Free Family Portrait Studio

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We do, our hearts are broken and our dear Phil Shea has passed away.

We just wanted to share that news with you because he was a part of our office family, he was a part of our office ladies family. I was just in touch with Phil recently, we were trading some text messages about Pam's chore wheel. And something I can tell you is just how much he loved sharing his passion, his work with everyone. And he loved that. You all took such an interest in all of his props and all of his work, and it was his pride and joy. And we're so happy that we got to share it with you.

Yes, when I ran into him a few months ago, he told me how much it meant to him that people on office ladies knew his name, knew what he did. So, thank you for being part of our office family and we will miss Phil very much.

We will, we love you Phil.

Love you.

I'm Jenna Fisher.

And I'm Angela Kinsey.

We were on the office together and we're best friends, and now we're doing the ultimate office rewatch podcast just for you.

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

We're the office ladies.

You guys, guess what I was just doing. As our theme song comes on, we listen to it every time we record.

Is that dorky? It is dorky. It is dorky, but it gets me in the mood, me too.

And it makes me excited to hop on here and talk about the office. So we listened to our theme song with you guys, and this morning I decided to dance, I did a little dance.

She did.

Uh-huh.

We do that sometimes.

Sometimes we mouth the words, sometimes we do. My dance this morning was two fingers where you're like, going ba-do, ba-do.

Yeah, I did a little shimmy.

You did, you? shimmied the ladies.

I shimmied the ladies today and I'm glad we did it.

Yeah.

Because, oh boy.

Uh-oh, that's a big sigh.

Today we're completing season eight.

Yeah, this is it. This is the last episode of season eight.

It's season eight, episode 24.

He was wearing a lot of hats. Mm-hmm on this last week of 24 episodes. Poor BJ, he must've been so tired. I mean, we were all tired, but I think BJ must've been super tired.

This was also my birthday week.

Oh yeah.

My birthday happened in this week.

I bet you were tired on your birthday.

I was tired on my birthday, oh, but we did the cutest thing for my birthday. During this week. We were filming over March 7th, which is my birthday, and you guys got me a cake, which was really, really sweet.

That's adorable.

And they filmed a little bit of him. Oh, I know. And I just wrote to Dave Rogers and asked him if there was any way that he could find that footage. Cause that memory came back to me when I was watching this episode.

Somebody has that footage, and somebody at NBC also has when Creed and Ed sang Angela's baby to me. We want these things, someone at NBC.

I know.

Get it to us, I just sounded so southern, you did get it to us.

Dang it. Are you ready for a summary?

I am last summary of season eight. Are we going to do this the whole episode? I'm going to do it the whole season nine, so just get ready.

Oh no, okay, here's your summary. In an effort to prove his paternity once and for all, Dwight sets up a portrait studio in the office for all of the employees. He's hoping to steal some of baby Phillip's DNA for testing.

Yeah.

And he pretends to be down and out, but he has a secret plan to become manager again, thanks to David Wallace.

I loved when Nellie calls him like a drunken chimney sweep.

That's such a good description. Robert California reveals his true identity after Joe Bennett dissolves Sabre, and Daryl makes his intentions clear with Val. It's a lot happening, yeah.

I have lots to say about their impromptu photo shoot. We'll get to it.

Oh, we got a lot of mail about it, Anne, Uh-huh.

Yeah.

Are you ready for the last fast fact number one of season eight?

I mean, I guess so here it is.

Like we said, this was our season eight finale and it marked a number of goodbyes. We mentioned that. B.J. Novak wrote and directed this episode. This was his last episode as a writer on the office. He'd been with us since the very beginning. This was also Mindy Kaling's last episode as a writer.

I remember just at the time being like, No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, you guys can't go. It felt like we were losing our core team that built and defined the whole show.

I call them the originals.

The OGs, that's what kids say, they say the OG.

Oh, not the originals.

I dare say there was hubbub lady.

Oh, I think that is accurate.

Yes.

Hubbub.

Hubbub about the originals.

Yes.

Leaving.

Well, I remember John and I went over to BJ's trailer and we asked him to please consider taking the showrunner position for season nine. We told him nobody else knew the show as well as he did. We were very, what would you call it, passionate.

Yes, you guys wanted him to stay, and he said, no.

He said No, I could tell he was really touched, but he said he felt really burnt out. He needed to move on.

Well, I can understand that.

I know.

And when you're writing and creating, you can't be in a space where you're burnt out.

