March 16, 2021 • 50 mins
To truly Deep Dive into The Office, Brian must go to the person who started it all - the creator and star of The Office U.K., the incomparable Ricky Gervais. In this episode, Ricky shares David Brent’s deepest desires, talks about the greatest love story ever told (hint: it’s The Office) and discovers a shocking truth about Steve Carell.
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on this podcast. I'm taking you on a search, a
search for love, hard working Latina, but there were other
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to Crumbs on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts
or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm really devided. You
probably know me from the UK version of the Office,
(01:28):
or the Office as we call it in the UK. Hello,
and welcome back to the Office Deep Dive. I am
your host, Brian Baumgardner. Today you will get to listen
to my conversation with the one and only one of
(01:51):
my comedy heroes, Ricky Gervais. Ricky was the co creator
of the British version of the Office along with Stephen Merchant,
who we spoke to last week, and Ricky, in addition
to creating the show, also played David Brent, the British
counterpart and the inspiration for Michael Scott, who was somehow
(02:14):
possibly even more cringe e than Michael was. I didn't
think it was possible either, but only Ricky himself could
pull that off. Now, obviously, Ricky is a very, very
busy man, and when I interviewed him, he was doing
a ton of press for another show he created called Afterlife,
(02:36):
which I am obsessed with. That show. I absolutely love it.
Everyone you should go and watch it if you haven't. Um,
but Ricky was doing so many TV appearances at the
time that when I spoke to him, he thought that
this was another video interview, which it was not. So
(02:56):
here I am, I'm lounging in, I'm in my sweatpants,
and Key is looking sharp, he's looking camera ready, he's
looking Gervais sexy is how I like to call it. Um,
So just keep that image in your head as you listen. UM. Anyway,
I am totally psyched that I got a chance to
talk to him, and I so appreciate him making the
(03:18):
time for us. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the
incomparable Ricky Gervais. Bubble and Squeak. I love it. Bubble
and Squeak on Bubble and Squeaker cookie every month, left
(03:42):
over from the night before. UM, do you know what
we're doing here? Isn't it a podcast about the history
of the Uh? Yeah? So like the ten second version
(04:03):
is basically the Office American version. Since two thousand seventeen,
it's the number one streaming show in the world. It
has over a hundred and thirty five billion minutes that
have been stream stream in essentially two years and so
(04:23):
what we're doing is going back and trying to figure
out why this has happened. Um. Yeah, Well, I mean
it's a testament to all the hard work, hard work
that went into it, and the rioting and the action,
the fact that it's about everyday people and about everything exactly.
(04:43):
All right, I'm just going to start at the beginning
and I'll ask you questions. So what were the what
were the influences that had you And you know, Stephen
talked to me a little bit about you know, how
you guys got to know each other and you hired
him as as your assistant the radio station. Well, what
were some of the influences that you guys had. Well,
(05:04):
it goes back before that, It goes back before that.
I had David Frent as a character. Um, you know
a few years before that. In fact, I worked in
an office for like ten years, and obviously that's the
biggest influence real life, being part of it of a
working office, and you know, you start noticing that the
fact that you're thrown together with random people and you
(05:26):
have to get along. So, you know, that was one
theme coupled with that. Throughout the nineties, I watched a
lot of those docu soaps that were happening here where
ordinary people got their fifteen minutes of fame. Um, there
was one called Airline and airport and you know all that,
you know, the hotel and sort of they'd make celebrities
(05:49):
that are these normal people because they were just ordinary people.
But they were funny and at work and and of
course now fames a different beast. Now they'd get an
agent and they try and get their own game show
and make the most of it, and you know, but
then it was sort of it was they were quite quaint.
But I did notice that people had started to be
obsessed with fame in the nineties, and of course that's
(06:13):
just got worse and worse and worse until it sort
of eats itself. So those were the those were the
sort of big things, an ordinary person getting his one
shot fame, wanting to be famous. You know, if you
take away it was a fake documentary, it doesn't make
much sense because you say, well, why is David Brent
acting like that? Or he wants to be famous, he
(06:33):
wants to be discovered, he wants to be loved, he
needs to hug you know, So so it was a
bit it was a we weren't spoofing the genre, but
the fact that it was meant to be a documentary.
You know, it's fifty of the show before you start
writing the sitcom, and um, so how much how much
of the comedy comes from it being a documentary. Well,
(06:58):
you've got to believe this is a real person who
wants to be famous. So you've got to really believe that.
Um you're eavesdropping almost you're you're looking on someone's life.
Because if you start thinking about you know, it's it's written,
anything can happen. So you have to try and make
the ordinary extraordinary. And once you realize that David Frn
(07:21):
just wants to be discovered and become famous and needs
a hug, it all seems to make sense really, And
from a personal point of view, I wanted it to
be a more about body language, not just acting and
saying the lines. I wanted it to be you know,
people notice things like I hated it in the drama
(07:43):
or comedy where someone would hang up the phone and
then talk to themselves, you know, like go mm hm,
he doesn't usually call on a Tuesday. They have to
find a way of showing someone was worried or lying,
and you know you do that by the guy sort
of not looking at you and then flicking his eyes
at the camera, or you know, you had to somehow
(08:05):
act like you would if you were being filmed and
being caught out. And so there was there was lots
of reminders that this was a fake documentary, because otherwise
it just wasn't that special or interesting. If that, there'd
be no reason to be making, you know, a sitcom
where these people were acting like that, unless it was
(08:26):
because one of them sort of wanting to be discovered
and famous. So it really was about you know, TV
in itself. It was about people, the beginning of this
new narcicism, this beginning of people doing anything, you know,
living their life like an open wound, just doing anything.
And and that was the beginning of bad behavior being rewarded.
(08:48):
You know, as soon as we people thought, well I
made it. I made an absolute proud of myself on television.
But they've invited me on a new program to talk
about it. You know, it's okay. And then people started
with people that would break the law and then write
a book, you know, So that was the ninth is
I saw that a lot. But apart from that, it was.
(09:10):
It was still about people. It was still about people
being randomly thrown together and getting along, you know, and
and conflict. But the fact that it was a fact
documentary and one person in particular wanted to come out
of this famous because he was looking for something. He
was searching for something, you know, that was a very
(09:32):
very big part of it. Yeah, it's interesting you talk
about behavior, right, and that so much of the comedy
comes from that. Greg Daniels shared with me that he
would send his writers down to the set to just
observe the actors because you can't write people's behavior, you
can't write their body posture, you can't write that stuff.
(09:54):
And so to really observe, for the writers on the
American Office, to actually observe are the actors and the
characters in their setting, because so much of the humor
came from that. Yeah, and that's because obviously, in real life,
so much communication is non verbal. You know, just someone being,
as I said, someone lying, they don't look at you.
(10:15):
They touched their face. They when they're nervous, they touched
their own head. You know. Brent kept fiddling with his tie.
He wasn't quite comfortable being in charge the way he
convulsed and giggled to show that he wanted to be
one of the gangs. And you know, you're you're right
that if we hadn't shot a little pilot showing the character,
(10:38):
it was like a couple of years before we did
the actual thing. I went back to the office I
used to work in, and I had like friends who
still worked there, but we used as extras, so it
looked very hyper real. But they also like to see
what I meant if I have said, oh, this is
a character. He's quite boring, really and quite desperate to
(11:00):
be loved. He doesn't say anything funny. He screws up
jokes in that and when he makes a joke, no
one laughs. And then he touched his tie and looked
at the camera. They think, what is this? You know,
it just doesn't jump off the page. It was it
was a performance piece. Initially it was it was about
behavior and about a man who was doing stuff to
(11:24):
be loved and famous, and deep down he wanted to
be popular and he thought being famous would that would
be a short cut to it. And you know, he
he threw everything. You know, he wanted to be a
philosopher and a teacher, he wanted to be cool, he
wanted to be sexy, he wanted to be funny, he
(11:46):
wanted to be all those things that he wasn't quite.
And that is comedy. It's most basic, particularly in sitcom.
A sitcom is about an average guy or gal and
an average person who's trying to do something they're not
equipped to do. And that's what we're laughing at the
blind Spot. So I just made David friend so about
(12:08):
the blind Spot. But it was so it was so
obvious and cringe e what we were trying to say
with this man. He was delusional, and that in itself
was about people who wanted to be famous. Because in
the nineties there were people, as I said, there were
these people that in you know, quaint docu soaps, just
getting on with their lives and being discovered and having
their fifteen minutes and that was it. But then all
(12:31):
this talent shows started and how many times have you
seen people on the talent show crying, going, please, I
just want this, vote for me, I just want this.
