April 6, 2021 • 40 mins
If The Office were a puppy, director Ken Kwapis would be “the country vet that birthed it” (according to Greg Daniels, at least). Ken speaks on the decisions he made that let the audience feel like they were catching the action on screen by accident, how no one was allowed on set while filming the first few episodes - not even hair and make-up - and the moment he knew that Phyllis just belonged in a paper company.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
I'm Ken Kappas. I I am a director. I directed
the pilot of the Office and many other episodes. Hello everybody,
this is the Office Deep Dive, and I am your
host Brian baum Gartner. How's everybody doing out there? Is everybody? Okay?
(00:29):
I wish I could hear you. Um today you will
be listening to me and my conversation with Ken Kappas
now as usual, no one can put it better than
Greg Daniels. And Greg described Ken as the country vet
who birthed this puppy, this puppy being the American Office,
(00:52):
and this is so true. Ken was. He was the
director of the pilot, but also so many of our
most beloved episodes. He directed Diversity, Day, Booze, Cruise, The Fire,
The Job, Casino Night Gave which the finale. Honestly, there
(01:13):
are too many to name, but you should go look
him up. Ken is such um sweet nice guy one
and two. He He also has a really unique directing style. Um.
He wrote a book recently actually called but what I
(01:33):
really want to do is direct lessons from a life
behind a camera. And to get to sit down and
talk with him about all of that, that was my pleasure.
So on that note in homage to Ken Ken Go ahead,
(01:55):
bub I love it, Bubble, We're gonna bubble and Squeaker
cook at every moment left over from the nut before. Hello, sir,
(02:19):
I'm coming around for another hacks. Yes, it's so good
to see you, So good to see you, to see you.
I and I'm glad, uh you're doing this well. I
think that there's a story here that needs to be told.
I you know what I was saying to Margaret that
(02:43):
I have been It's not a book about the office,
but I'm actually I'm writing a book about directing, right,
just a general book about directing, and it certainly includes,
you know, some of our experiences. But I but I
have been approached by a bunch of people and I've
just basically now, I say, is Greg doing this right?
So right? The first person that I went to was Greg,
(03:04):
and I said, look, this is what we want to do,
and he was totally supportive. And you know, they're finishing
editing his or sorry, finished shooting his show this week,
well in fact on Raleigh, because that's where Angela and
I were doing this other show. So literally I saw Greg.
I wander over to his that math did you go visit. No,
(03:26):
I haven't been there yet, this massive out of this
space whatever worship right and uh, but yeah, no, I
can't wait to see it. Yeah, see it? Um? Now
did you had you worked with Greg before the Office?
I met him when I was invited to meet him
to direct the pilot of the Office. Okay, so so
(03:47):
before the pilot, what what were you were working on
Bernie Mac? Yeah, that seems specifically what I was doing.
I had worked on the show Malcolm in the Middle.
I directed nineteen episodes of Malcolm in the Middle. I
helped launch the Bernie Max Show with Larry Wilmore, and
I was working on I think. Yeah, so I was
(04:10):
working on the Bernie Mac Show when I got the
call to meet with Greg. Right, and were you familiar
with the British version of the show. I was familiar
with it, but I hadn't seen much of it. I
think I may have only seen the pilot episode of
the British show, right. And now we shot the pilot
and the first season in the production offices above the
(04:34):
sound stage, right. I mean we built within, We built
within a practical space, and in fact, one of the
things that we did when we moved to the whatever
we call it warehouse. What are we calling that the warehouse?
I guess. When we built the dunder Mifflin's set, one
of the things that Greg and I definitely discussed was
(04:55):
the idea of not making any walls movable while the bowl.
And the idea was that since this was a you know,
quote documentary, that directors had to respect the physical limitations
of the space, so that if you couldn't get an angle,
you couldn't get an angle. And that was again it
was it was sort of a way to signal to
(05:17):
directors coming down the line that you know, you had
to kind of honor the space. And again, if this
were any other kind of either single camera or multi
camera situation, you just move a wall out of the
way and get back and in some cases get almost
a procenium view of the action. And one of the
things I loved, not just in the pilot, but in
(05:38):
episodes in the second season in particular, was creating a
sense that we were blocked from seeing the action properly,
or or even that you know, some either a pillar
or a file cabinet, something was in our way and
we couldn't quite get a good angle on things, and
that increased the realism. Yeah, I mean, I think that
(06:00):
so much of what Greg and I discussed in terms of,
you know, a camera style was how to uh, you know,
create a sense that we were there observing people, observing characters. Obviously,
it's not a secret that the staff of dunder Mifflin
knows they're being observed, they know they're being filmed. Most
of the staff members don't want to be filmed, except
(06:20):
for you know, Michael Scott. So part of it was
just trying to come up with visual ideas that would
either we would sort of be in a character's face
and and and you know, for instance, if I was
shooting you, you, if I was this far from you,
you'd know I'm there. Or we'd wed, you know, kind
of hide behind a shrub or a file cabinet and
sort of eavesdrop on the action a little bit more
(06:41):
so that we could sort of observe without characters knowing
we were. They're looking at them. And I'm always mindful that,
you know, it was Greg's decision not to shoot the
series at a studio. We you know, we weren't at Universal,
we weren't, you know, and it was his choice to
you know, find this warehouse in this scrubby section of
(07:03):
the valley, so that even if it wasn't actual Scranton,
it was definitely not Hollywood, and it definitely felt like,
you know, where were we? Why are we coming all
the way out into this kind of bizarre area to
shoot this show in a warehouse? And you know, it
wasn't like we used the surroundings very often, but I
(07:23):
think Greg really wanted to give us an opportunity to
not feel like we were in a show. Right. We're
definitely gonna talk a little bit more about that, but
um so you and Greg met and was there any
discussion at that time about making the American version. Let's
just call it that the American version versus where there
(07:44):
are things that you wanted immediately to do differently before
we started work on the pilot. As I recalled, there
was a British show and I'm blanking out on the
name of it. It was a comedy. It was kind
of like a romantic slash sex comedy show. God, I
can't remember the name of it, but anyways, it was
a show that either NBC or some other network tried
(08:05):
to do a U S version of and it didn't work,
And one of the things that Greg and I definitely
discussed was the need to maintain the kind of the
unorthodox approach of the UK show, not exactly mimicking the
tone of it, but for me as a director visually
sort of trying to maintain the style that what's the
(08:26):
right way to put it where where it feels like
we were catching the action by accident that things were
not being staged for the camera, and I mean everyone,
I think you know, there are a lot of people
were saying, well, this is going to fail because no
network will allow you to do what they did in
the UK version. But in fact, I think, you know,
Greg leading the charge, and certain people at NBC understanding
(08:49):
that it wouldn't work unless it it wouldn't work if
it traveled down the middle of the road, or it
had to at least aspire to the same kind of
you know, offbeat quality that the original at or else
it just wouldn't play, and so on on every level
that affected every decision. I mean, I can go through
any number of things, including the decision to do screen
(09:12):
tests and improvisation instead of the traditional, you know, approach
of bringing the finalists for a role in front of
a bunch of really humorist network executives, right right, And
so I mean in place of that, we we shot
a lot of screen tests with different combinations of actors,
(09:33):
and I feel like that made all the difference in
the world in terms of I don't know, it just
it changed the whole tenor of how the cast played
the scenes that we weren't trying to sell them. It
wasn't joking. We weren't selling jokes. It was it was.
