EP. 48 — The Negotiation w/ David Denman

OFFICE-048-20200911-NegotiationDenman-SKv06.mp3

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:04] I’m Jenna Fischer.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:05] I’m Angela Kinsey.

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:06] We were on “The Office” together.

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

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

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

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:19] We’re the “Office Ladies”. Hello Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:26] Hey, lady, it’s very good to see your face today.

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:29] Same. I feel the same way.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:31] Oh, I said “lady” right out of the gate. Jenna, some people love the lady and some people don’t love the lady.

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:39] I want to get a T-shirt that just says “Lady”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:43] Lady. All right. What are we talking about today?

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:47] Today we are talking about Season 3, Episode 18, “The Negotiation”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:55] Mmhmm.

JENNA FISCHER [00:00:55] It was written by Mike Schur and directed by Jeff Blitz.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:00:59] Those are two powerhouses of comedy.

JENNA FISCHER [00:01:02] Yes, this is a good team. Here is a summary. “Angered by Pam’s confession that she and Jim shared a kiss, Roy tries to attack Jim in the office”. I mean, right out of the gate. That’s the first scene, everybody.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:17] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:01:18] “Jim is spared by Dwight’s quick thinking, a.k.a. pepper spray. Roy is fired and Darryl tries to leverage it into a raise. But upon hearing how little Michael makes at his job, Darryl, Toby and Michael drive to corporate so Michael can ask for his own raise. Roy takes Pam out for coffee to apologize and they break it off for good”. This is it. No more Pam and Roy, guys. “And then at the end of the show. Jim catches Dwight and Angela kissing in the office”. It’s a lot.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:01:58] Busted. It’s a lot.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:00] Fast Fact Number One, this episode was a supersized episode of “The Office”. And as a result, Angela, I think, am I right? There are no deleted scenes for this episode.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:11] There are none on the DVDs. Now I don’t know if there’s some secret NBC archives somewhere, but there aren’t any that we know of.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:20] I think we used it all. It’s all in there, guys. Now, here’s a little bit of a fact. This is a fact within a fact.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:28] I was going to say, a little bit of a fact, what’s happening?

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:31] This episode, like I said, was written by Mike Schur, who was nominated for an Emmy Award for writing this episode.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:39] Oh, he should have won. Did he win?

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:41] He did not.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:42] Oh, boo.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:44] He lost to Greg Daniels, who won for “Gay Witch Hunt”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:49] Oh OK. OK. OK.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:51] You’re all right with that. You’re like, all right.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:53] OK, OK.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:53] “The Office” won.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:54] Keep it in the family.

JENNA FISCHER [00:02:55] That’s right. Yay.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:02:58] Yay. All right. Well, that was fun.

JENNA FISCHER [00:03:00] All right. Well, now I’m going to give you Fast Fact Number Two. In this episode, you remember Michael says that he got tips on how to negotiate from Wikipedia?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:10] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [00:03:11] And some of the stuff that he says that he found on Wikipedia is stuff like, you have to suddenly change the location or refuse to talk first.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:21] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [00:03:23] Well, we had a fan question from Brianna Kernan, Zu Ji Xang, Charlie Altman, Shay Quiz and Jeremy Sharp. They all asked, “Were the interview tips that Michael was using actually from Wikipedia or did the writers make them up”? OK, none of that stuff was on Wikipedia for real.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:48] For real.

JENNA FISCHER [00:03:48] The writers just made that up.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:03:50] Yeah, I, you know, Jenna, I did a mini deep dive on the art of negotiation for this episode. And I can confirm because I went to the actual Wikipedia page for negotiating and those are not on there.

JENNA FISCHER [00:04:03] Well, you know, after this episode aired, there was a major stir.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:04:10] Really?

JENNA FISCHER [00:04:11] Fans started going on to “The Negotiation” page of Wikipedia and they started changing it to reflect Michael’s advice.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:04:22] That’s awesome. I mean, not, I mean, don’t, don’t be hackers, guys, but that’s funny.

JENNA FISCHER [00:04:27] And the administrators at Wikipedia had to put the page in, I guess what is called “semi-protection mode”. And that limits who’s allowed to edit a page. So any user that had an account that was less than four days old or anyone who’s trying to put a post up as anonymous were forbidden. And then they had other administrators who would go in and delete all of the fake negotiation advice, that was just Michael Scott.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:00] Oh, my goodness, you guys.

JENNA FISCHER [00:05:02] But it was a whole thing. There were like articles written about it in USA Today.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:08] Oh, wow.

JENNA FISCHER [00:05:09] Yeah. It caused a stir.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:10] Stirrin’ it up “Office” fans.

JENNA FISCHER [00:05:13] I’m going through these quickly, Angela, because we have some exciting news, which is part of Fast Fact Number Three.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:18] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [00:05:19] This episode marks the return of Ed Helms as Andy Bernard, but it also marks the last regular appearance of Roy, played by David Denman. Now, Roy will continue to come back now and then. But this really officially ends the Pam Roy relationship, and we felt like we had to mark this occasion by talking to Roy himself. David Denman.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:45] And we had so much fun talking to him. Sam, can you play that interview?

JENNA FISCHER [00:05:54] David Denman. Hello, welcome to “Office Ladies”.

DAVID DENMAN [00:05:57] Hello, ladies.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:05:58] Hey, David, it’s so good to see you.

DAVID DENMAN [00:06:01] Been a long time.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:06:02] Yeah. It’s been a long time.

JENNA FISCHER [00:06:03] It has. Well, David, we always like to start by asking our guests how they came to be on the show.

DAVID DENMAN [00:06:12] My buddy, who is an actor, friend of mine in New York. He watched the British “Office” and he called me and said, “Dude, you’ve got to watch this show. It’s amazing. You’re going, you’re going to love it. There’s nothing like it on TV. And I hear they’re doing an American version and you got to try to get in on that”. So I watched it and I was like, “Oh, my God, this is genius”. And there was, you know, a couple little guys my age on the show. And I called my agent and I was like, “Hey, I hear they’re doing an American version of ‘The Office’”. And he goes, “Yeah, yeah”. And I go, “I’d love to get in on that”. And then he goes, “You, really? You want to do that”? I go, “Yeah, yeah. What do you mean”? He goes, “I don’t know they’re looking for improv comedians” and I’m like, “Yeah”? You know, I went to Juilliard, I did study improv along with Shakespeare, and many other things. It’s not, just because I didn’t go to, you know, Improv Olympic or whatever, doesn’t mean I don’t have an interest in that and I don’t have that in my tool box. And he goes, “Oh, OK”. So he called over and all the parts were cast except for Roy. So I said, “Yeah, I’d love to go in for that part”. That little thing changed my career.

JENNA FISCHER [00:07:21] Well, David, I remember that you were one of the very, very first people cast. You were at our first original table read that Angela was not even at. They hadn’t even filled out the rest of the office. It was just. Steve John, Rainn, B.J., me, Phyllis, and you, that’s who was at the first table read. And I remember Alison Jones brought her Polaroid camera. And she took a Polaroid picture for each of us because she said that’s a tradition of hers at table reads for actors at their, for their first series. Do you still have yours?

DAVID DENMAN [00:08:02] I remember it slightly different. I know she brought the Polaroid camera and she took a picture for herself that she did on every table read of her first show. And you said, “Ooh, I want one of those”. And she took another one and gave it to you. I don’t think anyone else has any of those photos besides those two.

JENNA FISCHER [00:08:19] OK. That, that sounds like me.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:21] Thank you, David. Because Jenna has talked about this. And thank you for setting that straight.

JENNA FISCHER [00:08:29] Well, that explains why no one else has one but me. Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:08:34] Maybe you should stop asking that question, Jenna, to the original table read people.

JENNA FISCHER [00:08:42] Oh, my gosh. Well, David, I just remember meeting you and being so excited. And we had that theater connection because I also got a theater degree. I just liked you immediately.

DAVID DENMAN [00:08:52] I immediately liked you. No, we definitely hit it off. It was, what was fun about that show in the beginning was you guys were all stuck in the office for hours and hours and hours. And usually when you film a series, it’s like, oh, we’ll shoot that scene and then we’ll go shoot that scene. But because the way they filmed this with, you know, documentary style where they whip the camera across the whole office, they needed everyone to sit in the background all day long. So you guys would always be losing your mind by the time I showed up on set, you were like, “Ah! Ah, there’s a new person. Hi!”. And you were very enthusiastic every time I got there. And I was very grateful for it. So, you know, we definitely hit it off.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:35] I do remember Jenna coming to set, though, and being like, “Guess what I did this weekend”? I was like, “What”? She was like, “I played poker with David”. And I was like, what is happening? Where are you guys-? You guys are like hanging out. You’re playing poker in someone’s garage. Like what? What’s this whole other life? I need to get in on.

JENNA FISCHER [00:09:50] I know, you never learned poker, Angela, you missed out on a lot.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:09:54] Well, you wouldn’t want me at your poker table. I mean, I, I mean, one time I played with, and I had like a pair of threes and I thought I could win the whole thing. But I guess that’s not, you know, I don’t know. I’m not good at it, guys.

JENNA FISCHER [00:10:04] Well, if we’re playing for real money. We would want you at our poker table.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:09] No, you wouldn’t. Because I’m the person that’s like “All in!”, and everyone’s like, “Wait, what’s happening”?

DAVID DENMAN [00:10:15] I remember that like in Rainn’s garage like, and here we are at a little poker table. But I remember I took down a big pot opposite you Jenna once and you lost your mind. You could not believe that I, that I had beat you in that hand. I don’t think I ever won another hand against you, but that one just set the tone. You were just so livid that I’d beat you. Do you remember that? Or is that just my fond memory?

JENNA FISCHER [00:10:42] I feel like I would often get dramatic when I lost and wasn’t expecting it.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:10:49] So David, Jenna and I have talked a little bit how we give our characters backstories like I would give Angela Martin reasons why she would react one way. And Jenna has shared her Pam backstory. And what was your take on Roy and Pam? Did you invent a backstory for their relationship and for Roy?