We want to go, well, what's that got to do
with me? Why you what? What's that got to do
with us? What? What a we care? Whether you want
to be famous just because you want it, Well, what
are you going to do for it? What? What have you?
(12:51):
Whatever have you put in? You know? And then it
wasn't even talent shows. Then it was just people and
be and famous for being famous and doing anything to
be famous, you know, or being a housewife, I said,
being a housewife, right, like suddenly being a housewife Beverly
Hills or whatever, like yeah, it's yeah, exactly, but but
(13:15):
just just people, you know. And then it got to
be that the producers are in on it. People would say,
let me go in big Brother, and I promise our
cause trouble, start a fight to take my clothes off,
and the producers said, okay, you're in. It was these
It was honestly, it was these contrived things people. You know,
(13:35):
you watch shows like The Apprentice, and these people they
say anything to get on with the blessing of the
producer that wants to see conflict. You know, I'll go
in there, I'll put the cat among the pigeons. I'm
a man who will steamroller anyone who gets in my way.
I say what I think, I ruf all feathers, and
the producers are going, well, great, let's do it. Yeah,
that's let's and and suddenly there was there was this
(13:57):
culture of misbehavior media that was being rewarded. But I
think that it was just the start of it. When
I came with David Brent, it was just you know,
and as I say, he was mainly before television, before docusents,
he was mainly just a Frankenstein of those guys you
(14:20):
meet growing up. You know, your elders who should know better,
your teachers who sometimes embarrass themselves, your first boss who
was an idiot, and it's it's someone behaving when they
should know better. And that's why it was important that
he was the boss, really because if he weren't the boss,
he could be an idiot. And sometimes sitcoms made the difference,
(14:43):
you know, the mistake of they they got that right
and then they went on holiday, and on holiday it
doesn't matter so much because people can behave badly on holiday.
So you need that restriction, you need that authority that
he's undermining. You know, it has to be someone who
shouldn't be behaving like this because they should be a
(15:04):
role model and they shouldn't know better. So all those
things were put in the mix, and the big theme
of it as well. Was uh men as boys and
women has grown ups because there was also a PC
culture that I saw come in where people were taught
(15:25):
what to say and do, but they didn't really mean it.
So guys like him, they knew that they couldn't be
sexist upstairs because they're you know, they're get in trouble
with HR And they talked a good talk and they
talked about sexism, misogyny and racism, but deep down they
hadn't changed and they could get away with that in
(15:46):
the warehouse. So Brent was caught between two worlds because
he wanted to be loved by everyone. He wanted to
be a lad downstairs with the warehouse, but then he
had to behave properly in front of his boss. It
was a man who was caught. He was caught between
two worlds. He wanted to say terrible things, but the
camera was rolling. He wanted to be one of the guys,
(16:09):
but his boss was watching. So this was a man
who wasn't comfortable with himself because he wasn't being honest
with himself. He wasn't being honest because he didn't he
just wanted a hand out of business cards that said
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Eating Wall Broke podcast while I eat a meal created
by self made entrepreneurs, influencers, and celebrities over a meal
they once ate when they were broke. Today I have
the lovely AJ Crimson, the official Princess of comfin Asia
(18:29):
kind and Asia. This is the professor. We're here on
Eating Wall Broke, and today I'm gonna break down my
meal that got me through a time when I was broken.
Listen to Eating Wall Broke on the I Heart Radio app,
on Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Did
you know that on the day Dr King was shot,
the old black security detail normally assigned to him was
(18:52):
called off. They're the ones who would not allow him
to stay at any hotel with balconies. That security union
was reassigned. I was a man there who just bawn
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(19:12):
the day Dr King was shot, two black firemen stationed
across the street and one black police detective who was
surveiling King. We're all taken off the job. What was
the emergency that caused? Usually moved another fire sun? Did
you ever asked what this was all about? And then
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this is the MLK tapes. The first episodes are available now.
Listen on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or
wherever you get your podcasts. Do you remember the this
(20:00):
time you met Ben Silverman? Yes, I do. I was
walking down the street in London. I think I was
going to see my agent, and the phone rang um
and he said, Hi, it's Ben Silverman. You don't know me.
I wanna I want to remake the Office for America.
(20:22):
And I went okay, all right. He said can we
meet up? He said I'm in town. I went right.
He said where are you? I'll come to you. I've
juve the cab. I went okay, and I looked up
and I said, right, I'm right outside Starbucks in ward
Or Street and he went, wait there, I'll be there
in fifteen minutes and he jumped in a cab. He
got I've never met anyone like him. He came and
(20:44):
found me because obviously he knew what he looked like
because he'd watched the Office. And he talked to me
and I said, well, listen, let me introduce you to
my agent to get the ball rolling. And I took
him in to see Duncan Hayes as my UK still
is my Okay agent, and that's and that was the
beginning of it. And then I can't remember all the
(21:07):
details or all the phone calls, but I think the
next big step was we sort of auditions show runners
and we saw some amazing ones from my favorite programs
of all time. We we chose Greg. And I think
we chose Greg not just because of his body's work,
(21:29):
which was as good as anyone's, and he was a
nice chat but I think I think it was because
he was the only one that brought up that he
thought it was a love story. That was very important
to me. That the love story. So you know, I
didn't want to say I never thought of it was,
you know, just the sitcom. You know, you traditionally sitcoms were,
(21:51):
as I say, an ordinary guy getting into Caper's and
then you num back at square one and there wasn't
there wasn't really romance. But you know, we stole that
from America because you know, and movies, because you know,
there was always a love interest in movies and a
lot of Americans shows have more romance and love interests
than than ours. That was usually about a grumpy, middle
(22:15):
aged man, so we we like that. And then I
can't remember what all of this this was in, but
I think it was the Golden Globes where we won
for the office and I won Best Comedy Actor. I
think that was the same week. So we went to
Ben Silverman's office, and I don't know before and after,
(22:38):
but then Ben and Greg came to London that I
think that was nearer the time when we were very
getting very close to actually start in production, and we
worked out the translation what was slow in America, you know,
what was the equivalent of this, and what was the
equivalent of that, and do we have this and what
(23:00):
we almost did like a blueprint to you know, just
americanizing stuff, and then we started. Then we started auditions
and and that was it. I do remember at one point,
I think before or auditions, or when we were thinking
of looking for you know, the David Brent and I
(23:23):
think Ben Silverman called me and said, why don't you plane?
And I said, well, what were the point of that?
I did my best. Now I want to rest. Now
I want some I want some other schmack to do
a two episodes. But mainly my really, apart from the
fact that I was lazy and I was terrified of
(23:43):
being working hard for seven years, I said, no, this
should be this should be made by Americans for Americans.
And I was flattered that they even let us being
involved as we were. But you know, it really took
off when they started making in their own show. Is
the first episode was basically a remake, but then it
(24:06):
just got further and further away, and you know, by
the end, it yeah, it was it was his own show.
And I remember that people were scared because The Office
was such a media darling, you know, to a few Americans,
even its peak. I remember the Office in America, the
our version. I remember it was the biggest show on
(24:29):
BBC America and it had something like one point one million, right,
and Ben Dieldon was saying, listen, there's a lot of
people that haven't seen this, that won't be prejudiced. But
of course, I remember he was worried about the press
saying this is a you know this, we love the original, um,
(24:50):
and he came up with a really good thing. When
they were saying, why would you do a remake of
this that the original was perfect, he said, well, why
I wouldn't. I wouldn't make a film of a shitty novel.
I'd make a film of the best novel I could find.
And I thought that was such a clever counter. But
(25:10):
of course we want to remake of something that's really
good at wine, we don't remake something that was terrible.
And then soon, you know, people forgot that there was original.
Some people don't even know there's an original. To most
Americans that they have no idea that this is a remake,
(25:31):
and they don't care. And you know, and I imagine
most people who love the American Office they prefer it
to the British version. So and which is a great
position to be in for me. I remember once it
was after syndication and someone someone on Twitter sent me
a tweet that said, the American version of the Office
(25:54):
is so much bigger and better than yours. How does
that make you feel? And I sent back, fucking exactly.