One of the hallmarks of the show, obviously, is the
kind of very understated, often kind of mute quality that
(09:58):
you know, like character is who have nothing to say,
We're just sort of start there with us. And I
think that was that's not the kind of thing you're
going to communicate well in a traditional network executive audition,
Like in a network test. It's like theater in a
huge room with no camera there. And I think Jenna
(10:18):
and Rain both talked about you brought the camera in
and asked the actors to also behave as though the
camera were character. And I think that, you know, every
actor sort of developed his or her own relationship with
the camera, and some people were more eager to acknowledge
the camera, Like, you know, John's character, I think pretty quickly,
(10:41):
you know, kind of makes a friend of the camera, Jenna.
I think there's moments where it feels like Jenna wants
to crawl under the reception desk, right, And so I
think everybody had their own specific relationship to the camera,
and that's something we started to uh explore in the
in the screen test period. So that was one choice
or one thing that Greg insisted on. And all credit
(11:03):
to Greg for insisting that we not go the traditional
route in terms of bringing actors to a network for
the auditions. Do you remember was there any pushback about that? No,
I don't remember any crush back about it, because again,
I feel like the people at NBC at that moment
sort of I don't want to say they indulged Greg
or indulged us, but I think they just knew on
(11:25):
some level they had to let us do this in
a different way. The UK show was so beloved, partly
because of its tone, partly because of its very unusual
visual style, and I think they knew to like kind
of get out of the way at least in certain ways.
I mean, I can say that one of the other
things we did during the pilot shoot itself was we
(11:48):
started each day with, you know, shooting basically documentary footage
of the whole cast, the entire ensemble, just at their desks,
and both Greg and I kind of borrowed Ricky Gervais
and Stephen Merchants phrase general views. We didn't call them
establishing shots right then. We keep calling them b roles,
but general but that was that was I don't know
(12:09):
if that's a general term in Great Britain for an
establishing shot or something, but Ricky said, oh, we would
just do general views. And so each morning during the
pilot shoot we started the day with quote general views
of people at work. And what was great about it
was there was no story going on. It was just
(12:30):
everyone at their desks, you know, you and Angela and
Oscar sort of you know, doing accounting work. We would
take shots of things that were just by definition like
so mundane like and some of them I think got
into the credit role at the beginning the title sequence,
like I think rain like sticking the things into the
paper shredder and things like that, shredding me doing the
(12:52):
absolutely yeah, adding machine, the adding machine. Those were things
I think that came out of the general views. Definitely.
I think Eve adjusting his little trophy on his desk
was one of the general views. And what I do
remember you asked about network pushback was I remember getting
a comment from some executive not understanding why. For example,
(13:14):
they were like lunge like lengthy shots of like the
water cooler, or you know, why is there a lengthy
shot of rain sharpening pencils? What is the purpose of this?
So it wasn't exactly paying you for this, So I
wasn't pushedback, but it was definitely like what are you
(13:35):
guys doing? And then and and by the way, you
can shoot a lot of footage and a half hour,
and we usually spent about a half hour before we
kind of slid into a scene. And one of the
things that I discovered in this process is that the
cast during the i'll call it the g V section
of each of our days, they knew they were being observed,
(13:58):
They knew they were the subject of a document entry,
and that when we then moved into a scene, it
wasn't like we now went into show mode, you know,
it was like we we we were still in a
kind of documentary mode. And so I think the general
views created it kind of lived in reality. It feels
like they've been there working there for years. Well, that's
(14:18):
that's fascinating. I think it did something else as well,
And I'm curious if this was an unwitting benefit or
if there was some thought to this. I mean, you
had every actor essentially there from four thirty or five
am or whatever time it was, to be ready by
seven or seven thirty in the morning. We didn't do
(14:40):
the general views when it was convenient during the day
when everyone was there. It was about bringing everybody in
and I think that that is what started building the ensemble.
You know, It's funny because I one of the things, um,
one of the advantages we had is that the pilot
takes plays by and large in the bullpen, So it
(15:02):
wasn't like there were scenes in the parking lot or
anywhere else and the bullpen, except for the hr section
of the office, the bullpen requires everyone to be there,
and in theory, each the actors are not entirely clear
when the camera's going to find them. So when we
did the general views, yeah, I mean, it definitely created
a sense of ensemble. And I would also say that
(15:23):
it felt like whatever else you might think of that pilot,
and I love the pilot. One of the things that
really strikes me when I look at it now, it
doesn't feel like oh new show. It feels like we were,
we've we've we've wandered into a place that's, you know,
going about its dreary way the same way it has
been for the past couple of years or more. So
(15:43):
I think it kind of helped, uh people just sort
of start to create a little sense of what their
normal days like. There was also something we did that
it was kind of impractical to continue doing this over time.
But during the pilot shoot, with the exception of Peter
Smokeler who was shooting Greg and myself and maybe maybe
(16:06):
the boom operator I'm not even sure, probably, but no
one else actually was allowed on the set, including hair
and makeup, and as I recall, we kind of gave
everyone a little compact. And obviously this is not something
you could sustain for a long time, but that was
definitely something Greg and I spoke of to kind of
create a sense that what's the right way to put it, basically,
(16:30):
how do you how do we create a real space,
a real workplace. But my hope was that it just
made people feel, you know, a little bit trapped in
their workplace right well, and that is a great word
that I use all the time. Trapped. We were trapped
within the confines the walls. There were no movable walls.
We were all there together and all arriving at roughly
(16:53):
the same time and showing up on set at the
same time, which forced us to make relationships. I've actually
never talked with Greg about this, but I mean that
Greg's decision to embed within the ensemble writers also, I
think helped grow grew that sense of ensemble in a
way that it wouldn't have if they if the writing
(17:13):
staff was always at arm's length from the from the calf.
(17:37):
I want to go back for a second to the casting,
and um, how obvious was it to you or how
difficult were the decisions for you in casting? You know,
it wasn't obvious across the board because there are a
lot of good people who came in and and so
there were like a lot of viable, you know, versions
(17:58):
of different characters. But I do think that, um, I
mean again, part of what was fun in the screen
tests was just sort of you know, starting to not
only see people in pairs, but starting to see a
whole picture of a group of people. I mean that.
And by the way, when you talk about ensemble, one
of the things I was so happy about with the
(18:19):
pilot is even if some characters aren't don't have speaking parts,
they are they're they're very present. And I remember that,
you know, one of the things that Greg insisted on,
you know, as as with any half hour comedy, at
the end of the pilot shoot, the network sends down
a photographer to do, like, you know, a bunch of
glossy shots of the actors looking cute and jumping up
(18:41):
and down and all that, and we were so determed.
That was you know, we pushed back, I shouldn't say we.
Greg pushed back and insisted that we not do anything
traditional like that, anything that would scream comedy. So that
what we did instead was the our Christmas card photo.
So we got the group together for a kind of
(19:02):
candid dunder Mifflin, you know, Xmas card photo, and that
was our marketing photo. That was it. There were and
if you go to if you like, if you were
to go to NBC at that time and walk down
the halls, you know, you'd see giant glossy shots of
each of the comedy stars, not the ensemble. And that
was the other part of it. It wasn't Steve standing.
(19:25):
And in fact, I think there was actually a discussion
on the set about, you know, let's put Steve in
the foreground of the shot of the group for the
Christmas card. And I think Steve or Greg, or you know,
both of them said absolutely not, he's he's in the group,
and that boy, that really sent the right signal. Yeah. Absolutely.
