Second Drink: Product Recall

Summary

Office Ladies "Second Drink: Product Recall" (September 29, 2025)

Episode Overview

In this milestone “Second Drink” Office Ladies episode, hosts Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey go deep into “Product Recall” (The Office, Season 3, Episode 20), celebrating their 50th Office Ladies breakdown. With their signature blend of warmth, banter, and exclusive behind-the-scenes stories, they relive fan-favorite quotes, dig into writing legends, deleted scenes, memorable on-set moments, and answer myriad fan questions. The episode’s tone is lively, nostalgic, and punctuated by genuine admiration for the cast and crew’s work on this classic.

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Main Theme: Iconic Cold Open and Behind-the-Scenes Gold

The podcast opens by spotlighting “Product Recall” as one of The Office’s most quotable and beloved episodes, largely thanks to its unforgettable cold open and relentless joke density. Much of the breakdown centers on both the writing and execution of key scenes, notably Jim’s impression of Dwight and the layers of chaos stemming from an obscene watermark scandal at Dunder Mifflin.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Cold Open: Jim as Dwight

• [22:51–24:44] Jenna and Angela agree that Jim’s impersonation of Dwight is one of the most iconic moments of the entire series.
  • Jenna: “John Krasinski was so funny we could not hold it together.” [23:03]
  • Highlights include the origin of the lines “Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.” and “Identity theft is not a joke, Jim.”
  • Notable quote, with speaker attribution:
    • “Bears eat beets. Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.” — Jim as Dwight [24:23]
    • “Identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year.” — Dwight [23:32]
• Writing backstory:
  • The cold open wasn’t in the original script. Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester (episode writers) say it was pitched by Jean and Lee, with the actual “Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.” line pitched by Mike Schur. [25:18–25:51]

2. Quotable Gold & Fan Favorites

• [02:37–03:04] Jenna enumerates the four quotes from this episode that always appear on fan lists:
  • “Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.”
  • “Identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year.”
  • “Lord, beer me strength.”
  • “I don’t have a headache. I’m just preparing.”
• Angela mentions she often gets sent a meme of her “I’m just preparing” line. [03:04]

3. The Episode’s Writers & Writing Process

• [10:27–11:30] Jenna and Angela explain that Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester co-wrote the episode—but not as an established team. They split duties (“Brent took a pass at act one, Justin did act two, then split act three”) and report that both were so happy with the other’s work they barely edited each other. [11:30]

4. Inspiration and Real-Life Parallels

• The title idea (“Product Recall”) emerged as a “group mind” pitch from Lee Eisenberg, but coincidentally The Office’s fictional recall occurred mere months before real-life massive toy and crib recalls dominated news in 2007—dubbed "the year of the recall." [13:59]

5. Location Trivia

• The high school apology scene was filmed at St. John Paul Academy in Burbank, not the school used for “Diwali.” [14:22]

6. Deleted Scenes & The “Candy Bag Alts”

• Angela and Jenna share script alts and deleted scenes, especially for the Kelly/Angela office fight:
  • Kelly apologizes to Angela, who begrudgingly forgives her, only to admit she still hates Kelly (just “a little bit less”). [05:09]
• Kevin’s deleted “talking head” involves lingering pettiness: “Angela caught me counting on my fingers once, and she made my life hell. Well, today I will make her life hell. 4. That..." [06:23]

7. The Watermark Scandal & Behind-the-Scenes Details

• Michael’s explanation: a disgruntled paper mill employee put a pornographic watermark (duck & mouse) on 500 boxes of paper, leading Dunder Mifflin into crisis mode. [31:04]
• Angela dives into watermark history (originating in Fabriano, Italy, 1282!) and says she wants to visit the watermark museum with Jenna. [33:16–35:34]
• The prop department created the actual obscene watermark featured in the episode; writer Brent Forrester framed one for his office. [36:41]

8. Iconic Michael & Creed Moments

• Michael, in typical mismanagement, launches a press conference for a “mini scandal” no one even knew about. [43:04]
• Creed, in survival mode, masterfully diverts blame onto an absent employee, Debbie Brown, and even collects money for her after she’s fired—then keeps the cash himself. [76:25]

9. On-Set Memories & Fun Facts

• Angela confesses a “huge zit” on her left cheek during filming and makeup did its best to hide it, but it’s visible in episode closeups. [18:12]
• Jenna admits to a yearlong “no calculator” policy (in her 30s!) to force herself to do math by hand, much to Angela’s teasing amazement. [28:00]

10. Guest Star Shira Scott Astroff (Jamie, Andy’s “girlfriend”)

• Shira was nearly 28 when playing a high schooler (older than John Krasinski!), didn’t know the show before her audition, and became a superfan after filming. She now runs an animal rescue. [53:02–54:33]

11. Other Notable Guest and Crew Notes

• Chad Light, played by Anthony Russell, is outed in a deleted scene as knowing Creed “from the Grassroots,” with Creed referencing one of his many backstories that always end up getting deleted. [55:13]
• Mrs. Allen, the unimpressed customer, is played by veteran TV actress Lisa Darr; fun fact: she played multiple roles over time on both Murder, She Wrote and CSI. [66:53]

12. Office Dynamics: Kelly Trains the Accountants

• Angela struggles mightily (and hilariously) with customer service, refusing to apologize sincerely; Kelly’s patience and Angela’s obstinance unfold in great deleted scene detail. [58:46]
• Angela confirms she took “sugar pills” for her on-camera aspirin-taking scene. [39:16]

13. The High School Apology & Andy’s “Girlfriend”

• Andy is shocked to learn his “girlfriend” works in the high school because she’s a student—which devastates him. [50:19]
• Jim tries to console Andy in the car by singing “The Lion Sleeps Tonight;” Andy eventually joins in, a running bit among the cast off-screen too. [75:34–76:13]

14. The Press Conference Disaster & Apology Video

• Michael’s live apology fails: Mrs. Allen “gives zero Fs” and refuses the apology certificate. [65:09]
• Dwight’s defense that the animals in the watermark “were smiling, so it was consensual” leads to a classic Dwight moment about farm life and “getting it exactly right.” [68:02]
• The apology video with Pam filming Michael is one of Jenna’s favorite Office memories—full of silent, awkward hair-spraying and stoic Pam. [70:03]
  • Angela: “11 seconds of silence. Except for while he sprays the hair.” [70:04]
• Multiple apology videos were filmed; in deleted scenes, one features Michael griping his mortgage is “hundreds of dollars a month.” [71:58]

15. The Episode Tag: Dwight as Jim

• In a reversal, Dwight shows up as Jim, but unlike Jim’s razor-sharp impression, Dwight’s has “a messier edge,” and everyone just compliments him on how great he looks—frustrating him. [77:10]
• Originally, this was scripted as the cold open’s end, but splitting it into the tag worked better editorially. [77:26]

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Memorable Quotes (with Timestamps & Attribution)

• “Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.” — Jim as Dwight [24:23]
• “Identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year.” — Dwight [23:32]
• “I don’t have a headache. I’m just preparing.” — Angela [03:04]
• “Lord, beer me strength.” — Jim [48:22]
• “I just can’t keep my ducks straight. There’s so many.” — Jenna (reacting to cartoon references) [31:54]
• “Our official position is one of apology.” — Angela (customer service struggle) [58:46]
• “You have one day. What?” — Michael (apology video ultimatum) [76:50]
• “Why do bad things always happen to good people?” — Creed (while keeping money meant for fired employee) [76:38]

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Notable Moments & Easter Eggs (with Timestamps)

• [04:11–05:30] Kelly and Angela’s deleted “apology” scene and talking head script alts.
• [14:22–15:06] Location details for the high school scenes.
• [26:16–26:29] Reception desk plant watch: another new plant, this time a sad one in a purple pot.
• [41:05–41:35] Steve Carell (Michael) putting his foot on the conference table, making John Krasinski break.
• [53:02–54:33] Shira Scott Astroff’s experience as Jamie, Andy’s girlfriend.
• [70:03–70:13] 11-second silent hairspray moment during the apology video.
• [73:01] Kevin’s rare sass toward Angela (fan-called-out moment).
• [77:10–77:51] Dwight’s “Jim” impression in the episode tag—meta commentary on mimicry.

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Flow & Tone

• The episode captures Jenna and Angela’s friendly teasing and genuine friendship, with asides about life, personal quirks, guest stars’ careers, and their own career starts (Angela’s “Conan internship hustle” story [44:39]).
• The language mirrors the upbeat and conversational style of the show, filled with affectionate jabs, relatable tangents, and deep admiration for the craft of The Office—perfectly suiting super-fans and newcomers alike.

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Timestamp | |------------------------------------------------|----------------| | Cold Open breakdown | [22:51–25:51] | | Iconic quotes rundown | [02:37–03:10] | | Writing team & process | [10:27–11:43] | | Real-life recall context | [13:21–13:59] | | Deleted scenes—Angela/Kelly apology runner | [04:11–05:30] | | Watermark making-of | [32:20–36:41] | | Michael’s apology video filming | [68:54–71:59] | | Guest star (Shira Scott Astroff) profile | [53:02–54:33] | | Jim and Andy high school scenes | [47:51–50:19] | | Kevin sassing Angela | [73:01] | | Creed’s “collection” for Debbie Brown | [76:25–76:43] | | Tag: Dwight as Jim | [77:10–78:13] |

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Conclusion

This “Second Drink” episode is a treasure trove of Office trivia, inside jokes, and loving deconstruction of one of the series’ most packed episodes. Whether it’s the story behind the “Battlestar Galactica” line, deleted scene gems, or the hosts’ personal stories, the episode is both a nostalgic joyride and a master class in comedy writing and ensemble performance—offering plenty for die-hard fans and new listeners alike.