I don't think you had any problem with the success
of the American version of The Office. No, I was,
(26:15):
you know, but I remember also early days it was
an okay start. It was a new sitcom. I mean
it was our network TV, so it was already audacious.
It was pretty out there. Yeah, and the readings were
not good. It was it was a bit spiky and different,
and I think it struggled, and I think we've got
(26:35):
They deferred people's wages too, so it could keep going,
and and you know, people really pulled together to try
and get this going. And then I think that there
was two big breaks, as I remember, one was they
discovered that it was watched by the right demographic for advertising,
and even though it was only getting a few millions,
(26:57):
I think it was the highest percentage of people earning
over a hundred thousand dollars. I think it was second
to Will and Grace, And so advertisers loved it, and
so the channel loved it. So there was all that
behind the scenes things going on. And then Steve Carrell
became a huge film star, so it took off. It
(27:19):
just and then it grew and grew and grew and
got bigger and bigger, and it's still getting bigger and bigger.
It's remarkable. Remarkable. Yeah. One of my favorite Emmy moments
of all time was the bit you did with Steve Correll.
What do you think about the fact that he never
won an Emmy? Didn't he never How many did he
get nominated for? He must have got nominated every year.
(27:41):
He probably got six or seven, but he never won. Wow? Wow,
Oh in your face, Steve Carrell? Um, Wow, So was
I up against him? Then? When I won, I won
an Emmy firm My Performance and extras, and I wasn't
there and so and that's the one where John Stewart
(28:05):
gave it to Steve. Also one of them is my
fault that he didn't win. Now I feel bad. Yeah,
that was funny, that bit. I just I bumped into
him on the red carpet and said, I've got an
idea if you could, Um, I'm going to come and
get my Amie back and you've stolen it. And he
(28:26):
just went, do whatever you want and he just played
it so so dead talents and so great and it
was just lovely when he bent down and gave it
back to me. He's great, I think. I you know,
I have said this many times an interview, never to
his face. I always wind him up in public. Obviously
(28:47):
that's my job. But he's such a brilliant, hard working, conscientious,
it's just a lovely man who is great. He's so versatile.
And then we got to see him that he was
a dramatic actor after all this was over. I mean,
(29:10):
we really we really lucked out when we got Steve
Garral for being our sitcom, didn't wed. Yeah, he's one
of the best. Yeah, because you know he can be
you know, he can be snide and rude and unaware
(29:31):
and somehow you still have that feeling where you you
just want to love him. I know, I know it is. Yeah,
he's some he's remarkable, but I still beat him at
the end. Is let's not forget that o. The Gangster
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We got you interested in starting a trucking company or
vendor machine business. Not really sure about how taxes or
credit work. We got it all covered. The Earnier Leisure
Podcast is available now. Listen to Earnier Leisure on the
Black Effect podcast Network. I Heart Radio, app, Apple Podcast,
or wherever you get your podcasts. Um were you pleased
(32:58):
with how Greg Daniels after the show? I thought it
was great. I just thought it was great, how dense
it was, how fast everything one, how many plot lines,
and how written it was. I mean, I know there was,
you know, a lot more writers, but I just thought
he held it together, and he kept the heart and
(33:21):
he kept the love story. It was. It was as
funny as anything needed to be. It looked great, and
it just got better and better. And I was so
proud of him and everyone, and you know, and and
Steve Correll. And then it was a joy for me
to pop up in a couple just for fun like
(33:42):
I would have, like I would have in my favorite show.
I did a Simpson, I did a Family Guy, I
did Sesame Street, and this was like this show, but
I you know, you forget that it came from an
idea you had ten years before, but it was this monster.
And I felt flattered that they invited me to do
(34:05):
a cameo in it. So that's how good it was
that I felt flat out that I was invited to
be in this show. That's how good I thought it was. Oh,
that's that's crazy. I just watched last night. I had
somebody sent me those two clips and you and Steve
at the elevator banks doing your Chinese impression, and you know,
(34:28):
I mean that was completely ad libbed, but but we
just bumped into and I just thought, because it was
the time when people were thinking of you know, I
think it was already out there that Steve was leaving,
wasn't it. And so I dropped in this little false
thing for the bands where I said, any jobs going
(34:51):
And I just thought that was a buddy little tease that.
I mean, your show started with the idea of redundancy, right,
and then in the American version, it really went on
unlike anything that was happening in American television, like dealing
with serious issues like race, homosexuality, healthcare, you know, et cetera.
(35:16):
And as we talked about before, like that that unpec
or the the woke culture as they call it now,
well exactly. But you know, the thing is that again
it's important that people know that the difference between the
subjects of a joke and the actual target and the
target was actually people pretending to be all those good
(35:36):
things but not quite getting it right. We were taking
the stab of this this false notion of just pretending
to have like equality and fairness but not really. And
you know, we did it to a certain extent in
our version, and certainly David Frent, you know, was was
fascinated with with difference, and he was had that terrible
(35:59):
white class ancht about anyone thinking he was sexist or racist,
and so he overcompensated. He was basically a good person,
but he overcompensated. He panicks around different you know, around
disability or color or anything like that. So that was
funny because and we're we're laughing. We're laughing at that
(36:21):
white ant. That's what we're laughing at. And of course
people getting it wrong. You know, he's funny because he's
getting it wrong. He's trying to do the right thing,
but he's not a quick he's not a quick to
do it. Yes. Yeah, one thing someone told me recently,
and I'm sure you're aware of this. You know, American
(36:42):
television was basically every show was set up with a
love story. Right here are the lovers. It's you know,
a will they won't they or a married couple, and
then you have kind of the wacky boss or the
wacky uncle who comes in for you know, ninety seconds
of the show, may people laugh, and then he goes
away again. But what your show did was you inverted
(37:06):
it right. You made the wacky boss the central figure
of the show, which meant you had to care about him,
because before who cares what the wacky boss or the
wacky uncle is thinking. But you put him central, and
you put the love story in the corner, but you
make that just as important. But it makes people want
to lean in and and watch. That's exactly right. I
(37:29):
said once that people tune in for David Brent, but
they stayed with Tim and Dawn because there's a will
they won't. You've got to stick around. You've got to
see the result with that. It is something you want,
and that's an emotional connection which is stronger than just gags.
And I see it in all forms of comedy. I
see it in stand up. You know, you you can't
(37:50):
go and see someone who just hous a hundred killer
jokes and they're great, but after about fifty you're looking
at your watch and there's no reason to stay and
you could pause, and you could, you know, but someone
shambles out and they tell you a story about the
terrible day they've had, and you're related. You can't leave.
You want to know what happened. And I think that's
(38:10):
what the love Story did, because we wanted to see
if they got together, and I tried it a certain
amount with them, you know, brength development, because I think
people eventually wanted him to be happy, because I like
the fact that people thought it was just awful with
no redeeming features. But then you see that he's wounded too,
and he's looking for love, and he's not a bad person.
(38:31):
He's just been doubt a bad hand, and you know
he made the mistake. He thought things like being on
Telly would making feel better, and you know, he thought
that popularity was as good as respect. It's just been
lied to, really by television. And I think people saw
that in the end, and they saw that actually he
(38:52):
wasn't he wasn't that bad a bloke. He was all right,
And everyone's wounded, everyone's looking for love, everyone needs a hug,
And I'm glad that eventually people thought of him fondly. Yeah,
it's it's crazy. This is just occurring to me now,
So maybe this is a stupid idea, but you know,
(39:13):
you talk about him just wanting fame and being you know,
in the family of say a Big Big Brother contestant.
But in a way, David Brent actually had more reality
right than than a real person on one of those shows,
because you eventually got to see the inside of David Brent,
(39:34):
and those guys on Big Brother you don't ever see
the inside, no you don't. And also what happened with
something like Big Brother is it started off like a
quite a good social experiment where no one really knew
how they were going to come across, not even the producers,
and there was real drama. Then they started contriving it.
(39:56):
Then they started putting in, As I said, people who
were think they were already at their lowest there they
had nothing to lose, they had no dignity to lose,
so it wasn't even particularly interesting. You know, when a
load of feral people are happy to run around and
fight each other and take their clothes off, you think, well,
what are we watching this for? Where's the conflict? They're
(40:16):
happy with that? There's no just see what I'm saying,
there's no there's no human interest story because it's like
they don't care about themselves. They know what's happening. They've
gone in there to get fIF demons to pay cash
in on it, sell their story to the paper, and
buy a house, and good luck to them. But I
don't know why that it was no longer entertaining because
(40:38):
it wasn't real. It's strangely reality, as you said, reality
TV became less real than than a well scripted drama
about reality, and so you know, that's what happened. I
think over that time, what are you most proud of
the legacy of the office? Oh, that's so difficult. That's
(41:01):
so difficult to say. I'd say it was the first
time I tried my harvest anything. I'm very proud of that.
