The physical memories that Jenna Fischer has kept from her years making the series of beloved comedy “The Office”, which made her debut on NBC 20 years ago today, have become invaluable artifacts from precious time now preserved on the screen for posterity.
In the American reimagination of the British show created by Ricky Gervais, Fischer played Pam Beasley, the kind but courageous receptionist with artistic aspirations.
While discussing these memories during a recent zoom interview, I questioned Fischer The teapot The fact that the seller charming with rapid mind Jim Halpert (played by John Krasinski) gives Pam in a thought of in the first season of the show as a loving Santa Claus.
“John had the teapot! How does it make sense? But I got my dungies,” said the actor while heading for another corner of the room to grasp the statuettes that Michael Scott (Steve Carell), regional director of the Dunder Mifflin paper supplier, Scranch, awarded Pam.
“I have both (dundies), for a longest commitment and white sneakers. I kept a lot of things, ”explains Fischer. “I kept one of the PAM sweaters and one of his shirts. I kept her watch, her handbag, and I kept the necklace she wore for the wedding of Jim and Pam. ”
“I kept one of the PAM sweaters and one of his shirts,” said Jenna Fischer, the actor who played Pam Beasley in “The Office”. “I kept her watch, her handbag, and I kept the necklace she wore for the wedding of Jim and Pam.”
(Byron J. Cohen / NBC Universal)
The list continues, and each element among its “small treasures”, including a medal made of a yogurt and trombones cover of the “Office Olympics“The episode is a tangible reminder of the importance of this period for Fischer.
“I kept this pen which was on his desk. It doesn't even work, but I kept it. ” She then indicates another memory that survived an accident. “This cup was the Pam Cup on the series, and in the ninth season, it fell from the office and broke. But the crew knew that I wanted to take it, and so they stuck it together for me. I can't use it, but I have it.”
By e-mail, Krasinski explains how he obtained the Sarcelle colored teapot which is so symbolic to the enviable relationship of Pam and Jim.
“She made me cook!” Yes, I have the teapot, which, I realize, is completely the memory, ”explains Krasinski, writing in production in a future project. “In fact, it came to me by chance when our incredible Accessory Maître Phil Shea sent me a box of accessories some time after our packaging.”
But just like Fischer, it is not the only Kavisage of “Bureau” in his possession.
“(Phil sent) things he thought he had, and it was a real treasure chest with my show bag, my name of my office name, even the copy of” The Adventures of Jimmy Halpert “Comic”, “added Krasinski.
These elements also symbolize the united relationships that have developed during the show. When Shea died in 2023, Fischer said that the casting and the crew met for her memorial. She says they often communicate: “We have a” office “text thread. We receive emails from Greg Daniels, and it is a really special community of people, and we will be linked for life. ”
At the beginning, in 2005, no one on production could have anticipated the legs that the series would increase, but Krasinski knows exactly when he realized that “the office” would be his breakthrough. “I remember the moment,” said the actor, who had not yet moved to Los Angeles between the seasons because no one involved had any certainty of what would happen with the show.
“I was back in New York, and I walked in the street and a guy looked at me, released headphones from his head and said to me:” Hey … You are on my iPod! ” And keeps it. “On the one hand, I was trying to understand what hell was an iPod, because they had just come out. And secondly, on this screen 2 by 2 was … my face. I remember thinking that many came from changed.”
Since the ninth of the show and The final season was broadcast in 2013Krasinski has established himself as a prolific director and retained with the “A quiet place»Films while expanding his actor horizons.
John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer in a scene from the last season of “The Office”. The NBC series ended in 2013 after nine seasons.
(Byron Cohen / NBC)
But even now, with hindsight, he cannot fully understand why “the office” has so strongly hindered in pop culture. “I think we are all blown away by its power,” says Krasinski.
Fischer thinks that one of the reasons why the show has resisted the time test is that the relationships have been modeled to feel authentic for any framework and not only for those who have had office work.
“We have a lot of young fans who have never worked in an office and are still at school, and some of the office relationships can imitate some of your class relationships,” explains Fischer. “Maybe in class, you are sitting next to someone who drives you crazy, or you have a teacher who thinks they are really an actor.”
As for the reason why Pam and Jim's love story has always passed out the viewers, Fischer attributes it in part in the format of the spectacle, which allowed them to show “stolen moments” where people have custody. “You look at a romance flower. And it just makes you well in the intestine, “she says. “This is something that is not much captured in movies and television.”
Above all, she thinks, the public rooted so that they recognize what they feel of each other because this type of mutual worship is what most people aspire.
“You always hope you will find and marry your best friend, the person who looks at you like Jim looks at Pam, or the way Pam looks at Jim,” explains Fischer. “At the beginning of the seasons, we capture so much of their mutually desire. Everyone wants to be sucked in the way these two are concerned. ”
Fischer did not move too far from Dunder Mifflin. In 2019, she and the co-star Angela Kinsey, who played Angela Martin in the show, launched the podcast “Office ladies. “Over the past five years, they have reviewed every 201 episodes of the show to share candid anecdotes behind the scenes.
“There was a desire to give back to fans. As we cannot give them more new episodes of the show, we thought we could at least give new ideas,” she said. “It was also a way to honor our team that worked so hard and their contributions.”
“You always hope you will find and marry your best friend, the person who looks at you like Jim looks at Pam, or the way Pam looks at Jim,” said Jenna Fischer.
(Chris Haston / NBC)
For Fischer, this exercise of revisiting the old memories presented a new opportunity to work with Kinsey. “One of the great gifts of my life was to find my best friend in the series, and to go to work every day with a person I trust so much and to hold so expensive,” she says.
Although the show was mainly shot in Los Angeles, the two friends plan to visit Real Scran, in Pennsylvania, for a special episode of their podcast, where they will make significant sites for the series (like the statue of the statue of A giant dundie at the town hall) and Cooper's seafood house.
While some actors may feel overwhelmed by their perpetual association with a successful project and want to leave it behind, Fischer has never felt such ambivalence. When she moved to Los Angeles de Saint-Louis at the end of the 90s, Fischer remembers that she wanted one day she is part of a spectacle of whole comedy that continues. The actor has now more than satisfied this goal.
Fischer is now also a successful author thanks to his book “The Office BFFS: Tales of` The Office 'of two best friends who were there” (co-written with Kinsey). In addition to that, their current podcast has been a success since its beginnings.
In the future, once his children are older, Fischer wants to make more theater. But even if her role in this program which ended a long time ago was everything she had, it would be enough.
“I wanted to play a role that touched people's hearts, and I did it with Pam and” The Office “. How many bites on the apple do I need? Said Fischer. “I don't mind if I still remember being Pam Beasley. Nothing would make me more proud. ”
That said, Fischer does not think that the show should come back, even if it was possible to bring the casting. The characters, according to her, were sent to their lives beyond Dunder Mifflin and finding a way to enjoy them would be difficult.
“Before seeing the show again, I was one of the people who was everything to come back and relive the show,” she admits. “But now that I have resumed it, I think we should leave it as it is. I don't think we should open it.”
Fans, of course, will always be curious to know the fate of the characters with whom they have spent so much time. When he was asked if he thought that Jim and Pam are still together in the universe “The Office” all these years later, Krasinski responds with an endearing certainty.
“Oh, I know it. They have a cool house just outside Austin where they loved raising their children,” he said. “Pam found a cool art crowd in Ut. And they probably slipped for an appointment night while we are talking, grabbing Whataburger to take away and sit in the park near the bridge while waiting for the bats flying. ”