DAVID DENMAN [00:11:07] Yeah, I did definitely have backstory, but I just, you know, I assumed that these guys met in high school. They started dating and, you know, they just kind of fell into this, you know, this dynamic where neither one of them, well, definitely, I don’t even think Roy wanted to get married initially. I think he was just like, “Oh, this is what were supposed to do next. And this is what we’re supposed to do next”. And it wasn’t until years later that, like, you know, when he was going to lose Pam, that like he was like, “Oh, I actually care about this person and I have to put some work into this”. And, you know, with any relationship, you have to put some effort into it. And I don’t think, I don’t think Roy’s had ever thought about that until it was too late. And I went to school with a bunch-, with some like, couple of meat heads that I sort of fashioned this guy after. I mean, I’m not going to say who they were, but that’s kind of where I saw Roy. And so I thought at the time I was like, “Oh, this would be a great way to make fun of those guys”. And then the next thing I know, playing these parts for the rest of my life.

JENNA FISCHER [00:12:19] Aw.

DAVID DENMAN [00:12:19] That’s not, that’s not entirely true. But.

JENNA FISCHER [00:12:21] Well, it’s so funny because you, I mean, like knowing you, you’re such like more of like an intellectual creative. Right?

DAVID DENMAN [00:12:31] Thank you, I appreciate that.

JENNA FISCHER [00:12:33] You’re an outdoorsman, though, like that part of Roy fits you, I think. Like, I mean, Roy is jet skiing, but, you know, you like the outdoors and stuff.

DAVID DENMAN [00:12:44] I do. I do like the outdoors. I mean, I go, I go out backpacking, stuff like that. I don’t know if Roy’s necessary that. He’s more of like a, “Let’s get my RV and my jet ski and like hang out and drink some beers”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:12:55] Yeah.

DAVID DENMAN [00:12:56] And, and that’s his, that’s his outdoorsman.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:12:59] Right. He’s gonna load up a four wheeler with a bunch of beer.

DAVID DENMAN [00:13:02] Exactly.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:02] Probably make some bad choices in the woods.

DAVID DENMAN [00:13:05] Yeah. Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:06] Well, David, I totally relate to how you can kind of fall into a casting rut because I just did an interview yesterday and the person interviewing me said, “So, Angela, you often play the heel. You’re kind of a heel in everything”. And I was like, “Um”.

DAVID DENMAN [00:13:22] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:13:23] “Yes. I, I have sort of made a way of playing the bitch or the weirdo. It’s kind of become my thing”.

DAVID DENMAN [00:13:31] It’s hard for people to see you outside of that box once you’re in it. And, and then, like the success of the show, it just continued on and on and on and on, which is fantastic. It’s more popular now than it ever was. And, you know, if you’re lucky enough to be part of something that like people enjoy and get into, and, that’s exciting. But to be part of something that gets into the culture of that, that is so rare and so impossible to, to be a part of that. I’m constantly grateful everyday that I got to be a little part, part of the show, because that’s, you know, very, very, very rare.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:14:12] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:14:13] So, David, at the beginning of Season 3, you came back to work and you were like super fit. We all noticed. Was this because you had done a movie role over the summer and they wrote it into the plot? Or did Greg get you aside and tell you this idea that Roy’s should come back and be all, like, excited to win Pam back and you sort of transformed for the show?

DAVID DENMAN [00:14:39] It was all for the show, but it was, and it was a conversation with Greg. I wouldn’t say Greg said, “Hey, go get in shape”. But he did say, he did take me aside and said, “Hey, I want, I got, I’d like to make you more of a rival of Jim’s next season”. I said, “Really”? Then he goes, “Yeah”. I said, “How are we going to do that? I mean, we’ve really made this guy such a knucklehead. I don’t know how anyone is going to root for Roy”. And he goes, “Well, I think, I think, I think you can do something and make it work. And we can also, you know, write it so, so we give them that opportunity”. And I said, “OK”. I said, “Well, I probably should get into shape then”. He goes, “OK, if you want to”. And one of our camera operators who became a director, you know, our buddy Matt Sohn, he was like, “You should do this triathlon”. And I was like, “Are you out of your mind? I’m not doing a triathlon. I don’t even, I barely run. I mean”. He was like, “You could do it. I’m telling you, you could do it”. I’m like, “No, no, that’s never gonna happen”. I mean, I, I played. Waterpolo in high school for like my freshman year. So I was a pretty good swimmer. I wasn’t worried about that, but I hadn’t ever been on a bike. He was like, “I know guys, I can get you a bike. And like, we should, you should just do it”. And, you know, it was like that conversation with Greg’s idea of trying to make, you know, Roy more of a rival just kind of put it all into motion. And so I started training for the Malibu triathlon, which I ended up doing like 10, I did that for like 10 years, I think. Every year and so many other people from “The Office” got, joined in on that. I don’t know if you, if either of you guys ever did it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:16:28] I never did it, but I remember this, David. I remember a bunch of the guys on the crew and some of the women as well.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:35] Teri Weinberg. Right? Teri Weinberg is like so fit. She really went all out.

DAVID DENMAN [00:16:41] Yeah. I see her out there every year. She still does it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:16:43] You guys would come back with photos and it was incredible.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:47] Yeah.

DAVID DENMAN [00:16:48] And it was always the same weekend as the Emmys, which was like, people would go do the, go do the triathlon in the morning and then to go change and go to an Emmy party that night.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:16:56] Oh, my God.

DAVID DENMAN [00:16:56] Which was hilarious to me. I like that’s-.

JENNA FISCHER [00:16:59] Well, I would have loved to have done that, David. But Angela doesn’t think I have the athleticism.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:04] Now that’s not true at all.

JENNA FISCHER [00:17:07] Thank you. Say it loud and clear for the “Office Ladies” audience, please.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:11] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:12] I need to hear your support for this argument, David.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:15] OK. First of all, do you, Angela, you have to remember this. And I hate to put you on point, but remember the year that Jenna decided to get into shape and was like-.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:26] Yes.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:26] And she was like, “I’m doing it, I am doing it”, and I’m like, “Good for it”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:31] Now David.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:31] And she was on the cover of like Shape magazine in a bikini.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:34] In a bikini. And she looked phenomenal.

DAVID DENMAN [00:17:35] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:17:35] She looked phenomenal.

JENNA FISCHER [00:17:36] David, here is what I’m saying to you. My argument is not that Jenna cannot get into shape. When she wants to get in shape, the woman is hardcore. You know. She also made a mixtape called “Sounds of Scranton”. She wrote a three page document about the background of Pam. When she wants to get in shape, by God, she gets in shape. But could she do a cartwheel and a backflip and throw a grenade in the air and then jump on a rope and swing across a parking lot? I’ve seen her carry a guitar through an airport, David, I saw her try to get a guitar on a plane.

DAVID DENMAN [00:18:12] OK, look, I stand corrected in regards to getting a guitar on a plane or doing a backflip through a parking lot, swing over a rope and I don’t know, like, is she going to be the next Lara Croft? Probably-.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:24] Exactly!

DAVID DENMAN [00:18:24] Probably not. But.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:28] This is my point, David.

DAVID DENMAN [00:18:29] She could do a triathlon. That’s all I’m saying.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:32] She, I, listen. I didn’t say she couldn’t do a triathlon. Jenna jumped in to give me shade and tried to get you on her side.

JENNA FISCHER [00:18:39] Whatever.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:39] I think she could do a triathlon.

JENNA FISCHER [00:18:41] Whatever.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:42] I think she would be the team leader. She’d have everyone on a schedule.

DAVID DENMAN [00:18:47] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:47] No doubt in my mind.

JENNA FISCHER [00:18:49] Whatever.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:51] Oh, Lord. Sass. We got some sass happening.

JENNA FISCHER [00:18:57] All right. Well, I have a question.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:18:59] Oh, OK.

JENNA FISCHER [00:19:00] For this interview.

DAVID DENMAN [00:19:01] Perfect.

JENNA FISCHER [00:19:01] I’m moving us along. David, in general, do you have any favorite scenes from your time on the show? Anything you just loved for any reason?

DAVID DENMAN [00:19:10] I do have a moment that I remember specifically, but it wasn’t anything that was on camera. It was, we were shooting the “Booze Cruise” episode. It was a long night. And the next morning, like we, as we were wrapping, they had a pontoon boat. And, and Steve and I jumped in the pontoon boat and we blazed through Long Beach Harbor as the sun was coming up. And it was like, it was awesome. And I just for some reason, remember that moment of my time on that show more than anything else.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:19:42] I love that. Well, David, I just want to get your take on the whole Angela and Roy thing, because there’s a lot of people online, there’s like a Reddit thread that Angela and Roy were having some secret love affair. We talked to Greg about it. Greg was like, “Uh, maybe if he had stayed on the show longer, but nah, I don’t think so”. But, but we could see where Roy would appeal to Angela, sort of this big gallant fella.

DAVID DENMAN [00:20:09] I remember that. Like, who would you do? I think, I think Roy was like, “Yeah. She’s hot”. I don’t, I don’t. I, like, like Greg said, I think if he’d been on the show, if I’d been on the show longer, that would have been a fun, you know, twist to throw in there to just create conflict.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:27] How much fun would it have been to revenge date Angela in front of Pam?

DAVID DENMAN [00:20:31] Oh. Oh, yeah. Oh, no. A hundred percent. That would have been, she would totally been into that. And Roy would’ve been into that too. I’m sure.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:20:40] Yeah.

DAVID DENMAN [00:20:40] That would have been funny. Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:20:42] Well, David, you got to have a lot of scenes with Craig Robinson. You sort of mentioned that we spent a lot of time in the office, but you got to do all those warehouse scenes and oftentimes the two of you were paired up. Do you have any stories from working with Craig or what that was like?