And I got addicted to that. I was sort of
this guy that would cruise around and I did well
at school because I was smart, and it was almost
like I wore it like a badge of hon and
(41:21):
I didn't need to try hard. And I realized that
that's not a good attitude. And then, you know, and
then I tried to become a pop star and failed miserably.
And my mistake was wanting to be a pop star,
and I should have wanted to be a songwriter. And
so when I came to this later in life, I thought,
I want to be a writer, director. I want to
be famous for something. If if fame, if I'm going
(41:42):
to be an actor and be famous, I'd better be
famous for something. I better do something I'm proud of.
And right in the Office, I knew at the time,
and I knew in retrospect that that was the first
time I had really tried my harvest at anything, and
it was a great feeling. And I don't think you
can have success without hard work. You know, if you
(42:04):
didn't work hard, it loses a bit of its success.
So that's what I'm proud is sold trying my harvest. Well,
it's uh, I mean, you know, look at everybody who
was involved in the American version owes everything to you,
you know, working your hardest on something. Um, I'll just
(42:26):
ask you one more thing that that at the end
of the American Office, it ends to talking head by
the character of Pam, and she is talking about you know,
she thought it was weird that people who work in
a paper company would be the subject of a documentary,
like why would anyone want to watch us. But she said,
(42:46):
you know, in retrospect, she feels like that they were
a really good subject for documentary because there's there's beauty
and ordinary things, and isn't that kind of isn't that
kind of the point? And that was what Greg's perspective was,
That's exactly right. I've always been fascinated with trying to
make the ordinary extraordinary, just trying to take a tiny
(43:10):
little story that you wouldn't think anyone's interested in, and
and making people interested in it. And I remember when
I was at school, I used to write and my
teachers say, yeah, it's a bit melodramatic. And I realized
that I was taking it from Telly and films, and
and he kept going a bit more dramatic, right, And
this really annoyed me. So I decided to try and
(43:31):
do the most boring story I could, right just to
annoy my teacher. I was like thirteen, And so what
I did was my mom used to look after this
old lady who lived near us, and when I was born,
i'd go around. I'd watched my mom sort of make
a tea and clean up and that, and it was
boring for a kid. And I thought, I know what
(43:52):
I do. I'll write about that right this feature a
lesson and I remember the just writing exactly what was happening.
And I handed it in and I've got it back
and the teacher had given me an a and said
much better. And I almost didn't get it. I did.
(44:16):
I did y um, because I think he knew what
I was doing, but he also knew what I was
saying was the truth and that I I've done it
from real life as opposed to a top show on Telly,
do you know what I mean? And then I was
(44:38):
dinna realize that ordinary life is the most fascinating thing
we have. Everyone's life is fascinating to them and and
if you look into it, it can be fascinating to
everyone because it's it's unique and real and it happened
and it was a life, and I think that's beautiful.
And then you know, I've taken that on my new
(44:58):
series After Life. It about the mundane things in life,
you know, saving you there are distractions, and it's true.
It's just true. Everyone thinks that you know what their
their lives a bit boring and mundane, but it's not.
It's it's fascinating. Well, I was not going to be
(45:18):
overly nice to you until the very end. But your
ability through all of your shows, obviously, and you as
a person, your ability to find that humanity in people
that you do not expect to be likable, is a
great gift that you know you've given everyone. Blah blah.
I don't want to sound too nice, but you know
what I'm saying. I love it. Thank you very much.
(45:39):
That's that is. That's lovely. Thank you, thank you so much.
I really appreciate it. Yes, and good luck with afterlife.
I cannot wait to watch it, and thank you man,
and enjoy a drink on me tonight. I'm going to
have one now. I'm sure some of the residuals that
that we made it just just something that we pay,
okay to there you nothing but the greatest champagne, full day,
(46:04):
every day on top. All right, thanks mam, all right, cheers, alright,
bye bye bye. That is a rap on Ricky Gervais. Ricky,
(46:26):
thank you so much for joining me. I hope it
was worth your time, if for no other reason than
to find out that Steve never won an Emmy. I'm
very pleased that I could provide that level of joy
for you to the rest of you as always. Thank
you so much for joining me, and don't forget to
subscribe to The Office Deep Dive on your podcast app.
(46:49):
Do your so that you and I can keep well
diving deeper. I hope you have a great day and
I will see you again next Yeah. The Office Deep
Dive is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner,
(47:12):
alongside our executive producer Langley. Our senior producer is Tessa Kramer,
our producer is Emily Carr, and our assistant editor is
Diego Tapia. My main man in the booth is Alec Moore.
Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by my great
friend Creep Bratton, and the episode was mixed by Seth Olanski. Hi,
(47:53):
my name is Cassi Zachary and I am April Callahan,
and we are fashion historian Yeah, and co hosts and
the creators of the podcast Dressed the History of Fashion,
which is dedicated to investigating the significance of dress from
throughout history and around the world. And we are so
excited to bring you a brand new season celebrating groundbreaking
(48:13):
fashion figures and explain the history of everything from courses
to blue jeans dressed. The History of Fashion is available
on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever else
you listen to your favorite shows. New episodes trap every
Tuesday and Thursday. I'm Colleen would joined me the host
of Eating Wall Broke podcast While I eat a meal
(48:35):
created by self made entrepreneurs, influencers, and celebrities over a
meal they once eight when they were broke. Today I
have the lovely aj Crimson, the official Princess of compon Asia,
Kidding and Assia. This is the professor. We're here on
Eating While Broke and today I'm gonna break down my
meal that got me through a time when I was broken.
(48:55):
Listen to Eating Wall Broke on the I Heart Radio app,
on Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Hello, Hello, Hi,
Oh my god. I want to come through the screen
and hug you. Hey, everybody. Jessica's are here, also known
as Vanessa Abrahams on Gossip Girl. I am so excited
(49:15):
to share my new podcast with you guys. It's called
XO XO and it's a walk down memory lane all
about Gossip Girl. I'll chat with some of the cast, crew, fans,
of the show, and I'm just so pumped for you
guys to go on this journey with me. All Right.
I made Westwick, I played Chuck Bass Is this Michelle Tractonberg,
I'll never tell, Okay, I'm Taylor Mompson and I played
Jenny Humphrey. Hi, I'm sbashion Stan and I played Carter Ason.
(49:40):
That was one of the reasons I liked the character
Jenny so much, is that she was very relatable. The
whole thing was such a choice for me to do,
and I was just so thankful that people responded the
way they did to what we were doing. This really
was just like wonderful. I like have like warm feelings inside.
I'm giving you air hugs. Listen to XO so on
(50:00):
the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts.
From the creator of The Bright Sessions, comes a new
fiction podcast for all ages. When a fellow student vanishes,
Max starts to look into the disappearance. Her investigation draws
her deep into the dark woods around Hastings, and even
deeper into the secrets and lies the course through the
veins of this sleepy town. This New Y, a mystery
from writer director Lauren Chippen, is an audio drama with
(00:20):
heart and wit that involves the audience in a way
no fiction podcast ever has. Listen to MAXI Miles on
the i Heeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts. Conquer your New Year's resolutions with the
Before Breakfast podcast. In each bite sized daily episode, you'll
learn how to make the most of your time with
practical tools to help you feel less busy and get
more done. Listen to Before Breakfast on the I Heart
(00:42):
Radio app four wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Emilia
on this podcast. I'm taking you on a search, a
search for love, hard working Latina, but there were other
reasons I felt like I couldn't always beat myself. My
mom in prison. This crumbs my love story. It's a
(01:04):
show about the things we set up for and the
bits of ourselves that make us who we are. Listen
to Crumbs on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts
or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm really devided. You
probably know me from the UK version of the Office,
(01:28):
or the Office as we call it in the UK. Hello,
and welcome back to the Office Deep Dive. I am
your host, Brian Baumgardner. Today you will get to listen
to my conversation with the one and only one of
(01:51):
my comedy heroes, Ricky Gervais. Ricky was the co creator
of the British version of the Office along with Stephen Merchant,
who we spoke to last week, and Ricky, in addition
to creating the show, also played David Brent, the British
counterpart and the inspiration for Michael Scott, who was somehow
(02:14):
possibly even more cringe e than Michael was. I didn't
think it was possible either, but only Ricky himself could
pull that off. Now, obviously, Ricky is a very, very
busy man, and when I interviewed him, he was doing
a ton of press for another show he created called Afterlife,
(02:36):
which I am obsessed with. That show. I absolutely love it.