I mean the work that you all did to create
(19:47):
that ensemble early on, and of course, you know, as
you know, really no one was famous that you know,
Steve had done the Bruce Almighty movie and he was
on The Daily Show before the Daily Show was cool.
And you know Rain had done the one arc on
six ft Under and that was pretty much it. Why
(20:07):
was that so important for you? Well, I again, I
will defer to Greg because it was Greg's decision, and
Greg was the one who, no doubt made the argument
to the network that it's best not to have known
faces in the show. I mean, I think the again,
everything has to do with creating this kind of Barris
similitude that this is a show, this is not a show.
(20:29):
It's a it's part of a documentary about a group
of people who work in a paper company, so you
wouldn't know them. There's no need, there's no reason you'd
see a star in a in a workplace like that.
And I think that, you know, in terms of the
wardrobe choices, the makeup and hair choices, I mean, you know,
you know, everything was sort of designed to make it
(20:50):
feel like these are people who don't belong on television,
let alone on a primetime half hour comedy. And Steve,
you know though, I felt that one of the things
Steve did so well is that he's the one character
who's who's so excited about a documentary crew being there
because Michael Scott fancies himself a superstar. But weirdly enough,
(21:11):
even Steve, I think, somehow both played to the camera,
but also it was himself the subject of a documentary too.
He somehow, and it's it's one of the things I
just marvel at. You know, Michael Scott is grandstanding and
you know, making jokes, and he's playing to the camera,
(21:33):
but the character doesn't quite realize it, but we're observing him.
He's he's under the microscope and Steve somehow kind of
found that weird duality. Tell me about what's true and
what's what's lore or fairy tale. How did Phillis get
cast in the show? I well, I will tell you
(21:57):
what happened. So, um, we were doing, uh probably know,
kind of more traditional auditions, and in the room Greg, myself,
Phyllis Allison, and the setup was is that I sat
next to a video camera and on the other side
of the video camera Phillis was sitting and Phillis was
reading off and Phyllis was her casting associate. And I
(22:20):
hadn't met Phyllis. All I knew is I was sitting
next to her, and there was a camera between us
and the actors who were auditioning were some of them
were kind of playing it to the hilt and kind
of working a little too hard. Phillis, meanwhile, was reading
her lines in in this very kind of monotonal way,
sometimes not even looking up at the actors, just looking
(22:43):
down at the sheet of paper. And I just became
fascinated with her and started looking at her. And there
was a couple of actors whose auditions I kind of
missed because I kept throwing Phyllis these glances and I finally,
during a break, I took Greg aside and I said,
this woman really belongs in a paper company. And so
(23:03):
we Greg thought about it and he said sure. And
now there's a there is there is one additional detail
that's so wonderful, and that is that after Greg said sure,
let's ask her to be in the bullpen and she
agreed to do it. That Greg and I had a
discussion and Greg said, do you know if she can act?
(23:27):
And I took Phillis aside and I said, do you
have a lot of acting experience? And she said not
not really. But she said that some years earlier that
she had, you know, worked in burlesque in Branson, Missouri.
And I said stop it. And she then later that
(23:48):
week brought in a photo of herself into like a
very you know, wonderfully old fashioned burlescout. It was on
her desk for ten years and the So that is
the Phillis story and and I couldn't be happier that
she became such a beloved member of the ensemble. I
(24:08):
feel also responsible for Creed and I and I so
tell the Creed story. How did you know Creed? When
I was on the Bernie Max Show. Creed was a
stand in, and I remember one day that's Creed and
another stand in. We're just having a conversation while we
were lighting, and I was wandering around, and I kept
(24:30):
eavesdropping on little bits of the conversation, and at one
point I heard Creed say something like, oh yeah, And
then Hendricks taught me this lick that one night, and
I walked away and I thought, what the what the
heck is he talking about? And then I turned back
over my shoulder and he was doing some air guitar
for this fellow stand in, and I thought, what's going
(24:51):
on here? So I went up to him and I
introduced myself and he introduced himself as Creed Bratton, formerly
of the Grassroots that you know, ninth sixties pop band
that in the mid sixties actually opened for people like
Janis Joplin and the Doors. They were, you know, a
Bay Area band, but Creed was in this band during
(25:13):
its earliest incarnation and and literally hung out at you know,
the Whiskey a go go with the likes of Janis Joplin.
So we became pals on the Bernie mac Show, and
then I went off to do other things and lost
touch with them for quite a while, actually not quite
a while, but a while. And then I heard through
a mutual friend that he was looking for work, and
(25:35):
he heard that I was directing the pilot of the
office and did they need stand ins? And so I
contacted Creed and I said, you know, the truth is,
the style of the show is that we're making a
mock documentary and trying to do a minimal amount of lighting. Therefore,
there's not really a need for standings. But there are
(25:57):
a couple of empty desks in the back of the bulletpen.
And again there's no guarantee of anything. But if you
want to, just you know, be an extra in the
background of this paper company for a week, you know,
or whatever. How how long was the pilot seven shooting days? Maybe? Um,
you know, you're welcome to take a seat at this desk.
And he did and and stayed, Yes, he stayed. And
(26:22):
poor Devon, poor poor Devon. Um. But one more thing
about sort of before we leave this really early time
that um, the idea that you and Greg cast regular
looking people in terms of making the show really accessible
(26:43):
to people. You know, the conventional wisdom is we want
beautiful people that people want to look at, but but
really choosing real people taking place in a real place. Um,
how that really made people fall in love with the people?
I mean, I feel like, again, this was part of
trying to make sure that we lived up to the
(27:06):
standards of the UK original, because certainly that's the case
in the UK original people are not glamorous who work
at Warnham Hogg. But I also think it's a tribute
to Alison Jones. I mean, she's so exceptional and and
one of her gifts is finding people who look real,
who do not look glamorous, who nevertheless kind of draw
(27:28):
you in, who are so compelling. I mean, I think
that again. My the way I always put it is,
if you tuned into the Office during its first season,
you'd say, none of these people belong on television, right, Yes,
and weirdly, for like Rain, that's still true. He does
not belong on television at all. Um, did you bring
(27:49):
any other of the staff or crew members with you
when you came and joined the pilot? Did you know
Peter Smokeler or well, Peter Smokeler and I had. I
did not hire Peter, but I was excited when I
heard he was shooting the pilot because Peter was the
DP of the Larry Sanders Show, Gary Shandlings Show, and
(28:13):
of course Peter has important mockumentary credentials having shot this
is spinal tap. And in fact, Peter and I actually
I don't want to say budded heads about documentary style,
but we definitely had a lively debate about how to
shoot a documentary. And this is actually a really important
(28:35):
thing that from Peter's point of view is if you're
a documentarian, you use a whip zoom you're you know,
let's say I'm getting a medium shot of you, and
now I'm gonna zoom in really quickly and get a
tight shot of you. The intention for the documentary filmmaker
is too. Then in the cutting room, eliminate the whip.
You know, the documentary filmmaker will get rid of those pants,
(28:57):
so that it feels like the documentary re creates the
feeling of a traditionally covered story. And I remember saying
to Peter, well, I think, no, I think we're going
to keep those and he and the heat and I
actually disagree. He goes, well, that's not good documentary filmmaking.
I go, yeah, but I think we need to kind
of signal to the viewer, you know, that we're making
(29:19):
this documentary. And I tried to justify it. I said, well,
you know, it's not the finished documentary, Like I was
trying to rationalize it. But I mean, he's right, if
you look at you know great And by the way,
Greg and I also talked about cinema verite documentaries. We
talked about the Mazel Brothers, about great films like Salesmen
or Great Gardens, and those films generally, yes, the the
(29:42):
the erratic camera moves to get from angle to angle
are eliminated so that you were more quote involved with
the story. But anyway, so I did not I wasn't
part of the decision to invite Peter, but I was
thrilled that he was on board. How did you feel
when you when you saw the final version? Were you
proud of it? The pilot? Oh, well, here's what actually happened.