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Final advice from the Office Ladies:
Angela: “Lord, beer me strength!”
Jenna: “Identity theft is not a joke. Millions of families suffer every year.” [79:01–79:08]

Transcript

[Angela Kinsey]

All right, I've got your one stop shop for fall's latest trends and all the must haves curated by experts. It's the Macy's Fall Fashion Guide. Do you love a guide when it comes to buying clothes? Because I do. I love people that have an eye for fashion. I really don't. So these shopping guides are so much fun and that's why I love going to Macy's at the very beginning of the season. They have all the latest trends and the best brands in one place. And if you have a hard time putting together an outfit like I do, you can go to Macy's Fall Fashion Guide. They curate everything, which makes it so easy to find the perfect look for you. And like Kelly says, then you'll be ready for your fashion show. Fashion show, fashion show at lunch. They even tell you some of the trends that are happening right now. Like weekend in the country, the new boho statement, luxury. These are all terms I didn't even know. So get your fall fashion looks ready to go shop now@macy's.com or in store. We wanna talk to you guys a little bit about new Eggo protein waffles. It's really good, tastes great, plus it's gonna give you 20% of your daily protein.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes. Eggo Protein Plus Waffles provide the same great taste of Eggo that you know and love, plus 10 grams of protein per serving. I made the new Eggo protein waffles for my kids the other day. They didn't even know that they were protein waffles. They're just the Eggo waffles that you know and love. I know they have protein.

[Angela Kinsey]

They're just yummy waffles.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, listen, I know we're talking about breakfast, but I have shared this before. I like them as an afternoon treat. And when your teenagers come home hungry, guess what's real easy to give them a little protein waffle.

[Jenna Fischer]

They say you can fuel your morning, but you can also fuel your afternoon.

[Angela Kinsey]

Sure can.

[Jenna Fischer]

Head to your local grocery store to fuel your morning with Eggo protein waffles and pancakes. Available at retailers nationwide.

[Angela Kinsey]

Hey, everyone. Welcome to the second drink of product recall. This was our 50th Office Ladies episode breakdown. Those early milestones were always so big to me. I remember thinking, oh my God, we've done 50 of these.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. And this episode had great behind the scenes details from co writers Brent Forrester and Justin Spitzer. Plus we got some on set memories from guest star Shira Scott Astroff. You know, she played Jamie in those Scenes at the high school.

[Angela Kinsey]

And you know, this episode has some of the Office fans favorite quotes.

[Jenna Fischer]

We discussed a few of them, but according to the Internet, as you like to say, Angela.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

There are four quotes that make the lists every time. And they are all in product recall. Here's what they are. Number one fact. Bears eat beets. Bears, beets. Battlestar Galactica.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yep.

[Jenna Fischer]

Identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year. Lord, beer me Strength.

[Angela Kinsey]

One of my favorites.

[Jenna Fischer]

And from you, Angela. I don't have a headache. I'm just preparing.

[Angela Kinsey]

That is a meme I get sent.

[Jenna Fischer]

I mean, all four of those are in this episode.

[Angela Kinsey]

I know. Wild. You know, there are also some really good lines in the deleted scenes. And the candy bag alts, too. I thought we could dive into some. And I wanted to start with this. Kelly, Angela Runner. We mentioned it in our breakdown, but we didn't play any of it. We talk about the big fight they have because Angela is horrible at customer service. And Kelly gets frustrated and tells Angela she looks old enough to be her mother. And Angela gets really pissed off. She storms off. Angel. In a deleted scene, Kelly apologizes to Angela, hoping that Angela will then also apologize for her snarky comments. It's in deleted scenes, so Kelly comes over to accounting.

[Jenna Fischer]

Hey, Angela, I'm sorry that I said that you were old enough to be my mother. I don't know why I said that. I think I might be hypoglycemic or something. But still, it's no excuse, so I'm very sorry.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, thank you, Kelly. And I wish I hadn't called you stupid.

[Jenna Fischer]

Do you think I'm a slut?

[Angela Kinsey]

No, but some of your outfits are not accepted. I didn't apologize.

[Jenna Fischer]

We're like best friends now.

[Angela Kinsey]

We're not. I'll text you. Don't. Bye, Angela. Fine. Does Kelly really think they're gonna be pals?

[Jenna Fischer]

I mean, this is. If Kelly is being sincere, I can see why her and Ryan have lasted so long. It doesn't take much to win back her favor.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, Angela really doesn't apologize at all. But Kelly is just so, you know, delighted she's pleased. This would have cut to an Angela talking head. It's also in deleted scenes, but I wanted to read you the scripted version and then a few candy bag alts. All right, Angela. Kelly's not so bad. She really taught me something today. Can you tell that I'm still lying? Here's another one. I never lie, but I will fake like a melon plucker.

[Jenna Fischer]

I have never heard that Melon plucker.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yep. Lastly, yes, Kelly apologized for her comments and I forgave her. But do I no longer hate Kelly? No, I still hate Kelly, but knowing she was sorry makes me hate her just a little bit less. There you go. Maybe that's the one Kelly really hopes for. That Angela hates her just a little bit less.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I know you dug into the candy bag alts for Kelly and Angela, but guess what? I dove into the candy bag alts for Kevin. There are just so many treasures in this candy bag. I found a Kevin talking head to share that made me laugh so hard. So remember when Kevin is sassy to Angela because she's having a tough time with the customer service line and he just couldn't wait to make a snarky comment about it and then he and Oscar do their little high five?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, there was a talking head for him in the candy bag where we learned that he has been holding onto some resentment toward Angela. And here's how it read. Angela caught me counting on my fingers one time, and she made my life hell. Well, today I will make her life hell. 4. That it says counting on fingers to four, then four hours.

[Angela Kinsey]

It's such classic Kevin.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, there are just so many great one liners in this episode from our amazing writers. We were so blessed.

[Angela Kinsey]

We really were. All right, before we break down Product Recall, I have to tell you, I couldn't help but think of this lazy Genius episode. You guys know Lazy Genius is on our Office Ladies network. Hi. Kendra Adachi, amazing host. And she has an episode called how to Handle Bad Moods. And I thought about Angela Martin a lot when I was hearing it because she's so grumpy in this episode. She does not want to work with Kelly Kapoor. Kendra, she could have used that episode. She has seven things she reminds you of when it comes to handling bad moods. And let me tell you, Angela Martin would have needed all seven of those reminders. Anyway, it's a really great listen, Kendra. I loved it. Okay, let's get to Product Recall.

[Jenna Fischer]

I'm Jenna Fisher.

[Angela Kinsey]

And I'm Angela Kinsey.

[Jenna Fischer]

We were on the Office together, and we're best friends. And now we're doing the ultimate Office Rewatch podcast just for your.

[Angela Kinsey]

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

[Jenna Fischer]

We're the Office Ladies. Howdy, Ange.

[Angela Kinsey]

Bonjour, Jenna.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh. Oh, that's gonna kind of come up later in this episode. There's going to be some accents later.

[Angela Kinsey]

There are. Oh, it's fun accent day.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, no. People are turning us off.

[Angela Kinsey]

No, no, no.

[Jenna Fischer]

They're like, oh, no, it's accent day, guys.

[Angela Kinsey]

It's okay. We won't go crazy. Yeah, this is a fun one. Jenna, tell them what we're doing today.

[Jenna Fischer]

We are doing product recall, season three, episode 20, written by Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester and directed by Randall Einhorn.

[Angela Kinsey]

Randall. I was so excited when Randall got to direct. We'll get into that. But, you know, Randall was our cinematographer, so this was really fun for him and fun for us.

[Jenna Fischer]

Did you know that Randall directed the most episodes of the Office?

[Angela Kinsey]

No, I did not.

[Jenna Fischer]

Crazy, right? I think he did 15.

[Angela Kinsey]

That is so wild. Well, I love that even more.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I am ready for a summary, Angela, but I've got a little special something. Sam, it's Angela and Jenna here to read the Office episode summary.

[Angela Kinsey]

What? Where is that from? That is so adorable.

[Jenna Fischer]

Isn't that so cool?

[Angela Kinsey]

It's so cute.

[Jenna Fischer]

That was sent in by Joey Moy Sicka and he said he recorded all of the parts himself. Just like Andy.

[Angela Kinsey]

I was going to ask because there's like a doo wop part. Yeah. That's so cool. Thank you, Joey.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right, so here is the summary for product recall. Dunder Mifflin is in crisis mode. After paper with an obscene watermark goes into circulation to customers.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oof. Ugh.

[Jenna Fischer]

Michael organizes a press conference and apologizes to a client. When the client demands that Michael be fired, Michael recruits Pam and Dwight to help him make an apology. The accountants learn how to make customer service calls from Kelly. And Creed, who is determined to save his job, pins the blame on an employee at the paper mill.

[Angela Kinsey]

Poor Debbie Brown.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, poor Debbie.

[Angela Kinsey]

This was such a fun episode. I loved rewatching it. I had so many fun memories.

[Jenna Fischer]

Same. Oh, my gosh. I feel like Steve is in rare form in this episode.

[Angela Kinsey]

I also personally think some of the best quotes of the whole season three are in this episode.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yes. It's so many. We'll get to it.

[Angela Kinsey]

And I just want to share. One of my favorite quotes of the whole entire series is in this episode.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, this is also the episode of animal noises or nonverbal reactions. Yeah, accents and non verbals.

[Angela Kinsey]

Someone just hit fast forward.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, no. Well, fast fact number one. I mentioned that this episode was written by both Justin Spitzer and Brent Forrester. I should probably clarify that there are some writers who work in teams.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

Like we've mentioned before, Jean and Lee.