DAVID DENMAN [00:21:01] I love that dude. Like, like you. I got along with him really well. And we hung out outside of work quite a bit at the beginning. And I was trying to get him to do the triathlon, which he was not into. But we almost did, almost, a Muddy Buddy, which is this like crazy race where you, like, go on this obstacle course, like. And you get, I mean, literally you like, you do it with a partner or, or multiple people. And you help each other, like, climb across this obstacle courses, you go through mud, you get electrocuted like it’s the most insane like-.

JENNA FISCHER [00:21:43] Electrocuted?

DAVID DENMAN [00:21:43] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:43] What?

JENNA FISCHER [00:21:45] Why? Why are we electrocuting you?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:21:46] This sounds like a bad, yeah. This sounds like a bad frat hazing.

DAVID DENMAN [00:21:51] It’s not. It is horrible. And I did it once and I’ll never, ever do it again. But anyone who’s ever participated, they know there’s this one obstacle course where you have to crawl on the ground on your, through the mud. And they have these hanging like, like electric light currents that like once they touch your body, they zap you.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:09] Ah!

DAVID DENMAN [00:22:09] And like, it’s to keep you down low. But when you’re as big as I am, you just get zapped over and over and over again. It was the worst thing ever. Craig and I like we talked about it all the time. We were going to, we were so possibly going to do that. Maybe he just was just being nice to me, saying, “Maybe, I’ll think about that”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:22:31] One hundred percent he was.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:33] Yeah, I think he was totally placating you. “Yeah. Man, that sounds like a great idea. Buh bye”.

DAVID DENMAN [00:22:38] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:22:39] Oh, I love that.

DAVID DENMAN [00:22:41] Well, that’s my fantasy that Craig and I would have done one of those adventures together. Now I’m too old, I don’t want to do it. It’s nuts.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:22:46] I don’t want to do it 20 years ago. I don’t want to be zapped.

DAVID DENMAN [00:22:55] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:22:55] Now, on this episode, David, we have this scene at the Hungry Fox Diner, and it’s kind of Pam and Roy’s last big scene together for a while, because you do come back and we have another kind of heart-to-heart later. But this ends it for a while. And I remember shooting this scene with you and feeling kind of emotional because I knew that your regular time on “Office” was ending. Do you have any memories from that? Did Greg talk to you about that?

DAVID DENMAN [00:23:28] I’ll tell you, like, when I, when I found out. We did a table read and right then Craig got the phone call or right before that you guys had all got picked up for two more seasons, or maybe it was three seasons. I don’t know how many seasons it was at that point, but everyone was like, “Oh, my God. Yay”! And I was sitting right next to Greg. And I turned to Greg and I go, “I’m not coming back, am I”? And he goes, “No”. He goes, “But it’s not you. I just got to get Romeo and Juliet together. And I just don’t feel like I can do that with you here. And, but I don’t want to kill you off because I want you to come back”. And I said, “I get it”. And the coolest thing ever was, like I said, “Would it be OK for me to do like a, you know, a pilot or something”? Because it was right at the beginning of pilot season. He goes, “Yeah, I think that would be OK”. And, you know, oftentimes because they don’t want people to know something’s not going to happen. They won’t let you do that, like you’re under contract. And so they’re not going to allow you to do another show. And so he was very gracious to let me do that. And I ended up getting this really great pilot that ended up not going. But it was a, it was a big get for me, and definitely changed the trajectory of my career. Shortly after that, we did shoot this episode and I knew that I was leaving the show. And I was definitely, it was emotional for me too, because we’d become really good friends, you know?

JENNA FISCHER [00:24:47] Yeah.

DAVID DENMAN [00:24:47] And I, and we, we, you know, you know, I just knew that, like, it was, it was coming to an end. Like we did stay friends afterwards, but we didn’t see each other as often. You’re working and I’m off doing other things. And, you know, you just end up becoming friends with the people you’re working with. And, and that’s just the way life goes on these, on these shows. But, yeah, it was definitely emotional because I definitely felt like, you know, this cast, you know, you become a family. So, yeah, there was definitely emotional for me to shoot that last scene.

JENNA FISCHER [00:25:16] David, did you take anything from set when you wrapped? Do you have a memento? What would Roy take?

DAVID DENMAN [00:25:22] You know, it’s funny, I don’t. But I have. I don’t if you guys remember this, but like, the jacket that all of the warehouse wears was my jacket that I auditioned with.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:25:35] No.

DAVID DENMAN [00:25:36] Yeah. Yeah, it was, I bought this jacket from Old Navy and I wore it to my audition. And Greg said, “I want that jacket. What is that jacket”? And it’s kind of looks like a Dickie jacket. But it wasn’t it was this like, you know, like warehouse jacket that Old Navy made. And so poor costumes had to call Old Navy. They called me and they’re like, “Where’d you get that jacket? I have to get it because Greg says everyone has to wear that”. So then they bought every, every, you know, every thing they could get in stock of Old Navy’s jackets. So I have that original jacket. I don’t wear it anymore. I have it somewhere.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:11] Can you imagine if you put that jacket on and Jenna, the two of you met for lunch? Just you in that jacket and Jenna with their hair half up, half down. People would be like, “Bah”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:26:23] Well, David, thank you so much.

DAVID DENMAN [00:26:25] Thank you, guys.

JENNA FISCHER [00:26:26] It was really, really good to see you and reminisce.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:26:28] Well, David, what are you up to now that we can talk about here?

DAVID DENMAN [00:26:33] Well, I finished this a while ago, and it got pushed because of COVID. But I did this movie, “Greenland”, that’s out with Gerard Butler and Morena Baccarin that I think will be in theaters by the time this airs. It’s like a disaster movie. It’s really good, and I play, I play a really, really fun character. I don’t want to saying anything about it. And I’m doing this series called “Mare of Easttown” with Kate Winslet that we were in the middle of filming. And it’s amazing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:04] Holy Moly. That’s amazing.

DAVID DENMAN [00:27:06] She’s awesome. It’s great.

JENNA FISCHER [00:27:08] Well, I’m so excited for you. Kate Winslet is one of my idols. So can we please go out for drinks when you get back?

DAVID DENMAN [00:27:15] I will be happy to do that. I’d love to get drinks, it’d be fun.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:18] David, thank you. Thank you so much. It was so wonderful to see you. And I can’t wait to see all the things that you’re up to. They sound so wonderful.

DAVID DENMAN [00:27:25] Thank you, guys. So good to see you.

JENNA FISCHER [00:27:27] Thanks, David. Angela, that was so great getting to talk, David.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:35] I know, we’re just having the best time getting to see everyone from the show. But lady, are you ready to tackle this episode? Because a lot happens.

JENNA FISCHER [00:27:44] Oh, and it happens fast. Guys, this episode opens with Roy pacing outside in the parking lot.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:53] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:27:53] It’s kind of like he’s waiting, I think, for Jim to come out of the building. But Jim’s not coming out of the building.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:27:59] Yeah, it’s the end of the day. And Jim and Karen are kind of, they’re flirting and kind of making their plans, what they’re going to do. And Roy gets tired of waiting the parking lot and he comes on up inside.

JENNA FISCHER [00:28:10] Yeah. He just, he burst in, he yells for Jim. And Pam is like, oh, no.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:18] Well, did you notice? Jim right away looks right to you like, oh, crap.

JENNA FISCHER [00:28:22] Yeah. And then a lot happens. So Roy lunges at Jim. Jim just shoves Karen out of the way.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:32] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:28:33] He’s like, I got to get Karen out of this line of danger. And right before Roy gets his hands on Jim, Dwight pops up and just pepper sprays Roy in the face.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:28:46] I mean, Dwight doesn’t just spray him, douses him with the whole container. And it clearly starts to affect everyone in the bullpen.

JENNA FISCHER [00:28:56] Well, I remember Jeff Blitz talking to us about this. We had a whole conversation where he was like, listen, it’s not just the person who gets hit that suffers the consequences of pepper spray going off. Like this, it’s a, it’s a mist that will affect people in a general radius. And they did a bunch of research on it. And I remember us talking about what happens when you get pepper sprayed. And so that’s why I was like, OK, well, I’m going to pick up a tissue and I’m going to hold it to my eyes. And we were all blinking and kind of coughing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:29] Yeah, I believe it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:29:30] Well, Angela, we had a fan question about this scene from Lyla Dano, who is 11 years old. Hi, Lyla.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:36] Hi.

JENNA FISCHER [00:29:36] As well as, from Catherine M., Anna C., Stephanie T., Chloe J., and Hannah S. They all asked, “What did Dwight actually spray Roy with”? Because, I mean, obviously we didn’t pepper spray David Denman.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:29:52] Well, that’s a good question. And I was wondering it as well. I wonder if you had some Kentopedia or Phil Shea info for us.

JENNA FISCHER [00:29:58] I did ask Kentopedia about this, and Kent said that it was an Evian water bottle sprayer.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:07] Oh, well, that’s some good acting then, you guys.

JENNA FISCHER [00:30:09] Yeah. Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:30:11] You just got misted, basically, you basically went to the spa, aggressive, an aggressive spa.

JENNA FISCHER [00:30:17] Yes, exactly. Well, we had some other people write in Mnet Yeji, Aaron W., Gustavo G., Brianna L. and Carly G., all asked, “How much choreography went into filming the opening scene when Roy tries to punch Jim. How many takes were needed to get it done”? And Kent told me that we did, and I remember this, Ang, about a dozen takes of Roy just rushing in and we got everyone’s reactions and we staged that all out. Before we ever even got out the spray. And then we only did a couple of takes where we actually sprayed. And everything was overseen by a stunt coordinator and our stunt coordinators name was Bobby Porter.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:09] I remember Bobby Porter.

JENNA FISCHER [00:31:11] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:12] He was so sweet. Well, you know, Kevin and Angela aren’t there.

JENNA FISCHER [00:31:16] I know.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:16] They’re not there.