(30:06):
I worked on the cut of the pilot, and I
worked on it with Greg for a little while. Then
I left and I went off to work on a film.
And by the way, while I was working on the film,
there was a lot of discussion about whether this show
would make the cut and get on the air. And
so I was on the phone with Greg occasionally and
and he was not always very optimistic. But in the meantime,
(30:28):
in the interim, I did see, you know, his final
cut of the pilot, and I just loved it. And
I loved again one of the things I'm so happy
with how he cut the pilot, as he preserved, he
didn't cut it for tempo. Rather, let me put it
more specifically, it wasn't up tempo. It had weird slack
pauses where we're on any other television show, you would
(30:51):
either have the sound of an audience laughing, you'd have
you know, three jokes where in that space or and
this is so significant, or you would hear music, you know,
nine seasons of the Office and other than that, you know,
opening title song that that is the driest show on
broadcast networked out. You know, there's nothing, there's no music, right,
(31:14):
and it really that is a significant part of the
what distinguishes the Showy. So Diversity Day, we get the order,
(31:43):
you come back and you're directing Diversity Day. Now, was
there any thought once we were now veering, you know,
if the pilot was very much like the original UK
version pilot. What was the thought about beginning to americanize
the show now that it had gotten picked up. Do
you remember any conversation about that. I don't remember any
(32:04):
conversation about americanizing the show when we worked on Diversity Day, because,
if anything, I felt Diversity Day was and I still
think it is one of the boldest episodes me too.
And you know, there was a lot of people at
the time who you know, would say, oh, the office, yeah,
it was kind of slow coming out of the gate
and all this stuff, and I thought, well, you're kidding
you watch episode two Diversity Day. It's like it's it's
(32:27):
it's as strong as we get. It's very good. And
and so I don't remember any discussion about that. I
do remember, um No, I'm trying to know. I can
think about many other things. Um were you proud of
how bold that episode was. I'm proud of that episode
for a number of reasons, one of which is um
(32:50):
In the script it said that, you know, Michael Scott's
you know, diversity training seminar took place in the conference room,
as did Mr Brown's seminar, and I remember there was
a lot of discussion about whether or not we should
move the seminar out into the bullpen, because otherwise the
(33:12):
whole episode was going to be stuck in the conference room.
And there was and it was like, oh my god,
it's our second show. We're trying to prove to the
network that this is a viable show, and and and
and our second episode is going to take place in
a small room. And it's like, so, I remember there
was a there wasn't pressure. I do remember talking to
Greg and a few others about was there a version
(33:33):
of it where like that seminar basically was spread out
into the into the into the bullpen. And I remember
just having a strong gut feeling that it would be
funnier if everyone was once again trapped in a small space.
And it made it more challenging to shoot. And again
it forced us to respect the limitations of the set.
(33:54):
There were no wild walls. Sometimes the cameras were in
people's faces a bit too much. There were instances where,
you know, actors blocked one another that I thought worked
really well. So that's just a small but important staging
decision we made. I also remember Greg and I discussing
the casting of Mr Brown and at the time Larry
(34:17):
Wilmore was a consultant on the show. He but he
had not been on the pilot, but he was, you know,
working with us on the second season, and there were
a lot of different names being bandied about from Mr Brown.
But I do remember, and I had worked with Larry
a lot, you know, on Bernie Maxhew. So I remember
taking Greg aside and saying, you know, I think I
think Mr Brown's sitting in an office down the hall here,
(34:40):
and happily Greg liked that idea, and and uh and
Larry did such a great created such a great character.
But I do I guess what I feel is that
that episode, I just felt like everyone was sort of
in top form. You know, everyone brought their a game
to that. So, you know, b J's script is remarkable.
(35:03):
And again I think the idea of all of us
being cooped up in that little room once again, it's
sort of contributed to that sense of ensemble. Had we
staged the you know, Michael Scott's seminar out in the bullpen,
it would have been cutaways, two people in different parts
of the space. But in the conference room, everyone was
in everyone's shot, everyone was together, right, m I something
(35:28):
I don't know why. I just occurred to me or
I started thinking about if those of you you are listening,
obviously there's this. It's a stereotype. But when a scene
begins and the camera start rolling and the director is ready,
they say action, and Ken doesn't say this, he says, um.
It's very hard to describe, but basically oftentimes will act
(35:51):
as though he's about to tell you something and then
says go ahead. And I'm wondering, is that's something that
you have always done? Because that in terms of what
you were talking about earlier, having us there to do
the general views altogether and not oh, we're showing up
(36:13):
and now we're going to perform that the go ahead
isn't now start acting. I just wanted to hear your take.
Is that something you've always done or it's not something
I've always done. I can tell you exactly when I
started doing it. I directed the pilot episode of The
Larry Sanders Show, and when Gary and I were prepping
(36:35):
the pilot, he, I mean, he very much wanted, you know,
a sense of verisimilitude about the you know, the talk
show world and and although that show is not a
mock documentary, you know, it definitely has a kind of
well observed quality, and he wanted He came up to
me and he said, is there any way that you
can develop a shooting style so that the actors actually
(36:57):
don't know when the cameras on? And I mean, it
was kind of a brilliant idea, but I didn't know
what to do with it. This we shot the Larry
Sanders Show in sixteen millimeter, so you had to constantly
reload magazines. It was not something you could hide from
the cast. So I finally came up with the idea
that we would start each scene, you know, without the
(37:22):
usual announcements, without a first d D saying you know,
rolling speak like all those things, or the sound person
saying rolling. And what I said to Gary was that
will roll the cameras without letting anyone know, and I'll
just give you a signal to start. And I said,
I'll just say, like, I don't know, go ahead or
something like that. And what often happened with Gary was
(37:46):
I'd say go ahead, and let's say it was a scene,
you know, in in Larry Sanders office with a number
of people. Gary would take the signal, but then he
would just sort of like chat with the cast for
a while, and then it's some you know, arbitrary point
just launched into the scene, so that there was this
sense that the line between acting and not acting kind
(38:08):
of got very blurry. And after working on that show
with Gary, I stopped using the word action. And I
feel like, um actors find that it does sort of
take a little bit of the onus off of act
The acting part is it's like there's real life and
(38:28):
then there's the scene. And so if you can erase
the line between real life and the scene, that might help.
And and and sometimes I mean, I I mean, this is
just something I've also done is occasionally actually interrupted take
without cutting, so that even I'm I'm like now just
having a like we're in a scene and I just
start talking to you and I said, oh, you know,
(38:49):
go back to such and stuff. So that again, it
just sort of keeps the atmosphere less about you know, oh,
I don't know, scene acting, you know. So that's brilliant. Alright, guys,
(39:15):
every word out of Kent's mouth is so fascinating to me.
But I'm gonna I'm gonna interrupt the scene. But you
will get to hear much more from Ken in a
later episode, including lots more about his work on the
Office in later season. Until then, tune in next week
for my conversation with the brilliant I can't wait for
(39:36):
this casting director Allison Jones, and of course lots more
of the cast and crew after that. Thank you all
for listening, and UH have a wonderful week. The Office
Deep Dive is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner,
(39:57):
alongside our executive producer, lay Lee. Our senior producer is
Tessa Kramer, our associate 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 Creed Bratton, and the episode
was mixed by seth Olandski.
