Scott, he would never do that."

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:56Speaker 02

  Which was like, that was the whole storyline that was laid out.

• 32:00Speaker 01

  And Charles Esten was great.

• 32:01Speaker 02

  He was so good, yeah. He was really great. He was a perfect, just like handsome, charismatic guy who like, everyone was like psyched to work for and, you know. The hardest part, obviously, like Ed, you cast, because Ed's hilarious. And like, he is like a guy who you're like, "Well, this guy will fold naturally into any ensemble and will be wonderful and great."

• 32:20Speaker 01

  Can I say one thing about that episode? When they find out in branch closing that, you know, Scranton is going to be, you know, closed down, he goes up to Jim at the Stanford office and goes, "In your face!" And Jim's like, "I don't work there. I work here."

• 32:38Speaker 02

  Of all of Krasinski's tiny line readings, it's one of the tiniest, because he goes, "Hi, in your face," and John goes, "Well, I work here now."

• 32:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:48Speaker 02

  You can barely hear him. He speaks so quietly, it's wonderful.

• 32:51Speaker 01

  But anyway, I'm so sorry. So Ed, obviously.

• 32:54Speaker 02

  Ed is like, cast that guy, he's great. He's a New England preppy. Like, I was delighted, because Andy Brown is everyone I grew up with in Connecticut. Like, I was like, "Oh, I can write this guy forever." Like, wind me up and set me loose. The hardest part was Rashida, because this is one of the hardest things to do in any show, right? Is there are two people on the show who are soulmates. It's very clear that they're soulmates. And they are going to, at some point, get together. And Greg was like, "If they get together, they're staying together. We're not doing Ross and Rachel," which they did, obviously, incredibly effectively over 10 years, which is like, get together, break up, get together, break up, over and over again. He's like, "When Jim and Pam get together, they're going to stay together." He always kind of knew that.

• 33:38Speaker 02

  So what we needed for the obstacle was a woman who Jim could date, who was a good match for him. He also didn't want to do a move, which I think is kind of crappy and slightly misogynistic, which is you give the protagonist of the show a girlfriend who's just a terrible person. Either cheats on him, or browbeats him, or is like selfish, or is mean, or whatever. And it's cheap because it makes the audience just like root for Jim and for the person to go with you with the other person. And Greg was like, that's just fake. Like, you know that's fake. And Greg, he had this very, very Greg-like analogy, which is he told the story, I want to say it's General Sherman in the Civil War.

• 34:21Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh.

• 34:22Speaker 02

  It's a classic Greg thing.

• 34:23Speaker 01

  Amazing.

• 34:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:24Speaker 01

  Did he tell it while laying on his back, stretching his?

• 34:27Speaker 02

  A hundred percent he did, yes.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  His hamstrings.

• 34:29Speaker 02

  He was lying on the floor, on the dirty floor of the writers' room. The story from history was that, I think it was Sherman, it might have been Grant, or I'm getting all of this wrong, but it was an army was marching south through the US, and the opposing forces, the Confederate forces, were very skilled fighters. And even if they were outnumbered, they could win a theoretical battle if they knew where they were going. So if Sherman were marching on Richmond, Lee would marshal all of his forces in Richmond and be ready for him. So what Sherman did, according to Greg, was to drive his army halfway between two possible destinations, halfway between Richmond and Atlanta. So Lee would then have

• 35:10Speaker 02

  to send half of his army to Richmond and half to Atlanta, and then at the last second, Sherman would break towards one of them, and then he would only have to fight half of the Southern Army and would win. And he used this analogy by saying, like, we have to create a girlfriend for Jim, who is compelling enough and a good enough match, that half of our audience is rooting for him to say, I'm sorry, Pam, you missed your shot. And half of the audience is rooting for him to say, like, get rid of this lady and go with Pam. And so that required a lot of things. One, some good stories where Rashida was funny and interesting and compelling and smart and cool. And it required an actor to play that role that people wouldn't hate.

• 35:54Speaker 02

  And so we looked forever. We tried so many different versions of like, just combing through the other shows and seeing like, what actors have been on these shows who seem good and funny and whatever. I met Rashida my second day of college and we've been friends ever since. And so I was obviously like quietly being like, cast Rashida.

• 36:14Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 36:15Speaker 02

  And then she had met John already and so John liked her and was like pushing for her. But Greg famously indecisive in these moments, or I guess the indecisive is not the nicest way to say it, thorough would be the nicest way to put it, that he exhausts every avenue of possibility. And we looked and looked and looked and eventually settled on Rashida. And then the challenge became, in like six episodes, introduce her and build her into a person who, at least some of the audience, was like, wait, I think she's a better girlfriend for Jim than Pam is. And that was really hard. And that took like, most of the time of the writers' room. And the time between season two and season three was spent just doing that, of like, how can we like meticulously form a character that audiences are rooting for?

• 37:00Speaker 02

  It was very hard.

• 37:01Speaker 00

  You know what I think worked about it? Is that I liked Karen as a woman. Like, I wanted to go to lunch with Karen. I wanted to be friends with Karen. I'm like, oh, this is a woman I'd want to spend time with. She's cool.