JENNA FISCHER [00:31:17] Oh, that’s right. So you would not have remembered that.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:20] No, we weren’t there. So. But, you know, obviously, Angela has many questions about this moment. We’ll get to that.

JENNA FISCHER [00:31:27] Yes, she does.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:31:29] Jenna, now we’re into the episode, and this is just one of my favorite scenes. Michael is talking to Jan on speakerphone. Toby is there. Jan is like, “Is Toby there”? Michael says “No”. And then Toby is like, “I’m right here, Jan”. And so Toby sort of updates Jan that Jim isn’t going to press charges. They’re going to let Roy go. But because Roy is leaving the warehouse, Darryl now wants a raise. He wants to renegotiate his, his job, right?

JENNA FISCHER [00:32:02] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:02] And this is going to prove to be problematic. And Jan says to Michael, “Are you gonna handle this”? And this couplet of dialog is one of my favorites. Sam, can you play it?

JAN [00:32:14] Can you take care of this?

MICHAEL [00:32:15] Yeppers.

JAN [00:32:16] What did I tell you about “yeppers”?

MICHAEL [00:32:20] I don’t remember.

JAN [00:32:22] I told you not to say it. Do you remember that.

MICHAEL [00:32:25] Yesh.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:30] Jenna, I love this so much. I had to rewatch it a few times because this is a window into their relationship. And I love the Jan Michael dynamic so much. How many times has he said “yeppers” to her at home in their condo? How many times has he said it in the car or whatever they’re doing and she has had it-.

JENNA FISCHER [00:32:50] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:50] With “yeppers”. Yeppers is done.

JENNA FISCHER [00:32:53] And she really doesn’t want to have to say it again.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:32:56] How many times have I told you not to say “yeppers”?

JENNA FISCHER [00:32:58] Yesh.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:00] Yesh. OK. Do you have a word that, like, triggers you like that? Have you had a relationship or someone says something or a friendship?

JENNA FISCHER [00:33:09] Oh, that’s a good question, do you?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:11] Well, I actually have had someone in my life, no names mentioned, that has said “Any who”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:33:20] Interesting.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:33:22] “Any who”. And let me tell you, “Any who” repeated over and over, it can make you snap.

JENNA FISCHER [00:33:28] I don’t love the phrase “Brain fart”. I don’t, I don’t love when people say, “Oh, I had a brain fart”. Why do I? I don’t know why, I just don’t love it. Well, listen, after this, Angela, Pam has this talking head. There’s this kind of a series of talking heads. Pam says, you know, she doesn’t want to be rude, but she would prefer not to comment on what happened. But it sucked. And at the end of that talking head, I feel like I smirk a little bit. Did you notice this? We had people write in about it. They were like, why does she kind of smirk at the end? She says it sucked. But is she smirking because she kind of liked it in some way? You guys, I’m Pam, and I was completely thrown by this performance choice. I don’t know what I was doing there.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:34:20] I mean, I sort of thought you were, like, trying to shrug it off, like it sucked. You know how like when people are really uncomfortable, sometimes they smile?

JENNA FISCHER [00:34:30] Yeah, I think that’s what I was doing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:34:32] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:34:33] I certainly was not intending to make you think that Pam liked it.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:34:39] No, she was really uncomfortable by it. I think so uncomfortable that she doesn’t even quite know how to relay, relay in the moment. It’s like someone with a nervous laughter.

JENNA FISCHER [00:34:48] Yeah, she’s, she’s embarrassed. And we’re going to see later in the episode like she is, she’s truly embarrassed by this.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:34:56] I love this episode so much. And I feel like Mike Schur’s really, really delivered on some dialog. In particular, I loved when Jim was trying to thank Dwight. He just wanted to thank him. And Rain has great dialog as Dwight. He says, “Thank you not necessary. Does not accept it. Don’t want it. Won’t open it. Don’t need it. Won’t take it”. He’s got this really fun runner of how he is responding to Jim. Just simply trying to say thank you.

JENNA FISCHER [00:35:21] Yeah. And Jim is going to keep trying to show his appreciation through this episode. And Dwight will not have it.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:35:28] No.

JENNA FISCHER [00:35:29] Well, now, Angela, we get to a scene that I love so much and we got a lot of mail about. Like-.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:35:35] OK.

JENNA FISCHER [00:35:35] This is when Oscar gives Angela Roy’s check and says Roy will be coming to pick this up later this afternoon. Kevin is really bummed that he missed the fight. And Angela says to Oscar, “Yeah, I missed it, too. Could you, could you describe it”? And so Oscar explains the fight and Dwight’s heroism. How can we describe it? It has a real effect on Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:03] I mean, guys, let’s just call it out. She’s totally turned on by this moment of, like, gallant behavior by Dwight. And Roy? I don’t know what’s happening. The whole interaction clearly does it for her. You have to remember in Season 5 down the road, “Blood Drive”, we learn that Angela has had two men duel over her.

JENNA FISCHER [00:36:28] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:28] So she, she has a thing for these dueling fellas. Mike Schur, I, I feel like always like to put my character in these really like throes of emotion, whether she was incredibly upset or aroused or pissed off, like I feel like he’d like to see her journey through that.

JENNA FISCHER [00:36:49] Yes. Well, she’s not a very emotionally showy person. And I think Mike liked to play with that a little bit.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:36:57] Mmhmm. Well, we certainly had a lot of fun. I remember when we were doing this episode having conversations with Jeff Blitz and Mike about how much of her hand would she tip. Right?

JENNA FISCHER [00:37:10] Mmhmm.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:10] Like, how much would she really show? And that was really fun to play around with. I did some takes where I reacted a little bit bigger, some a little smaller. And just finding those nuances was so much fun for me as an actor.

JENNA FISCHER [00:37:22] Well, we had a fan catch Angela from Madeline Webber and Greg Rodriguez. They said, “Around 4 minutes, 30 seconds, Angela appears to be rubbing a heart shaped necklace while Oscar talks about Dwight’s heroic actions. Do you think that this necklace was given to Angela by Dwight”? Any thoughts on that, Angela?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:44] I have never thought about that. It was actually, if I remember, kind of like a tiny locket.

JENNA FISCHER [00:37:49] Mmhmm.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:37:50] And I remember when I was talking to Jeff Blitz about doing the scene, we talked about ways I might fidget a little to sort of show my emotion in this moment. And wardrobe had given me this necklace and I just began to play with it. I loved the idea that it’s a necklace that Dwight gave her, though, that adds a nice layer. I didn’t think that through, though. So. So that’s a great idea.

JENNA FISCHER [00:38:17] Well, we had more questions, Angela, more mail, please excuse me, but people want to know, Ellis Friedman said, “Angela, you have all of these beautiful micro expressions on your face. How are you able to do that without doing too much? You do it a lot in the series, but you really get to shine in this episode”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:38:38] Aw, thank you. That is so nice. I remember when I got the script and I read Oscar’s retelling of it, you know, his, he’s just telling it matter of factly what happened. But I did a little bit of homework as an actor. I wrote next to Oscar’s lines what emotion that line made me think of. And then when I did the scene, I played through those emotions on my face. And they were, you know, an example would be like surprise, nervousness, excited, embarrassed, you know what I mean?

JENNA FISCHER [00:39:11] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:11] So I would go through all of that and just kind of very subtlety just do emotions. So as he said his lines, I was thinking of those emotions.

JENNA FISCHER [00:39:22] I love that. That’s so actory, Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:24] I know, I did my homework.

JENNA FISCHER [00:39:26] Oh, the actor nerd in me loves it. I love that.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:31] Well, Jenna, I could talk about these scenes because they were so juicy for me. But let’s move along. I want to talk about Michael’s tactics that he has learned on Wikipedia. The best thing ever. And he’s going to try them out on, Jim, these negotiating tactics.

JENNA FISCHER [00:39:49] Yes. Yes, he wants to role play.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:39:53] I mean, his ideas are you lean back, you mumble your words, you change location, surprise them. Guys, I looked up the art of negotiation online because, of course, I did.

JENNA FISCHER [00:40:07] And?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:40:09] This is not how you do it. As, as we are learning, Michael’s ways are not the way to do it. I will tell you, Jenna, there is so much to learn about negotiation. And the more I read, the more I realize what a horrible negotiator I have been in my career. It’s a true art form. There’s a whole theory of negotiation. I found it fascinating. But one of the things every sort of guide to negotiating has in common, and I, I read Forbes magazine, Business Insider. I went to the Harvard Law School website. And one of the things is they all say, “Do your homework, know your goals. Listen. Ask for what you want”. Right? And also, one of the things they talk about is that a negotiation is not the same as conflict. You have to be willing to compromise or just say no if you don’t like the offer. And I think I grew up, Jenna, I don’t know if it was just my family dynamic, but to negotiate something seemed confrontational. And it’s not. It’s just expressing your needs and seeing if that other person or other company or whatever is willing to meet you halfway. And you go back and forth. I found it really, it felt like a, like a mini therapy session for me.

JENNA FISCHER [00:41:31] Well, I remember I got some amazing advice from a very successful businessman right before I was getting ready to negotiate a big deal. And he said something that I’ve noticed, especially about women in negotiation, is they tend to negotiate with themselves first and they go in with where they’ve already compromised. So he’s like, if you want three weeks vacation, I see women especially talk themselves out of that or they think that’s too much to ask for. So then they ask for two and then they get one. And he said, “So my advice to you is go in there and really ask for what you want. Like, don’t negotiate with yourself first. Just negotiate with the company”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:23] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:42:23] And I’ve never forgotten it.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:25] And it’s not conflict.

JENNA FISCHER [00:42:26] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:26] Negotiating is not conflict. It’s totally different. It’s going in there to be an advocate for yourself.

JENNA FISCHER [00:42:35] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:37] It was so, I loved it. So anyway, there’s tons of really great things online, and then, I won’t even get into this, somehow I ended up on a website that talked about the best and worst negotiations throughout history that involve countries and policy. And it was fascinating.