I'm Ken Kappas. I I am a director. I directed
the pilot of the Office and many other episodes. Hello everybody,
this is the Office Deep Dive, and I am your
host Brian baum Gartner. How's everybody doing out there? Is everybody? Okay?
(00:29):
I wish I could hear you. Um today you will
be listening to me and my conversation with Ken Kappas
now as usual, no one can put it better than
Greg Daniels. And Greg described Ken as the country vet
who birthed this puppy, this puppy being the American Office,
(00:52):
and this is so true. Ken was. He was the
director of the pilot, but also so many of our
most beloved episodes. He directed Diversity, Day, Booze, Cruise, The Fire,
The Job, Casino Night Gave which the finale. Honestly, there
(01:13):
are too many to name, but you should go look
him up. Ken is such um sweet nice guy one
and two. He He also has a really unique directing style. Um.
He wrote a book recently actually called but what I
(01:33):
really want to do is direct lessons from a life
behind a camera. And to get to sit down and
talk with him about all of that, that was my pleasure.
So on that note in homage to Ken Ken Go ahead,
(01:55):
bub I love it, Bubble, We're gonna bubble and Squeaker
cook at every moment left over from the nut before. Hello, sir,
(02:19):
I'm coming around for another hacks. Yes, it's so good
to see you, So good to see you, to see you.
I and I'm glad, uh you're doing this well. I
think that there's a story here that needs to be told.
I you know what I was saying to Margaret that
(02:43):
I have been It's not a book about the office,
but I'm actually I'm writing a book about directing, right,
just a general book about directing, and it certainly includes,
you know, some of our experiences. But I but I
have been approached by a bunch of people and I've
just basically now, I say, is Greg doing this right?
So right? The first person that I went to was Greg,
(03:04):
and I said, look, this is what we want to do,
and he was totally supportive. And you know, they're finishing
editing his or sorry, finished shooting his show this week,
well in fact on Raleigh, because that's where Angela and
I were doing this other show. So literally I saw Greg.
I wander over to his that math did you go visit. No,
(03:26):
I haven't been there yet, this massive out of this
space whatever worship right and uh, but yeah, no, I
can't wait to see it. Yeah, see it? Um? Now
did you had you worked with Greg before the Office?
I met him when I was invited to meet him
to direct the pilot of the Office. Okay, so so
(03:47):
before the pilot, what what were you were working on
Bernie Mac? Yeah, that seems specifically what I was doing.
I had worked on the show Malcolm in the Middle.
I directed nineteen episodes of Malcolm in the Middle. I
helped launch the Bernie Max Show with Larry Wilmore, and
I was working on I think. Yeah, so I was
(04:10):
working on the Bernie Mac Show when I got the
call to meet with Greg. Right, and were you familiar
with the British version of the show. I was familiar
with it, but I hadn't seen much of it. I
think I may have only seen the pilot episode of
the British show, right. And now we shot the pilot
and the first season in the production offices above the
(04:34):
sound stage, right. I mean we built within, We built
within a practical space, and in fact, one of the
things that we did when we moved to the whatever
we call it warehouse. What are we calling that the warehouse?
I guess. When we built the dunder Mifflin's set, one
of the things that Greg and I definitely discussed was
(04:55):
the idea of not making any walls movable while the bowl.
And the idea was that since this was a you know,
quote documentary, that directors had to respect the physical limitations
of the space, so that if you couldn't get an angle,
you couldn't get an angle. And that was again it
was it was sort of a way to signal to
(05:17):
directors coming down the line that you know, you had
to kind of honor the space. And again, if this
were any other kind of either single camera or multi
camera situation, you just move a wall out of the
way and get back and in some cases get almost
a procenium view of the action. And one of the
things I loved, not just in the pilot, but in
(05:38):
episodes in the second season in particular, was creating a
sense that we were blocked from seeing the action properly,
or or even that you know, some either a pillar
or a file cabinet, something was in our way and
we couldn't quite get a good angle on things, and
that increased the realism. Yeah, I mean, I think that
(06:00):
so much of what Greg and I discussed in terms of,
you know, a camera style was how to uh, you know,
create a sense that we were there observing people, observing characters. Obviously,
it's not a secret that the staff of dunder Mifflin
knows they're being observed, they know they're being filmed. Most
of the staff members don't want to be filmed, except
(06:20):
for you know, Michael Scott. So part of it was
just trying to come up with visual ideas that would
either we would sort of be in a character's face
and and and you know, for instance, if I was
shooting you, you, if I was this far from you,
you'd know I'm there. Or we'd wed, you know, kind
of hide behind a shrub or a file cabinet and
sort of eavesdrop on the action a little bit more
(06:41):
so that we could sort of observe without characters knowing
we were. They're looking at them. And I'm always mindful that,
you know, it was Greg's decision not to shoot the
series at a studio. We you know, we weren't at Universal,
we weren't, you know, and it was his choice to
you know, find this warehouse in this scrubby section of
(07:03):
the valley, so that even if it wasn't actual Scranton,
it was definitely not Hollywood, and it definitely felt like,
you know, where were we? Why are we coming all
the way out into this kind of bizarre area to
shoot this show in a warehouse? And you know, it
wasn't like we used the surroundings very often, but I
(07:23):
think Greg really wanted to give us an opportunity to
not feel like we were in a show. Right. We're
definitely gonna talk a little bit more about that, but
um so you and Greg met and was there any
discussion at that time about making the American version. Let's
just call it that the American version versus where there
(07:44):
are things that you wanted immediately to do differently before
we started work on the pilot. As I recalled, there
was a British show and I'm blanking out on the
name of it. It was a comedy. It was kind
of like a romantic slash sex comedy show. God, I
can't remember the name of it, but anyways, it was
a show that either NBC or some other network tried
(08:05):
to do a U S version of and it didn't work,
And one of the things that Greg and I definitely
discussed was the need to maintain the kind of the
unorthodox approach of the UK show, not exactly mimicking the
tone of it, but for me as a director visually
sort of trying to maintain the style that what's the
(08:26):
right way to put it where where it feels like
we were catching the action by accident that things were
not being staged for the camera, and I mean everyone,
I think you know, there are a lot of people
were saying, well, this is going to fail because no
network will allow you to do what they did in
the UK version. But in fact, I think, you know,
Greg leading the charge, and certain people at NBC understanding
(08:49):
that it wouldn't work unless it it wouldn't work if
it traveled down the middle of the road, or it
had to at least aspire to the same kind of
you know, offbeat quality that the original at or else
it just wouldn't play, and so on on every level
that affected every decision. I mean, I can go through
any number of things, including the decision to do screen
(09:12):
tests and improvisation instead of the traditional, you know, approach
of bringing the finalists for a role in front of
a bunch of really humorist network executives, right right, And
so I mean in place of that, we we shot
a lot of screen tests with different combinations of actors,
(09:33):
and I feel like that made all the difference in
the world in terms of I don't know, it just
it changed the whole tenor of how the cast played
the scenes that we weren't trying to sell them. It
wasn't joking. We weren't selling jokes. It was it was.