• 37:15Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:15Speaker 00

  And they seemed like, exactly what you're saying, like, Jim and Karen seemed like a couple who were compatible enough and had enough fun that they'd have like a three year relationship and then break up.

• 37:28Speaker 02

  Right.

• 37:28Speaker 00

  You know, like Pam aside, Jim was not gonna end up with Karen in the long run.

• 37:35Speaker 02

  Right.

• 37:35Speaker 00

  Whenever he met her.

• 37:36Speaker 02

  Right.

• 37:37Speaker 00

  But this was like a solid choice. This was like a person to spend three years of your time with.

• 37:42Speaker 02

  She was cool.

• 37:42Speaker 00

  Yeah, she was great.

• 37:43Speaker 02

  She was smart, she was good at her job, she was funny.

• 37:46Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:46Speaker 02

  A huge breakthrough for the writers was the Christmas episode that year.

• 37:52Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:53Speaker 02

  Which was extended, which Jen Salata wrote, I want to say, and which was so good. And Harold Ramus, the late Harold Ramus, direct. And was so good that it was the first time that the cut came in at like forty-two minutes, as it always did. And instead of cutting it down to twenty-one thirty, Greg went to the studio and was like, we should make this a two-parter. We should make this an hour. And we ended up shooting another, like, writing and shooting another like six or eight minutes of stuff in order to then boil it down to the best forty-three. But the plot that mattered so much was that Karen and Pam were on the same team. Yeah.

• 38:29Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was like Churchill, right? Like, nothing brings people together like a common enemy.

• 38:34Speaker 02

  Yes, and so there you were.

• 38:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 38:38Speaker 02

  And like that, but that pitching out that story was a huge relief for us because we were like, right, the story of this doesn't have to be a rivalry between Pam and Karen. It can be that, like you said, that like Pam is like, I kinda like this lady. Like, I wanna be friends with her, like legitimately, not as a way to like weasel my way back into Jim's life. But just because for Pam, life in that office could be pretty lonely in terms of like ladies that you can hang out with and talk to. And suddenly, here's one right here, and she's cool. And so in the like slow deliberate sort of brick-by-brick construction of Karen as a character, that was like a huge moment that we were like, oh, there

• 39:20Speaker 02

  should be an episode where they happily and joyfully find themselves on the same team.

• 39:25Speaker 01

  I think shout out too to Rashida because she just has a natural presence as Karen that puts you at ease.

• 39:33Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 39:34Speaker 01

  And that's her just instincts as an actor. And then also in real life, she is one of the coolest people you'll ever meet.

• 39:40Speaker 02

  That's the thing.

• 39:41Speaker 01

  She is. Like, you know, I took a trip with her. Like, we've talked about this before. I went and did this work with this nonprofit that helps save the world's oceans, and Rashida and I went together. And there are still things she said as we traveled to Belize, like, that I still say to people. Like, like, she emotionally expensive. That's one of them. She said, I kind of was like going through some stuff, and she was like, Angela, that person is too emotionally expensive for you. And I was like, what? This is brilliant. The other thing is, she gets on a plane. She's like a professional.

• 40:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:13Speaker 01

  She has so many lotions.

• 40:14Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:15Speaker 01

  And she hydrates. And she's like, my friends call me lotions and potions on planes. Now, I like bring like hand lotion and chapstick like on a plane and I think of her.

• 40:27Speaker 02

  She was, I mean, again, I'm coming from a medium sized town in suburban Connecticut. But even so, when I met her and on the second day of freshman year of college in 1993, she was the coolest person I'd ever met. And now, 33 years later, she is still the coolest person I've ever met.

• 40:46Speaker 01

  Well, I think to wrap up this part of our office convo, we wanted to ask you, and this is like kind of one of those questions, like when people ask me, I'm like, oh, it's so hard. But do you have an episode that you wrote that's near and dear to your heart?

• 40:59Speaker 02

  I mean, all of them, obviously. I will say branch closing, I was very delighted in how it all turned out. I think the one that I think of the most is the negotiation, which was one of the supersize-y ones that, which I was so happy about because there was so much going on. It's the one that starts with Dwight spraying mace at Pam's boyfriend and stopping an attack.

• 41:26Speaker 01

  And Angela's titillated by it and keeps having everyone retell the story.

• 41:30Speaker 02

  So this was, this was the best part of it, was Roy comes in and Dwight maces him. He's about to attack Jim and maces him. And that's a great beginning to an episode, right? That's so exciting. And then a bunch of stuff has to branch out of that. And, because the story that we had for Michael was that Daryl wanted to renegotiate his salary because Roy had been fired and now he was like, okay, I'm stepping up and whatever. And so that whole thing, that whole story is huge. And they go to the corporate offices and he talks to Jan. And it also flips and Daryl finds out how much Michael makes and is like humiliated for him. And it's like, you gotta get a, like, you have to get a raise so that I can

• 42:10Speaker 02

  get a raise, you know? And it's a real Craig Robinson showcase, that whole episode. But then, the B story was Jim feeling like he owed Dwight a debt of gratitude and was like, how do I pay this guy back? And he tries all these silly ways to pay Dwight back. And Dwight, in his like weird code of honor, is refusing to accept a payback because he says citizens do not accept prizes for being citizens. Is that how he puts it? So both of those stories were so great. It was like, put Michael Scott and Craig Robinson in a room together and like send them off and it's gonna be great. And also Jim feeling a debt to Dwight that he's trying desperately to fill because he hates the feeling of owing Dwight something. Fantastic.

• 42:52Speaker 02

  The problem was, the best episodes of the show were always ones where everyone was involved. And you're talking about two huge stories where it's just Michael and Craig, really, Toby at the end, and then Dwight and Jim. And so this was a risky maneuver, but on my own, when I went off to write it, I was like, I'm gonna add another story. And the story was that Angela heard the tale of heroism for Dwight and was like turned on by it and kept asking other people to like, well, I didn't really hear what happened. Can you repeat the story? And she's doing like fingering, playing her necklace. Yeah. And then the wonderful thing that came out of it was that Jim had hit a wall where he

• 43:36Speaker 02

  just couldn't figure out how to pay Dwight back. And he came out of the bathroom at the end and saw Dwight, because Angela has gone up to Dwight and been like, I've heard of some incredible tales of heroism. And there's no one in the office, they think, and they start making out. And Jim sees it and he gets so excited and he's like, I, and then he realizes and says, I'm never gonna say a word and that is how I will pay Dwight back. And it was like the perfect like dovetailing of stories that involve like everyone in the office entirely. And so the way that all kind of coalesced into a big giant fun story. And then we had this wonderful thing for like another bunch of episodes, which was

• 44:21Speaker 02

  that Dwight thought that no one knew and Jim, his worst enemy, knew this thing and wasn't telling anyone. And I think it just made Jim really likeable and he was like doing a nice thing without Dwight knowing it, which was just like a really sweet little backstory, you know? Oh. Yeah. I love that. Yeah, that one was really fun and I was so happy that it was supersized because it allowed us to keep all that stuff in the episode. Yeah.

• 44:44Speaker 00

  Oh my gosh, you're so like just fun to talk to. You are, you're just, you're smart and you remember things.

• 44:53Speaker 02

  Well, I mean, look, I've said this the last time I was here, like that show was so formative for all of us. Like it taught me everything I've ever learned about writing and about story creation and about working with actors and all that stuff. Like it was such a vibrant laboratory is how I think about it. Like Greg threw us into the deep end of the pool in the best way. You know, I'd never written on anything before and there I was like on the set, like dealing with directors and talking to actors and like in the edit bay, like making editing decisions. I didn't know that isn't typical. And now, you know, 20, 30 years later, I'm realizing how atypical it really was. And so I've tried in my life now, running different shows to replicate that process.

• 45:37Speaker 02

  It's not easy. It requires a lot of faith in the people that you hire and it requires a lot of time to walk people through all of the mistakes that they make when they don't know what they're doing. Like we all made horrible mistakes and like wasted enormous amounts of time making terrible editing decisions. And even then I was aware of how special it was. The lessons I learned and the moments that stood out like are very deeply embedded in my brain and I don't think they'll ever leave.

• 46:04Speaker 00

  You know, I'm really moved by you saying that. Like I got a little choked up because it is such a gift that Greg gave all of us, the actors too, bringing us into the process so intimately. Like I left that show A Better Actor because I knew everything that was happening besides just my acting. Because he brought us into the edit bay and into conversations and into the writer's room. And so seeing how a story was crafted and why it was important and like. Little things like, I don't know, like you get a line or you get a scene and you're like, I don't get it. Like, he didn't just say, "Do it, because I wrote it."

• 46:43Speaker 02

  Right.

• 46:44Speaker 00

  He'd be like, "Let me tell you where we're going with this."

• 46:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:46Speaker 00

  And you're like, "Oh, I gotcha."

• 46:49Speaker 02

  It was obvious to me very early, I think I told this story the first time I was on your show, but my meeting with him was like two hours long and it was very different from all the other meetings I had taken. And I sent my agent an email when I left and said, "I don't know if that guy's gonna offer me a job, but if he does, I'm gonna take it, because I think he's gonna teach me how to write."

• 47:08Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 47:08Speaker 02

  And he did offer me the job and I did take it, and he did teach me how to write. And so I knew from the beginning that this was like a person I could learn from. And then like the process of that first season of like, breaking stories and slogging through all these different versions and everything, sort of, you know, made it clear. But then, the first episode I wrote was The Alliance, and he was like editing it, and I was working on The Comeback, this first season of the show, The Comeback on HBO at the time. And so I wasn't able to be around a lot. And he was like, "Hey, we just finished our first assembly of The Alliance, and I'm gonna send it to you so you can look at it." So I watched it, and it was completely different. Obviously, it was completely different. The first cut was 38 minutes long, and this one was 24 or whatever. And I remember watching

• 47:53Speaker 02

  it and like, my heart sinking, because I was like, "Wait, he cut this, and he cut that, and he moved this scene over here." And I like panicked. And I wrote him this long email where I was like, "Hey, so here's just a few thoughts on like, on this." And like, "You cut the cold open, and the cold open really does this thing where it sets up this. And you also, you know, by starting this scene here, you do blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." And I remember sending it off and being like, "When he reads this, he's gonna rethink some of his decisions."