JENNA FISCHER [00:42:54] Well, I need to know about that.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:42:56] I know for later. For later. This is a big episode.

JENNA FISCHER [00:42:59] Well, now, Angela, we go back to the annex and Toby is clearly taking statements on what happened and he is taking Dwight’s statement. In the meantime, Ryan and Kelly are on the other side of the partition and they are eavesdropping and they start getting in a fight because Ryan is like, “I wonder what I would have done if I had been there”? And Kelly’s like, “I know exactly what you would have done, because when that kid dropped their shake on me when we were on the Ferris wheel, you just laughed. And you didn’t stand up for me”. And, oh, this starts a whole thing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:36] Ryan and Kelly remind me of that SNL sketch, the Bickersons. Do you remember that?

JENNA FISCHER [00:43:41] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:43:41] The couple that, like, gets, really awkwardly fights at the, at the dinner table and then makes out in the hallway at a party. And they’re doing all of this behind Toby. And he has a brilliant line where he says, “I don’t think Michael intended to punish me by putting Ryan back here with Kelly. But if he did intend that, wow, genius”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:44:04] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:04] Well, now, at 7 minutes, 40 seconds, guys, Darryl has arrived to negotiate with Michael, and Michael is already trying out his tactics.

JENNA FISCHER [00:44:13] He’s going to change the location at the last minute, but then he’s changes it back.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:18] And then they sit in silence.

JENNA FISCHER [00:44:19] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:20] And then he won’t speak first. Oh, that was so awkward. They sat there for so long.

JENNA FISCHER [00:44:25] I love Craig Robinson in these scenes. He’s so still. Right? He’s just sitting there and it’s so confuses Michael. Like Michael does not understand. So finally, he says, “I’m declining to speak first”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:42] Yeah. He can’t take it anymore.

JENNA FISCHER [00:44:45] And Daryl’s like, “All right, I’ll start”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:44:48] Well, I think Darryl, if you guys read about negotiation theory, he’s come with a clear vision of what he wants and there’s no B.S. He’s very upfront. And Michael is doing all this weird stuff and cannot understand that Darryl is not thrown by it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:45:06] And it’s at this moment when Darryl says, “Michael, are you wearing a woman’s suit”?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:15] I think he says, “Are you wearing lady clothes”?

JENNA FISCHER [00:45:18] That’s right. And Michael’s like, “What are you talking about”?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:45:21] Michael goes on to tell this talking head that I love. He said he found a suit in a bin and there were a lot of people, and they were rifling through things like crazy. And, and I don’t know, maybe the suit is bisexual. It’s, it’s mis-, it’s made by Mysterious. And there’s buttons on the wrong side. Maybe that’s the mystery. It’s European, OK? It’s a European cut. He just is like rambling all this stuff and Jenna, I love the idea that Michael went to some crazy day after Thanksgiving Black Friday craziness at some like department store and was rifling through a bin.

JENNA FISCHER [00:45:59] Yeah. And he was really proud of it. I think he really did think he had bought like a European suit.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:05] On sale.

JENNA FISCHER [00:46:06] Well, he comes out into the bullpen and he’s like, “Pam, Pam, will you please tell everyone that this is not a woman’s suit”? And Pam is like, “Oh, my gosh, it doesn’t have any pockets”. And then when Steve turns around and, like, shows how he can’t put his hands in his back pockets, it makes me laugh so hard.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:29] Yeah. And Phyllis is like, “And it has shoulder pads”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:46:33] Well, let me just say, Angela, this scene points out something that has been a pet peeve of mine for a long time. More than a pet peeve. So if you’ll excuse me, I need to get my soapbox and I’m gonna be there for a second.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:45] I was, I was going to say, are you about stand up on a soapbox?

JENNA FISCHER [00:46:48] I am. I want to discuss the lack of adequate pockets on women’s clothing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:46:55] OK, I know this about you already. Go.

JENNA FISCHER [00:46:58] Well, first of all, I did a deep dive on pockets because it has bothered me for a long time. You know, Angela, I’ve had back problems, so it is not comfortable or practical for me to carry a purse. So I had this idea, I’m going to just carry a wallet in my pocket. Men do it all the time. Why can’t I do that? But whenever I would try to put, like, my phone or a wallet in my pockets, they pop out when I sit down. And here is why. Are you ready?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:31] I don’t know if I’m ready, bring it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:47:33] So in the beginning, all clothing was made without pockets and everyone, men and women, carried around a little pouch with their money and belongings. If you’ve ever watched “Little House on the Prairie”, you’ve seen it. Both Ma and Pa, they both carry around a little pouch.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:49] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [00:47:51] All right.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:51] And what was it? Was the pouch called?

JENNA FISCHER [00:47:53] I don’t know. It was just a pocket pouch.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:47:56] Oh, that’s so interesting, because I know my mom will still sometimes say, “Will you get me my pocketbook”?

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:02] Yes. Because your pocket was not a thing that was sewn on you. It was a thing you carried.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:09] Oh, that makes very, I always wondered where “pocketbook” came from. OK. Go on. I’m, I’m interested. Let’s do it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:15] All right. So about 400 years ago, they started sewing pockets into men’s clothing, but not women’s clothing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:21] Why not?

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:22] Well, some historians think that it was a way to keep women sort of powerless. Like you couldn’t hide keys or money or do business. Like your pocket was on the outside of you, you were more vulnerable.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:39] OK, all right.

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:40] OK. Less secure.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:42] Got it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:43] But then in the late 1800s, there was a movement called the Rational Dress Society.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:49] Jenna, are these your people? These are your people. The Rational Dress Society.

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:54] Well, listen to what these women did.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:48:56] What?

JENNA FISCHER [00:48:58] Their goal was to, quote, “dress for comfort and health”. Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:03] These are definitely your people.

JENNA FISCHER [00:49:05] I know. These women are definitely in drawstring pants today. I’ll tell you that.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:11] Oh, they are.

JENNA FISCHER [00:49:13] Well, back then, their main goal was to get women to abandon the corset because it was literally unhealthy to wear a corset. And they also really pushed for women to be able to wear trousers with pockets without stigma.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:29] Love it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:49:30] All right. Eventually, in 1920, Coco Chanel started sewing pockets into women’s jackets. But it was not until the 1970s when women regularly started wearing jeans, that we finally had pockets on a regular basis, Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:45] That is crazy to me because, I mean, the 70s are not that long ago. Someone sitting right here might have been born in the 70s.

JENNA FISCHER [00:49:52] I was born in the 70s.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:49:53] I know. And that’s when my lady started having more pockets? That’s crazy.

JENNA FISCHER [00:49:58] Well, they started having pockets, Angela, but they weren’t great. Because pockets on women’s clothing are either sewn shut in the example of Michael’s suit. What am I supposed to do with that? What am I doing with a faux pocket?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:15] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:50:15] Or they are proportionally smaller than men’s pockets.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:20] Oh. Oh, that’s so true. I cannot fit my cell phone in my pants pocket. It falls out of the side. It doesn’t fit.

JENNA FISCHER [00:50:26] Well, Angela, I’ll tell you what. I read a report that tested 80 pairs of pockets on both men’s and women’s blue jeans, all with a waist size of 32.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:37] So wait. Same size pants.

JENNA FISCHER [00:50:39] Same size pants. So you can’t say, oh, the pockets are smaller because women’s pants are smaller than men’s pants. No. They are proportionally smaller. On average, women’s front pockets were 48 percent smaller and 6.5 percent more narrow.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:55] Why?

JENNA FISCHER [00:50:55] I don’t know.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:50:56] I mean, I get it if like, it’s like a smaller, like style. You know what I mean? But on two pairs of jeans that are made the same.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:06] You know, Angela, here’s my thing.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:10] OK. Am I getting out your so, your soap box?

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:13] My soap box is out.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:15] OK. Get on it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:16] Here’s what I want to say, Angela. I think we all know that women do not get paid the same as men, even if they’re doing the same job. And we also know now that our pockets don’t hold as much. I just think we need bigger pockets.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:33] And bigger paychecks.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:35] Cha-ching. Can I get my “cha-ching”? Equal pay for equal pockets. Hashtag it, everyone.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:43] Hashtag, Jenna. I liked the history of pockets. I found that fascinating.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:47] Yeah. Thank you very much.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:48] You’re welcome. You-.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:50] I’m passionate about pockets and Angela, I’m also passionate about high heel shoes and why we shouldn’t wear them. But I’ll save that for another episode.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:51:58] OK.

JENNA FISCHER [00:51:58] Well, you know, Michael is just so embarrassed and devastated. You know, he’s not, he thought he was on top of things with this negotiation and this has really thrown him.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:08] Yeah. He said he made one mistake. You can’t make any mistakes in negotiating, but he wore one. But he made one mistake, wearing women’s clothing.

JENNA FISCHER [00:52:17] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:19] And now, Jenna, this scene takes us to the kitchen. And I have labeled this scene at 11 minutes, 15 seconds. “Kevin, the Shit Stirrer”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:52:29] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:31] I mean, Kevin, listen to what he says to Karen in front of Stanley and Angela. Kevin says, “So, Karen, how do you feel that Roy tried to kick your boyfriend’s ass over another woman”? I mean.

JENNA FISCHER [00:52:46] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:47] Kevin, sit down, Kevin. You need to sit down.

JENNA FISCHER [00:52:50] But then Angela is like, “You know, I wasn’t there. I mean, what happened? I wasn’t there”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:52:56] I know.

JENNA FISCHER [00:52:56] Because she wants Karen to tell her the story. She cannot get enough.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:00] I remember talking to Phil Shea about what I should be eating in this scene. And we thought it would be kind of funny if she’s eating grapes. It’s very sort of like, like Renaissance moment for her.

JENNA FISCHER [00:53:12] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:13] Of like the lady eating grapes being titillated by a story.