Everyone you should go and watch it if you haven't. Um,
but Ricky was doing so many TV appearances at the
time that when I spoke to him, he thought that
this was another video interview, which it was not. So
(02:56):
here I am, I'm lounging in, I'm in my sweatpants,
and Key is looking sharp, he's looking camera ready, he's
looking Gervais sexy is how I like to call it. Um,
So just keep that image in your head as you listen. UM. Anyway,
I am totally psyched that I got a chance to
talk to him, and I so appreciate him making the
(03:18):
time for us. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the
incomparable Ricky Gervais. Bubble and Squeak. I love it. Bubble
and Squeak on Bubble and Squeaker cookie every month, left
(03:42):
over from the night before. UM, do you know what
we're doing here? Isn't it a podcast about the history
of the Uh? Yeah? So like the ten second version
(04:03):
is basically the Office American version. Since two thousand seventeen,
it's the number one streaming show in the world. It
has over a hundred and thirty five billion minutes that
have been stream stream in essentially two years and so
(04:23):
what we're doing is going back and trying to figure
out why this has happened. Um. Yeah, Well, I mean
it's a testament to all the hard work, hard work
that went into it, and the rioting and the action,
the fact that it's about everyday people and about everything exactly.
(04:43):
All right, I'm just going to start at the beginning
and I'll ask you questions. So what were the what
were the influences that had you And you know, Stephen
talked to me a little bit about you know, how
you guys got to know each other and you hired
him as as your assistant the radio station. Well, what
were some of the influences that you guys had. Well,
(05:04):
it goes back before that, It goes back before that.
I had David Frent as a character. Um, you know
a few years before that. In fact, I worked in
an office for like ten years, and obviously that's the
biggest influence real life, being part of it of a
working office, and you know, you start noticing that the
fact that you're thrown together with random people and you
(05:26):
have to get along. So, you know, that was one
theme coupled with that. Throughout the nineties, I watched a
lot of those docu soaps that were happening here where
ordinary people got their fifteen minutes of fame. Um, there
was one called Airline and airport and you know all that,
you know, the hotel and sort of they'd make celebrities
(05:49):
that are these normal people because they were just ordinary people.
But they were funny and at work and and of
course now fames a different beast. Now they'd get an
agent and they try and get their own game show
and make the most of it, and you know, but
then it was sort of it was they were quite quaint.
But I did notice that people had started to be
obsessed with fame in the nineties, and of course that's
(06:13):
just got worse and worse and worse until it sort
of eats itself. So those were the those were the
sort of big things, an ordinary person getting his one
shot fame, wanting to be famous. You know, if you
take away it was a fake documentary, it doesn't make
much sense because you say, well, why is David Brent
acting like that? Or he wants to be famous, he
(06:33):
wants to be discovered, he wants to be loved, he
needs to hug you know, So so it was a
bit it was a we weren't spoofing the genre, but
the fact that it was meant to be a documentary.
You know, it's fifty of the show before you start
writing the sitcom, and um, so how much how much
of the comedy comes from it being a documentary. Well,
(06:58):
you've got to believe this is a real person who
wants to be famous. So you've got to really believe that.
Um you're eavesdropping almost you're you're looking on someone's life.
Because if you start thinking about you know, it's it's written,
anything can happen. So you have to try and make
the ordinary extraordinary. And once you realize that David Frn
(07:21):
just wants to be discovered and become famous and needs
a hug, it all seems to make sense really, And
from a personal point of view, I wanted it to
be a more about body language, not just acting and
saying the lines. I wanted it to be you know,
people notice things like I hated it in the drama
(07:43):
or comedy where someone would hang up the phone and
then talk to themselves, you know, like go mm hm,
he doesn't usually call on a Tuesday. They have to
find a way of showing someone was worried or lying,
and you know you do that by the guy sort
of not looking at you and then flicking his eyes
at the camera, or you know, you had to somehow
(08:05):
act like you would if you were being filmed and
being caught out. And so there was there was lots
of reminders that this was a fake documentary, because otherwise
it just wasn't that special or interesting. If that, there'd
be no reason to be making, you know, a sitcom
where these people were acting like that, unless it was
(08:26):
because one of them sort of wanting to be discovered
and famous. So it really was about you know, TV
in itself. It was about people, the beginning of this
new narcicism, this beginning of people doing anything, you know,
living their life like an open wound, just doing anything.
And and that was the beginning of bad behavior being rewarded.
(08:48):
You know, as soon as we people thought, well I
made it. I made an absolute proud of myself on television.
But they've invited me on a new program to talk
about it. You know, it's okay. And then people started
with people that would break the law and then write
a book, you know, So that was the ninth is
I saw that a lot. But apart from that, it was.
(09:10):
It was still about people. It was still about people
being randomly thrown together and getting along, you know, and
and conflict. But the fact that it was a fact
documentary and one person in particular wanted to come out
of this famous because he was looking for something. He
was searching for something, you know, that was a very
(09:32):
very big part of it. Yeah, it's interesting you talk
about behavior, right, and that so much of the comedy
comes from that. Greg Daniels shared with me that he
would send his writers down to the set to just
observe the actors because you can't write people's behavior, you
can't write their body posture, you can't write that stuff.
(09:54):
And so to really observe, for the writers on the
American Office, to actually observe are the actors and the
characters in their setting, because so much of the humor
came from that. Yeah, and that's because obviously, in real life,
so much communication is non verbal. You know, just someone being,
as I said, someone lying, they don't look at you.
(10:15):
They touched their face. They when they're nervous, they touched
their own head. You know. Brent kept fiddling with his tie.
He wasn't quite comfortable being in charge the way he
convulsed and giggled to show that he wanted to be
one of the gangs. And you know, you're you're right
that if we hadn't shot a little pilot showing the character,
(10:38):
it was like a couple of years before we did
the actual thing. I went back to the office I
used to work in, and I had like friends who
still worked there, but we used as extras, so it
looked very hyper real. But they also like to see
what I meant if I have said, oh, this is
a character. He's quite boring, really and quite desperate to
(11:00):
be loved. He doesn't say anything funny. He screws up
jokes in that and when he makes a joke, no
one laughs. And then he touched his tie and looked
at the camera. They think, what is this? You know,
it just doesn't jump off the page. It was it
was a performance piece. Initially it was it was about
behavior and about a man who was doing stuff to
(11:24):
be loved and famous, and deep down he wanted to
be popular and he thought being famous would that would
be a short cut to it. And you know, he
he threw everything. You know, he wanted to be a
philosopher and a teacher, he wanted to be cool, he
wanted to be sexy, he wanted to be funny, he
(11:46):
wanted to be all those things that he wasn't quite.
And that is comedy. It's most basic, particularly in sitcom.
A sitcom is about an average guy or gal and
an average person who's trying to do something they're not
equipped to do. And that's what we're laughing at the
blind Spot. So I just made David friend so about
(12:08):
the blind Spot. But it was so it was so
obvious and cringe e what we were trying to say
with this man. He was delusional, and that in itself
was about people who wanted to be famous. Because in
the nineties there were people, as I said, there were
these people that in you know, quaint docu soaps, just
getting on with their lives and being discovered and having
their fifteen minutes and that was it. But then all
(12:31):
this talent shows started and how many times have you
seen people on the talent show crying, going, please, I
just want this, vote for me, I just want this.
We want to go, well, what's that got to do
with me? Why you what? What's that got to do
with us? What? What a we care? Whether you want
to be famous just because you want it, Well, what
are you going to do for it? What? What have you?
(12:51):
Whatever have you put in? You know? And then it
wasn't even talent shows. Then it was just people and
be and famous for being famous and doing anything to
be famous, you know, or being a housewife, I said,
being a housewife, right, like suddenly being a housewife Beverly
Hills or whatever, like yeah, it's yeah, exactly, but but
(13:15):
just just people, you know. And then it got to
be that the producers are in on it. People would say,
let me go in big Brother, and I promise our
cause trouble, start a fight to take my clothes off,
and the producers said, okay, you're in. It was these
It was honestly, it was these contrived things people. You know,
(13:35):
you watch shows like The Apprentice, and these people they
say anything to get on with the blessing of the
producer that wants to see conflict. You know, I'll go
in there, I'll put the cat among the pigeons. I'm
a man who will steamroller anyone who gets in my way.