No, another goodbye. James Spader. Yes, he was moving on, you know, he'd really just agreed to do the one season.

Right?

So we were saying goodbye to him. After this episode, we also say goodbye to saber, goodbye, saber.

Yeah, saber's no more sabre.

So we had a lot of goodbyes, but we also had a lot of oh, hellos.

Oh okay, hello, oh hello.

Hello again, Senator Lipton.

Yes.

Hey there David Wallace.

Yes.

Oh, hi, Jerry Miner is Val's boyfriend Brandon. Hi there Warehouse fellas. now is this, and Calvin Tenner is Hidde and Glenn.

I'm sorry. Is this oh, hello, or is it hi there? because, oh, you pivoted?

It's all.

It's, oh, hello.

Hi there, oh good to see you again.

Top of the morning to you.

That's right, good to see you again. Mike Schur as Mose, who we haven't seen in a real long time, yes.

Oh, is that section done?

That section's done.

Okay, oh hello, hi, there is done.

Yes, and the goodbyes are done, okay. In fact, I'm moving on to fast fact number two.

Oh, let's do it.

I'm calling fast. Fact number two reflections.

Oh gosh, and you did like the whisper voice, reflections, reflections with office ladies.

We got a fan question from Allison W. in Dallas, Texas, who asked Now that you've watched eight seasons of the show, what is your favorite episode so far? I thought that question might kick off our reflections.

Well, it's a fantastic question from Allison, What's up, big D love Dallas? Just thought I would just say that.

Shout out, Dallas.

Shout out Dallas, Gosh, Jenna. That's one of those thinking questions.

I gave it some thought, I sent it to you, we thought on it, Allison.

We thought on it, we sure did.

It has been a really wild ride watching this show again, I've just loved it, I've really gained a deeper appreciation as a fan. Yeah, and I have to say there are so many episodes that surprised me that I had completely forgotten about, or there were some that I totally changed my opinion about.

Give us an example.

Mafia.

Okay.

I remember when we filmed it, I thought it was so broad and so silly, right? I thought this is ridiculous. As a viewer, I just absolutely loved it. It's one of my favorites now.

Yeah.

I have really enjoyed watching the show evolve. But if I have, to be honest. And this is what you do when you're reflecting.

You just did that thing where you kind of looked over the top of your glasses a little, yeah.

Well, that's my lawyer. Look, that's when, you know, I'm serious.

Serious?

I thought season eight was a little clunky.

I did.

I know that we were trying to find our way after Steve left, and I think you can tell.

Well, you're doing that thing where you say something you don't think is 100 gonna be received well, and you whisper it.

Yeah, I think.

It's your bless her heart, it's my bless her heart.

I mean, season eight bless its heart.

Bless its heart.

I think it started well.

I would say I think it's ending like feeling like it ends strong, ends strong, yeah.

Turf War and Free Family Portrait Studio.

We feel like we're back in the zone there, I think.

But I think we took a real crazy detour around pool party.

Oh yeah.

And then things got real, kind of spotty. That said, I do think there are a lot of wonderful moments in season eight that are truly classic. Big Preggs, little Preggs.

Love that.

Josh Groban and Garden Party.

Oh yeah.

Jerry Minor as Brandon.

Perfect.

Need him to be a series regular? Sad that he's not.

Also, we had unbelievable.

Unbelievable bedbugs.

Oh, bedbugs, we had smug bedbug, yes.

I thought Jim's presentation at Test the store, I'd forgotten about that, loved it. But like I said last week, I really understand why people start over and re-watch. I think that the show has evolved very subtly over the many seasons. And I really want to go back and see people from before, I want to see Michael again.

Yeah.

I want to see old Jim, I want to see Dwight and Angela and their romance unfold again.

Yeah, that's such a good point, like you said, I have this new appreciation for the show in a way that I didn't when we were filming it. Even though I was a big fan of the show when we filmed it, but now I have an appreciation of the fandom of the show. And what I mean by that is. When we first started this re-watch, so many people would come up to us and tell us how many times they had watched the show all the way through.

Yeah.

So I have this new appreciation for the fandom. Because, like, what you were just saying, we're coming to the end of this re-watch. And I find myself just so desperately wanting to go back to season one, me too. It's emotional and it's comforting to go back to those seasons and I was thinking about which episodes were my favorite. And I know I have my go-tos that I've always liked, like dinner party, things like that, but in my re-watch, kind of like you with Mafia. A few that snuck up on me that I'd just forgotten about was like the deposition, for example.