[Angela Kinsey]

They were a writing team. They were hired together as a duo. But Justin and Brent were not a writing team. They were hired separately. So this was interesting that they were co writing this together.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, we reached out to both of them to hear what it was like to be paired together on this episode. So they said that Greg just paired them together because he thought it would be kind of fun. And Justin told me that they basically just split it down the middle, that Brent took a pass at act one, Justin did act Two, and then they split act three, and then they came together one afternoon and they kind of went over it. And since Brent was the senior writer, he kind of took the lead on a kind of a dual rewrite. And then they turned it in, and it was kind of, you know, punched up by the staff like every other episode.

[Angela Kinsey]

I could see Greg doing this because he loved pairing together people to see what would come out of that pairing, whether it was characters or writers. You know, he loved to see what happened. Even our editors sometimes were paired up in different ways.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, Brent said that it's true that Greg did make it clear that he was the senior writer and that he had final decision on what went into the draft, but he said right from the start, he could see that Justin's scenes were just so good that it would be a terrible mistake to put, quote, my grubby fingers on any of it. End quote. So he said that they didn't change any of each other's work. They ended up turning it in just as they had both originally written it.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, that is so fun.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right, fast fact number two. I asked these guys, what was the inspiration for this episode? Was this based on anything in real life? And Justin told me that he couldn't remember exactly where the idea came from, but he's pretty sure that it just came out of one of those pitch sessions in the room. So it wasn't like one writer had the idea, but it was sort of a collective one of your group mind things, Ange.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, I like group mind.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, he said he does have a very distinct memory. As they were circling closer and closer to something that felt like an episode, Lee Eisenberg suddenly blurted out, a product recall. It's a product recall. And after Lee said that they knew it was going to be, like, a defective product and a mini scandal. But here's the thing, Ange. Here is why I asked. I did a little Googling. This episode aired in April 2007. And the crazy thing is that in August of 2007, there was a massive Historic Mattel toy recall. A huge product recall.

[Angela Kinsey]

What did they recall?

[Jenna Fischer]

They recalled 19 million toys.

[Angela Kinsey]

What was it?

[Jenna Fischer]

Some of them were recalled because they had lead paint.

[Angela Kinsey]

Was it a GI Joe?

[Jenna Fischer]

No, I don't know what it was a bunch of toys that were shown to have lead paint. And the other was because there was a tiny magnet that kept falling off and it posed a choking hazard. But also in 2007, there was a massive crib recall. One million Graco and Simplicity Cribs were recalled. And I even read an article that called 2007 quote the year of the recall.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, that's crazy. I wonder if it was in the Zeitgeist. It was in the group mind of the world. And it went into Lee's brain and he shouted it into the writer's room. And it became an episode of the Office.

[Jenna Fischer]

Major group mind.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's some global group mind.

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay, lady, I'm going to move us along to fast fact number three. I'm calling it location alert.

[Angela Kinsey]

Okay.

[Jenna Fischer]

As part of this episode, Jim and Andy go to a local high school to apologize for the obscene watermark. And Kentopedia let us know because we got some mail. People wanted to know, was this the same school where we shot Diwali?

[Angela Kinsey]

People love to know about locations. They love it.

[Jenna Fischer]

This was filmed at a different school than Diwali. This time we filmed at St. John Paul Academy in Burbank. In real life, it is a private Catholic STEM immersion high school. The school colors are white, blue and red. And the real students at the school wear uniforms. For our shoot, we hired background performers to play the students. We did not use the actual students of this school.

[Angela Kinsey]

I. I feel like that is a thorough answer to this location question.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. You know, I went to a Catholic high school. I know it was not co ed. It was all girls. And I wore a uniform. And our colors were green and white and gray and navy, I think were the colors we were allowed to wear. And yellow.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's a lot of colors.

[Jenna Fischer]

It's really only five. And you're only allowed to wear those colors.

[Angela Kinsey]

Seems like a lot. Scale it back.

[Jenna Fischer]

Do you. Do you wear. How many colors do you wear?

[Angela Kinsey]

I just grab whatever's, you know, there.

[Jenna Fischer]

Right. So imagine you're getting dressed in the morning and you have to limit it to only these five colors.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, listen, a friend of mine did that thing. Remember when ladies would get their colors.

[Jenna Fischer]

Done and you find out if you're.

[Angela Kinsey]

Like a summer or a winter or something? My mom did this. My mom was a summer. Okay, so A friend of mine recently did this. It's sort of.

[Jenna Fischer]

Wait, they're still doing this?

[Angela Kinsey]

They're still doing it. It sort of went out of fashion, but whatever. She did it, and she found out that she is, like, shades of blue and coral and white, and. And she just filled her closet with those colors. She's always in those three colors.

[Jenna Fischer]

So what do you know what she is? Is that summer coral, blue and white.

[Angela Kinsey]

I don't know what it is. Maybe spring. But listen, it's a commitment to stay in those three colors. I'd have a hard time. Oh, my gosh.

[Jenna Fischer]

This is literally what I was saying. I said I could only wear five colors, and you're like, oh, it's a lot of colors. I don't see what the issue is. And now you're like, I would have a hard time only wearing a few colors.

[Angela Kinsey]

My point was, if you're gonna have a school that has uniforms, you can't have a lot of options.

[Jenna Fischer]

Why? Because you're already have personal expression within uniform.

[Angela Kinsey]

No.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my gosh. You're taking a stand. You've clearly not thought about this at all, because you are taking multiple positions on this one subject.

[Angela Kinsey]

What's the point of having a uniform if you can have multiple colors and freedom of expression? There's no point. Either have a uniform or don't.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right, well, we had to all wear the same skirt. It was the same. There was no choice.

[Angela Kinsey]

Or navy pants or a yellow shirt or a green shirt or a white shirt. We have to be done talking about this on top.

[Jenna Fischer]

You could wear the different colors, but they had to be a collared shirt, and you couldn't have any, like, logos. No logos. Not even, like, you know, some people, they would try to sneak in, like, a little polo on their lapel, and that would be a no.

[Angela Kinsey]

Wow. Lock it up. Lock it up. Uniform. Lock it up, lady. Where are we?

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, we're ready to take a break, and then we're going to come back and break down this episode.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, before we take a break, I want to just share one thing about this episode. Well, I'll just get to it.

[Jenna Fischer]

What is it?

[Angela Kinsey]

I had the hugest zit on my cheek. And I remember being really bummed out because I had a nice, big storyline, and I woke up with an enormous zit on my cheek. And they tried to cover it with makeup. Jenna. They didn't splurge for CGI and scoochy it out. It's in the whole episode. There's so much makeup on it. It's like an orange patch on my cheek.

[Jenna Fischer]

I did not notice it one time.

[Angela Kinsey]

It's on my left.

[Jenna Fischer]

Watching this. Do you have time codes for it? Is that something we can look forward to after the break?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes. Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, there you go.

[Angela Kinsey]

You want to close up. Well, listen, I'm sure you're riveted now. You can't wait to come back. We're going to take a break and come back with this episode.

[Tropical Smoothie Cafe Narrator]

You know those mornings where everything feels like it's moving 100 miles an hour? Emails are flying in, you're trying to hit your protein goals and somehow you're already running late?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah, so same.

[Tropical Smoothie Cafe Narrator]

That's exactly when I hit pause and head to Tropical Smoothie Cafe because nothing flips the vibe quite like Tropic time. Whether I'm craving something bold and fruity or warm and savory, Tropical Smoothie Cafe makes it easy breezy. I'll grab a Peanut paradise smoothie, 22 grams of smooth peanut buttery protein or mix it up with a PB protein crunch bowl packing a punch at 32 grams of protein. And when I'm in a breakfast sandwich mood, their sausage, egg and cheese Diya or the All American Wrap are hot, toasty and packed with the protein I need to actually power through my day, not just survive it. The best part? I order ahead in the app, swing by and grab it on the go. No waiting, no stress. Just me, my smoothie and a much needed mental getaway. Every smoothie bowl and wrap is made to order, filled with better for you ingredients and serious good vibes. So go ahead, manifest a more refreshing morning Tropical Smoothie Cafe. You're on tropic time now.

[Angela Kinsey]

I remember when I left home and I had graduated college and I was getting my own apartment and I remember so clearly my dad saying ang, you won't be able to do this. Every month the same. But every month make a commitment. Save a little every month and just try to make that a life goal. That's something that Acorns does for you. Acorns makes it easy to give your money a chance to grow. Here's what it is. It's a financial wellness app that helps you invest for your future, save for tomorrow and save. Spend smarter today and you don't need to be a finance whiz. Acorns puts money into an expert built portfolio to make sure you're investing wisely, not wildly. Sign up now and Acorns will boost your new account with a $5 bonus investment. Join the over 14 million all time customers who have already saved and invested over $25 billion with Acorns. Head to acorns.com officeladies or or download the Acorns app to get started. Paid non client Endorsement compensation provides incentive to positively promote Acorns Tier 2 compensation provided investing involves risk. Acorns Advisors LLC and SEC registered investment advisor. View important [e-mail] OfficeLadies this podcast is sponsored by Squarespace. Today I had lunch with Iliana who does our website and we talked about the shop feature on our Squarespace website. We can't wait. We have some new merch coming and we're going to have a new little dropdown feature. But this is the great thing about Squarespace. We have been using it for years and it continues to grow with our business. There's so many great templates and tools on Squarespace that you can design the perfect website for your business. It's really an all in one platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online. Whether you're just starting out, which we were years ago, or as you start to evolve your brand and add more things to your website, Squarespace is there for you. They make it easy to create a beautiful website, engage with your audience and sell anything from products to content to time all in one place. And you know, every dream needs a domain. Squarespace Domains makes it easy to find the best name for your business at one fair, all inclusive price. No hidden fees or add ons required. Head to squarespace.com officeladies for a free trial and when you're ready to Launch, go to squarespace.com officeladies to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Okay, so we start off this episode with a very funny Cold Open. I think it is one of the classics of all the cold opens on the whole series.