I say what I think, I ruf all feathers, and
the producers are going, well, great, let's do it. Yeah,
that's let's and and suddenly there was there was this
(13:57):
culture of misbehavior media that was being rewarded. But I
think that it was just the start of it. When
I came with David Brent, it was just you know,
and as I say, he was mainly before television, before docusents,
he was mainly just a Frankenstein of those guys you
(14:20):
meet growing up. You know, your elders who should know better,
your teachers who sometimes embarrass themselves, your first boss who
was an idiot, and it's it's someone behaving when they
should know better. And that's why it was important that
he was the boss, really because if he weren't the boss,
he could be an idiot. And sometimes sitcoms made the difference,
(14:43):
you know, the mistake of they they got that right
and then they went on holiday, and on holiday it
doesn't matter so much because people can behave badly on holiday.
So you need that restriction, you need that authority that
he's undermining. You know, it has to be someone who
shouldn't be behaving like this because they should be a
(15:04):
role model and they shouldn't know better. So all those
things were put in the mix, and the big theme
of it as well. Was uh men as boys and
women has grown ups because there was also a PC
culture that I saw come in where people were taught
(15:25):
what to say and do, but they didn't really mean it.
So guys like him, they knew that they couldn't be
sexist upstairs because they're you know, they're get in trouble
with HR And they talked a good talk and they
talked about sexism, misogyny and racism, but deep down they
hadn't changed and they could get away with that in
(15:46):
the warehouse. So Brent was caught between two worlds because
he wanted to be loved by everyone. He wanted to
be a lad downstairs with the warehouse, but then he
had to behave properly in front of his boss. It
was a man who was caught. He was caught between
two worlds. He wanted to say terrible things, but the
camera was rolling. He wanted to be one of the guys,
(16:09):
but his boss was watching. So this was a man
who wasn't comfortable with himself because he wasn't being honest
with himself. He wasn't being honest because he didn't he
just wanted a hand out of business cards that said
great bloke just laugh at my jokes. But life isn't
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Deep Dive terms and conditions apply. Need to hire you
need Indeed. I'm Colleen with Join me the host of
Eating Wall Broke podcast while I eat a meal created
by self made entrepreneurs, influencers, and celebrities over a meal
they once ate when they were broke. Today I have
the lovely AJ Crimson, the official Princess of comfin Asia
(18:29):
kind and Asia. This is the professor. We're here on
Eating Wall Broke, and today I'm gonna break down my
meal that got me through a time when I was broken.
Listen to Eating Wall Broke on the I Heart Radio app,
on Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Did
you know that on the day Dr King was shot,
the old black security detail normally assigned to him was
(18:52):
called off. They're the ones who would not allow him
to stay at any hotel with balconies. That security union
was reassigned. I was a man there who just bawn
in and I was track. Did you know that on
(19:12):
the day Dr King was shot, two black firemen stationed
across the street and one black police detective who was
surveiling King. We're all taken off the job. What was
the emergency that caused? Usually moved another fire sun? Did
you ever asked what this was all about? And then
(19:35):
this is the MLK tapes. The first episodes are available now.
Listen on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or
wherever you get your podcasts. Do you remember the this
(20:00):
time you met Ben Silverman? Yes, I do. I was
walking down the street in London. I think I was
going to see my agent, and the phone rang um
and he said, Hi, it's Ben Silverman. You don't know me.
I wanna I want to remake the Office for America.
(20:22):
And I went okay, all right. He said can we
meet up? He said I'm in town. I went right.
He said where are you? I'll come to you. I've
juve the cab. I went okay, and I looked up
and I said, right, I'm right outside Starbucks in ward
Or Street and he went, wait there, I'll be there
in fifteen minutes and he jumped in a cab. He
got I've never met anyone like him. He came and
(20:44):
found me because obviously he knew what he looked like
because he'd watched the Office. And he talked to me
and I said, well, listen, let me introduce you to
my agent to get the ball rolling. And I took
him in to see Duncan Hayes as my UK still
is my Okay agent, and that's and that was the
beginning of it. And then I can't remember all the
(21:07):
details or all the phone calls, but I think the
next big step was we sort of auditions show runners
and we saw some amazing ones from my favorite programs
of all time. We we chose Greg. And I think
we chose Greg not just because of his body's work,
(21:29):
which was as good as anyone's, and he was a
nice chat but I think I think it was because
he was the only one that brought up that he
thought it was a love story. That was very important
to me. That the love story. So you know, I
didn't want to say I never thought of it was,
you know, just the sitcom. You know, you traditionally sitcoms were,
(21:51):
as I say, an ordinary guy getting into Caper's and
then you num back at square one and there wasn't
there wasn't really romance. But you know, we stole that
from America because you know, and movies, because you know,
there was always a love interest in movies and a
lot of Americans shows have more romance and love interests
than than ours. That was usually about a grumpy, middle
(22:15):
aged man, so we we like that. And then I
can't remember what all of this this was in, but
I think it was the Golden Globes where we won
for the office and I won Best Comedy Actor. I
think that was the same week. So we went to
Ben Silverman's office, and I don't know before and after,
(22:38):
but then Ben and Greg came to London that I
think that was nearer the time when we were very
getting very close to actually start in production, and we
worked out the translation what was slow in America, you know,
what was the equivalent of this, and what was the
equivalent of that, and do we have this and what
(23:00):
we almost did like a blueprint to you know, just
americanizing stuff, and then we started. Then we started auditions
and and that was it. I do remember at one point,
I think before or auditions, or when we were thinking
of looking for you know, the David Brent and I
(23:23):
think Ben Silverman called me and said, why don't you plane?
And I said, well, what were the point of that?
I did my best. Now I want to rest. Now
I want some I want some other schmack to do
a two episodes. But mainly my really, apart from the
fact that I was lazy and I was terrified of
(23:43):
being working hard for seven years, I said, no, this
should be this should be made by Americans for Americans.
And I was flattered that they even let us being
involved as we were. But you know, it really took
off when they started making in their own show. Is
the first episode was basically a remake, but then it
(24:06):
just got further and further away, and you know, by
the end, it yeah, it was it was his own show.
And I remember that people were scared because The Office
was such a media darling, you know, to a few Americans,
even its peak. I remember the Office in America, the
our version. I remember it was the biggest show on
(24:29):
BBC America and it had something like one point one million, right,
and Ben Dieldon was saying, listen, there's a lot of
people that haven't seen this, that won't be prejudiced. But
of course, I remember he was worried about the press
saying this is a you know this, we love the original, um,
(24:50):
and he came up with a really good thing. When
they were saying, why would you do a remake of
this that the original was perfect, he said, well, why
I wouldn't. I wouldn't make a film of a shitty novel.
I'd make a film of the best novel I could find.
And I thought that was such a clever counter. But
(25:10):
of course we want to remake of something that's really
good at wine, we don't remake something that was terrible.
And then soon, you know, people forgot that there was original.
Some people don't even know there's an original. To most
Americans that they have no idea that this is a remake,
(25:31):
and they don't care. And you know, and I imagine
most people who love the American Office they prefer it
to the British version. So and which is a great
position to be in for me. I remember once it
was after syndication and someone someone on Twitter sent me
a tweet that said, the American version of the Office
(25:54):
is so much bigger and better than yours. How does
that make you feel? And I sent back, fucking exactly.
I don't think you had any problem with the success
of the American version of The Office. No, I was,
(26:15):
you know, but I remember also early days it was
an okay start. It was a new sitcom. I mean
it was our network TV, so it was already audacious.
It was pretty out there. Yeah, and the readings were
not good. It was it was a bit spiky and different,
and I think it struggled, and I think we've got
(26:35):
They deferred people's wages too, so it could keep going,
and and you know, people really pulled together to try
and get this going. And then I think that there
was two big breaks, as I remember, one was they
discovered that it was watched by the right demographic for advertising,
and even though it was only getting a few millions,
(26:57):
I think it was the highest percentage of people earning
over a hundred thousand dollars. I think it was second
to Will and Grace, And so advertisers loved it, and
so the channel loved it. So there was all that
behind the scenes things going on. And then Steve Carrell
became a huge film star, so it took off. It
(27:19):
just and then it grew and grew and grew and
got bigger and bigger, and it's still getting bigger and bigger.