One of the hallmarks of the show, obviously, is the
kind of very understated, often kind of mute quality that
(09:58):
you know, like character is who have nothing to say,
We're just sort of start there with us. And I
think that was that's not the kind of thing you're
going to communicate well in a traditional network executive audition,
Like in a network test. It's like theater in a
huge room with no camera there. And I think Jenna
(10:18):
and Rain both talked about you brought the camera in
and asked the actors to also behave as though the
camera were character. And I think that, you know, every
actor sort of developed his or her own relationship with
the camera, and some people were more eager to acknowledge
the camera, Like, you know, John's character, I think pretty quickly,
(10:41):
you know, kind of makes a friend of the camera, Jenna.
I think there's moments where it feels like Jenna wants
to crawl under the reception desk, right, And so I
think everybody had their own specific relationship to the camera,
and that's something we started to uh explore in the
in the screen test period. So that was one choice
or one thing that Greg insisted on. And all credit
(11:03):
to Greg for insisting that we not go the traditional
route in terms of bringing actors to a network for
the auditions. Do you remember was there any pushback about that? No,
I don't remember any crush back about it, because again,
I feel like the people at NBC at that moment
sort of I don't want to say they indulged Greg
or indulged us, but I think they just knew on
(11:25):
some level they had to let us do this in
a different way. The UK show was so beloved, partly
because of its tone, partly because of its very unusual
visual style, and I think they knew to like kind
of get out of the way at least in certain ways.
I mean, I can say that one of the other
things we did during the pilot shoot itself was we
(11:48):
started each day with, you know, shooting basically documentary footage
of the whole cast, the entire ensemble, just at their desks,
and both Greg and I kind of borrowed Ricky Gervais
and Stephen Merchants phrase general views. We didn't call them
establishing shots right then. We keep calling them b roles,
but general but that was that was I don't know
(12:09):
if that's a general term in Great Britain for an
establishing shot or something, but Ricky said, oh, we would
just do general views. And so each morning during the
pilot shoot we started the day with quote general views
of people at work. And what was great about it
was there was no story going on. It was just
(12:30):
everyone at their desks, you know, you and Angela and
Oscar sort of you know, doing accounting work. We would
take shots of things that were just by definition like
so mundane like and some of them I think got
into the credit role at the beginning the title sequence,
like I think rain like sticking the things into the
paper shredder and things like that, shredding me doing the
(12:52):
absolutely yeah, adding machine, the adding machine. Those were things
I think that came out of the general views. Definitely.
I think Eve adjusting his little trophy on his desk
was one of the general views. And what I do
remember you asked about network pushback was I remember getting
a comment from some executive not understanding why. For example,
(13:14):
they were like lunge like lengthy shots of like the
water cooler, or you know, why is there a lengthy
shot of rain sharpening pencils? What is the purpose of this?
So it wasn't exactly paying you for this, So I
wasn't pushedback, but it was definitely like what are you
(13:35):
guys doing? And then and and by the way, you
can shoot a lot of footage and a half hour,
and we usually spent about a half hour before we
kind of slid into a scene. And one of the
things that I discovered in this process is that the
cast during the i'll call it the g V section
of each of our days, they knew they were being observed,
(13:58):
They knew they were the subject of a document entry,
and that when we then moved into a scene, it
wasn't like we now went into show mode, you know,
it was like we we we were still in a
kind of documentary mode. And so I think the general
views created it kind of lived in reality. It feels
like they've been there working there for years. Well, that's
(14:18):
that's fascinating. I think it did something else as well,
And I'm curious if this was an unwitting benefit or
if there was some thought to this. I mean, you
had every actor essentially there from four thirty or five
am or whatever time it was, to be ready by
seven or seven thirty in the morning. We didn't do
(14:40):
the general views when it was convenient during the day
when everyone was there. It was about bringing everybody in
and I think that that is what started building the ensemble.
You know, It's funny because I one of the things, um,
one of the advantages we had is that the pilot
takes plays by and large in the bullpen, So it
(15:02):
wasn't like there were scenes in the parking lot or
anywhere else and the bullpen, except for the hr section
of the office, the bullpen requires everyone to be there,
and in theory, each the actors are not entirely clear
when the camera's going to find them. So when we
did the general views, yeah, I mean, it definitely created
a sense of ensemble. And I would also say that
(15:23):
it felt like whatever else you might think of that pilot,
and I love the pilot. One of the things that
really strikes me when I look at it now, it
doesn't feel like oh new show. It feels like we were,
we've we've we've wandered into a place that's, you know,
going about its dreary way the same way it has
been for the past couple of years or more. So
(15:43):
I think it kind of helped, uh people just sort
of start to create a little sense of what their
normal days like. There was also something we did that
it was kind of impractical to continue doing this over time.
But during the pilot shoot, with the exception of Peter
Smokeler who was shooting Greg and myself and maybe maybe
(16:06):
the boom operator I'm not even sure, probably, but no
one else actually was allowed on the set, including hair
and makeup, and as I recall, we kind of gave
everyone a little compact. And obviously this is not something
you could sustain for a long time, but that was
definitely something Greg and I spoke of to kind of
create a sense that what's the right way to put it, basically,
(16:30):
how do you how do we create a real space,
a real workplace. But my hope was that it just
made people feel, you know, a little bit trapped in
their workplace right well, and that is a great word
that I use all the time. Trapped. We were trapped
within the confines the walls. There were no movable walls.
We were all there together and all arriving at roughly
(16:53):
the same time and showing up on set at the
same time, which forced us to make relationships. I've actually
never talked with Greg about this, but I mean that
Greg's decision to embed within the ensemble writers also, I
think helped grow grew that sense of ensemble in a
way that it wouldn't have if they if the writing
(17:13):
staff was always at arm's length from the from the calf.
(17:37):
I want to go back for a second to the casting,
and um, how obvious was it to you or how
difficult were the decisions for you in casting? You know,
it wasn't obvious across the board because there are a
lot of good people who came in and and so
there were like a lot of viable, you know, versions
(17:58):
of different characters. But I do think that, um, I
mean again, part of what was fun in the screen
tests was just sort of you know, starting to not
only see people in pairs, but starting to see a
whole picture of a group of people. I mean that.
And by the way, when you talk about ensemble, one
of the things I was so happy about with the
(18:19):
pilot is even if some characters aren't don't have speaking parts,
they are they're they're very present. And I remember that,
you know, one of the things that Greg insisted on,
you know, as as with any half hour comedy, at
the end of the pilot shoot, the network sends down
a photographer to do, like, you know, a bunch of
glossy shots of the actors looking cute and jumping up
(18:41):
and down and all that, and we were so determed.
That was you know, we pushed back, I shouldn't say we.
Greg pushed back and insisted that we not do anything
traditional like that, anything that would scream comedy. So that
what we did instead was the our Christmas card photo.
So we got the group together for a kind of
(19:02):
candid dunder Mifflin, you know, Xmas card photo, and that
was our marketing photo. That was it. There were and
if you go to if you like, if you were
to go to NBC at that time and walk down
the halls, you know, you'd see giant glossy shots of
each of the comedy stars, not the ensemble. And that
was the other part of it. It wasn't Steve standing.
(19:25):
And in fact, I think there was actually a discussion
on the set about, you know, let's put Steve in
the foreground of the shot of the group for the
Christmas card. And I think Steve or Greg, or you know,
both of them said absolutely not, he's he's in the group,
and that boy, that really sent the right signal. Yeah. Absolutely.
I mean the work that you all did to create
(19:47):
that ensemble early on, and of course, you know, as
you know, really no one was famous that you know,
Steve had done the Bruce Almighty movie and he was
on The Daily Show before the Daily Show was cool.