[Jenna Fischer]

100%.

[Angela Kinsey]

It is Jim dressed as Dwight acting like Dwight and it makes Dwight crazy. And some of the best lines right here in this Cold open Lady.

[Jenna Fischer]

I remember filming this episode and John Krasinski was so funny we could not hold it together.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, we all knew how great he was at impressions and so when he got to actually flex that a little we were just like, ah, I can't wait to watch.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well Angela, I think this Cold Open has two of our most quoted moments for sure. Number one, Bears beats Battlestar Galactica.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, how many T shirts is that on? It's on everything.

[Jenna Fischer]

And also, identity theft is not a joke, Jim. Millions of families suffer every year.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's right.

[Jenna Fischer]

I see that all the Time. Identity theft is not a joke. Don't we sell pencils that say, identity theft is not a joke? Don't we have a pencil pack on officeladies.com?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

And we have that quote, right?

[Angela Kinsey]

We have that.

[Jenna Fischer]

And we also have Bears beats Battlestar Galactica.

[Angela Kinsey]

It's just one of my favorite quotes. It is not my favorite quote of the whole episode, though. We'll get to that. But this couplet is so fun. And I have seen people, like, at conventions and stuff say this false black bear. Like the whole thing.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yeah, let's. We should play it, Sam. Yeah, let's play this. Play this clip. Question.

[Angela Kinsey]

What kind of bear is best?

[Jenna Fischer]

That's a ridiculous question.

[Angela Kinsey]

False black bear.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, that's debatable. There are basically two schools of thought. Bears eat beets. Bears, beets. Battlestar Galactica. Bears do not. What is going on?

[Angela Kinsey]

What are you doing?

[Jenna Fischer]

I love it so much.

[Angela Kinsey]

I want to know what are the two schools of thoughts about bears? We never find out.

[Jenna Fischer]

We don't listen. We had a fan question from Ashley Trick, Emily Dennis, Faith Lynn, Rhianne Holeb, and Tara laporte. Basically, they all said the same version of this. Please, please, please tell us everything about the cold open. It is one of the best sequences on television ever. How long did it take John and Rain to get through it? Here's what I found out, Angela.

[Angela Kinsey]

Okay.

[Jenna Fischer]

Kentopedia thinks we only did about eight takes of this. He said it went a lot faster than we may realize.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, it was a quick beat, you know, it was a quick scene.

[Jenna Fischer]

And then I asked Justin and he said that he and Brent did not write this cold open. They wrote a cold open where Michael is getting scammed by a telemarketer. But during the rewriting process, Jean and Lee are the ones who came up with the idea for Jim to come in as Dwight and they wrote the cold open. And it was Mike Shore who pitched the line. Bears beats Battlestar Galactica.

[Angela Kinsey]

Applause, applause.

[Jenna Fischer]

This is why you need a whole writing team. Look at that. That's how the magic happens.

[Angela Kinsey]

It's a collaboration, people. I have two other observations about this cold open. Not as popular as the obvious ones. Bears beats Battlestar Galactica. All that. But I have. You know, there is a new plant at reception.

[Jenna Fischer]

No. Get out of here. What is going on?

[Angela Kinsey]

I am telling you, I don't know when I'll have time to do this, but I am going to screen grab every plant on reception for the whole series.

[Jenna Fischer]

What is it this week?

[Angela Kinsey]

It's a real Sad looking plant. It's only got a few leaves on it. It's in a purple pot with. It looks like some polka dots. And it is through the whole episode. I notice it's in the cold open the tag and the whole episode. And in Jim's talking head where he says he created that whole look for $11.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

We have an old tech alert. Old tech alert. We have the old calculator watch.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Now, I know that Dwight always wears one, but just to see Jim actually use it. Like you. You hear the beeping as he's adding on it. I just thought it was really fun.

[Jenna Fischer]

How often do you use the calculator on your phone?

[Angela Kinsey]

Surprisingly, a lot.

[Jenna Fischer]

Same, same. I see why they made a calculator watch. Yeah, because you, you know, I use it.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, I remember, like, because I'm 100 years old, that, you know, boys would have it at school and they would be told in math class they could not use it.

[Jenna Fischer]

You know, I spent a year where I refused to let myself use a calculator and I had to do all of my math problems by hand. It was just a weird commitment I made to not, you know, I don't know, struggle. It was a weird commitment I made because I felt sort of like I should be able to add 26 and 97 without a calculator, like just, you know, carry the one or whatever.

[Angela Kinsey]

How old were you when you made this commitment?

[Jenna Fischer]

I was in my 30s.

[Angela Kinsey]

Really?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

I was really expecting you to say I was 24.

[Jenna Fischer]

No, I just got disappointed in myself for relying on my calculator for simple math problems.

[Angela Kinsey]

So did I know you when you made this commitment because I knew you in your 30s.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah, I guess you did. I guess I never added anything or subtracted anything around you.

[Angela Kinsey]

My best friend in her 30s took a year off from calculators and didn't tell me.

[Jenna Fischer]

I do weird stuff like that sometimes. What is that about me?

[Angela Kinsey]

I think you like to make hurdles for yourself. What is.

[Jenna Fischer]

This is horrible. I should speak to a therapist about this. What am I doing? Why am I.

[Angela Kinsey]

You know what you get? You get into a real cushy stride. You're like, hey, things are clipping along. I'm having a great run here. I'm going to give myself a hurdle.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah, I don't deserve too easy. I'm going to stop using a calculator.

[Angela Kinsey]

I don't deserve this cushy stride right now. I'm not allowed to use a calculator.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my God.

[Angela Kinsey]

All right. It's okay. To use a calculator.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I use one now. I mean, that was one of the dumbest things I've ever done. That was one of my dumber goals.

[Angela Kinsey]

I'm sure there's a mathematician out there somewhere that's, like, really into that. You know, that's like, yeah, way to go.

[Jenna Fischer]

You know what? I'll say. At the end of the year, I was no better at adding, subtracting, or multiplying than I was when I started. You can't say.

[Angela Kinsey]

Say that. That can't be your button. You have to.

[Jenna Fischer]

There was no skill gained. There was no speed, nothing. I was still, you know, counting on my fingers to carry the numbers. I mean, it was like it was for nothing.

[Angela Kinsey]

You just had a year where you were slightly more irritable. Okay, let's get into this episode. Speaking of people being irritable, everyone is on the phone with very upset customers. I want to share with that. There are a lot of delicious deleted scenes, and one of them starts off in customer service with this speech. And Kelly repeats it over and over, and Ryan is, like, dying inside because he's right behind her. And then it cuts to a talking head of Ryan, and he's got it fully memorized. But this is what Kelly says right at the top of the episode. Had it stayed in customer service. This is Kelly. Oh, my God. I am so sorry. That is so messed up. Everyone here is so upset. You have no idea. And rest assured, your voice has been heard. Okay. I'll be thinking about you all day. Customer service, this is Kelly. Oh, my God. I am so sorry. That is so messed up. Everyone here is so upset. You have no idea. And rest assured, your voice has been heard. Okay. I'll be thinking about you all day.

[Jenna Fischer]

Wow.

[Angela Kinsey]

She says it on a loop. And Ryan looks like he wants to just explode.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, Michael has a talking head where he explains what happened, why everyone is so upset, why everyone's on the phone. I guess a disgruntled employee sent out 500 boxes of their standard paper with a pornographic watermark of two cartoon characters engaging in a sex act.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes. He said it's a, you know, beloved duck doing something to a mouse.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Now, was he talking about Daffy Duck and Mickey Mouse? Cause he says, never been a fan. Not a fan.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I think he would be talking about Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

Cause Daffy is part of the Bugs Bunny.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, I can't get. Can't keep my duck straight. I just like the idea.

[Jenna Fischer]

I'm so sorry, but that is that is the quote of the day.

[Angela Kinsey]

Ah.

[Jenna Fischer]

I just can't keep my duck straight. There's so many.

[Angela Kinsey]

There's so many.

[Jenna Fischer]

There's so many cartoon ducks.

[Angela Kinsey]

Who can.

[Jenna Fischer]

Scrooge McDuck.

[Angela Kinsey]

There's so many ducks. But I love the idea. It just makes me laugh that Michael has never liked Mickey Mouse.

[Jenna Fischer]

I know. Not funny enough for him. I don't know.

[Angela Kinsey]

I guess not.

[Jenna Fischer]

Not edgy enough.

[Angela Kinsey]

Not enough jokes. Well, Michael holds up the piece of paper to the light and shows the watermark. And guess who did a little bit of a deep dive on watermarks?

[Jenna Fischer]

You. Because it wasn't me. And we're the only people on this podcast.

[Angela Kinsey]

Sam Cody, anyone? No one? No, it was me, folks. It was me. And listen, I don't know if this is going to be interesting. I found it fascinating. I'll do a quick overview. Okay, so we all know what a watermark is, right? A watermark is basically this image that's applied to a piece of paper, right? And you hold it up to the light, and that's how you see it. The term watermark comes from the way these designs are created. It's during the wet paper stage of making paper. Right. It's almost like a damp. That was really fascinating. A damp water spot. Here's where it gets interesting. Ready?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes.