JENNA FISCHER [00:53:17] So now we go back to Michael’s office. He and Darryl are still negotiating. And Darryl makes a very compelling argument for why he deserves a raise.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:27] Yeah, he said he’s picking up Roy’s slack. I mean, that, that is so legitimate. But Jenna, I have to tell you, there is a fantastic blooper moment, if you go to the bloopers on YouTube. You know, Michael is doing that weird mumble tack, “bleh bleh bleh’, like that.

JENNA FISCHER [00:53:43] Yeah. Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:53:45] And there’s some great bloopers of Steve and Craig just cracking up. I loved it.

JENNA FISCHER [00:53:49] Aw, I love that. Well, I don’t know if you noticed in the background over Darryl’s shoulder, Pam is not at reception. Do you know why?

ANGELA KINSEY [00:54:00] Ooh, that’s a good catch, ’cause she’s in the break room.

JENNA FISCHER [00:54:03] Yeah. She’s in the break room and she’s experiencing major heart break in the break room.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:54:12] Lady, I titled this scene “Despair in the Break Room”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:54:18] Oh no. Well-.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:54:18] Despair

JENNA FISCHER [00:54:20] Well, I thought it was so heartbreaking, I felt it warranted a little musical intro. Sam, could you play “Heartbreak in the Break Room” by Josh Compton?

JOSH COMPTON [00:54:38] [“Heartbreak in the Break Room” by Josh Compton plays.]

ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:46] Yeah, well, ain’t that the truth? Heartbreak again. Now, Jenna, this scene when I watched it, I did think of Dwight and Angela scenes just in the fact of the staging.

JENNA FISCHER [00:55:58] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:55:58] He doesn’t look at you. His back is towards you the whole time.

JENNA FISCHER [00:56:03] Yes. Yeah. And Pam gets pretty vulnerable here.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:56:11] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:56:11] She’s really trying to connect. She says, “I’m really sorry, it’s over with Roy”, and Jim is doing that thing where he’s like, “Oh, yeah. No, I’m sure it’s fine. I mean, come on, you guys will get back together again, I’m sure”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:56:29] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:56:30] Oh, he’s being so cold.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:56:30] So cold and, and he doesn’t believe her. That’s the thing. I really believe that he doesn’t believe her. He’s like, “We’ll see. You guys were good together. You’ll probably figure it out”. And she’s just like, “Oof”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:56:42] Yeah. Oh, she just feels so bad, so embarrassed. And, you know, Jim has just been down this road too many times with her. I think he’s really, really trying to move on. And that’s why he’s behaving this way in the scene. He’s like, “I can’t do this again”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:02] Yeah, well, I think he’s probably frustrated with himself that he, he let himself get to a place emotionally where he could see them together again and in Phyllis his wedding, that was just crushed.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:15] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:16] And he’s just not gonna put himself out there like that anymore.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:20] It’s too much drama.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:21] So much drama.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:22] You know, I get it. I get why he’s like, “You know what? I’m not going there”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:27] Yeah, well, then in the next scene, we find out that Michael hasn’t had a raise in 14 years.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:35] He’s never been given a raise. Ever.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:37] Ever. And, and he shows Darryl his paystub. And Darryl was like, “Oh, my God. Any wonder they’re not gonna give me a raise? Look what they’re paying you. You’ve got to ask for a raise”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:48] Yeah. And he convinces Michael to call Jan and ask for a raise.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:57:55] But before Michael hits up Jan, we find Jim and Karen in the kitchen.

JENNA FISCHER [00:57:59] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:00] Jim is eatin’ his carrots.

JENNA FISCHER [00:58:02] 15 minutes, 22 seconds. Bag of carrots.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:06] Bag of carrots. And, you know, he wants Karen’s advice about how he can thank Dwight. And she was like, “Well, are you feeling guilty for all those pranks you pulled on him”?

JENNA FISCHER [00:58:15] Jim’s like, “Yeah, maybe that’s it”. And she says, “OK, we’ll go sell some paper so we can go on a trip”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:21] Yeah. Focus on work.

JENNA FISCHER [00:58:23] She’s so practical.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:26] I know. He’s like, “Dang it. I don’t want practicality. I want to play pranks with Pam, but I can’t because she keeps breaking my heart”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:58:33] Yes. Well, finally, Michael does pick up the phone, right? He’s like, “I’m gonna call Jan and I’m gonna ask for a raise”. And he’s got Jan on speaker phone and Darryl is supervising. He’s kind of like going to be his support, right? His coach.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:58:50] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [00:58:51] And Jan tells Michael the only way they can discuss a possible raise is if he comes in person by five o’clock and he has to bring Toby.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:01] And he says, “Toby is the worst human being I’ve ever known”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:59:05] Michael says, “I’m bringing Darryl”. And she’s like, “Michael, we need someone from H.R.”.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:10] So now the three of them are gonna be on this weird road trip. In the meantime, Angela still wants to hear this story, guys, she’s not done. And she asked Creed, here’s Creed’s version. Ready?

JENNA FISCHER [00:59:22] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:23] “Big fella comes in about 11:30 at night, screaming Jim stole his car. Big fella pulls out a sock full of nickels. Schrute grabs hairspray and a lighter”.

JENNA FISCHER [00:59:32] So insane.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:34] So insane. Angela’s like, “You’re useless”. Then she goes to Kelly and Kelly’s like, “You know, I think Toby wrote a whole report about it”. And Angela’s like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. And she goes and steals the report.

JENNA FISCHER [00:59:48] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [00:59:49] I mean, what is she up to? And I have to point out, we haven’t talked about it. This is a very classic Angela Martin hairdo.

JENNA FISCHER [00:59:57] Yes. I was gonna ask you. It looks like the Angela Martin braid, but also it’s a ponytail.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:04] I think it’s the headband braid ponytail version. I will tell you, it’s all my hair. That is not a hairpiece. Kim Ferry, the master of hair. She was able to separate a little piece, do this braid over, pin it into a ponytail. And, and that’s all my hair, guys.

JENNA FISCHER [01:00:23] I love it. Did it give you a headache?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:27] It didn’t. Those did not give me a headache. It was more like the severe buns.

JENNA FISCHER [01:00:32] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:32] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:00:34] Well, listen, we’re about to hit the road with Michael and Darryl and Toby, but before we do, let’s take a break and we’ll be right back.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:00:49] All right, so now Toby and Darryl and Michael are in the car. This is hilarious pairing. No one’s comfortable. He’s like, “You’re comfortable”. “No”. “You’re comfortable”? “No”. And then Darryl is like saying maybe I’ll crash in New York for the night. And, and Toby’s like, “How will we get back”? He’s like, “You could stay”. And then, but Michael’s not invited.

JENNA FISCHER [01:01:09] I know. I love this odd grouping of people.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:14] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [01:01:14] This is one of my favorite things. This feels very Mike Schur to me as well. He loved to team up odd characters. Angela, I have to say, they bring up the movie “Rush Hour” in the car. Right?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:27] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:01:28] And this made me think of the movie “Speed”. Stay with me here. Do you remember a few podcasts back? You were like line for line quoting “Speed”. And I was like, “When is the last time you watch ‘Speed’”? And you were like, “Three days ago”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:47] “Pop quiz, asshole”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:01:48] There it is. Well, I got that in my head. And I was like, huh, maybe I should watch “Speed”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:01:56] Did you watch Speed”?

JENNA FISCHER [01:01:58] Angela, it is so good. Everybody watch “Speed”. OK? Keanu Reeves, Sandra Bullock, Jeff Daniels.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:09] I mean, you guys, this movie has everything. It’s action, romance, friendship, I mean, and it’s peak Keanu Reeves hotness.

JENNA FISCHER [01:02:19] It is peak Keanu Reeves hotness. Well, Angela, I’ll tell you what. I enjoyed “Speed” so much that then I watched “Point Break”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:28] Oh. Oh, wait. “Surf’s up, bruh”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:02:31] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:32] Johnny Utah. Are you kidding me?

JENNA FISCHER [01:02:35] Johnny Utah. Let me tell you this. You thought that “Speed” was peak Keanu Reeves hotness. But in “Point Brea”, he starts in the rain and he ends in the rain. OK?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:48] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:02:48] He’s it’s a beautiful, it, Kathryn Bigelow directed it.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:02:53] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:02:54] Again, there is, in the movie “Point Break”, there is a five minute, at least five minute foot chase through people’s backyards and houses and-.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:05] Jumping over fences.

JENNA FISCHER [01:03:07] When do you see that anymore in movies? I absolutely love both these movies. So I have decided that to get me through the rest of 2020, I will become a Keanu Reeves film aficionado. And I think I’m going to start next on the “John Wick” movies, which I’ve never seen.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:26] Well, Josh has seen the “John Wick” movies. He told me they might be too violent for me. But I love Keanu Reeves. You know, I love him.

JENNA FISCHER [01:03:34] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:35] And I have seen pretty much all of his movies, but maybe I’ll watch “John Wick” with you.

JENNA FISCHER [01:03:39] Let’s watch “John Wick” and we’ll get back to each other. We’re gonna have to go into some “Bill and Ted’s”, you know, the new one just came out and-.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:47] My friend Erin Hayes got to kiss Keanu Reeves.

JENNA FISCHER [01:03:51] Well, you’re going to need to get some information on that and bring that to the podcast.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:03:55] Erin was in “Hot Wives of Vegas” with me on Hulu.

JENNA FISCHER [01:03:58] When did she kiss Keanu Reeves.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:00] In “Bill and Ted’s”. Second one.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:02] Oh.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:02] What about “A Walk in the Clouds”? What about that one?

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:05] Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t know. I mean, he’s, we have a lot to do.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:09] Don’t get me started on “The Matrix”. One of my favorite movies ever.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:12] Well, I don’t need to rewatch those because I’ve seen them so many times. But I will because I want to.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:18] “There is no spoon”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:18] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:22] Oh, I’m so excited. I had no idea you went down that.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:25] It’s what I am doing now.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:28] Down the rabbit hole. Oh, my God, they play football on the beach. Are you kidding me?