And you know Rain had done the one arc on
six ft Under and that was pretty much it. Why
(20:07):
was that so important for you? Well, I again, I
will defer to Greg because it was Greg's decision, and
Greg was the one who, no doubt made the argument
to the network that it's best not to have known
faces in the show. I mean, I think the again,
everything has to do with creating this kind of Barris
similitude that this is a show, this is not a show.
(20:29):
It's a it's part of a documentary about a group
of people who work in a paper company, so you
wouldn't know them. There's no need, there's no reason you'd
see a star in a in a workplace like that.
And I think that, you know, in terms of the
wardrobe choices, the makeup and hair choices, I mean, you know,
you know, everything was sort of designed to make it
(20:50):
feel like these are people who don't belong on television,
let alone on a primetime half hour comedy. And Steve,
you know though, I felt that one of the things
Steve did so well is that he's the one character
who's who's so excited about a documentary crew being there
because Michael Scott fancies himself a superstar. But weirdly enough,
(21:11):
even Steve, I think, somehow both played to the camera,
but also it was himself the subject of a documentary too.
He somehow, and it's it's one of the things I
just marvel at. You know, Michael Scott is grandstanding and
you know, making jokes, and he's playing to the camera,
(21:33):
but the character doesn't quite realize it, but we're observing him.
He's he's under the microscope and Steve somehow kind of
found that weird duality. Tell me about what's true and
what's what's lore or fairy tale. How did Phillis get
cast in the show? I well, I will tell you
(21:57):
what happened. So, um, we were doing, uh probably know,
kind of more traditional auditions, and in the room Greg, myself,
Phyllis Allison, and the setup was is that I sat
next to a video camera and on the other side
of the video camera Phillis was sitting and Phillis was
reading off and Phyllis was her casting associate. And I
(22:20):
hadn't met Phyllis. All I knew is I was sitting
next to her, and there was a camera between us
and the actors who were auditioning were some of them
were kind of playing it to the hilt and kind
of working a little too hard. Phillis, meanwhile, was reading
her lines in in this very kind of monotonal way,
sometimes not even looking up at the actors, just looking
(22:43):
down at the sheet of paper. And I just became
fascinated with her and started looking at her. And there
was a couple of actors whose auditions I kind of
missed because I kept throwing Phyllis these glances and I finally,
during a break, I took Greg aside and I said,
this woman really belongs in a paper company. And so
(23:03):
we Greg thought about it and he said sure. And
now there's a there is there is one additional detail
that's so wonderful, and that is that after Greg said sure,
let's ask her to be in the bullpen and she
agreed to do it. That Greg and I had a
discussion and Greg said, do you know if she can act?
(23:27):
And I took Phillis aside and I said, do you
have a lot of acting experience? And she said not
not really. But she said that some years earlier that
she had, you know, worked in burlesque in Branson, Missouri.
And I said stop it. And she then later that
(23:48):
week brought in a photo of herself into like a
very you know, wonderfully old fashioned burlescout. It was on
her desk for ten years and the So that is
the Phillis story and and I couldn't be happier that
she became such a beloved member of the ensemble. I
(24:08):
feel also responsible for Creed and I and I so
tell the Creed story. How did you know Creed? When
I was on the Bernie Max Show. Creed was a
stand in, and I remember one day that's Creed and
another stand in. We're just having a conversation while we
were lighting, and I was wandering around, and I kept
(24:30):
eavesdropping on little bits of the conversation, and at one
point I heard Creed say something like, oh yeah, And
then Hendricks taught me this lick that one night, and
I walked away and I thought, what the what the
heck is he talking about? And then I turned back
over my shoulder and he was doing some air guitar
for this fellow stand in, and I thought, what's going
(24:51):
on here? So I went up to him and I
introduced myself and he introduced himself as Creed Bratton, formerly
of the Grassroots that you know, ninth sixties pop band
that in the mid sixties actually opened for people like
Janis Joplin and the Doors. They were, you know, a
Bay Area band, but Creed was in this band during
(25:13):
its earliest incarnation and and literally hung out at you know,
the Whiskey a go go with the likes of Janis Joplin.
So we became pals on the Bernie mac Show, and
then I went off to do other things and lost
touch with them for quite a while, actually not quite
a while, but a while. And then I heard through
a mutual friend that he was looking for work, and
(25:35):
he heard that I was directing the pilot of the
office and did they need stand ins? And so I
contacted Creed and I said, you know, the truth is,
the style of the show is that we're making a
mock documentary and trying to do a minimal amount of lighting. Therefore,
there's not really a need for standings. But there are
(25:57):
a couple of empty desks in the back of the bulletpen.
And again there's no guarantee of anything. But if you
want to, just you know, be an extra in the
background of this paper company for a week, you know,
or whatever. How how long was the pilot seven shooting days? Maybe? Um,
you know, you're welcome to take a seat at this desk.
And he did and and stayed, Yes, he stayed. And
(26:22):
poor Devon, poor poor Devon. Um. But one more thing
about sort of before we leave this really early time
that um, the idea that you and Greg cast regular
looking people in terms of making the show really accessible
(26:43):
to people. You know, the conventional wisdom is we want
beautiful people that people want to look at, but but
really choosing real people taking place in a real place. Um,
how that really made people fall in love with the people?
I mean, I feel like, again, this was part of
trying to make sure that we lived up to the
(27:06):
standards of the UK original, because certainly that's the case
in the UK original people are not glamorous who work
at Warnham Hogg. But I also think it's a tribute
to Alison Jones. I mean, she's so exceptional and and
one of her gifts is finding people who look real,
who do not look glamorous, who nevertheless kind of draw
(27:28):
you in, who are so compelling. I mean, I think
that again. My the way I always put it is,
if you tuned into the Office during its first season,
you'd say, none of these people belong on television, right, Yes,
and weirdly, for like Rain, that's still true. He does
not belong on television at all. Um, did you bring
(27:49):
any other of the staff or crew members with you
when you came and joined the pilot? Did you know
Peter Smokeler or well, Peter Smokeler and I had. I
did not hire Peter, but I was excited when I
heard he was shooting the pilot because Peter was the
DP of the Larry Sanders Show, Gary Shandlings Show, and
(28:13):
of course Peter has important mockumentary credentials having shot this
is spinal tap. And in fact, Peter and I actually
I don't want to say budded heads about documentary style,
but we definitely had a lively debate about how to
shoot a documentary. And this is actually a really important
(28:35):
thing that from Peter's point of view is if you're
a documentarian, you use a whip zoom you're you know,
let's say I'm getting a medium shot of you, and
now I'm gonna zoom in really quickly and get a
tight shot of you. The intention for the documentary filmmaker
is too. Then in the cutting room, eliminate the whip.
You know, the documentary filmmaker will get rid of those pants,
(28:57):
so that it feels like the documentary re creates the
feeling of a traditionally covered story. And I remember saying
to Peter, well, I think, no, I think we're going
to keep those and he and the heat and I
actually disagree. He goes, well, that's not good documentary filmmaking.
I go, yeah, but I think we need to kind
of signal to the viewer, you know, that we're making
(29:19):
this documentary. And I tried to justify it. I said, well,
you know, it's not the finished documentary, Like I was
trying to rationalize it. But I mean, he's right, if
you look at you know great And by the way,
Greg and I also talked about cinema verite documentaries. We
talked about the Mazel Brothers, about great films like Salesmen
or Great Gardens, and those films generally, yes, the the
(29:42):
the erratic camera moves to get from angle to angle
are eliminated so that you were more quote involved with
the story. But anyway, so I did not I wasn't
part of the decision to invite Peter, but I was
thrilled that he was on board. How did you feel
when you when you saw the final version? Were you
proud of it? The pilot? Oh, well, here's what actually happened.