It's remarkable. Remarkable. Yeah. One of my favorite Emmy moments
of all time was the bit you did with Steve Correll.
What do you think about the fact that he never
won an Emmy? Didn't he never How many did he
get nominated for? He must have got nominated every year.
(27:41):
He probably got six or seven, but he never won. Wow? Wow,
Oh in your face, Steve Carrell? Um, Wow, So was
I up against him? Then? When I won, I won
an Emmy firm My Performance and extras, and I wasn't
there and so and that's the one where John Stewart
(28:05):
gave it to Steve. Also one of them is my
fault that he didn't win. Now I feel bad. Yeah,
that was funny, that bit. I just I bumped into
him on the red carpet and said, I've got an
idea if you could, Um, I'm going to come and
get my Amie back and you've stolen it. And he
(28:26):
just went, do whatever you want and he just played
it so so dead talents and so great and it
was just lovely when he bent down and gave it
back to me. He's great, I think. I you know,
I have said this many times an interview, never to
his face. I always wind him up in public. Obviously
(28:47):
that's my job. But he's such a brilliant, hard working, conscientious,
it's just a lovely man who is great. He's so versatile.
And then we got to see him that he was
a dramatic actor after all this was over. I mean,
(29:10):
we really we really lucked out when we got Steve
Garral for being our sitcom, didn't wed. Yeah, he's one
of the best. Yeah, because you know he can be
you know, he can be snide and rude and unaware
(29:31):
and somehow you still have that feeling where you you
just want to love him. I know, I know it is. Yeah,
he's some he's remarkable, but I still beat him at
the end. Is let's not forget that o. The Gangster
(30:08):
Chronicles podcast is a weekly conversation that revolves around the
underworld and criminals and entertainers to victims, crime and law enforcement.
We cover all facets of the game. Gangster Chronicles podcast
doesn't glorify promotilstit activities. We just discussed the ramifications and
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gamester games, you are ultimately rewarded with gangster prizes. Our
(30:31):
Heart Radios number one for podcasts, but don't take our
award for it. Find Against the Chronicles podcast and my
Heart Radio app or wherever you get your podcast. I'm
Emilia on this podcast. I'm taking you on a search,
a search for love. Four hard working Latina seeks cool,
(30:52):
down to earth guy. It's hard out there for a
girl to find Mr Wright. I have to meet a
lot of Mr Wrongs. He'd invite me over to have
dinner with his family. I knew he didn't tell them
that it was transgender. Dating as a trans woman can
be complicated, but there were other reasons. I felt like
I couldn't always beat myself. And he's asking me things
(31:15):
about my family, like my mom's in prison, my grandmother
was arrested for working with the Mexican drug cartel. This
scrumbs my love story. It's a show about the things
we set up for and the bits of ourselves that
make us who we are. Listen to Crumbs as part
of the Michael Duda podcast Network, available on the i
(31:36):
Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
What's up, guys. I'm a Shop Bloud and I am
Troy Millions and we are the host of the Earnier
Leisure podcast, where we break down business models and examine
the latest trans and finance. We hold court and have
exclusive interviews with some of the biggest names of business, sport,
and entertainment, from DJ Khalid to Mark Cuban, Rick Ross
(31:57):
and Shaquille O'Neil. I mean alum, not list's ex Listen
in as our guests reveal their business models, hardships and
triumphs and their respective fields. The knowledge is in death
and the questions are always delivered from your standpoint. We
want to know what you want to know. We talked
to the legends of business, sports and entertainment about how
they got their start and most importantly, how they make
their money. Earn Your leisure is a college business class
(32:18):
mixed with pop culture. I want to learn about the
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We got you interested in starting a trucking company or
vendor machine business. Not really sure about how taxes or
credit work. We got it all covered. The Earnier Leisure
Podcast is available now. Listen to Earnier Leisure on the
Black Effect podcast Network. I Heart Radio, app, Apple Podcast,
or wherever you get your podcasts. Um were you pleased
(32:58):
with how Greg Daniels after the show? I thought it
was great. I just thought it was great, how dense
it was, how fast everything one, how many plot lines,
and how written it was. I mean, I know there was,
you know, a lot more writers, but I just thought
he held it together, and he kept the heart and
(33:21):
he kept the love story. It was. It was as
funny as anything needed to be. It looked great, and
it just got better and better. And I was so
proud of him and everyone, and you know, and and
Steve Correll. And then it was a joy for me
to pop up in a couple just for fun like
(33:42):
I would have, like I would have in my favorite show.
I did a Simpson, I did a Family Guy, I
did Sesame Street, and this was like this show, but
I you know, you forget that it came from an
idea you had ten years before, but it was this monster.
And I felt flattered that they invited me to do
(34:05):
a cameo in it. So that's how good it was
that I felt flat out that I was invited to
be in this show. That's how good I thought it was. Oh,
that's that's crazy. I just watched last night. I had
somebody sent me those two clips and you and Steve
at the elevator banks doing your Chinese impression, and you know,
(34:28):
I mean that was completely ad libbed, but but we
just bumped into and I just thought, because it was
the time when people were thinking of you know, I
think it was already out there that Steve was leaving,
wasn't it. And so I dropped in this little false
thing for the bands where I said, any jobs going
(34:51):
And I just thought that was a buddy little tease that.
I mean, your show started with the idea of redundancy, right,
and then in the American version, it really went on
unlike anything that was happening in American television, like dealing
with serious issues like race, homosexuality, healthcare, you know, et cetera.
(35:16):
And as we talked about before, like that that unpec
or the the woke culture as they call it now,
well exactly. But you know, the thing is that again
it's important that people know that the difference between the
subjects of a joke and the actual target and the
target was actually people pretending to be all those good
(35:36):
things but not quite getting it right. We were taking
the stab of this this false notion of just pretending
to have like equality and fairness but not really. And
you know, we did it to a certain extent in
our version, and certainly David Frent, you know, was was
fascinated with with difference, and he was had that terrible
(35:59):
white class ancht about anyone thinking he was sexist or racist,
and so he overcompensated. He was basically a good person,
but he overcompensated. He panicks around different you know, around
disability or color or anything like that. So that was
funny because and we're we're laughing. We're laughing at that
(36:21):
white ant. That's what we're laughing at. And of course
people getting it wrong. You know, he's funny because he's
getting it wrong. He's trying to do the right thing,
but he's not a quick he's not a quick to
do it. Yes. Yeah, one thing someone told me recently,
and I'm sure you're aware of this. You know, American
(36:42):
television was basically every show was set up with a
love story. Right here are the lovers. It's you know,
a will they won't they or a married couple, and
then you have kind of the wacky boss or the
wacky uncle who comes in for you know, ninety seconds
of the show, may people laugh, and then he goes
away again. But what your show did was you inverted
(37:06):
it right. You made the wacky boss the central figure
of the show, which meant you had to care about him,
because before who cares what the wacky boss or the
wacky uncle is thinking. But you put him central, and
you put the love story in the corner, but you
make that just as important. But it makes people want
to lean in and and watch. That's exactly right. I
(37:29):
said once that people tune in for David Brent, but
they stayed with Tim and Dawn because there's a will
they won't. You've got to stick around. You've got to
see the result with that. It is something you want,
and that's an emotional connection which is stronger than just gags.
And I see it in all forms of comedy. I
see it in stand up. You know, you you can't
(37:50):
go and see someone who just hous a hundred killer
jokes and they're great, but after about fifty you're looking
at your watch and there's no reason to stay and
you could pause, and you could, you know, but someone
shambles out and they tell you a story about the
terrible day they've had, and you're related. You can't leave.
You want to know what happened. And I think that's
(38:10):
what the love Story did, because we wanted to see
if they got together, and I tried it a certain
amount with them, you know, brength development, because I think
people eventually wanted him to be happy, because I like
the fact that people thought it was just awful with
no redeeming features. But then you see that he's wounded too,
and he's looking for love, and he's not a bad person.