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:31] All right. So the guys, eventually they get to New York. They get to Dunder Mifflin. And we find Michael sitting in the lobby and he looks over to the woman sitting next to him and she is wearing the same suit.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:47] You know, Jenna, I looked up, how many times does Michael Scott wear women’s clothing by accident? This is going to be a recurring thing.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:56] It is?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:04:57] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [01:04:58] Do I not remember this?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:05:00] OK. In “Launch Party”, he has on a shirt that’s way too tight. And the consensus is that it was probably a woman shirt.

JENNA FISCHER [01:05:07] OK.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:05:08] And then in “Nepotism”, Erin mentions that the pants Michael had that she had to return to Talbots or something. So clearly he has bought some women’s suits repeatedly and, and he says he won’t make that mistake again.

JENNA FISCHER [01:05:23] Well, we got some mail. We had some questions from Maroona T., Briona K., Meghan S., Rachel Hayes and Dan Saliman. They said, “Was Steve really wearing a woman’s suit or was it custom made for him”? So and I reached out to Carey Bennett, our wardrobe designer.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:05:47] Awesome.

JENNA FISCHER [01:05:47] Here is what she told me. She said, “It really was a ladies suit”. She did not have time to sew something from scratch because they would have had to also sew a matching suit for the woman in the lobby. So here’s what she did. She said the first thing she did was try to find a woman suit that would fit Steve and then hope that she could buy an identical one to fit the woman. So she went to stores with a measuring tape looking for a jacket and pants that would fit Steve’s measurements. But also, she said it had to look masculine enough that it would be plausible that Michael would be confused enough to buy it from a bargain bin.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:06:30] Right.

JENNA FISCHER [01:06:32] She said that Steve was always so wonderful and generous with his time in the fittings and that oftentimes he would learn about a plot point for a future episode from her. And this was one of those times. She said he walked into a fitting and she was like, “So today I’m going to need you to try on all of these women’s suits”. And Steve was like, “For, why”? And she was like, “Well, let me tell you. There’s gonna be an episode next week where this happens”. Because, you know, they would give the crew these scripts a couple of weeks in advance so they could prepare. But the actors, we would only get them, what, five days before we started shooting?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:07:14] Sometimes the day of, Jenna.

JENNA FISCHER [01:07:16] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:07:16] Sometimes we would get them like an hour before the lunch table read. It depended on what kind of turnaround and how long the script was taking. And I learned about storylines many times and wardrobe. I totally relate to that. I remember learning about Dwight and Angela’s wedding because I was going to need to be fitted for a wedding dress.

JENNA FISCHER [01:07:36] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:07:37] Jenna, do you realize that this is the first time we meet Hunter?

JENNA FISCHER [01:07:44] Yes. Played by Nicholas D’Agosto.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:07:47] And Michael’s like, “You didn’t tell me you hired James Van Der Beek.

JENNA FISCHER [01:07:52] Well, you know, Angela, this guy has a very extensive resumé. I looked him up, but he was in the movie “Election” with Reese Witherspoon and Matthew Broderick.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:00] I love that movie.

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:02] Yes. He has starred in “Gotham” and “Trial and Error”. But I was very excited because he is the lead of “Final Destination 5”. And I’m a huge fan of the “Final Destination” movies.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:18] I’ve never seen one of them.

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:20] What?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:21] Well, you haven’t seen “Speed”. Come on.

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:24] I’ve seen “Speed”. I just haven’t seen “Speed” in a while.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:28] Had you seen “Point Break”?

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:29] Of course I’ve seen “Point Break”. It came out in 1991 when I was a senior in high school. Of course I saw it. Every girl-.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:38] OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:38] Who was 17 years old saw “Point Break”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:08:41] OK, I haven’t seen “Final Destination”. Is it a scary movie? Do they have to get somewhere? And if they don’t get there, they die or something? It’s their final destination.

JENNA FISCHER [01:08:50] Here’s what happens. Everyone starts the same, but different. There is a major catastrophe, for example, in “Final Destination 5”, they are supposed to take a bus over a bridge, but-.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:06] Who’s they?

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:07] Like a group of kids, like it’s always like a group of teenagers are traveling somewhere by plane or bus or maybe on the highway and like a major accident happens and they’re all killed.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:19] Asteroid. Something like that?

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:21] No, it’s not science fiction, Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:23] Oh, OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:24] There’s no asteroid that falls from the sky.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:26] OK. OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:28] It’s always like a series of little things that lead to a giant calamity. So like someone’s tire bursts and then the car spins and then that hits a truck and then things fall off the truck and hit another truck and then something slams into something and then the whole bridge ends up collapsing. Right?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:44] And they’re trapped on the bus, hanging from the bridge or something?

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:46] No, they’re dead. They all die.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:09:49] Oh. Oh. Oh, then how do you have a movie?

JENNA FISCHER [01:09:51] Exactly. Every movie opens up with like a giant disaster moment and then it rewinds and you realize that it’s a person’s premonition of what’s about to happen. And that person freaks out and says, “Everybody, get off the bus. We’re all going to die. We’re all going to die”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:07] OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:07] And he convinces everyone to get off the bus. And they think he’s crazy. And they get off the bus. And then everything happens as they envisioned it. But they live because of the person’s weird premonition. Right?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:19] OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:20] But here’s the problem, Angela.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:22] Do they all die anyway?

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:24] They were meant to die on that bus.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:26] Right.

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:26] And they’ve cheated death. And so death is now going to come for them slowly, one by one in the order that they would have died in the accident.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:34] Oh, OK.

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:35] Yeah, it’s the same plot every time. But they’re great.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:40] Sounds really stressful.

JENNA FISCHER [01:10:42] It, it, I like movies. I like it. They relax me and, I shouldn’t say they relax me.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:10:49] No, I think they do, Jenna. I think they do because I think, I love you, but you will play out the worst case scenario of every situation.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:01] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:01] To sort of prepare yourself.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:03] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:03] So I think movies like this are all horrible, worst case scenarios.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:09] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:09] And in your mind you’re like, oh yeah. I would, I would think about that. I can relate to that.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:13] Yes. Angela, thank you for saying this. I found “Uncut Gems” very, mmmm, I don’t want to say soothing, but I just want to say that my brain operates on that level of stress and anxiety all the time.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:29] Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:30] So when I see it depicted, it’s sort of, it’s like it cancels it out. And I feel like, oh, finally someone’s meeting me where I am.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:40] Yeah. You feel seen. I think you feel seen.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:43] Yeah. So whereas I know like you or Lee watch a movie like that and you’re like, I can’t handle this. I can’t do this, right?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:52] Yeah. That’s not, that’s not recreation for me.

JENNA FISCHER [01:11:54] No.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:11:54] I don’t want to feel like that in my free time. I want to watch “Pride and Prejudice”. I want to watch Keira Knightley say “Mr. Darcy. Mr. Darcy”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:03] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:04] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:05] Well, anyway, that was a little bit of a tangent, but I just want you to know, that’s Hunter.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:10] So now Roy is coming to collect his final paycheck. You know, Angela must be very excited. She’s so thrilled now, Roy and Dwight are in the same room. Oh. Anything could happen.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:23] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:24] And there’s a moment where Kevin runs out and he goes, “Jim. Roy. Look out”. Like so delayed. It’s too late. He’s pointing a Twizzler?

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:36] Is that what it is?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:37] It’s a Twizzlers or a Red Vine. We had a big, big container of them, remember? In the kitchen.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:43] Oh, yeah, they were Red Vines.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:44] I remember I got into a big debate on set about-.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:48] About the Red Vines?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:49] That container. Yes. Because I like Red Vines. And then there’s the Twizzlers camp.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:54] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:12:54] And the two don’t see eye to eye.

JENNA FISCHER [01:12:58] You know what? I can enjoy both a Twizzlers and a Red Vine, but if I had to choose, I might go Red Vine.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:13:06] I’m a Red Vine.

JENNA FISCHER [01:13:07] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:13:08] Yeah. So there’s now sort of this awkward apology moment where Roy apologizes to Jim and Jim’s like, “Yeah, no worries”. And then Dwight is ready, you know, in case he’s, Roy’s going to lunge again. But he’s not. He’s just embarrassed and he feels bad. And he asks Pam if she’ll have coffee with him one last time.

JENNA FISCHER [01:13:26] Yeah. He says he just has a few things he has to get off his chest and she agrees. So then we go to this coffee place. And do you remember this place, Angela? It’s a, we see a shot of it and it says, the Hungry Fox.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:13:37] It’s a real place and it’s still there.

JENNA FISCHER [01:13:39] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:13:40] And I would go there. They actually, they’re, they’re sort of one of these places, guys, where you can get a little bit of everything. It’s kind of like a diner. And I’ve had their cheeseburger. It’s so good.

JENNA FISCHER [01:13:49] I used to eat there all the time too, because it was very close to our offices. And Greg told me that he often in the mornings before he went into work, he would stop there and have breakfast and kind of set his head for the day, basically. And so it’s kind of cool that we got to shoot at this place that we all really would eat at.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:14:13] Yeah, I loved it. It’s a little mom and pop place. Well, I have a question for you, Jenna. When I was watching the scene, it occurred to me, I mean, would Pam have wanted the camera crew to come to this? It’s such an intimate moment. It’s a farewell. And I was so surprised that she would agree to let the camera crew come along.

JENNA FISCHER [01:14:39] It’s interesting that you asked that question because I actually had the same thought. I thought that it was interesting that this was done on camera, but I had another thought, which was maybe Pam doesn’t want to be alone with Roy.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:14:55] Well, that’s true. The camera crew would have been a buffer, especially, you know, we learned that Pam had become friends with some of the crew, right?