[Angela Kinsey]

Did you know that watermarks were first introduced in Fabriano, Italy, in 1282?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes, I did.

[Angela Kinsey]

You did not.

[Jenna Fischer]

Of course I did not know that.

[Angela Kinsey]

Why did I believe you? I wholeheartedly believed you.

[Jenna Fischer]

Like, I thought my delivery was very good.

[Angela Kinsey]

You're a very good actress. You should have won that Emmy that year. I was really mad. You didn't. I cursed on national television. Okay, so. And they're not really sure why exactly. Watermark started in Italy. Then it could have been, you know, to show, like, maybe it was the service of the king or to convey a secret message or prove authenticity of a message. Right.

[Jenna Fischer]

But now, wait, they were deliberately invented. So one thing I'm curious about is that the watermark was not an accident that happened one day in the wet paper making stage of paper making. And then people were like, oh, my gosh, what if we did this on purpose? Someone purposely watermarked.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, Jenna, I don't. I don't have, you know, the Fella's journal from 1282. It might have been a thing where he was like, hey, that's my thumb. Hey, that's cool. We should do that. Oh, I bet the king would like this, because then everyone would know it's his paper.

[Jenna Fischer]

I love how this. I love how this paper maker in Italy in the 1200s journals exactly like you.

[Angela Kinsey]

Exactly.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my God, my thumb. Oh, hey, I should tell the king about this.

[Angela Kinsey]

He might like to have his official paper. Oh, man. Gonna have a glass of wine. Okay.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, look at the hummingbirds. Xo xoxo. Paper maker guy.

[Angela Kinsey]

Smiley face. So Cartier Miliani Fabriano claims to have innovated three techniques which are still a part of paper making today. But here's the fun part. Jenna, put this on our bucket list. You and I can go and visit the paper and watermark museum of Fabriano in Italy.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, that is 100% happening.

[Angela Kinsey]

Now, how much fun would we have walking through that, getting a tour? How perfect would it be? These two people who were on a show about paper going to one of the oldest paper mills in the world.

[Jenna Fischer]

I can't wait. That is bucket list for sure.

[Angela Kinsey]

Let's get back.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, let me tell you what Brent told me about this obscene watermark.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, yes. Let's hear it.

[Jenna Fischer]

Brent, our writer, told me that this watermark for our show was faithfully created by our prop department and that it really did look like a blank sheet of paper. But when you get up close, you can see this little caricature. And he said after the episode, he asked the prop department to have one of the sheets of paper, and he framed it, and it hangs on the wall of his office. And he says, people come in all the time, and they say, why do you have a blank piece of paper framed on your wall? And he says, it's a keepsake from the office. Look closely. And then they lean forward, and they inevitably say, oh, my God. Because, you know, on the show, we put the little black bar up to hide the real obscene part, but on the actual piece of paper, I think it's there. It's all there.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

There you go.

[Angela Kinsey]

And that was. That was Phil's Shay job that week. That was his job. How was your day? Well, I had to have a duck and a mouse do some stuff. Anyway, how was your day exactly?

[Jenna Fischer]

I want to point out something before we get too far. Remember we said at the very beginning of this episode, everybody's on the phone and they're talking to customers, and they're, like, really trying to do damage control. I wanted to point out that at 1 minute, 55 seconds, Creed is holding the phone up to his ear, but he isn't saying anything. It's a little bit of foreshadowing, I think, for the fact that Creed knows he's responsible. He's just. He's pretending to be on the phone with a customer, I think, but not really.

[Angela Kinsey]

He could also just be Creed being Creed.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Not doing his job again.

[Angela Kinsey]

Exactly. So Michael gets everyone in the conference room. You know, this is like crunch time. And he. He says, creed, you really messed up.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Quality assurance. So I feel like we. We officially hear Creed's job title.

[Jenna Fischer]

Quality assurance.

[Angela Kinsey]

Creed says every week he's supposed to stop by the paper mill, give it a check. The one year he blew this off so good. So he hasn't gone for a whole year.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I know I said at the beginning of the podcast that Michael is in rare form in this episode, and he truly is in this conference room scene, but also, Creed absolutely crushes it in this episode as well.

[Angela Kinsey]

He does.

[Jenna Fischer]

So we get back into the conference room. Michael has just great stuff. He's. You know, he was speaking in acronyms.

[Angela Kinsey]

Crimin, squaw, fnc.

[Jenna Fischer]

Not saving any time, as everyone points out.

[Angela Kinsey]

And he's really. I mean, Michael's really freaking out. He tells everyone. This is threat level midnight.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Midnight, Oscar.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Threat level midnight. This is such a fun callback to the client.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes. And everybody gives little looks to each other because of it, too.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, then Michael says, today Kelly will be training everyone on how to do customer relations. And, Angela, you have a talking head where you just take a pill and you say you don't have a headache. You're just preparing.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. I loved. I loved this back to back talking heads. Because Mindy is. Kelly is like, this date is bananas. B, a, N, a, S. And she's so perky and happy. And then it cuts to me just taking an aspirin.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And my kids were really hung up on this. They really wanted to know, was that a real pill? Did I have to take it? They were like, it looks like you take it. You swallow water.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, Angela, we got so much mail about this. Okay, Carlos L, Taya C, Emily W, Angela B, and Lily n all said, what did you take instead of a real pill?

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, I will tell you, I did a few takes of that talking head, and I had to take sugar pills.

[Jenna Fischer]

Wow. So I guess that's a props thing. I've never had to take fake medicine on a show before, so that's weird.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. Phil Shea brought it to me. He said, listen, it's just sugar. It's like a sugar pill, so you'll be totally fine. So I guess I just had a little spike in sugar that Day.

[Jenna Fischer]

So also during this conference room scene, Angela, we find out that Jim's client is a high school, and they printed their prom invitations on this paper.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

So Michael tells Jim he has to physically go to the high school to rectify the situation. He says, you have to bring someone. Ryan volunteers. Michael says, no, you have to bring Andy.

[Angela Kinsey]

William Dolittle, at your service, AKA will do.

[Jenna Fischer]

And there we go. We said we were going to bring you accents. We didn't lie.

[Angela Kinsey]

And Jim is like, yeah, I'm definitely going alone. And Michael's like, no, no, I need two men on this. That's what she. No time. But she did no time. That is like, such fantastic dialogue.

[Jenna Fischer]

Is that your favorite quote? Is that the one?

[Angela Kinsey]

No.

[Jenna Fischer]

Still not yet.

[Angela Kinsey]

Still not yet.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I remember John could not keep it together in this conference room scene. And anytime John starts to laugh, it is a very bad sign for the rest of us because you just know that we're never going to make it through. But Steve does something in this conference room scene that makes John lose it.

[Angela Kinsey]

I'm gonna guess I have no idea what you're about to say.

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay.

[Angela Kinsey]

I know people can't see me, Jenna, but. Oh, my God, Sam's filming. This is what Steve does at 4 minutes, 2 seconds just to mess with all of us.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yep, there it is. Angela just put her foot up on the table and then leaned into her crotch.

[Angela Kinsey]

Do you know how. Do you know how hard it is to lift your leg this high when you're short? Like, that table's kind of high.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Steve took his foot and he put it up on the conference table. And I remember the first take, he decided to do that. John lost it. Yeah, because we had no idea anytime Steve did that. Steve used to do that to John's desk all the time.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes, he would. And you know what, Jenna? I remember in this scene, when I lost it, I completely lost it. When Michael goes. Here is your headline. Scranton area paper Company. Dunder Mifflin apologizes to valued client. Some companies still know how business is done.

[Jenna Fischer]

That's what I'm saying. It was. It's like. It's like the greatest hits of Michael in this one conference room scene in this episode. It's so good. Well, now Michael reveals that he has invited Barbara Allen, one of Dunder Mifflin's oldest customers, into the office. He's going to offer her a personal apology. He says, if the press wants a story, we'll give him a story.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. There's a great deleted scene of Dwight calling cnn and, like, no one. No one will take his call. It's like. It's really funny.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my gosh. I love it. I love that. Jim is like, did the press ask for a story?

[Angela Kinsey]

Nope, Nope.

[Jenna Fischer]

No. Michael explains in his talking head, when a company screws up, the best course of action is to hold a press conference.

[Angela Kinsey]

You gotta control the spin.

[Jenna Fischer]

You gotta control the story. Well, this had me look up crisis management, Angela, because that's a whole thing now. Now, I did a very shallow dive on it. All I found out was that this really became popular in, like, the 1980s. And this idea of getting ahead of the story is all part of the crisis management public relations handbook. So Michael has it a little bit right here, but he has it wrong in the sense that literally no one knows about this right now.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. If Michael had not made a big to do, it would have just gone away. But no, he's gonna blast it, and it's gonna blow up in his face.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. So now we see Creed is trying to do his own kind of damage control.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, Creed says that this job is the only thing separating him from being a homeless man. Because he was a homeless guy.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. I have to say, Creed calling up this paper mill and asking who wasn't there last week so that he can then pin it on this employee is kind of genius.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, Creed's a survivor. I mean, he's smart. He's actually. He's very smart. He's cunning.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. I was actually impressed.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

I was like, wow. Wowzers. Who thought of that?

[Angela Kinsey]

It's exactly how I got my internship on Conan o', Brien, by the way.

[Jenna Fischer]

How did. Wait, what?

[Angela Kinsey]

You know this story?

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yeah. You called up and I just kept.