• 48:23Speaker 02

  He wrote back, and I remember it so clearly, he wrote like, "Hey dude!" exclamation point. Like, "Response is below, see if they make sense to you." And then just one by one, everything I had said, he like took the time to write out a long paragraph of like, "Here's why I did this, and here's why it's good, I think, and here's why it makes sense, and here's why it helps the episode." And then I remember, it was like my heart like sank again somehow because I was embarrassed, but also like rose back up into my chest, because I was like, "Oh, this guy knows everything. Like, this guy is seeing the matrix code behind the show in a way that I could never in this moment in my life." And I just remember thinking like, There is nothing that I could suggest to Greg Daniels that he has not already thought

• 49:08Speaker 02

  about. He knew the show from beginning to end before he started working on it somehow. And like, when you know that you're in the hands of someone who cares that much and knows that much about what he's doing, it's so freeing. You're just like, I just trust that the decisions that are being made are like, coming from a place of like, thoughtfulness and understanding and like, love of the characters and love of the world that makes me just very at ease, you know?

• 49:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah. He's smart and thoughtful and funny. Oh my gosh, all the things. The one thing he said to me about my character, and I don't know if I've shared this before, but there was a moment where we didn't know if we were gonna be series regulars or not, you know, the supporting cast. And I think I just, sort of insecurely just said to him without even thinking, "I don't know if my character brings much," you know? And he said, "Oh Angela, your character's the bitch. You always need the bitch." It's like, no, that's a very good, that's a good character. And I was like, "Okay, okay. Maybe I'll be around a while."

• 50:17Speaker 02

  Did we talk about the Secret Santa Christmas episode about Angela specifically? The last time I was here, I can't remember?

• 50:23Speaker 01

  No, uh-uh.

• 50:24Speaker 02

  This is like, one of the great writing lessons. I feel like every time I was in that room, I learned something about how to write. But I had to write the Yankee Swap Christmas, the Secret Santa Christmas episode. So I did this thing where I did a real drawing. I took, I put everyone's names into a hat. And I, we knew that like, for the plot, like, Jim had to have Pam, because he was gonna get her the teapot. And Michael had to have Ryan, because he gave him the video iPod. But everything else was up in the air. So I did a real drawing in my house when I went off to write the script. And I forget who had Angela. But anyway, the point is that the person who got Angela, it wasn't a plot point. It was just like, we were just, needed people to open gifts, right?

• 51:03Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 51:05Speaker 02

  So the gift that was, that I wrote in was like one of those sort of like Joel Osteen, sort of like Christian books, like self-help books or whatever. And I think it's because Angela had said in the, in the fire episode, it was like when it was, when you're playing, you know, what books would you have on Desert Island? She says, she mentions one of those books. And so I was like, okay, so the person will just get her one of those books. And Greg was like, we need to change that. When I turned in the script and I was like, why? Like it's in universe, you know, she's already said she likes those books. And he's like, yeah, but that's the reason we need to change it. He said like, every episode of every TV show, you should learn something new about every character, if you can, like that should be the goal, that you move the ball slightly

• 51:48Speaker 02

  down the field of like character development for as many people as you can, because that's what leads to like rich characters, right? And I was a little bit like, what does this matter? Like this episode is so complicated already and like this is not a plot point. This doesn't matter. Like it's just a moment where Angela opens a gift and then we move on. But we of course, put like seven hours of thought into it and ended up with buying that someone gets Angela a poster of babies dressed up like humans, of like dressed up like adults, right?

• 52:17Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 52:18Speaker 02

  And first of all, immediately it's like, well, that's way funnier. It's a way funnier little moment. If it's just that moment, it's, it's much better than just a book that, because who cares? But then, whatever, 10 episodes later, that poster becomes the centerpiece of an entire other episode.

• 52:34Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 52:35Speaker 02

  And suddenly Oscar is wearing it as a shirt.

• 52:37Speaker 00

  Yes.

• 52:38Speaker 02

  Because it's, and it was just such a great lesson, because it's like, right, even if it doesn't matter in the moment, like make it as interesting as possible and say something new about each character, because you don't know how that's going to pay off down the line. And that poster became like a very important thing in the world of the show. And it's just because he cared at that granular level of like, make every moment 1% better. And then suddenly the entire episode is like 15% better and the entire season is like 30% better and future episodes are 500% better. And that's the level of detail that he was putting into all of that story breaking work.

• 53:16Speaker 00

  Oh, wow. That was a great, specific example of that.

• 53:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:21Speaker 00

  That's awesome.

• 53:31Speaker 00

  Well, Mike, we also want to talk to you about your book.

• 53:33Speaker 02

  Great.

• 53:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 53:34Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 53:35Speaker 01

  Mike has a new book.

• 53:36Speaker 00

  Let's pivot.

• 53:36Speaker 01

  Yes. It is called Big Fan, and you wrote it with your friend and an amazing sports writer, Joe Posnanski.

• 53:43Speaker 02

  That's right.

• 53:44Speaker 01

  And I did read this little blurb, and I thought I would share it with our listeners so they can get an idea of the book. It says, "Best-selling authors and podcast hosts. Mm-hmm. Joe and Mike love games, almost any games, and they bring readers to the front row and sometimes even right onto the field, whether ringside at WrestleMania in Las Vegas, singing along with the maniacs at the World Darts Championships in London, or just watching eight straight hours of football at a Buffalo Wild Wings in Dallas. They bring us to the very heart of what it means to love something so much it hurts."

• 54:19Speaker 00

  I got this book for Lee for Father's Day.

• 54:21Speaker 02

  Did you really?

• 54:21Speaker 00

  Yes, I did.

• 54:22Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 54:23Speaker 00

  Yes, and my son has already stolen it.

• 54:25Speaker 02

  Great.

• 54:26Speaker 00

  So.

• 54:26Speaker 01

  I got it for myself, and I was on a flight to Utah, and I started reading it, and the man next to me was like, "What's that?" So.

• 54:33Speaker 02

  Look at you.

• 54:34Speaker 01

  I don't know his name.

• 54:35Speaker 02

  You're doing a Dutton's marketing work for them.

• 54:37Speaker 00

  Yeah, exactly.

• 54:39Speaker 01

  One person at a time.

• 54:41Speaker 00

  Um, tell us about this book and how it came about.

• 54:43Speaker 02

  So, a couple of years ago, I was sent a video by a friend of mine who said, "Look at this, it's hilarious." And it was a video of the World Darts Championship in London, a thing I did not know existed. And in the video, a couple, like, very stocky European gentlemen with no expressions on their faces are just playing darts, or just throwing darts at a dartboard, and they seem to be doing fairly well, because behind them is a crowd of people, like, 3,000 people, and with every throw, they are absolutely losing their minds.

• 55:14Speaker 01

  Oh, my gosh.

• 55:14Speaker 02

  Like, they just are going, like, crazier and crazier, it's escalating. And the announcer is with, like, the thickest, like, I think Scottish accent you've ever heard, is, like, losing his mind. And it's a very funny juxtaposition of just, like, no expression, just, like, thunk, thunk, thunk, and people going, like, "Blah!" And then I start to realize that the crowd behind them are all in costume. Different costumes. Some of them are dressed like Harry Potter. Some of them are minions. Some of them are the Jamaican bobsled team. Some of them are dressed like giant bananas or tomatoes or British barristers with like white wigs on. And I was just like, what is this? What is this event? And I was laughing so hard at how crazy it was. And by the way, by the end, they're literally like

• 55:58Speaker 02

  jumping up and down and throwing pitchers of beer in the air and throwing napkins up and hugging each other. And I was like, these people are lunatics. And then I was like, but also, that's probably kind of how I look to like my wife when I'm watching sports that I care about. Like, it does make you crazy to be a fan. And I just had this idea that my friend Joe, who I've known forever, who's a legendary sports writer, that he and I should go to a bunch of kind of strange events. Not the Super Bowl and the World Series and stuff like that, but like weird events where fans really care. And just try to figure out if there is something universal about fandom. Like, is it the same at the World Darts Championship as it is at a Dodgers game?

• 56:41Speaker 02

  What is it about fandom that matters so much to so many people? Like, why do so many people put their lives on hold and carve time out of their busy days and stare frantically at a TV screen and like pace around in their living rooms and bite their nails and like fall into deep spells of depression when their team loses and celebrate euphorically when they win? And I just thought that, I was like, this is a phenomenon that's worth investigating. So I called him and pitched him the idea and he was like, immediately saw it and we were off and running. And so we spent like a year and a half going to a bunch of different events. We do go to like mainstream American sports. We go to basketball, football, baseball. I went to the Olympics in Paris and watched the US men's basketball team. He went to a Montreal Canadiens hockey game

• 57:27Speaker 02

  with some friends in Montreal. Like, we do the stuff that matters most to Americans, but we also went to some really fun stuff that we had never heard of before. Joe went to the Indigenous Stickball Championships in Philadelphia, Mississippi, which is a sport that native tribes have used to like settle disputes for like hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. It's sort of like field hockey or lacrosse, but it's like played by like dozens and dozens of people at the same time. It's sort of like lacrosse plus rugby plus like a fistfight.

• 57:58Speaker 02

  And it's, you know, it's in the middle of Mississippi in the summer and it's 140 degrees with 140% humidity. Like, we went to places where there are games that matter. And we tried to like, figure out what it was about that unites all of them and the fans who love them.

• 58:14Speaker 00

  But you also went to like a Taylor Swift concert.

• 58:16Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 58:17Speaker 00

  Which is another kind of fandom.

• 58:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, so we didn't want it to just be about sports. So, one of the things that we did was, there were two really fun things that were non-sports related. One of them was, I had the idea that we should each send the other one to something that the other one hated.

• 58:33Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 58:34Speaker 02

  So it was like, I know you hate this now, but go see if you can figure out why people like it. So I sent Joe to play pickleball in a pickleball tournament, because he's a tennis player and he's like-

• 58:43Speaker 00

  Me too!

• 58:43Speaker 02

  Yeah, there you go.

• 58:44Speaker 00

  I know.

• 58:44Speaker 02

  He's like, pickleball's taking over and I hate it, I hate the sound, I hate the, I hate the kitchen, I hate that it's named after the guy's dog. Like, he just hates everything about it. But he sent me to WrestleMania, because I don't care at all about wrestling, I don't like combat sports, I think they're ridiculous. And so I was like, alright, fine, I'll go to WrestleMania. And then my agent called me and was like, "Hey, I'm taking a bunch of people to a Dead and Company show in Vegas for my birthday. Do you want to go?" And I was like, "I can't, I'm going to WrestleMania." And he was like, "Well, WrestleMania's also in Vegas and it's the same weekend." And I was like, "Crap." And I was like, I realized in that moment, like, I should do both things. Like, it's funnier to do both things. So I embark on what I refer to in the book as the world's

• 59:25Speaker 02

  weirdest biathlon, where on Saturday night, I go to a Dead and Company show and Sunday night, I go to WrestleMania. But then, you know, we were writing this book in 24, 25, and like, it was impossible to write a book about fandom without including Taylor Swift. My wife and I took our daughter and some of her friends to the Eras Tour.

• 59:42Speaker 00

  We did the same.

• 59:43Speaker 02

  Did you?

• 59:43Speaker 00

  Yeah, both of us, yeah.

• 59:45Speaker 02

  At SoFi?

• 59:45Speaker 00

  I was in New Orleans.

• 59:47Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 59:48Speaker 00

  I was in Vancouver, I was at her last show, yeah.

• 59:50Speaker 02

  My wife and my daughter were also at her second to last show.

• 59:53Speaker 00

  Oh, wow, yeah.

• 59:54Speaker 02

  But my wife and her friend also went, her friend from college, and their daughters came. And my wife's best friend made one of those photo books about it. And the title of the book is Better Than Our Weddings, because they both agreed that evening was better than each of their weddings.

• 1:00:13Speaker 01

  They're like, it was more joyous. I was happier.

• 1:00:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was more important in my life. Like, yeah. And Joe had taken his daughter to a Taylor Swift concert in North Carolina. And so we were like, well, we have to write about Taylor Swift. But what are two like 50 year old dudes gonna say about it? That will matter? Nothing, but our daughters should do this. So I had my daughter Ivy, who's 14. I was like, just write a chapter about what Taylor Swift means to you. And his daughter did the same. And then we put them together and it was like, and we did not edit them. They are unedited. They are like, this is what she wrote. I added a few commas, but other than that. And so it's just a great little snapshot in time of like what Taylor Swift means to girls at different ages in the year 2024. So there's, we tried to cover not just sports, but all fandom. I wrote a long section on TV fandom too.

• 1:01:00Speaker 02

  And wrote about like what I've observed about why TV matters to people and what is it about sort of bonding with characters on long running TV shows that makes them feel like they matter in their lives and that sort of thing. So it's really a, an attempt to be comprehensive about fandom as a phenomenon.

• 1:01:16Speaker 01

  And you have some great pictures in here too, from different events that you guys went to.

• 1:01:20Speaker 02

  Yeah, there's some good WrestleMania pictures. We were very close to the ring and I'm still not a wrestling fan, but holy moly, those athletes are doing some crazy stuff, man.

• 1:01:31Speaker 01

  Their bodies.

• 1:01:32Speaker 02

  They're flying, like I, the thing I write in the book is like wrestling might be fake, but like the sounds their bodies make when they hit the mat are not. Like they, they are really jumping and flying and twisting and it's really wild. I went with my friend Jen Statsky, who wrote with me on Parks and Rec and The Good Place and then created Hacks, because she's an enormous wrestling fan. And Eleanor Shelstraub, Kristen Bell's character in The Good Place is a huge wrestling fan and is like deeply in love with Stone Cold Steve Austin. And that all came from Jen. That was all Jen's thing. And I asked Jen to come with me to like be my, you know, sherpa, to like walk me through it. And the thing she said to me, I was like, help me understand this. Like, I don't, I can't access this. It's like not a real sport. And she goes, no, that's the whole point.

• 1:02:17Speaker 02

  She goes, the thing that's great about wrestling is that it's the perfect marriage of sports and theater. And when you think of it as the intersection of sports and theater, you can figure out why it's so compelling. And I have to say, like, it was the perfect thing to say to me. It was like, one, I changed my frame of reference to like, this isn't really a sport. To like, it's not supposed to be. It's supposed to be a dramatic performance done by the world's best athletes. And that really helped me like, get to the heart of why people are so nutty for it, you know?

• 1:02:49Speaker 00

  It's funny that you mention not being a fan of something and then like, getting absorbed by it. So I was in New York this year when the Knicks were in the playoffs.

• 1:03:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:03:02Speaker 00

  What is the thing you win?

• 1:03:04Speaker 02

  The championship.

• 1:03:05Speaker 00

  The championship, just the NBA championship.

• 1:03:07Speaker 02

  Yes, correct.

• 1:03:08Speaker 00

  I'm like, does it have a name like the Stanley Cup? I don't think so. So here's the thing, I have never watched a basketball game on television in my life.

• 1:03:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:03:16Speaker 00

  I've been to one Lakers game, I took my son. I don't particularly care for basketball. My opinion is that like, you could just turn it on in the last three minutes. You don't need to watch the whole thing because it just goes back and forth the whole game. And it's just sort of like, well, I'll just watch the end.

• 1:03:30Speaker 02

  Sure.

• 1:03:31Speaker 00

  So haven't ever been a fan of basketball. I spent seven days in New York during this time. And by that last night when they won, I was at a neighborhood watch party on the street.

• 1:03:43Speaker 01

  She was outside.

• 1:03:45Speaker 00

  At a bar, like a bar had like a TV.

• 1:03:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:03:48Speaker 00

  And I was like, oh my God, if they don't fucking win, they deserve it. It's been 50 years. Like, I was so hardcore. And then they won and I was like, on the street.

• 1:04:01Speaker 02

  Euphoric.

• 1:04:02Speaker 00

  And it like erupted and cars are honking and the guy's got a giant blow up basketball that we're all like kicking down the street.

• 1:04:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:09Speaker 00

  And I was like, oh my God, I didn't even know.

• 1:04:13Speaker 02

  I know, it is deeply inside us fandom. That's one of the things that we really learned. Is like you can go from I don't care about this at all to if Jalen Brunson doesn't win the MVP of the finals, I will throw myself in front of a train in like a second. Yes. And the most sort of interesting part of this whole experience was we talked to this professor who studies sports fandom. His name is Daniel Wong. He teaches at Murray State University. And the thing he said to us that rang so true was, look, if sports were just like fun and a good way to kill a couple hours, that would be fine, but it wouldn't explain that reaction you had and it wouldn't explain why a billion people in the world care about it so deeply.

• 1:04:57Speaker 02

  And he said, in order for that to be true, it must be the case that sports fandom and fandom in general is satisfying some kind of deep emotional need, like an emotional need is being met by this phenomenon. And that's why it erupts out of us the way it does. It's because it's drilling down into our souls and meeting us at some very deep and primal place. And that feeling that you just described, so my son is a huge sports fan, but has never liked soccer. I've tried to get him to watch with me. He doesn't care. He thinks it's boring. There's not enough scoring, all those things that people think. He was out with his friends on the first night of the World Cup and he was like, what do you guys want to do? And they were like, there's a watch party in Koreatown because South Korea is playing

• 1:05:42Speaker 02

  in the World Cup. And he was like, all right. And that, all of a sudden, I started getting these texts that was like, this is low key. Lock in dad, low key. This is the most incredible thing I've ever seen. And it's my son and his friends and like a thousand Koreans in at like an outdoor park in Koreatown, watching the World Cup. And when they scored a goal, he was like, I've never felt anything like this in my life. It was like a jolt of electricity. And like that night, he's staying up until three in the morning, like learning about like all the players on the team, where they play, what the European leagues are, like learning about like the transfer system in soccer, which is incredibly complicated. And now he's just got World Cup fever and he's like living and dying with all these matches.

• 1:06:26Speaker 02

  And I just think. I think it speaks to something. There's a lot of reasons why fandom occurs in people, but like, life is a little bit lonely and sports creates communities that we can feel like we're a part of. And like, you're standing on the street in New York City, suddenly feeling like nothing has ever mattered more to me in my life than this thing that I did not care about one week ago.

• 1:06:50Speaker 00

  Exactly. I mean, on game four, we walked to Central Park and we watched the game like through some trees. They had the Central Park Watch Party, but it was like, it was at Walman Rink. And so it was like, kind of a closed thing.

• 1:07:04Speaker 02

  Right.

• 1:07:05Speaker 00

  And we're like, we're standing on some rocks.

• 1:07:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:07Speaker 00

  And I'm like, who am I?

• 1:07:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:09Speaker 00

  I didn't even know this team existed four days ago.

• 1:07:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:12Speaker 00

  This is nuts.

• 1:07:14Speaker 01

  I'll tell you when I fall apart. It doesn't matter what sports I'm watching. I love sports. I quickly just glom onto whatever, everyone like, what are we watching? Oh, we're watching World Cup. Great. Okay. Oh, champion. Okay. Whatever. I just glom on and I love it. It's the minute that moment of either triumph or failure happens and you see the different emotions go across the faces of thousands of people who are sharing this moment with each other.

• 1:07:42Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:07:43Speaker 01

  I like cry. I like-

• 1:07:45Speaker 02

  Every time. I cry every time.

• 1:07:47Speaker 01

  Every time. I didn't know anything about Jalen. I call him by his first name now. And I just was like, oh, like hearing his life story. I'm just like, huh huh. And then, you know, you see his mom and I'm just like, forget it. Like, it's amazing. It's amazing.

• 1:08:01Speaker 00

  But you're right. That, that shared grief is part of it too. Like, it's not just the winning.

• 1:08:06Speaker 01

  It's failures and triumphs.

• 1:08:09Speaker 02

  And the reason, like, then, New York would have gone crazy no matter what, but 53 years means that there are whole generations of people who have never known their favorite team to be a winner at the end of the year. The most extreme example of this in my life is I'm a Red Sox fan and they went 86 years. So 32 more years, 33 more years than the Knicks did without winning. And in that intervening time, sort of like the Knicks, had a bunch of near misses, like a bunch of close calls and tragic failures and embarrassing errors made at the wrong time. And when they finally won in 2004, there was an article written, many articles written, about the celebration that happened. And there was a story that I think about all

• 1:08:51Speaker 02

  the time, which is at 3:00 in the morning, a guy had a thought, which was, I need to share this with my dad. And his dad had passed away many years earlier and had never seen them win. He lived his entire life in a world in which they had never won the World Series. And his dad was buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery outside Boston, and he got a bottle of champagne and a Red Sox hat. And he was like, I'm gonna go to my dad's grave, I'm gonna leave him this bottle of champagne and this Red Sox hat and just celebrate with him. And he was walking towards the cemetery, and he was thinking, like, how am I gonna get in? Like, it's 3:00 in the morning. Like, this is, there's a gate, it's locked. And as he was walking, he started to see other people walking in the same direction. He got to the cemetery,

• 1:09:32Speaker 02

  the guy who was the night guard at the cemetery had anticipated this, and had unlocked the gate and opened it. He walked to his dad's grave, put the hat and the champagne down, and saw like 11 other people just in his line of vision, speaking out loud to people in their graves.

• 1:09:49Speaker 01

  This is making me tear up.

• 1:09:50Speaker 02

  I know. And it's beautiful. It's so important and meaningful. And if you think of sports as like a distraction, a diversion from the banality of everyday life, that's fine. That is what they are at some level. But when you have communities that bond around these teams, and the fandom is passed down from generation to generation, and important moments and memories are made alongside those teams and alongside those moments, then it becomes something else. Then it becomes a thing where like, you are not thinking about necessarily like OG Ananobe's incredible tip in in game four. What you're thinking about is your grandmother, who used to sit in her living room and watch Knicks games

• 1:10:33Speaker 02

  and root for them, and who passed away 22 years ago, and how much she would have loved this moment. And it connects you to her, and it connects you to your kids and to your friends. And it really is, there's a great quote from the Pope, of all people, not this current Pope, but I think it was John Paul II, who said about soccer, calling it football as Europeans do, he said, of all of the unimportant things, soccer is the most important.

• 1:11:03Speaker 02

  Like, and it's, that's how I think we should think of these things. It's like, yes, of course, it's not as important as like a Supreme Court decision, or a federal election, or the eradication of a disease. But it is important, and it's important in a way that really does matter to an enormous number of people. And that's why we wanted to write the book.

• 1:11:22Speaker 01

  That's so great. Well, I think people are gonna love your book. You know, we're so thankful for our office community and the Office Ladies fans, and the fandom and family that we have found with them. And you guys, we love Mike Schur. We know you do, too. You're gonna love his book. I'm gonna put a link to it in our stories.

• 1:11:40Speaker 02

  Thank you. Hope you like it.

• 1:11:42Speaker 00

  Mike, thanks for joining us.

• 1:11:43Speaker 02

  Yeah. It's my absolute pleasure. It's lovely to see you.

• 1:11:46Speaker 00

  And your generosity, and talking all things office and all things sports and fandom.

• 1:11:50Speaker 02

  I love talking about the office. I'll talk about it forever. Anytime you want me to come talk about the office, I'll come back.

• 1:11:55Speaker 01

  Okay, great. Well, we have two more years of our contracts.

• 1:11:59Speaker 02

  There you go.

• 1:12:00Speaker 00

  Well, good job.

• 1:12:01Speaker 01

  Thank you. Thanks so much. That was wonderful.

• 1:12:05Speaker 02

  That was so fun.

• 1:12:08Speaker 00

  Thank you for listening to Office Ladies.

• 1:12:11Speaker 01

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

• 1:12:16Speaker 00

  Our senior producer is Matt Beagle, and our audio engineer is Sam Pfeifer.

• 1:12:20Speaker 01

  Odyssey's executive producer is Leah Reese Dennis.

• 1:12:23Speaker 00

  Office Ladies was mixed and mastered by Bill Schulz.

• 1:12:26Speaker 01

  Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.