JENNA FISCHER [01:15:04] Yeah. Later we’ll find that out.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:15:06] Yeah. So maybe it in some way was this buffer for this moment. And she wasn’t sure how that moment was going to play out.

JENNA FISCHER [01:15:12] Yeah. So it might have made her feel, I don’t know. A little better to have them there.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:15:19] Yeah. OK. I’ll buy that.

JENNA FISCHER [01:15:22] Well, Roy really apologizes to Pam and she apologizes as well. She says, we, you know, we both made bad decisions, but then Roy’s says, “So are you going to date Jim now”? And he says it’s sort of like it would be OK with him.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:15:45] Yeah. I don’t know if it would be OK if he’s just, like, curious and wanting to know up front so he knows what he has to hear about. You know, through the grapevine. But Pam says, “No”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:15:57] She’s like, “He has a girlfriend”. But Roy’s is like I mean, you called off our wedding for the guy and now you’re not going to date him? I just don’t get you, Pam.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:16:06] Well, he calls you Pammy. And you also say, well, there were other reasons, too, which I think is Pam just being polite and not, not saying you did this, you didn’t do this. She doesn’t want to run him through the ringer and just leaves it at that.

JENNA FISCHER [01:16:24] But I do think that Roy’s saying that is planting the seed for what Pam’s going to do later. Because it’s true, it’s true. She did call off her wedding to Roy, in part because she had feelings for Jim. If she did not have feelings for Jim, I’m not sure she would have called off the wedding just because they were not a perfect match.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:16:51] I agree. I think her, her feelings for Jim and the way Jim sort of held up a mirror to her life changed her. And he is the reason.

JENNA FISCHER [01:17:02] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:17:02] He’s a big, big part of the reason.

JENNA FISCHER [01:17:05] Yeah. All right. Well, that was, we talked about this with David a little bit. That was a really special scene for me. I love doing that scene with him. I just love doing scenes with David. He was a great actor. He’s a great acting partner. And I was really sad knowing that that was, you know, going to be the last scene we would do for a while.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:17:27] I know. You guys had a really special thing, and I loved being able to watch that scene.

JENNA FISCHER [01:17:33] He was kind of the first major, regular character who had been with us from the beginning who was leaving the show.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:17:40] Yes. Yes.

JENNA FISCHER [01:17:42] And that was, we’d been through a lot. You know, he was part of our origin story. He was with us when the show was struggling. And then he was with us when we started getting awards. And it was really weird to say goodbye.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:17:55] Yeah. Well, lady, we should go back to corporate because we’ve got some unfinished business there. Michael and Jan are in the throes of negotiation. And he says, “Give me a raise or no more sex”. And Toby just starts taking notes. And Michael’s like, “Whatcha writing down Perv Ball”? And then I’m telling you, Paul Lieberstein, as Toby crushes it in this talking head.

JENNA FISCHER [01:18:23] It’s so good.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:18:24] He talks about what a groundbreaking case this is gonna be when it inevitably goes to trial.

JENNA FISCHER [01:18:29] It’s so good. Well, Michael cannot help but make this personal.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:18:35] Yes. Well, right out of the gate. He says, “We’re lovers”. I mean, right, right away.

JENNA FISCHER [01:18:43] Finally, Jan says to Michael, “Listen, I can give you a 12 percent raise, but you have to ask me for 15 percent. OK? So just ask for 15 and we’ll settle at 12”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:19:00] He doesn’t get it.

JENNA FISCHER [01:19:01] He doesn’t get it. He says, “I want a 15 percent raise”. She said, “We can offer you 12”. And he says, “You said 15”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:19:10] And she’s like, “Michael”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:19:12] Yeah. Well, he does end up getting his raise. He does. And so does Darryl. And Michael explains that negotiating is an art form. And ultimately, it’s more about salary. It’s, it’s really about the perks. Like having sex with Jan.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:19:32] And I mean, moving forward, if Michael ever has another job, which we know he will. How’s he going to negotiate?

JENNA FISCHER [01:19:40] I don’t know.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:19:42] I don’t know. I don’t think he really learned anything.

JENNA FISCHER [01:19:44] I don’t know. Well, now it’s the end of the day at Dunder Mifflin. All is quiet.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:19:50] People are leaving. Did you catch as Phyllis is leaving? She mentions it’s very sort of under, under dialog as they’re leaving. She says that her and Bob are looking at historical homes near the river.

JENNA FISCHER [01:20:06] No, I did not catch that.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:20:09] What a great nugget. I’m like, what the heck?

JENNA FISCHER [01:20:12] I cannot get enough of Bob and Phyllis Van Nance.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:20:15] I know. I would have loved to seen more of them.

JENNA FISCHER [01:20:18] Something we haven’t talked about, exactly, are all the ways that Jim keeps trying to pay Dwight back. So like, you know, he tries to give him a display case for his bobblehead. And he tries to give him this Certificate of Bravery from the Scranton Police Department. But it’s, you know, something they give to little kids.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:20:37] Well, it has a teddy bear on it.

JENNA FISCHER [01:20:41] It does. And he just throws it away. And Jim just can’t figure out how he can repay Dwight. And, well, then he finds a way.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:20:50] Yeah, he does. So, yeah, everyone’s left. Angela and Dwight think they’re alone. Angela tells Dwight she’s heard tales of bravery.

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:01] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:02] A gallant hero. And maybe they’ll have to read the report, Toby’s report, together later. And Dwight just scoops her up and gives her a big old smooch. And who walks out of the bathroom?

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:20] Jim. He sees it all.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:23] Poor Jim.

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:23] And he’s like, “Oh, my gosh”.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:26] His face is so brilliant.

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:28] Now, there are two things that the scene made me think of. So number one. I noticed that when Rainn comes over to you, he sits on your desk.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:41] Mmhmm.

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:41] Was that intentional so you guys would be kind of the same height to start kissing?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:47] Always. Always. And almost every scene Dwight and Angela have together. He is seated. Look it up, guys.

JENNA FISCHER [01:21:58] I totally noticed it.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:21:59] He is, what, 6’3? I am 5’1.

JENNA FISCHER [01:22:03] And here’s the other thing that the scene made me think of, which is that Jim has this talking head where he says, “I will never say a word. And now we’re even”. So this means that Pam never told Jim what she knows about Dwight and Angela’s relationship.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:22:21] That’s right.

JENNA FISCHER [01:22:23] Pam completely kept that a secret.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:22:26] Yeah, Pam, I mean, I will say this. Pam does right by Angela over and over. She does.

JENNA FISCHER [01:22:33] I was like, I guess I had forgotten that Pam never told Jim.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:22:38] Well, I have a little behind-the-scenes story about this scene. We did probably like three, three or four takes just to get the timing right, of, of Jim walking out and reacting. In one take, Rainn sort of does this huge grand gesture where he shoves everything off Oscar’s desk. You know? He like takes his hand and sweeps across the desk and everything goes flying. And I’m like, “Ah”! And he picks me up and lays me down on the desk. And we thought it was hilarious. And Jeff Blitz was like, “It’s probably too much. It’s probably too big”.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:17] But that kind of goes with your whole, like, grape eating-.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:23:22] I know.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:22] Whole like Renaissance passion.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:23:25] I know. Ooh, look at my ankle. Oooh.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:28] Yeah.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:23:28] I know, but that cracked me up. But yeah, that is not the take we went with. And then before the show ends, Andy returns, guys. He is back from anger management. He’s not going to blow his second chance.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:43] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:23:43] He walks in the office and immediately gets pepper sprayed by Dwight.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:48] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:23:49] This leads to Toby taking away all of Dwight’s weapons underneath his desk. He had a little Sharpy star thing. What do they call it? You throw the star at people.

JENNA FISCHER [01:23:59] A throwing star?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:24:01] Or Sharpy Star. And he had nunchucks and pepper spray. All duct taped under his desk.

JENNA FISCHER [01:24:08] Yeah, I think maybe Toby’s next stop should be Creed’s drawer. Because remember when Creed was able to whittle the wooden stake, he opened his drawer and he had like a lot of stuff in there.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:24:23] I feel like there is a world where Creed hits a button and his desk flips up and there’s stairs that go below the office into an underground bunker. And he has everything you need for any doomsday scenario. Well, Dwight ends this with a talking head saying he’s not a hero, just a defender of the office. A real hero is Hero from “Heroes”, which was an NBC show on at the time.

JENNA FISCHER [01:24:49] Huge, huge show.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:24:51] Huge, huge show. Remember? What was their big catchphrase? Protect the cheerleader?

JENNA FISCHER [01:24:56] I don’t remember. Yeah, that sounds right.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:00] “Save the cheerleader”. Sam says. “Save the cheerleader”. Turns out the cheerleader didn’t need saving. She had superpowers. Before we say goodbye to “The Negotiation”. Jenna, there’s something really important we missed. We did not talk about.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:17] In “The Negotiation”?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:19] Yeah.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:20] What?

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:22] We find out Ryan’s middle name.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:26] Yes.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:27] Ryan Bailey Howard.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:30] Yeah. We also find out that Kelly wants to name their child, Usher Jennifer Hudson Kapoor.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:37] Well, that’s it for “The Negotiation”, you guys. Thank you so much for sending in your questions. And to David Denman.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:44] Yes. David, thank you so much. Guys, we are getting close to wrapping up Season 3 here. We’re in the final stretch of episodes and they are all going to get good.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:25:56] Real good.

JENNA FISCHER [01:25:58] We’ll see you next time.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:26:03] Thank you for listening to “Office Ladies”. “Office Ladies” is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey.

JENNA FISCHER [01:26:09] Our producer is Codi Fischer, our sound engineer is Sam Kieffer, and our associate producer is Aynsely Bubbico.

ANGELA KINSEY [01:26:15] Our theme song is “Rubber Tree” by Creed Bratton.

JENNA FISCHER [01:26:18] For ad free versions of “Office Ladies”, go to StitcherPremium.com. For a free one month trial of Stitcher Premium, use code “Office”.