And the christening, you know?

But I do I find myself wanting to go back. I wanna see the first party planning committee meeting, I wanna go back to all of that.

Well, when we talked to Billie Eilish on the podcast, we asked her about re-watching. And I kind of think of her as a re-watch expert. Because she really has seen it so many times. And we asked her, Do you ever skip anything? You know? Do you have favorite seasons? Will you just start with a certain thing? And she said, No.

Well, you know.

That's the only one.

That's okay, it's okay.

I think I would have to skip the one about the family Paper company.

Oh yeah.

That they closed down.

They put out of business.

Yeah, Prince Family paper, Prince Family paper, that one, I couldn't take it, oh.

But Allison, fantastic question. It clearly made Jenna and I think a lot about this re-watch and what it's meant to us. And we both wanna start back at the beginning.

We do, but don't worry, we will cover season nine.

Yes, yes.

Not to get ahead of ourselves. All right, fast. Fact number three is a fan question from Curtis G in Seattle. I didn't think there was anything else that we could learn Angela about. I don't know the origins of characters or anything this long into our re-watch, but Curtis has found something that I didn't know.

I would not be surprised at all because Greg liked to do that.

Well, I asked Greg.

What'd he say?

He said You can tell Curtis G that it is completely true that Andy Bernard on the office is named after Professor Andy Bernard at Dartmouth. However, Andy and I and our mutual friend Jim Halpert have been great friends since first grade, so Greg's two childhood friends are named Jim Halpert and Andy Bernard.

Yeah, yeah, I knew Jim Halpert same, but oh my gosh.

Greg said that it was really fun for him to give the characters his old friends names. He never thought that people would still be asking about it 20 years later. Greg also said the real life Andy Bernard is at Dartmouth, which is Cornell's big rival, and that the real Andy Bernard is not much like the character of Andy Bernard.

Well, I should think not.

He did say he thinks the real Andy Bernard might've had one of those preppy belts with whales on them at one time in the 80s. But besides that, nothing else, he said the real Andy would never punch his fist through a wall. However, Greg said the real life Jim Halpert is very sociable, athletic and romantic.

Oh my goodness.

The real life? Jim Halpert works in the White House as general counsel to the National Cyber Director, trying to write laws to protect people's security and privacy on the internet.

Okay, Greg's friends are really smart.

He said This is why I asked them both if it was okay to share a recent photo of the three of us. Oh, and Greg said, We can put it in the office, ladies pod stories.

What a lifelong friendship. Yeah, I love that.

Thank you, Greg.

Thank you Greg and thank you Curtis.

Yes, and for all of you Greg Daniels fans out there, you know? Season three of Upload is now streaming on Amazon Prime Video. The trailer is awesome. We have to put that in our stories. ANGELa And by the way, if you have not watched Upload, it is so good. It has like 93 on rotten tomatoes.

Let's do it because we have a little bit of old tech that was new tech at the time.

Oh well, we'll take a break and discuss.

We are back and Oscar is talking directly to a camera on his computer. He's doing like one of those, like a webcam, a webcam. Like, you know, like one of those confessionals that folks do on YouTube now, you guys, people were not doing this yet.

Yeah, people do it all the time.

All the time.

Well, I asked Steve Burgess, how'd we get this shot? and he said, Matt Soane just set up one of the cameras on Oscar's desk, moved the computer out of the way and set the camera there with this sort of special lens. And then everybody just walked over and talked into it as if it was a webcam.

It's very funny, you know? Dwight and Phyllis are kind of lurking behind. Kelly comes in and touches up her makeup, Robert then comes in and just starts talking straight to camera, takes over, headbutts Kevin and then it all falls apart.

Yeah.

So Oscar ultimately tells the youth, You know what? It may not get much better, but it does get a little better.

Well, this episode opens with a dwight talking head, and he's explaining that he wanted to give the tenants of the building something nice. So he has set up a family portrait studio in the break room, and during this talking head, we're seeing groups of people getting their picture taken.

Yes, I will say for this montage, everyone that's getting their picture taken, there was written dialogue.

There was.

Yes, that wasn't used.

Please tell me more.

Well, Toby and his daughter are doing a dance and she's like saying, Jazz hands, dad, and he can't quite get it. Stanley and his daughter just have a sweet moment, you know? And then Creed and his parents, he's like, Look, I'm in a parent sandwich, you know? Creed is just being cuckoo pants. And then Meredith and her son just continue to yell at each other.

I see.

Yeah, so there was just extra beats of all of it.

Well, if you're wondering who played all the family members, Toby's daughter was played by Delaney Ruth Farrell. She was the daughter of our set dresser. Stanley's daughter was played by Sarah Rebecca. Creed's Parents were played by Ed Ford Jr. and Jackie Beno.

Shout out to our actual NBC set photographer and Kate Flannery's longtime fella, Chris Hastings, for working the Dwight's family Portrait studio. You'll see him in the corner, he's sitting at the desk, kind of logging all the pictures onto the computer.

I saw him.

I also want to share with you guys. In the shooting draft, there would have been an establishing shot of the flyer for this free family portrait studio. And here's what it said.

Oh boy.

In all caps on the flyer, it says Free Family Portrait Studio All Professional. Exclamation Point, May 9th, noon to 5 p.

I've got one, too. It's the scene that keeps on giving, okay?

Here's mine in the shooting draft. The person who was in the very front of the line who would have been first up to get their picture taken was any guesses?

Oh, this is a good question.

No, it was Brandon, and this might explain a little bit of that photo at the end. Oh, here's how it read, and it's also in deleted scenes. Interior break room.

I have a question, is Val wearing her warehouse uniform in this scene?

Yes.

Why? She wants a portrait with her boyfriend and she's in her like work uniform and he's in regular clothes. This is very poor planning. Well, it bothered me later, too.

Yes, it didn't really look like most everyone dressed for this photo.

Pam really dressed her kids for this photo.

Pam went all out.

As did Angela, or the senator, the senator.

Angela had nothing to do with it, but I wanted to share this scene because it just shows you the dynamic of their relationship. He didn't even want a picture with her, he wanted photos by himself. That doesn't feel good.

I wish we had that scene in. I just want more of Jerry Minor.

Oh, he's very funny in it.

He would've been so good in that.

His poses are hilarious.

We got a fan catch from Emily J in Ohio, who said Creed brings in his parents for a photo. But in season six, the cover-up Creed says his mom has died. You know what, Emily? you can't trust anything, Creed says.

I was gonna say he might have multiple families in different places.

Yeah, I think that is a good catch. And at the same time, anything goes with creed.

Yeah, which I think the writers took to heart. I think his show, Bible, is a bit squirrely. It's all over the place.

It's just a bunch of contradictions.

Yeah, but very good catch. Dwight now enters the bullpen and announces there's only a few more hours left of the portrait studio. He suggests for Daryl to bring his daughter in, for Angela to bring Phillip. Maybe Jim could bring his two cuties, and Jim says, You know what? I know why Dwight's doing this.

Well, you know, Angela, in our fan appreciation Mailbag episode, we discussed this scene. We did. I read a letter from Joe V in Oregon. And he had done an in-depth breakdown of what it costs Jim to prank Dwight over all of these many years. If you haven't listened to that episode and you're interested in really digging deep into this subject, you can go back and listen to it.

Easily $100.

Easily, and he included a tip for the dry cleaner that was $10.

Yeah, I mean.

How does PAM feel about that?

I mean, I.

Is their family so flush with finances that they can afford to spend $310 on this prank?

Absolutely not. No one, no one wants to spend $300 on a tear-away suit like, What are you doing?

Yeah.

I will say this.

What?

Maybe we'll get mail about it, what is it? But I'm just gonna say it.

What is it?

I think Jim's pranks are Roy's jet skis. Hmm, oh boy, uh-huh.

ANGELA That is a strong statement.

It's a strong statement. But if you add up everything Jim spends on pranks, what could that be? A vacation for their family? could they go to Disneyland? could they maybe, you know, splurge and buy that new sofa they've been wanting?

Ooh, Angela, Oh boy, I had not ever thought of it. Here's my yes. And to that theory. Do you think Jim checked in with Pam before doing this?

But remember, we said-.

And she said, That's hilarious, we should do it. Do you think he consulted her? He bought a whole house without talking to her?

Well, now we're going there. Well, I'm just saying, yeah.

People come for PAM all the time, but we don't discuss exactly what you said. Which is that there's no trips to Disneyland. Because we're pranking our coworker and not talking to our wife about it first. Yeah, we're onto something here. I think that there is a pattern of Jim spending the couple's money without consulting PAM. We're gonna see it coming up again.

Well, Jim is gonna finish this talking head by saying he now thinks that Dwight is trying to get payback on him for this prank and wants Jim to bring his kids to work. And this is making him feel very nervous.

Yeah.

Immediately after Jim's talking head, there was a Dwight talking head. They filmed a few versions of this talking head. none of them made it into the episode. This one was my favorite. It was a quote must shoot.

Okay.

Right, so we filmed it, but it didn't make it in. Dwight would have said This has nothing to do with Jim. I'm merely trying to determine whether Angela's son is mine. Of course, if he is, I will raise him to be Jim's enemy.

Oh, I love that.

Next up is a scene that I absolutely loved. Daryl is going to be talking with Hide and Glenn. They lost all of their lottery winnings already. Hide blames the bad economy, bad investments. It has my favorite line in the episode.

Is it Calvin's line?

No, it's Daryl's line.

Okay, there's so many good lines in here. But Daryl says so nobody wanted an energy drink for Asian homosexuals, and then Calvin says, They did not. I love the delivery so much. They did not.

Okay, my favorite line was when Daryl, you know, he's gonna try the drink.

Yes.

And he's like, what's the flavor? and they say, coconut penis, and then Daryl takes a sip and goes, The coconut's pretty subtle.

That's pretty amazing, so well written, so we got a lot of fan mail about this scene, Ryder N, from Idaho, said. What is the writing on the can of the energy drink? Does it mean anything in particular?

Oh, great, tell us what it actually says.

Anna said As an office fan from Japan, I was thrilled to see Hide in the cold Open of this episode. And when he handed Daryl the Japanese energy drink, I had to pause and read what it said on the can. To directly translate, it says Gay energy, superpower, flavor, banish, lazy attitudes to the land of wind and ghosts. Okay, thank you so much.

I had no idea what it actually said all these years.

And you know what? I looked in the script to see if there was any description of the can or what was written on the can. No, so Phil Shea had to invent this all himself. It's so well done. We also got a fan catch from Adrian G in Connecticut, who said continuity error. When the two former warehouse workers and Andy come into the office this week, none of them are wearing the visitor pass that Erin established in episode 23..

Oh, none of them. The whole day, people, family members are coming in and out, there's no visitor passes.

No visitor passes. We also got a really nice note about Hide. This is from Shuhei in Tokyo, but who's currently living in Australia, Shuhei said. After I had listened to the podcast episode for Body Language, where you shared that Hide was on Instagram. I sent him a direct message in Japanese, letting him know that I'm a big fan of his character. He surprisingly replied back to me, thanking me in a very polite way. But this wasn't the end.

Not at all, he's a lovely person.

This is who he is.

Yeah, he's so warm and gracious.

I'd like to mention that if you love Hide and would like a personalized message from him, he's on Cameo. That's the website where you can request videos from celebrities. So if maybe I don't know you're looking for a last minute holiday gift for someone, maybe ask Hide to make a video.

I'll put it in stories so you can find it. Well, this scene is gonna end because Daryl sees Val walking into the office and he gets up. He's like, hold up one second, then he sees Brandon.

Yeah.

And he has a talking head where he says, You know what? If he was Val, he would break up with Brandon and then date the hell out of him.

Yeah, yeah.

Well after this talking head, there would have started Jenna, the most Bonkers. Jim Pam Robert California storyline.

I remember it.

Oh, it was a hole runner.

It was so weird.

It goes throughout the entire episode. You can also watch it all play out in deleted scenes on the DVD. But I wanted to play it for you all.

Oh boy.

Yeah, I need you to hear it. And thanks to Cassie who helped me stitch these moments together so we can play it all as one. I'm gonna give you a hint to the subject matter. It's just the number three.

Oh boy.

Shared silence?

Thank you, Robert, that is a really sweet thing to say.

I wanna be part of it.

Huh, okay.

Great.

It's from Robert Saturday. 10. Question mark Yeah, I could hear you do the question mark. 10's a little late for dinner.

No.

We were just wondering what we could bring on Saturday.

Oh, no, no, no, nothing, I have everything you'll need. Do you happen to own scattergories?

Yeah.

Yeah, we love scattergories.

That's great.

Yeah, we'll need the icosahedron, die from it, 20 sides, just enough.

Great, well, we're looking forward to it.

Me three.

Me three, yeah.

God, what a couple.

Oh, oh yeah, of course I'm sorry.

Me too.

Just out of curiosity, what would we have been doing exactly?

Three-way. I hate breaking plans, but without the underlying power dynamic. I'm just a guy with two parents.

No worries, I get it, I'm sorry to disappoint, it's okay.

Lady Robert, California, wanted to have a threesome with Jim and Pam.

They're like, this is what it is, but is it? They're doubting themselves, but they know.

I had completely forgotten about this. If you would have asked me this on an office trivia night, I'd 100 say no. There was never a storyline where Robert wanted a threesome with Jim and Pam, but there was.

Yeah.

That's crazy.

Crazy.

Well, Jenna, we have a fan question about it. We do. Yes, we do.

You're dipping into the fan questions over there. Ang I am.

Ella E. from the UK, wrote in and said I wanna know Jenna. How did you and John react to this storyline? How did you guys get through the scene? Where Robert says otherwise, I'm just a guy with two parents.

Ella It was very hard to keep a straight face during all of this. That was a doozy. But it was especially difficult for me in the scenes. That were just Jim and Pam, because John is particularly funny to me.

Oh, he's so funny.

When he's in denial about something, when he's in denial.

Are her little freaked out or scared?

Yes, in fact, John in this whole episode is some of my favorite John Krasinski comedy. When he's taking the picture, when he's worried something's gonna come get him, it reminds me of when he's walking out among all of the snowmen. Yes, that's just some of my favorite John comedy, so I am glad we cut this storyline. I think it was too much, but I did enjoy shooting it.

I laughed really hard. When they're trying to get to the bottom of, like, what are we doing at 10 p..m? Like, what is happening? We're not eating and you guys go in the conference room. And the part that really made me laugh is when Robert says, Do you like scattergories? The two of you have such a moment of relief.

I love the reveal that Jim has a salmon that he makes. I know should I make my salmon?

I'll make my salmon. Let's just forget it ever happened.

Lady, I think we should take a break, I think I need a moment.

Oh, after that, okay, all right. Well, I think we do need a big reset and I think I have the perfect thing.

Oh, really, Angela, I do.

As head of the party Planning Committee.

It is happy holidays here at office, ladies. Sam and Cassie get ready to open some presents because we are doing our gift exchange today.

That's right, and we have sweet treats. You guys, this is my favorite time.

I know Kinsey Claus is here, Kinsey Claus, you know? We're about to go on our two-week holiday break. And before we do, we had to give you some gifts. Sam, we wrapped yours in our own faces.

Cassie, I wrapped yours in the unicorn Princess paper.

Here you are, Sam. It is the Green Day. When we were young, festival t-shirt, we both went to this concert. Yeah, thank you, yes.

Oh, what a cool shirt. Yeah, this is great. Thanks. Yay, Cassie. I just saw these and I thought of you and I just think they're so cute.

Angela sent me multiple photos of these, by the way, cute.

They're little silver kitty cat earrings.

And each kitty's in a different pose.

Yes, so cute, I love it, that's so cute. And then Josh made ginger cookies with candy cane Hershey kisses in the middle.

I love the candy cane, Hershey's kiss, they're my favorite.

And Jenna, you are not forgotten. Here's some gluten-free shortbread cookies.

Gluten-free shortbread.

And I brought extra things so everyone can take cookies home. Oh, excellent, yay.

Thank you, happy holidays.

Happy holidays.

Oh, wait, you guys, I have one more thing, you know? For years on the office, Jenna would make us all Christmas ornaments, and then when we started Office Ladies, I made us Christmas ornaments. And then I kind of dropped the ball on it. So I made us all a Christmas ornament this year. Hey.

Yeah.

What is it?

It's a picture of the four of us, it's a wooden cube, and then on the other side, there's a pair of granny panties that say, getting shit done.

I love it.

Oh, this is perfect.

This is amazing. Well, that is the palette cleansing that I needed. Angela, thank you, thank you. Let's go to break. And when we come back, Andy's got a real unique outfit on.

These cookies are so good. Josh crushed it.

Josh, These cookies are really good, even though I'm I've moved from no gluten to avoiding gluten, and I'm not gonna avoid these cookies.

She told me right away she was like, I will be having one of those.

All right, listen. While we were on break and we're eating our cookies, we started talking to Sam about his new podcast that's coming out, Sam. Will you tell everyone about it? Because I'm so excited.

We are so excited about this, Sam.

Enemy in Paris?