[Angela Kinsey]

I would call and I would get, like, an answering machine, you know, because I wanted to do an internship at 30 Rock and in New York. And you in back in the day before, like, big Internet message boards and things like that, because I'm a hundred. You would have a phone number you would call, and it would. I would say, hi. It'd be like, 30 Rockefeller Center. And I'm like, hi, I would love to apply for an internship. Hold one moment, please. Transfer you to a machine. If you would like to apply for an internship at 30 Rockefeller center, please leave your name and phone number and someone will call you. I got that message every day for three months. And so one day I called up, I got the woman in BC, you know what, 30 Rockefeller Center.

[Jenna Fischer]

I said, yes.

[Angela Kinsey]

I was just speaking to a woman about my internship, and we got Disconnected. She said, oh, Barbara. I said, yes, Barbara. She said, let me transfer you. I said, thank you. Got to Barbara. Barbara's like, hi, Barbara. I was like, barbara, I was just talking to someone about my internship and got disconnected. And she was like, oh, were you talking to Nancy? I was like, yes, I was talking to Nancy. Transfer me through to Nancy. Nancy answers, hello. I'm like, hi. I was talking to someone about my internship. And she goes, how did you get my number?

[Jenna Fischer]

Did you tell her?

[Angela Kinsey]

I told her. I said, well, for three months I called and I got your voicemail, and no one called me back. So today I called and I lied and I said that I was talking to someone and that person transferred me to Barbara. And then I told Barbara a version of that lie, and she transferred me to you.

[Jenna Fischer]

And did Nancy say, you're hired?

[Angela Kinsey]

Nancy said, can you be here Monday? And I was in Texas. It was a Friday. I was in Archer City, Texas. Very rural area, three hours from a big airport. I said, sure thing. What time? She said, I'll see you Monday at 9. I said, great. I got off the phone. I said, mom, Dad, I gotta go to New York.

[Jenna Fischer]

Lady, that is what it takes. That's what it takes.

[Angela Kinsey]

I think you just like when you're starting out, and especially when you're, like, the lowest person on the totem pole. You gotta have a little hustle.

[Jenna Fischer]

Gotta have a little hustle, guys. You heard it from us.

[Angela Kinsey]

Get that? Hustle. Okay, so there is a whole bunch of deleted scenes with Kelly in accounting. There's like a whole runner. It's really fun. I mean, at one point, Kelly and Angela get into this huge fight, and Kelly says, you look old enough to be my mother. And Angela then calls her a slut.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my gosh.

[Angela Kinsey]

I know. And then they make up. Kelly apologizes, and then she's like, oh, my God, we're best friends. And Angela's like, I don't know about that. It's like. But there's a whole other journey that Kelly and Angela have that you don't see.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, now, should we go into the car with Andy and Jim driving to the high school?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

Is this it, Angela?

[Angela Kinsey]

This is leading up to it. Here are some things we learn on this road trip with Jim and Andy. Number one, we learned that Andy says, bear me when he wants something. Beer is like a verb. Like, get me that beer me that water. Right?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes.

[Angela Kinsey]

We also learned that Karen is one of Andy's oldest friends. What?

[Jenna Fischer]

I think that's just because they worked together at Stanford Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. And we learned that do not ask Andy to play music because he just. He just sings, like, some acapella version of Drift Away.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, this beer me line is another one of our most quoted. And Jim even says, lord, beer me the strength.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's my favorite line.

[Jenna Fischer]

That's yours.

[Angela Kinsey]

Of. Of. Almost like, I think about lines from the whole entire show, and one of my favorite lines from the whole entire series happens at 7 minutes, 51 seconds, and it's, lord, fear me strength. I love it so much. I love. I don't know if it's because growing up, there's been so many times where I've been like, lord, give me strength.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And just to have Lord, bear me strength, it just tickles me. I just love it.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, I reached out to Justin and Brent because I was very curious. Who wrote this beer me joke?

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, I would love to know.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right. They told me that their memory is that Ed Helms had a friend in college who used to say, beer me. And it was Brent who expanded it and wrote the joke, beer me a water. But this was based on a story from Ed Helms. They said he also had this friend that would do the. And Ed confirmed that. Right? Ed said he had a friend who would do, like, a gibberish thing to cut people off.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right, well, I texted Ed, and Ed is like, I don't know what they're talking about. I don't have any memory of a friend. He. He was like, yeah, they're ridded it to do. But I have no memory of a friend saying, beer me. I don't know.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, my gosh. This is like that moment where, you know, something happens, and you ask five people what happened, and they all have a different story.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, man.

[Jenna Fischer]

The one thing we know is that Brent did write the joke, beer me a water.

[Angela Kinsey]

So Jim has sort of suffered through this car ride with Andy. Now they're in the high school, and they're walking through, and Andy's like, oh, my God, what's my girlfriend doing here? And Jem's like, oh, is she, like, the counselor or something? And he's like, no, she works part time at the frozen yogurt place.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah, she's that girl standing by her locker.

[Angela Kinsey]

Her locker?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. And Jim's like, oh, Andy.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, Lord.

[Jenna Fischer]

So Andy goes up to confront her, and she's like, I have to go to Spanish class. Andy's mind is blown. He had no idea that she was a high school student. Andy does let us know that they did not do anything. Illegal. Except knock over a few mailboxes with her friends.

[Angela Kinsey]

There's also a deleted scene where Andy talks about how they met in a talking head, and he was at, like, a convenience store, and she asked him to buy wine coolers for her and her friends. Oh, boy.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, the actress who played Jamie was Shira Scott Astroff and Lady. She was a contestant on The Bachelor, season 16, the one with Ben. Bachelor. Ben.

[Angela Kinsey]

I don't. I've never watched the Bachelor.

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay, well, she's part of Bachelor Nation, so I looked her up on Insta and I slid into her DMs.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, my gosh. What'd she say?

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay, well, first of all, Shira and I have a mutual friend in common, and it's actor Michael Rosenbaum. So I think it was slightly less creepy when I slid into her DMs, because I saw on her Insta that she was friends with Michael, so I was able to lead with that.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's good.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. I'm always trying to find the least creepy way to slide into someone's dad.

[Angela Kinsey]

Hey, what's up? Hey.

[Jenna Fischer]

Remember when you were on the Office? You want to talk about it?

[Angela Kinsey]

I haven't talked to him in a while, but what's up? Okay.

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay. So we emailed her. She emailed back, and she told me all about her time on the show. Because, Ange, whenever there are these scenes that happen on a location and we weren't there, I like to get details. I want to know a little bit about it.

[Angela Kinsey]

No, I love it. Every time we reach out to someone in scenes like this, it's always so fun and just kind of fills in the picture for us.

[Jenna Fischer]

All right, so here is what she told me. She said that when she got the audition for this, she had never watched the show before.

[Angela Kinsey]

Really?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. So she said she watched one episode and then went to her audition. It was a cold read, meaning they would not give her the material ahead of time because they didn't want the storyline to leak.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, that's so hard. So she had no idea.

[Jenna Fischer]

But then she got the job. And also she told me, because she had never really watched the show, she thought that she was going to be playing Michael's girlfriend. So when she got to set, she was expecting to see Steve Carell, and that's when she met Ed and John. Now, here is the thing that I found absolutely fascinating in this episode. When she shot this, she was three months shy from turning 28.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, my gosh.

[Jenna Fischer]

She was 27 years old. She said she was older than John. Krasinski and only five years younger than Ed Helms. Baby face. Oh, my goodness. She said she had the absolute best time filming this episode. It is so still one of the best experiences she's ever had. And after she filmed it, she went home and watched every single Office episode from season one. She totally binged it. And so she was super excited. By the time her episode finally aired, she was, like, a super fan.

[Angela Kinsey]

That is so fun.

[Jenna Fischer]

But she said to this day, people still write her about being on the show, and she's so proud to say that she was part of the Office. Well, listen, guys, Shira was so lovely to tell us about her time in the office. She has a new film coming out called Half Brothers. She's also going to be in a pilot on Amazon called On the Spectrum. Her Instagram is @shirascottastroff. But here's the plug. I can't wait to give what. She is the founder of an animal rescue organization called the Animal Rescue Mission. They rescue abused and neglected dogs and cats in Los Angeles and all over the world. She just rescued, like, 70 dogs from death row in Tijuana.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, my gosh.

[Jenna Fischer]

And placed them in homes. So she said if anyone wants to adopt an animal or donate, you can go to the Animal Rescue Mission and check them out.

[Angela Kinsey]

I love that we have four rescues. I love little rescue animals. That makes me so happy.

[Jenna Fischer]

I know. Should we talk about Dwight preparing for the big press conference back at the office?

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, yeah. Well, you know, he equates this to beat sales. You gotta put the money beats. Those are the attractive beats. You gotta put them up front.

[Jenna Fischer]

That's right. He has set up the conference room for a giant press conference all for one man. This is Chad Light from the Scranton Times.

[Angela Kinsey]

He does the Lighter side of life.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And the obits.

[Jenna Fischer]

Right.

[Angela Kinsey]

And there's a great deleted scene with him and Creed where he recognizes Creed. He's like, wait, Creed Bratton from the Grassroots? Jenna. He basically calls Creed out as himself.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my gosh. And it got deleted again. This origin of Creed keeps getting deleted. It got deleted out of Boo's Cruise. It got deleted out of. What was the other episode where we found out that he stole his name from someone in prison? The conviction.

[Angela Kinsey]

And now again, so Chad Light goes, creed Bratton from the Grassroots. And Creed's like, yeah. And he goes, I wrote your obituary. Creed was like, oh, yeah. Creed has this great talking head that he faked his death so he could get, like, an insurance claim or something. He gets money. And so, yeah, Amazing. Amazing.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, Chad Light was played by Anthony Russell. And I found this in Anthony's bio, which I thought was absolutely so charming. It said, as a child he played harmonica, ukulele, guitar, trombone, and piano. He worked his way through college singing in a show band. And after he graduated Montclair State College with a major in trombone and a minor in piano, his band was booked as a Las Vegas lounge act for many major hotels.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, I played the trombone.