(30:06):
I worked on the cut of the pilot, and I
worked on it with Greg for a little while. Then
I left and I went off to work on a film.
And by the way, while I was working on the film,
there was a lot of discussion about whether this show
would make the cut and get on the air. And
so I was on the phone with Greg occasionally and
and he was not always very optimistic. But in the meantime,
(30:28):
in the interim, I did see, you know, his final
cut of the pilot, and I just loved it. And
I loved again one of the things I'm so happy
with how he cut the pilot, as he preserved, he
didn't cut it for tempo. Rather, let me put it
more specifically, it wasn't up tempo. It had weird slack
pauses where we're on any other television show, you would
(30:51):
either have the sound of an audience laughing, you'd have
you know, three jokes where in that space or and
this is so significant, or you would hear music, you know,
nine seasons of the Office and other than that, you know,
opening title song that that is the driest show on
broadcast networked out. You know, there's nothing, there's no music, right,
(31:14):
and it really that is a significant part of the
what distinguishes the Showy. So Diversity Day, we get the order,
(31:43):
you come back and you're directing Diversity Day. Now, was
there any thought once we were now veering, you know,
if the pilot was very much like the original UK
version pilot. What was the thought about beginning to americanize
the show now that it had gotten picked up. Do
you remember any conversation about that. I don't remember any
(32:04):
conversation about americanizing the show when we worked on Diversity Day, because,
if anything, I felt Diversity Day was and I still
think it is one of the boldest episodes me too.
And you know, there was a lot of people at
the time who you know, would say, oh, the office, yeah,
it was kind of slow coming out of the gate
and all this stuff, and I thought, well, you're kidding
you watch episode two Diversity Day. It's like it's it's
(32:27):
it's as strong as we get. It's very good. And
and so I don't remember any discussion about that. I
do remember, um No, I'm trying to know. I can
think about many other things. Um were you proud of
how bold that episode was. I'm proud of that episode
for a number of reasons, one of which is um
(32:50):
In the script it said that, you know, Michael Scott's
you know, diversity training seminar took place in the conference room,
as did Mr Brown's seminar, and I remember there was
a lot of discussion about whether or not we should
move the seminar out into the bullpen, because otherwise the
(33:12):
whole episode was going to be stuck in the conference room.
And there was and it was like, oh my god,
it's our second show. We're trying to prove to the
network that this is a viable show, and and and
and our second episode is going to take place in
a small room. And it's like, so, I remember there
was a there wasn't pressure. I do remember talking to
Greg and a few others about was there a version
(33:33):
of it where like that seminar basically was spread out
into the into the into the bullpen. And I remember
just having a strong gut feeling that it would be
funnier if everyone was once again trapped in a small space.
And it made it more challenging to shoot. And again
it forced us to respect the limitations of the set.
(33:54):
There were no wild walls. Sometimes the cameras were in
people's faces a bit too much. There were instances where,
you know, actors blocked one another that I thought worked
really well. So that's just a small but important staging
decision we made. I also remember Greg and I discussing
the casting of Mr Brown and at the time Larry
(34:17):
Wilmore was a consultant on the show. He but he
had not been on the pilot, but he was, you know,
working with us on the second season, and there were
a lot of different names being bandied about from Mr Brown.
But I do remember, and I had worked with Larry
a lot, you know, on Bernie Maxhew. So I remember
taking Greg aside and saying, you know, I think I
think Mr Brown's sitting in an office down the hall here,
(34:40):
and happily Greg liked that idea, and and uh and
Larry did such a great created such a great character.
But I do I guess what I feel is that
that episode, I just felt like everyone was sort of
in top form. You know, everyone brought their a game
to that. So, you know, b J's script is remarkable.
(35:03):
And again I think the idea of all of us
being cooped up in that little room once again, it's
sort of contributed to that sense of ensemble. Had we
staged the you know, Michael Scott's seminar out in the bullpen,
it would have been cutaways, two people in different parts
of the space. But in the conference room, everyone was
in everyone's shot, everyone was together, right, m I something
(35:28):
I don't know why. I just occurred to me or
I started thinking about if those of you you are listening,
obviously there's this. It's a stereotype. But when a scene
begins and the camera start rolling and the director is ready,
they say action, and Ken doesn't say this, he says, um.
It's very hard to describe, but basically oftentimes will act
(35:51):
as though he's about to tell you something and then
says go ahead. And I'm wondering, is that's something that
you have always done? Because that in terms of what
you were talking about earlier, having us there to do
the general views altogether and not oh, we're showing up
(36:13):
and now we're going to perform that the go ahead
isn't now start acting. I just wanted to hear your take.
Is that something you've always done or it's not something
I've always done. I can tell you exactly when I
started doing it. I directed the pilot episode of The
Larry Sanders Show, and when Gary and I were prepping
(36:35):
the pilot, he, I mean, he very much wanted, you know,
a sense of verisimilitude about the you know, the talk
show world and and although that show is not a
mock documentary, you know, it definitely has a kind of
well observed quality, and he wanted He came up to
me and he said, is there any way that you
can develop a shooting style so that the actors actually
(36:57):
don't know when the cameras on? And I mean, it
was kind of a brilliant idea, but I didn't know
what to do with it. This we shot the Larry
Sanders Show in sixteen millimeter, so you had to constantly
reload magazines. It was not something you could hide from
the cast. So I finally came up with the idea
that we would start each scene, you know, without the
(37:22):
usual announcements, without a first d D saying you know,
rolling speak like all those things, or the sound person
saying rolling. And what I said to Gary was that
will roll the cameras without letting anyone know, and I'll
just give you a signal to start. And I said,
I'll just say, like, I don't know, go ahead or
something like that. And what often happened with Gary was
(37:46):
I'd say go ahead, and let's say it was a scene,
you know, in in Larry Sanders office with a number
of people. Gary would take the signal, but then he
would just sort of like chat with the cast for
a while, and then it's some you know, arbitrary point
just launched into the scene, so that there was this
sense that the line between acting and not acting kind
(38:08):
of got very blurry. And after working on that show
with Gary, I stopped using the word action. And I
feel like, um actors find that it does sort of
take a little bit of the onus off of act
The acting part is it's like there's real life and
(38:28):
then there's the scene. And so if you can erase
the line between real life and the scene, that might help.
And and and sometimes I mean, I I mean, this is
just something I've also done is occasionally actually interrupted take
without cutting, so that even I'm I'm like now just
having a like we're in a scene and I just
start talking to you and I said, oh, you know,
(38:49):
go back to such and stuff. So that again, it
just sort of keeps the atmosphere less about you know, oh,
I don't know, scene acting, you know. So that's brilliant. Alright, guys,
(39:15):
every word out of Kent's mouth is so fascinating to me.
But I'm gonna I'm gonna interrupt the scene. But you
will get to hear much more from Ken in a
later episode, including lots more about his work on the
Office in later season. Until then, tune in next week
for my conversation with the brilliant I can't wait for
(39:36):
this casting director Allison Jones, and of course lots more
of the cast and crew after that. Thank you all
for listening, and UH have a wonderful week. The Office
Deep Dive is hosted and executive produced by me Brian Baumgartner,
(39:57):
alongside our executive producer, lay Lee. Our senior producer is
Tessa Kramer, our associate 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 Creed Bratton, and the episode
was mixed by seth Olandski.
Host
Brian Baumgartner
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