Sure, sorry, I'm also eating. Also. The title is perfect Sam. Yeah, it's a hate watch along podcast for Emily in Paris.

Brilliant. Oh my gosh, can I please come on an episode, please?

You sure can, both of you can.

Sam I absolutely love Emily in Paris and also hate it all at the same time. Yes, I can't get enough of it. I have so many feelings about it. Yes, this podcast was needed and I'm so excited. And when does it start?

It comes out December 20th. Okay, so perfect for the holidays. Are you kidding? Yeah, one of my favorite things, too, Sam, is when you were in Paris, how you went to places. Oh yeah. We stopped by Emily's apartment, we stopped by Gabriel's restaurant and got filled with anger, filled with. And then you have, like, snarky content, snarky photos.

All right, we should get back to this episode. Andy, he has shown up to work in a I guess like a boiler suit. Yeah, he hasn't shaved, his hair is all a mess. He tells Jim. he's fine.

You know, on this day where Andy most definitely doesn't look fine, even though he's orchestrating this whole look. You would think they would want him to log in and get his visitor label.

Listen, they were worried when he was sitting outside in his car, but I feel more worried now.

Yes, when we talk about clunky moments in season eight, I'm sorry, but this one was hard for me.

It's very hard for me when he is mopping the floor, the carpet, the carpet with like a bucket of water. What, he has a talking head where he explains that he has a delicious secret.

I would say this is a cautionary tale for anyone out there that feels like they need to have a moment of like, Gotcha, like revenge moment, gotcha.

Yeah.

It's never gonna play out the way you hope. Also, it is sort of the poison that poisons the well.

Mm-hmm.

No, how's that saying go?

I'm pretty, I mean, I'm sure it's not, it's the poison that poisons the well. No, no, no.

No, it's the poison that poisons the bottle, that holds it anyway. I don't know, but I'm just saying.

Is that a saying? It's the poison that poisons the bottle that holds it.

I just made it up, maybe is it I feel like it?

What are you going for? It's the it poisons the well.

No, I'm going for it poisons the bottle that holds it. So here you are, you have just taken into your body this resentment, this revenge. I'm gonna show them right, that energy and the more you hold.

And my body is the bottle.

Yes, and the more you hold all that in, yeah, it poisons you.

It poisons the bottle that holds it.

Thank you.

I'm liking this phrase, if this isn't a phrase, I like it. Don't poison the bottle that holds it.

Don't poison the bottle that holds it. I like it.

You just put on your glasses with emphasis and looked at me over the top of them. After you said it, I think that means you're onto a good saying.

Okay, well, Pam is now gonna arrive with Cece and Phillip. It's family picture time. Jim is like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, what, what? what are you doing here?

This is where I love, paranoid Jim.

I love him. They go into pose for photos and Jim could not look more freaked out in every picture. What are they doing with those pictures? That can't be the Christmas card?

I improvised the line, okay, so I'll just stand here when he takes, like both children.

The kids, yeah.

Also, I wanna say that he brought these kids to set. I had no idea what they were gonna be wearing. The little purple bows and Cece's hair that kind of matched what Pam was wearing. It was all so coordinated. I was like, this is what I can never do in my real life.

No.

I can never coordinate all our outfits, we will never send you a family holiday card where we are coordinated.

I tried one time.

One time, how'd it go?

We were at Josh's sister's wedding in Hawaii, and I thought, Oh, Christmas card opportunity here.

I remember this now, I'm sorry to laugh.

Why?

And I wanted us all to have, like a shirt that looked tropical, like sailboats, or, you know, flowers, or you know, someone surfing, or coral fish. Yeah, it was such a thing. No one wanted to wear their shirts.

I know I remember, but you did get a very nice picture and you were all dressed up, you just weren't in coordinating outfits.

Well, we couldn't, no one wanted to wear the same thing, but it, you know, then ultimately I just went for, okay, tropical, whatever that means to you.

Well, Angela, I think your card turned out adorable.

Thank you.

And Jim and Pam's color coordination in this family photo. I was like, Wow, they did it.

They did it, they look great.

I have a bunch of fan questions I can get, too. Ryder N, from Idaho, said Was there a fake baby used during the filming of this episode? Specifically when Pam brings her kids into the office? Nope, Ryder, there were not. We had a real baby, Phillip Halpert, who was played by some twin girls in this episode, Mahina and Malia Hatchie. And at six minutes and 12 seconds. I don't know which one of them is in the stroller, but there is a baby in that stroller. And you can see the baby's legs kicking as I push it toward the break room.