(38:31):
He's just been doubt a bad hand, and you know
he made the mistake. He thought things like being on
Telly would making feel better, and you know, he thought
that popularity was as good as respect. It's just been
lied to, really by television. And I think people saw
that in the end, and they saw that actually he
(38:52):
wasn't he wasn't that bad a bloke. He was all right,
And everyone's wounded, everyone's looking for love, everyone needs a hug,
And I'm glad that eventually people thought of him fondly. Yeah,
it's it's crazy. This is just occurring to me now,
So maybe this is a stupid idea, but you know,
(39:13):
you talk about him just wanting fame and being you know,
in the family of say a Big Big Brother contestant.
But in a way, David Brent actually had more reality
right than than a real person on one of those shows,
because you eventually got to see the inside of David Brent,
(39:34):
and those guys on Big Brother you don't ever see
the inside, no you don't. And also what happened with
something like Big Brother is it started off like a
quite a good social experiment where no one really knew
how they were going to come across, not even the producers,
and there was real drama. Then they started contriving it.
(39:56):
Then they started putting in, As I said, people who
were think they were already at their lowest there they
had nothing to lose, they had no dignity to lose,
so it wasn't even particularly interesting. You know, when a
load of feral people are happy to run around and
fight each other and take their clothes off, you think, well,
what are we watching this for? Where's the conflict? They're
(40:16):
happy with that? There's no just see what I'm saying,
there's no there's no human interest story because it's like
they don't care about themselves. They know what's happening. They've
gone in there to get fIF demons to pay cash
in on it, sell their story to the paper, and
buy a house, and good luck to them. But I
don't know why that it was no longer entertaining because
(40:38):
it wasn't real. It's strangely reality, as you said, reality
TV became less real than than a well scripted drama
about reality, and so you know, that's what happened. I
think over that time, what are you most proud of
the legacy of the office? Oh, that's so difficult. That's
(41:01):
so difficult to say. I'd say it was the first
time I tried my harvest anything. I'm very proud of that.
And I got addicted to that. I was sort of
this guy that would cruise around and I did well
at school because I was smart, and it was almost
like I wore it like a badge of hon and
(41:21):
I didn't need to try hard. And I realized that
that's not a good attitude. And then, you know, and
then I tried to become a pop star and failed miserably.
And my mistake was wanting to be a pop star,
and I should have wanted to be a songwriter. And
so when I came to this later in life, I thought,
I want to be a writer, director. I want to
be famous for something. If if fame, if I'm going
(41:42):
to be an actor and be famous, I'd better be
famous for something. I better do something I'm proud of.
And right in the Office, I knew at the time,
and I knew in retrospect that that was the first
time I had really tried my harvest at anything, and
it was a great feeling. And I don't think you
can have success without hard work. You know, if you
(42:04):
didn't work hard, it loses a bit of its success.
So that's what I'm proud is sold trying my harvest. Well,
it's uh, I mean, you know, look at everybody who
was involved in the American version owes everything to you,
you know, working your hardest on something. Um, I'll just
(42:26):
ask you one more thing that that at the end
of the American Office, it ends to talking head by
the character of Pam, and she is talking about you know,
she thought it was weird that people who work in
a paper company would be the subject of a documentary,
like why would anyone want to watch us. But she said,
(42:46):
you know, in retrospect, she feels like that they were
a really good subject for documentary because there's there's beauty
and ordinary things, and isn't that kind of isn't that
kind of the point? And that was what Greg's perspective was,
That's exactly right. I've always been fascinated with trying to
make the ordinary extraordinary, just trying to take a tiny
(43:10):
little story that you wouldn't think anyone's interested in, and
and making people interested in it. And I remember when
I was at school, I used to write and my
teachers say, yeah, it's a bit melodramatic. And I realized
that I was taking it from Telly and films, and
and he kept going a bit more dramatic, right, And
this really annoyed me. So I decided to try and
(43:31):
do the most boring story I could, right just to
annoy my teacher. I was like thirteen, And so what
I did was my mom used to look after this
old lady who lived near us, and when I was born,
i'd go around. I'd watched my mom sort of make
a tea and clean up and that, and it was
boring for a kid. And I thought, I know what
(43:52):
I do. I'll write about that right this feature a
lesson and I remember the just writing exactly what was happening.
And I handed it in and I've got it back
and the teacher had given me an a and said
much better. And I almost didn't get it. I did.
(44:16):
I did y um, because I think he knew what
I was doing, but he also knew what I was
saying was the truth and that I I've done it
from real life as opposed to a top show on Telly,
do you know what I mean? And then I was
(44:38):
dinna realize that ordinary life is the most fascinating thing
we have. Everyone's life is fascinating to them and and
if you look into it, it can be fascinating to
everyone because it's it's unique and real and it happened
and it was a life, and I think that's beautiful.
And then you know, I've taken that on my new
(44:58):
series After Life. It about the mundane things in life,
you know, saving you there are distractions, and it's true.
It's just true. Everyone thinks that you know what their
their lives a bit boring and mundane, but it's not.
It's it's fascinating. Well, I was not going to be
(45:18):
overly nice to you until the very end. But your
ability through all of your shows, obviously, and you as
a person, your ability to find that humanity in people
that you do not expect to be likable, is a
great gift that you know you've given everyone. Blah blah.
I don't want to sound too nice, but you know
what I'm saying. I love it. Thank you very much.
(45:39):
That's that is. That's lovely. Thank you, thank you so much.
I really appreciate it. Yes, and good luck with afterlife.
I cannot wait to watch it, and thank you man,
and enjoy a drink on me tonight. I'm going to
have one now. I'm sure some of the residuals that
that we made it just just something that we pay,
okay to there you nothing but the greatest champagne, full day,
(46:04):
every day on top. All right, thanks mam, all right, cheers, alright,
bye bye bye. That is a rap on Ricky Gervais. Ricky,
(46:26):
thank you so much for joining me. I hope it
was worth your time, if for no other reason than
to find out that Steve never won an Emmy. I'm
very pleased that I could provide that level of joy
for you to the rest of you as always. Thank
you so much for joining me, and don't forget to
subscribe to The Office Deep Dive on your podcast app.
(46:49):
Do your so that you and I can keep well
diving deeper. I hope you have a great day and
I will see you again next Yeah. The Office Deep
Dive is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner,
(47:12):
alongside our executive producer Langley. Our senior producer is Tessa Kramer,
our producer is Emily Carr, and our assistant editor is
Diego Tapia. My main man in the booth is Alec Moore.
Our theme song Bubble and Squeak, performed by my great
friend Creep Bratton, and the episode was mixed by Seth Olanski. Hi,
(47:53):
my name is Cassi Zachary and I am April Callahan,
and we are fashion historian Yeah, and co hosts and
the creators of the podcast Dressed the History of Fashion,
which is dedicated to investigating the significance of dress from
throughout history and around the world. And we are so
excited to bring you a brand new season celebrating groundbreaking
(48:13):
fashion figures and explain the history of everything from courses
to blue jeans dressed. The History of Fashion is available
on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever else
you listen to your favorite shows. New episodes trap every
Tuesday and Thursday. I'm Colleen would joined me the host
of Eating Wall Broke podcast While I eat a meal
(48:35):
created by self made entrepreneurs, influencers, and celebrities over a
meal they once eight when they were broke. Today I
have the lovely aj Crimson, the official Princess of compon Asia,
Kidding and Assia. This is the professor. We're here on
Eating While Broke and today I'm gonna break down my
meal that got me through a time when I was broken.
(48:55):
Listen to Eating Wall Broke on the I Heart Radio app,
on Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Hello, Hello, Hi,
Oh my god. I want to come through the screen
and hug you. Hey, everybody. Jessica's are here, also known
as Vanessa Abrahams on Gossip Girl. I am so excited
(49:15):
to share my new podcast with you guys. It's called
XO XO and it's a walk down memory lane all
about Gossip Girl. I'll chat with some of the cast, crew, fans,
of the show, and I'm just so pumped for you
guys to go on this journey with me. All Right.
I made Westwick, I played Chuck Bass Is this Michelle Tractonberg,
I'll never tell, Okay, I'm Taylor Mompson and I played
Jenny Humphrey. Hi, I'm sbashion Stan and I played Carter Ason.
(49:40):
That was one of the reasons I liked the character
Jenny so much, is that she was very relatable. The
whole thing was such a choice for me to do,
and I was just so thankful that people responded the
way they did to what we were doing. This really
was just like wonderful. I like have like warm feelings inside.
I'm giving you air hugs. Listen to XO so on
(50:00):
the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you
get your podcasts.
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