[Jenna Fischer]

What? No, you did not.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

Stop it. What are you talking about?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah, when we moved to Archer City, it's a very small town. Like, in football, it was class two, a super small town. So to have a marching band, pretty much everyone had to participate. And so all my friends in the town was. You know, I graduated with like, 34 people. So my friend Shannon was like, are you going to play in the band? And I was like, I don't know how to play an instrument. She goes, doesn't really matter. We need people. And so I was like, well, what do you play now? My best friend was six foot, three guys. She was like, star basketball player. I said, what do you play? She said, I play trombone. I was like, 4, 10. I was like, yeah, okay, sounds good. I'll do what you're doing. Because I wanted to be able to sit next to her. There was only three people in the trombone section. Shannon, Bill Crutcher, and me. And I said. The first day I sat next to Bill, and I said, bill, what. What are you playing? Because I. All I could hear was like. And he goes, I just play letter F the whole time. I said, okay. So Shannon was the only one that could really play. But I did learn how to play tequila.

[Jenna Fischer]

What's that?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah, I learned how to play that. It's really fun on the trombone because you can. You do this big slide. And then I could reach the. The last position, you know? Yeah, seventh position. Because I was too short. My arms didn't extend. Jenna, you wouldn't. You wouldn't use a calculator for the year. I was in a band playing a trombone for a few months of my life. Very poorly, by the way. Very poorly playing the trombone.

[Jenna Fischer]

I'm speechless.

[Angela Kinsey]

I know.

[Jenna Fischer]

Where are we?

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, God, I don't know if anyone even is listening anymore. Well, listen, I'll tell you where we are. Chad Light has gotten level three security clearance. Don't get excited. It's level three out of 20, and they're getting ready for this big press conference. Meanwhile, Kevin, Oscar, and Angela are busy apologizing to Customers. And it is not going well.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, because Angela refuses to say the words I'm sorry. She will not apologize. She keeps saying things like, our official position is one of apology. Like, she's like, will not just say, we are so sorry.

[Angela Kinsey]

I love it when, like, Kelly is just patiently trying to coach her to say, like, just to make conversation. And she's like, where are you from? Ohio. That's nice. She just does not want to be talking to these people.

[Jenna Fischer]

No, no. And also, by the way, in the meantime, Creed has found out that Debbie Brown did not show up to work last week. And he spins a whole tale for Dwight. He says, well, now she told me that she had an emergency dentist appointment. And Dwight gives a look to camera, which I think is a little bit of a callback to his lie to Michael about his dentist appointment. Remember Prentice the dentist?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

But then he says, well, then Debbie told the people at her work that she had the stomach flu. So she's clearly just making things up to avoid taking responsibility for this watermark. He's really laying it on thick.

[Angela Kinsey]

Creed is vicious.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, Ms. Allen arrives and before we get into this really embarrassing press conference, why don't we take a break?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah, we need a moment before we get to this.

[Angela Kinsey]

We promise we're gonna just talk about the office for the rest of the show.

[Jenna Fischer]

Why would you promise that when we know it's not true?

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, we'll try.

[Jenna Fischer]

We'll try.

[Angela Kinsey]

We'll try. So one of the hardest parts about business to business marketing is reaching the right audience. And when you want to reach the right professionals, you need to use LinkedIn ads. LinkedIn has grown to a network of over 1 billion professionals. And that's where it stands apart from other ad buys. You can target your buyers by job title, industry, company role, seniority, skills, company revenue, all in one place to reach the professionals you want to reach. So you can stop wasting budget on the wrong audience and start targeting the right professionals only on LinkedIn ads. You know how sometimes you get an ad and you're like, was this for me? Who is sending this to me? Well, with LinkedIn ads, that's never going to happen. LinkedIn will even give you an extra $250 credit on your next campaign. So you can try it yourself. Just go to LinkedIn.com office. That's LinkedIn.com office. Terms and conditions apply only on LinkedIn ads. Heads up, everybody. Prime Big Deal Days is coming on October 7th and and 8th.

[Jenna Fischer]

This is an annual sales event from Amazon that features tons of Exclusive deals just for prime members. So if you're a Prime member, this is literally the best time to get great deals on all the things you want.

[Angela Kinsey]

If you're a Prime member, this is a very exciting Tuesday Wednesday.

[Jenna Fischer]

It really is. I mean, I dive in and get an early start on my holiday shopping, personally.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, it's so smart. Also, it's the time if you want to splurge on something that you've been eyeing that you're like, this is when you do it. If your kids are into sports like mine, shopping Prime Big deal days is so amazing because like, you know, things like the basketball hoop for the driveway, all of that, you can get it on sale October 7th and 8th.

[Jenna Fischer]

That's right. And throw that on your list, you.

[Angela Kinsey]

Can shop deals up to 40% off.

[Jenna Fischer]

So why not start your list today? Shop prime big deal days October 7th and 8th. Exclusively for prime members. Fall is in full swing. I am in Chicago and I just had a costume fitting for my play Ashland Avenue. The costume designer gave me a pair of the most amazing corduroy pants. I'm gonna wear them in the play. Guess where they are from.

[Angela Kinsey]

Quince.

[Jenna Fischer]

I couldn't believe it. I told her, I love Quince. She said, I love Quince. And right now, Quince has all of the elevated essentials for fall. You have to check out these corduroy pants. They also have 100% Mongolian cashmere. Starting at 50 bucks, you can give your wardrobe an upgrade that feels smart, stylish and effortless. Keep it classy and cozy this fall with long lasting staples from quince. Go to quince.comofficeladies for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q U I N C E.com officeladies to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com officeladies as a young adult, finding the right path to your future can feel overwhelming.

[Angela Kinsey]

It starts with year up United's tuition, free job training program, career pathways.

[Jenna Fischer]

If you're without a bachelor's degree but have a high school diploma or ged, you can get skills first training to succeed in the industries you're passionate about. All while earning a weekly educational stipend to offset basic expenses.

[Angela Kinsey]

From there, you'll have access to internships and hands on experiences with Fortune 500 companies. And with Europe United's job placement services and personalized coaching and mentorship, you can put your knowledge, skills and most importantly, confidence into practice.

[Jenna Fischer]

Apply to Europe United today and take the first step toward achieving the Career. You want? Visit yearup.org to learn more. All right, so we are back. We are laser focused and we are in a press conference.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, it is not going well.

[Jenna Fischer]

No. Michael apologizes to Mrs. Allen and he offers her a giant certificate, which you know, he loves. Remember in Casino Night, he was like, toby, are we going to have one of those giant checks? He's so.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes, it's a novelty check is what he calls it. It's a novelty check. It's big, huge. It says six free months of paper or 25 reams, whichever comes first. And Mrs. Allen does not accept the apology. Mrs. Allen gives zero Fs as the kids say.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yeah. She literally says, I do not accept your apology. It's so good. Michael doesn't know what to do with it. And you know, Chad is back there taking up all the notes on this press conference. He's ready to write his article.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, he's, his hand is flying across that notepad. He's jotting everything down. So this back and forth between Mrs. Allen and Michael, it just starts to escalate and, and then he just asks her to leave and she just storms out and says she's going to call the Better Business Bureau. And Michael's like, oh, yeah, well, I'm going to call the ungrateful biatch hotline.

[Jenna Fischer]

It really, really did not go as planned. I mean, I don't think there's any better way to say it. I don't know.

[Angela Kinsey]

It could have gone worse. I really don't.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, lady, Mrs. Allen. The woman who played Mrs. Allen so very well was Lisa Dar. And she has done a ton of stuff like Curb youb Enthusiasm. She was a regular on Life as We Know it and popular. She also had a recurring on Strong Medicine, which is the show that I had a one day guest role on where My brain Melted. But I found this very fascinating because I ended up doing a deep dive on her IMDb page. This is crazy. Are you ready?

[Angela Kinsey]

Yes.

[Jenna Fischer]

She appeared in three episodes of Murder She Wrote, but each episode was in a different season and she played a different character. And then she was in two different seasons playing two different characters of csi. So she is such a good actress that she can appear multiple times in the same television show playing a different character each time. I felt like that was very telling of her talent.

[Angela Kinsey]

It is. But also, would she change her look?

[Jenna Fischer]

I don't know because I didn't do that deep of a dive. I didn't like YouTube, all of her appearances, but I mean, I found that Significant.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

And unusual.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. Unless I feel like that happened more back in the day, like on Bewitched. Weren't there two Darrens and like, it was never explained or something.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, that's like a major character change. This is like a guest role. Right. But they hired the same actress in three different guest roles.

[Angela Kinsey]

They loved her.

[Jenna Fischer]

Clearly. Clearly. Well, I loved her. I thought she was great on our show.

[Angela Kinsey]

She was so good. And she really just, I mean, push Michael over the edge.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, my gosh.

[Angela Kinsey]

You know, Jen, I did say what could have made this press conference worse. And I. And Dwight, once again, does not help. He says he thought both animals were smiling. There is a fantastic Dwight talking head where he talks about growing up on a farm and he has seen a lot of animal action. And he says really matter of factly, whoever drew this got it exactly right.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. He tries to tell Mrs. Allen that the cartoon did seem to depict a consensual sex act because they were smiling.

[Angela Kinsey]

And Dwight would know.

[Jenna Fischer]

Right.

[Angela Kinsey]

Because of his farm life.