Yeah.

That's why I'm talking to the baby and it really helped my performance, so I appreciated it. We also had a fan catch from Christopher H. in Hawaii, who said, Did you notice that? The duck the photographer is using to distract the kids when the photos are taken is the same stuffed animal duck that Toby gave Pam in season three?

No, what a great catch.

It's literally exactly the same duck. I went back and looked.

Speaking of ducks, you guys, you'll remember when we had Claire on how we talked that she took from set the quacking duck, not this stuffed animal duck that's in this scene, Christopher.

Different duck.

The little duck that sat by the file cabinet by Phyllis's desk. That would go off during takes and ruin take after take.

Yes.

Well, Claire sent this to me the other morning, first thing in the morning, I'm gonna read what she said. She goes, Hey Ang, good morning from this little guy. And then she took a video of herself hitting the duck. This is the duck guys that would ruin take after take. This is what it sounded like.

Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack, Quack.

I could do it from memory. They quack, quack, quack, quack, quack. It has a rhythm.

It has a little cadence. Quack, quack, quack. They say some sounds take you right back to where you were the moment you first heard them. And that definitely does. I'm gonna put that in stories so you can see the famous quacking duck.

Angela's like, No, no, no, no, no.

What are you doing here?

Yes, baby. Phillip Lipton, also played by Twin Girls Ally and Suzanne Hartman.

Well, Dwight is gonna welcome Angela and the senator to the photo studio. Angela will not let Dwight hold Phillip. Dwight keeps trying to get near Phillip. Angela has a talking head where she says she thinks Dwight's doing this whole thing. To get a DNA sample to prove he's the father, which is impossible because the senator's the only man she's ever been with. I have a question for you.

What is it?

What's up with my hair?

What is up with your hair? It looked like I had just been in a wind tunnel. What is up with your hair?

And then immediately, when I go to the family portrait studio, it's totally normal what happened to my hair.

I wondered if there was a deleted scene. Are you ripping your hair out in frustration? It's odd.

It's very odd. I went to the shooting draft, I went to the candy bag, I watched deleted scenes. There is no mention of Angela looking disheveled, her hair a mess.

I noticed it as well well. Speaking of messy hair, Dwight wants to try and comb baby Phillip's hair, but Angela swats him away.

These scenes were so fun.

They were so funny. Angela. Can we keep going with them? Because Dwight is also going to suggest he trim Phillip's toenails.

I know every time rain as Dwight came at us and I got to swat him away, it was so fun.

He's gonna try to collect excess dry skin.

Oh, I know.

Could you imagine if, like a photographer at a baby studio, was like, fussing over your baby like this?

Also isn't the senator like, What are you doing? Dwight? like the senator is so checked out.

He's so unaware. Mm-hmm. Oh, you know what? I should give a shout out to Julie Dove, who played our fake photographer in all of these scenes. She was very good.

Well, little baby Phillip Lipton is gonna make the poop skis.

Yep.

The senator takes him out to change his diaper. Very helpful.

Refreshing to see that.

Dwight is then going to emerge from the bathroom with a diaper. Angela notices this and screams for him and runs after him.

Where did Senator Lipton change the diaper in the men's restroom? I don't know, because I don't think there's a changing table in there.

Well, there's definitely not.

I don't think there's a changing table in the women's restroom at Dunder Mifflin.

Maybe he just laid him down, like on the carpet near Kelly's desk.

And then he threw it away all the way in the bathroom.

I don't know, these are logistics I can't get into.

There's also something that I noticed because we rarely have this angle where we're in the kitchen like this. And we shoot kind of into the bullpen in this way. Yeah, and I noticed that at 10 minutes and 30 seconds, Leslie has a heater under his desk. Oh, I saw that, too.

And I thought, Leslie got cold, I never knew that, I knew we had heaters.

I know I thought only the ladies had heaters because the men would wear full suits.

Yeah, they were always hot.

They were warm, but we would have our tights and our skirts and everything. I didn't know this all these years.

I didn't know it either.

Learned something new? Well, we should probably go back and discuss Andy.

We should, because there's a lot going on.

He's gonna gargle some whiskey, he's gonna choke on it.

He then brings out soup for Nellie, but then spills it all over himself and then tries to eat it off of his clothes.

Off his arm.