[Jenna Fischer]

Right.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, Michael is really upset. He starts to vent to Pam. I mean, that things got out of control. It's going to be a national story. She's like, michael, this is the Scranton Times. And he's like, no, we need. We need to do an apology video. Well, then Michael pulls out the video camera and Jenna, the look on your faces, Pam, is so brilliant. It's so brilliant, Jenna. It said so much history. How many videos has Pam had to film of Michael apologizing for things? I will tell you, in the deleted scenes, there's a runner of videos and they're fantastic.

[Jenna Fischer]

I was gonna say that, that we shot a whole bunch of former apology videos and they didn't make it in the episode. I will tell you that shooting this scene with Steve and Rain and then also these old apology videos is some of the most fun I ever had on the show. It was so hard to get through these. It was so difficult.

[Angela Kinsey]

I don't know how you did it. And everything about your expressions, Jenna, are perfection. You don't give away much, but it says so much about what Pam is thinking. I just thought you did a phenomenal job. And I loved these scenes. I love seeing the deleted ones. I want to see more. I could just see a clip show of all these videos that you guys had to do. And I love the small touches. I love the American flag behind him and clearly made out of four pieces of paper taped together. And I loved that. From 15 minutes, 55 seconds to 16 minutes, 5 seconds, Dwight is just spraying Michael's hair.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

11 seconds of silence. Except for while he sprays the hair.

[Jenna Fischer]

I couldn't get through that. I laughed so hard, I broke constantly. It was very, very difficult to get through that.

[Angela Kinsey]

When you think about the real estate of a show, like, every little moment counts. You're trying to just jam it with as much as possible. And I loved that our show would take these beats like this. 11 seconds. No one saying a word. Just an aerosol can longer than you.

[Jenna Fischer]

Have to stay on a bull.

[Angela Kinsey]

That's true. Thank you for bringing my measurement of time back to bull riding.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, also, I don't know if you noticed, in this scene, I kept my gaze on the camera. I never looked up to Steve. And I did this for two reasons. One, because it just felt like I'm in charge of operating the camera. And so I was gonna make sure he stayed in frame. And that just seemed like sort of my job. But the other reason was because I could look at the little plastic corner, and then I wouldn't have to actually see Steve. And it was easier for me not to laugh.

[Angela Kinsey]

I wondered about that. I was like a. It looks like you're really operating a video camera. But how lucky were you that you didn't have to make eye contact because you would have burst into laughter?

[Jenna Fischer]

Also, when rain drops one of the cue cards and it makes a thud on the ground, that made me laugh. It was like when I was rewatching the scene, just I was breaking constantly. Those poor guys. I mean, they must have been like, jenna, you need to leave the room.

[Angela Kinsey]

Well, there is a deleted scene of, you know, Michael does the first video, and he's not happy with it. Right. Well, in the deleted scenes, Jenna, there is his second take at the video. You know, you guys shoot the first one.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. And he doesn't like it.

[Angela Kinsey]

He doesn't like it. And there's a deleted scene. And Jenna made me laugh so hard. Michael goes on to say, I need this job. My mortgage is hundreds of dollars a month. With this job, I can barely cover that. I have a company car, but I still have to pay for the gas. Gas prices are high, and I have no savings whatsoever.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, Michael.

[Angela Kinsey]

What's kind of fun for this, for those folks who like to catch things in the background, is that deleted scene dialog is on the cue card. And their second attempt is right there. You can zoom in and see it. Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

A lot of people wrote in to ask how come what Michael is saying isn't what is printed on the cue cards when they Go back and forth. It was just because we cut some stuff out. We trimmed out some stuff.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. He actually said everything that was on the cards. We just had to lose some of it for time.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Well, over in accounting, we had someone write in Megan Allman said, 17 minutes, 6 seconds. Kevin Sassy.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah, serious Kevin sass. Like, he's been holding it in for so long, he just couldn't wait. Now he's got something on her.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Angela is critiquing Kevin's math skills, and he then gives some sass by insulting your customer relations skills.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. And then I call them apes. And then Oscar's like, apologize for that. And I'm like, oh, I'm sorry. You're both morons. And they're like, but you said sorry. It's like I'm sitting with my two, like, junior high brothers. That's what they're like. And I want you to know that Brian and Oscar improvised their sort of little high five at the end and that they don't quite get it right. They were so tickled by that moment. They kept cracking up. Brian kept cracking up.

[Jenna Fischer]

I love that.

[Angela Kinsey]

They, like, did a few different tries at it, and it just was, like, their favorite thing.

[Jenna Fischer]

Okay, well, I loved that moment. It made me laugh.

[Angela Kinsey]

Me too.

[Jenna Fischer]

Because why couldn't they have just high five? They were kind of doing, like, a coronavirus high five where you don't actually touch well. And they were trying to do, like, a fist bump and air. But they're right there. They could have easily touched one another, but that's what it made me think of.

[Angela Kinsey]

I think they love the Jim, Pam, air high five. This is their dude version.

[Jenna Fischer]

Also funny.

[Angela Kinsey]

It would have meant that one of them would have. Would had to get up or lean over awkwardly. And so I just. They were like, eh.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, okay. Well, I guess it was an optical illusion because it seemed like maybe they could have just made a connection.

[Angela Kinsey]

It would have required one of them getting up and not.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, maybe we should go back to the high school for a second, because we forgot to mention that Andy and Jim do meet with the principal. And it doesn't really go well because Andy is so preoccupied by learning that his girlfriend is at the high school.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah, I don't really know. Did they get this account back? We don't know. It just seems like Andy's about to have a breakdown and Jim is just trying to get them out of there.

[Jenna Fischer]

Well, the principal was played by Jim Jansen, who also played Reverend Skinner on Gilmore Girls. Little bit of trivia.

[Angela Kinsey]

Ooh. Ooh. That is good trivia.

[Jenna Fischer]

I know. And, yeah, we don't really find out how that went, but as they're driving home in the car, Andy is still clearly bummed out, and Jim wants to cheer him up.

[Angela Kinsey]

I mean, Jim really, really goes for it here. He just starts going, oweem oe. Oweem oe. Oweemowe. Oweemoway.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And Andy's fighting it. He's fighting it, but then he just. He can't resist. He's like. Like he can't not jump in.

[Jenna Fischer]

Do you remember that time on the show when we all sang that in the bullpen? Was that for an episode or were we just doing that one day?

[Angela Kinsey]

I think we just started doing it.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Because it is kind of infectious when someone starts it.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. We were just a little loopy.

[Jenna Fischer]

I think so, too.

[Angela Kinsey]

In the jungle.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah. Oh, one last thing now, before we end this episode and get to this amazing tag, is Creed.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah.

[Jenna Fischer]

Creed got this woman fired, and he's going around the office collecting money for her. He's going to put it in a card. You know, why do bad things always happen to good people? He asks.

[Angela Kinsey]

And then he tosses the card. He puts the money in his pocket. Creed is diabolical.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And we also find out that in Pam's opinion, Michael made the best apology video ever.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

That ended with an ultimatum. You have one day. What?

[Jenna Fischer]

Yeah.

[Angela Kinsey]

And where are these videos going, Jenna? Where's that going?

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, they go nowhere. I'm pretty convinced that Pam never sends them anywhere.

[Angela Kinsey]

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, now we have such a fun tag. And Rain had so much fun doing this.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes. Dwight arrives for work the next day dressed as Jim, but it backfires a little bit because everybody just compliments him on how great he looks. And he gets a little frustrated and.

[Angela Kinsey]

He tries to do, like, the gym look to camera.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes.

[Angela Kinsey]

But it's, like, so awkward.

[Jenna Fischer]

Yes. Well, I want to tell you that this was originally in the script as the alternate ending to the Cold Open. Dwight had a little talking head where he said, to defeat your enemy, you have to become your enemy. And then he showed up to work dressed as Jim. But in the editing process, we split it up, which I think was genius.

[Angela Kinsey]

I love that. I love that we end with it.

[Jenna Fischer]

I remember how much fun Rain had doing this scene, but I also remember him talking with Randall, the director, about how Dwight couldn't be as good of a mimic as Jim. So whereas Jim could come in and just do this spot on impression, they sort of felt like Dwight's version of Jim had to be a little messier. But, like, how do you thread that needle? Right? Like, how do you do an impression? But it's Dwight doing the impression. Because Rain could do an amazing impression of Jim Halpert, but he had to do it as Dwight. So I remember them playing with that a lot on the set when they were shooting this.

[Angela Kinsey]

Yeah. I feel like those moments would come up for us where it was like your character steps out of its comfort zone a little bit to do something, but you still have to do it as your character and through that filter. Yeah, but it was fun. It was fun for us to watch those fellas do that. Well, you guys, that was Product Recall. Thanks for taking that journey with us. We. We got off topic a few times, but, you know, there's some real nuggets in this. Lord, bear me strength.

[Jenna Fischer]

Oh, yes. And listen, identity theft is not a joke. Millions of families suffer every year.

[Angela Kinsey]

All right, guys, we'll see you next week.

[Jenna Fischer]

We'll see you next week.

[Angela Kinsey]

Someone bear me a snack. I'm hungry.

[Jenna Fischer]

Thank you for listening to Office Lady's second drink.

[Angela Kinsey]

This episode was initially created in collaboration with Earwolf.

[Jenna Fischer]

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

[Angela Kinsey]

Our executive producer is Cassie Jurkins, and our audio engineer and associate producer is Molly Nugent. Odyssey's executive producer is Leah Rees Dennis.

[Jenna Fischer]

Office Ladies was mixed and mastered by Bill Shaw. Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton.