Office Ladies - Survivor Man

Episode Date: March 3, 2021

This week we’re breaking down Survivor Man. When Michael is excluded from Ryan’s corporate camping trip, Michael ventures out into the woods and goes on his own solo camping adventure. Meanwhile, Jim tries to consolidate the office’s birthdays. The ladies break down Dwight’s menagerie of weapons, they talk about using tiny potatoes for bird eggs and Angela gets personal about birthday cakes. This episode is like a montage of birthday celebrations and you’re invited!

I'm Jenna Fisher and I'm Angela Kinsey. We were on The Office together and we're best friends. And now we're doing the Ultimate Office rewatch podcast just for you. Each week we will break down an episode of The Office and give exclusive behind-the-scenes stories that only two people who were there can tell you. We're The Office, ladies. Hi everybody. Hello.

Are you guys ready for this episode today, Survivor Man? Do you have your duct tape? Oh boy. That's probably... Oh man. Do you have your duct tape and a Ziploc bag full of... What were those? Peanuts?

I have so many questions about it. Pellets? Granola? We don't know. And maybe a bow knife? Definitely a knife. Definitely always a knife for Survivor Man. I forgot to eat breakfast this morning before we got ready to record this podcast, Angela.

So right before this moment, I ran downstairs and I ate an egg and a half of an apple. It hasn't digested yet, so I feel a little loopy. I feel a little bit like I'm in a good space for this episode. I'm a little bit like, you know, hungry, yeah, frazzled, yeah. Do you just have eggs ready to go? You know, I hard boil an egg first thing. When I wake up in the morning, I put an egg in my hard boiler. Okay.

And I just hadn't gotten back to it. So yeah, I had an egg ready to go. It's part of my morning process. Things you need to know about Jennifer, sure. Eggs, ruts to go. That's right. Add it to your list. Today is season four, episode 11, written by Steve Carell and directed by Paul Feig.

Here is a summary. Give it to me. After Ryan excludes Michael from a corporate wilderness retreat, Michael heads out into the woods for his own survival adventure with nothing but the suit on his back. Dwight secretly keeps watch. Back at the office, Jim tries to revolutionize the office birthday party system and learns that Michael's job is a lot harder than it looks. Oh yeah.

And for those of you really paying attention, Jenna just gave us a Dwight. Did I? You did. I Krasinskied it. Pulled a Krasinski. Fast fact number one, this episode was written by our very own Steve Carell. Applause. We love you, Steve.

I love you. I reached out because I wanted to hear a little bit about the inspiration for this episode. Here's what Steve told me. He said that he and his wife Nancy loved this show called Survivor Man. So Steve pitched the idea for this episode because he and Nancy were such fans of the real show. What is Survivor Man? I've never seen the show.

I mean, I'm guessing the guy's got to go survive somewhere. Oh, Angela, you're going to be so happy. What? Fast fact number two is all about the real Survivor Man show. Give it to me. It was a Canadian TV show starring a real life survival expert and filmmaker, Les Stroud. In each episode, he would be dropped off in a remote location and he would have to survive up to 10 days.

He brought little or no food, water or equipment except for his camera equipment because he would film himself. There was no camera crew. But would he bring like a cup? Like how does he get water? No lady, no equipment. No utensil. Correct.

Hey, yeah, yeah. Now they did have safety precautions. Like you know in this episode how Dwight is kind of watching Michael from afar? Yeah. There was a support team who monitored the sky from a distance just in case he got attacked by a wild animal or something. They were not going to leave him out there to die. I would not be good at that job.

Like watching the man or being the man? Watching the man. I can't. I'm like, you know, I've got to put in my two cents. How would that work? Explain. Well, like maybe he starts to go for a bush or something. He shouldn't, you know, be touching.

Maybe it's the poisonous bush. I don't know. I'd start going like, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, or I'd pretend to be a bird. But like it would be like, no, no, not that one. How can you watch someone struggle? I'd be horrible at that. Well, let me say this. He was allowed to scout and study these areas ahead of time with a team of local experts.

So he would go in with a survival plan. He would know the local fauna and flora. He would know what things he should eat or shouldn't eat. Something that Steve said was that he and Nancy noticed that the guy was always doing things like Michael does, like turning a stick into a spear. Like he's going to go spear an animal, but he never actually succeeded in actually killing an animal. So Steve and Nancy had a theory that he just really didn't want to kill any animals because

he was a really nice guy because he never seemed to actually catch any living food to eat. He was the friendly survivor man. Yeah. Fast fact number three is a location breakdown coming at you thanks to fan question from Catalina Rizzi, Sydney Weaver, Jason Barray, Sophia Spear, and Kate Betteridge. Where did Steve and Rain film the forest scenes? I'm going to guess the Los Angeles National Forest.

Hmm. I don't think so. Oh. I mean, unless the Los Angeles National Forest is at the 44 mile marker on the Los Angeles Crest Highway, because that's where we shot. These scenes were filmed at a picnic site called Charlton Flaps. And we spent one day shooting all of the forest scenes. And that day was, can I get a kentipedia from you, Angela, because kentipedia gave me this

information. Kenta, kenta, kentipedia. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Wednesday, October 17th, 2007. That's such a specific kentipedia fact. I know. So it was October and that is right when the chill starts to come over Los Angeles.

So some of the stuff where Michael is like, it's so hot in the day and then it's cool at night. That's actually really accurate for us here in LA. That is life out here, guys. It's like you leave and you're like hot and then you're freezing in like four hours. It gets to layer. Yeah. It's a layering city for sure.

Yeah. Of course, our show was set in Scranton, Pennsylvania, so it would have been much colder than we depicted at that time in Scranton. For sure. We didn't get the weather right, guys. We got it wrong. We portrayed a nice October day in Southern California. That's all I got, lady.

Well, this whole episode reminded me of Creed Bratton because, you know, Creed's my neighbor. He loves the show alone. It's like a survivalist show and he got Josh and I into it. And all I can think about when I watch these shows is, A, I would never make it. Not because I probably couldn't hunt and fish, but because I get too cold. What would do you in? I would get too cold. I think the lack of sleep.

Whenever I watch shows like Survivor or like people doing extreme camping or survivalist type storylines, I always think about how they're not getting a sound night's sleep. And I really need that sleep. I am super cranky, but also I get physical symptoms when I don't sleep enough. I get a stomach ache. I get a headache. I get like real loopy. So I think it would be the lack of sleep that would do me in.

I can sleep pretty much anywhere. I think I would figure out sleep, but I would just freeze to death or I'd get so cold I would get angry and then I'd quit. You're like, I am out of here. This is too effing cold. I'm out. Screw you guys. Where's my heater?

Well, my breakfast is kicking in, Ange, but I say we take a break and we'll come back to talk about one of my favorite opening scenes of an episode ever. Do you mean super sunburned Toby? Yes. Super happy sunburned Toby. All right, we'll be back. We are back and here it is, folks. Toby is holding court in the kitchen.

I mean, he is the most lit up you will ever see Toby. I have to point out something while Toby is holding court for our background catch people at two seconds. You will see the jar of red vines that was in the kitchen for nine seasons. Yes. Primo shot. It's right behind Phyllis and I just looked at it and I started cracking up because I feel like those red vines would survive, you know, Armageddon because they were so shellacked

and gross. Oh my gosh. You couldn't eat them. They were like sticks. Yeah. You remember opening them in season nine and they were the same as season one. It was scary. You know what?

They should have taken those out into the woods. They could have used them to build their shelter. I'm a big red vines fan. I have to tell you when I go to the movies. Me too. Red vines or junior mints. Oh, that's so cute. Yeah.

So Toby is chatting with Pam, Oscar, Phyllis and Meredith all about this wilderness retreat that he went on with Ryan and some of the other branch managers. We are hanging on his every word. We're laughing and you come to find out in this series of Talking Heads that Michael was not invited on the wilderness retreat. Three Talking Heads where the people say the same thing. Phyllis, Toby, you, Michael wasn't invited. He wasn't invited.

Toby was. Michael wasn't. And the smile on Phyllis' face when she says it is amazing. She's so delighted that Michael wasn't invited. There is a delicious Talking Head that was deleted. It is Ryan in his office at corporate and he's saying how he had this idea for the retreat and corporate wouldn't pay for it. And he does that thing where he talks in third person where he's like, okay, Ryan, fix

it, got it, make it about the environment. He says make it a green retreat, then they pay for it. And then he goes on to say, no one ever does anything for the environment just to help the environment. If someone tells you they have a green initiative, it's a scam. Oh my gosh. And then he's saying that now that he's like the green wonder kid, you know, the green environmentalist that it's going to impress the ladies of the office and he purposefully

like puts a plastic water bottle in the recycle bin by a group of women and they don't even acknowledge him. It's hilarious. Well, we had a fan question about this scene from Stephanie Pollan, Catherine Loza, Zach James and Anthony Bataglia. Paul looks so tan. Does he have special sunburn makeup on to make it look like Toby has been camping? Yes.

Oh yeah. That was very thought out. They did a test run on his face. They took pictures. They decided if it was too much or too little. And I remember they even did his forehead, Jenna. Like where his hairline is. Yes.

They did a great, great job. It really sells it. It looks real. Well, Michael is so stung by this. Oh, he's devastated. He's seething. He just like can't believe that Toby was invited to this over him. And Jenna, he starts asking people hypothetically if they would go camping with him.

In the deleted scenes, he starts with Pam and it's cut out and I wish it was in. Pam and Jim clearly have two different strategies with Michael because Pam is like, if Michael asked you a hypothetical, you always say no because his hypothetical could become an actually and you just say no. And then he doesn't make any leeway with you. So he moves on to Jim. But there is a great scene that clearly you and Jim kind of work together to avoid Michael to set up what you're about to listen to you guys.

Jim is in Michael's office and he asked her hypothetically would she go camping with him. She's like, no. So he's going to move on to Jim. He's like, is Jim there? She looks at his desk. Jim's not there. But she knows the minute Michael's like, can you send in Dwight? Dwight's going to be put on the tracking of Jim.

And so she runs to the break room to tell Jim to like hide and it's just so hilarious. And here's the clip. Is Jim out there? No. Can you send Dwight in here? Yeah. Dwight, Michael wants to see you in his office. You wanted to see me?

Mm-hmm. I have something very personal I would like to discuss. Would you go find Jim and send him in here please? I'm on it. Michael has employed Dwight to track you down. How much time do I have? Jim, Michael's office. A couple minutes, give or take.

Now Jim. Oh my gosh, I love that. How many times was Michael looking for Jim and him and Pam had this covert thing where she's like, Dwight's looking for you. You have five minutes. It's so good. But you know Dwight does find Jim, right? So now Jim is in Michael's office and Michael is asking Jim, hypothetically would you like

to go camping? And Jim's strategy is totally different from Pam's. Jim's like always say yes, right? But then have an excuse and apparently Jim's excuse is always that he's donating blood. Which I loved. I loved Steve's delivery as Michael when he says, how many times can a person give blood? Yeah. Jim says, is there a limit?

I didn't know. I remember John breaking every single time that Steve as Michael said, your body only has a certain amount. Yeah. That John would lose it. Do you remember that? I do because I was in the background at reception. I think at two minutes, nine seconds, you can see John trying not to break.

Also when Michael was talking to Jim about Ryan's lame camping trip that he clearly wanted to go on. He's kind of making fun that they did s'mores and he's like, hello, I'm broken mountain. You know. And this is this moment, Jenna, where I felt like Michael was my mom because my mom would never get the name broke back mountain, correct? My mom would probably think it was broken mountain. Yes.

My mom is always one word off. My mom is the same way, are we going to be like that, Angela? I think I already am. I feel like we're starting to turn into that. I went to say, like, let's FaceTime the other day and I said, why don't we Facebook? There it is. I know. That's classic mom brain right there.

It's happening. Well, then Michael has a talking head where he explains that when he and Jan had satellite TV, I guess maybe they turned it off because of their money problems. But yes, this is the thing we love. This is the callback to money, right? Yeah. They're on a budget now. Oscar has given them a budget.

I also want to point out that when we get to the dinner party episode and we see Michael's new flat screen TV, just remember that has no satellite television on it as established in this episode. That's great. Anyway, he says that he and Jan used to watch a show called Survivorman and it's all about this guy who survives in the wild and so Michael is going to do this because this is real wilderness adventure. So he tells Dwight, I need two things, a roll of duct tape and a knife.

And I need it in 30 minutes or less. And Dwight's like on it. No problem. I did a little bit of a breakdown of the weaponry in the office. Oh, there's so much Dwight goes around the office collecting weapons that he's hidden. Lady, look at my documentation. You really did document it. There's numbers.

They're numbered. How many are there? Okay. Guess how many weapons are in the office? I'm not talking about what he has in his car because we know he has stuff in the trunk of his car. Okay. Just guess what he has stashed in the office.

How many? Eight. Twenty-three. What? Now listen, office fans, if I got it wrong, let me know. But this is what I tracked and I went back and rewatched the negotiation. So ready? In the negotiation taped underneath his desk are pepper spray and throwing stars.

In his desk drawer are nunchucks, a Billy Club looking thing. And listen, my weapons experts, if I get some of these names wrong, just, you know, you'll let me know. Then there's also handcuffs, a taser, another throwing star, what looks like to be a whip, nuts, knuckles, and a boomerang. That's just in the negotiation. And in this episode, under Meredith's desk are, like he rolls out a set of like eight different types of knives.

Two pitchfork dagger looking things are behind the water cooler. There's a giant knife in the file cabinets by Kevin's desk. There's a samurai sword in the ceiling over Stanley and Phyllis's desk. And then finally he has blowdarts in the men's restroom, like in the back of the toilet. What do you call the back of the toilet thing? The tank? The tank. Yes.

So when I added them all up, you guys, I counted 23 weapons in the office. It's quite a menagerie of weaponry. A menagerie of weapons, Dwight. And I don't know what those pitchfork dagger thingies are called, and I'm sure you guys will let me know. But that's what they look like to me. I don't know what those were either. They seemed like they would be really good for roasting marshmallows, even though I understand

they're a weapon. It seemed like a really great triple marshmallow roaster. Mmm, yeah. I got really interested for whatever reason in the blow dart gun. Oh, okay. So guess what I have for you. Do you have a deep dive on blow dart guns? I sure do.

Oh, lady, lady, give it to me. Here it is. From what I could find, the blow dart seems to have been invented in ancient times and probably in Southeast Asia. They started as bamboo tubes that shot out seeds and clay pellets and then eventually graduated to poison darts. Now, Angela, you might find this interesting because it is believed that it was Indonesian traders that took the blow gun to Japan, South India, Madagascar, and they also popped

up in South America, Middle America, and the Eastern United States. That's Indonesian for, oh my goodness. There we go. Dart guns were primarily used for hunting, not combat. I feel like in movies we always see them used in combat scenes, right? But they were actually a hunting device. The North American Cherokees were known for using them to hunt rabbit and other small creatures and blow guns are still used today.

There are even sport blow gun competitions, Angela, and some groups are trying to make it an Olympic event. I would watch that. Yeah. The blow dart event. I'm there. Lady, can we go to a blow dart competition? I'm fascinated.

Can we go to a blow dart master and get trained on how to blow dart? I'm up for all of it. After researching the blow dart, I'm like, bring it on. Bring it on. I'll tell you what. One of my improv teams, we had a player who would sometimes hog the stage and just not leave the stage and take over every scene. So a bunch of us started improv blow darting him.

We just go like, he'd have to pass out and we just start blow darting him in scenes. That is very funny. He was the Michael of your class. Yeah. Well, guys, Michael is ready to go. He comes out of his office and he tells Pam that he and Dwight are leaving. Dwight will return later and Michael will be taking a personal day tomorrow and perhaps for the next two days.

And Pam is like, do you want me to ask you where you're going? Yeah. And he says, no. And then he tells her anyway. Of course. I noticed Dwight is standing behind Michael this whole speech. He is holding four things. He is holding a camera, the same camera that we used to make Michael's apology video, a

roll of duct tape, one of the giant knives, and a bag of what? What is it? What is it? I zoomed in. I took a picture of it. I can't tell. At first I was like, is it peanuts? There's no way it's peanuts.

It's also so full. It looks like the pellets you feed your hamster. That's what it looks like to me. It looks like some sort of animal kibble. I don't know. Like he's going to sprinkle around to attract animals? Well, we never see him eat it. We never see him use what's in the bag.

He uses the other three things. I don't know. We see him only hold the bag of question mark. That's right. Also in this scene, I love that Michael announces that when he comes back, he is going to be a completely changed human being. And then Jim says, that would be great. So good.

Dwight, of course, has this talking head, which is really funny where he's like, no, he doesn't believe Michael would survive in the wilderness. Super matter of fact. But lady, I have to point out something at five minutes, 19 seconds. What is it? Why are Michael and Dwight in a 2006 or 2007 give or take PT Cruiser? I think we have a car switch. Is this an extension of Michael's money stuff where he said they traded in both their cars

for that Porsche and did they get rid of the Porsche and now he has a PT Cruiser? Oh my gosh. We need someone to figure this out. We do. And I looked up the PT Cruiser. This is around the 2007 make with the red interior. I Googled it. Why is Michael having a Chrysler PT Cruiser?

I need to know why. Who could we ask? I don't know. Guys, this is one of those moments where you can see so clearly that we are not the experts of the office. Perhaps there is a really obvious answer for this. Like remember when I declared that Pam had never used the shredder and then several episodes later she clearly uses the shredder and take your daughter to work day.

It is very possible that we missed why he's driving a PT Cruiser. Someone tell us. Let us know. This is going to keep me up at night and you know how I do with no sleep. Let her know. And while they're in this PT Cruiser, Angela, Michael is explaining to the camera what's happening. We are to assume that Michael is being driven to the forest by a serial killer who's going

to leave him for dead but Michael is going to survive. The overkill killer, as Dwight calls himself. Yes. He says, if I were your serial killer, you would never survive. I have a fan question from Elizabeth Congdon and Matthew Lister. In this scene in the car Dwight takes off his shoe and hits Michael in the head. Was the shoe hit, planned or improvised? And Joey Carr would like to know, was that an actual shoe or did Phil Shea have to make

a shoe out of rubber or some other soft material that wouldn't hurt Steve? I asked Steve about this. Yeah. First of all, it was planned. It was in the script. It was not improv. Steve believes it was a real shoe. He is not sure.

I zoomed in on it. It looked like a real shoe. Steve said maybe the reason he can't remember is because it was a real shoe. And so he's going with real shoe. I zoomed in on it too, Jenna. Not only do I think it was a real shoe, I actually think it's Dwight's shoe. I think it came off Rain's foot. It looks exactly like the shoes he wore.

Yes. I can't imagine that Phil Shea was able to make a replica foam shoe. That was a real shoe. Back in the office, there's some drama. I guess Jim has been put in charge of things because of Michael's absence and Angela goes up to Jim to talk about ordering a cake for Creed's birthday. Well she lets him know it's birthday month. And you guys, we all have birthday month, right?

Our birthday month in my family is May. All three kids are born in May, my mother-in-law is born in May, two of my sisters are born in May. We call it birthday palooza. Jenna, what's your birthday month? Our birthday month was March. When I was growing up, me, my sister, and my mom are all born in March. So we had three birthdays in one month.

I'm telling you, every family has one. And at Dunder Mifflin, this is birthday month. Creed's is today. Oscars is a week after next. Meredith is at the end of the month. And we also find out later in this episode from Creed that Jim's was three weeks ago and there's a series of talking heads about birthdays. Angela says, you know what, if this is birthday month, jog back nine months.

You know what that was, Valentine's Day. And then she tells everyone, stagger your sin, stagger your sin so we don't have birthday month. And Jenna, Kelly has a talking head about the birthdays. And I'm just going to show you a screen grab because I really need it to just be a surprise. I want you to read. I put the subtitles on last night. I want you to read what Kelly says about Pam because this is a little bit of Kelly's

shade. Oh my gosh. Read out loud what Kelly says about you. Pam lies about her age. That's amazing. There's a great runner of talking heads that were deleted and that's part of Kelly Kapoor's. Well, I'll tell you something. In real life, I am five years older than John Krasinski.

Scandalous. I know. But on the show, our characters were meant to be the same age. I couldn't tell. So I think they made Jim a little bit older than John and they made Pam a little younger than me. You met in the middle. Well, I want to point out two things at six minutes, five seconds during this whole conversation

between Angela and Jim, which, by the way, this episode was the most Jim and Angela have interacted so far to date. This is the most they've ever had to speak to each other. Huge Janjala storyline. Janjala storyline. At six minutes, five seconds, Jenna, this is the return of the puffy elbow sweater. Oh, it's so unattractive. I'm sorry, lady.

Your face, your bangs, your skin is glowing. You look gorgeous. This top is a tragedy. Why did they buy it in two colors? Remember, I wore it in the beige version of launch party. Yeah. Well, it's back. Now it's in maroon.

So we've got that going. But my plant at reception, people, over Jim's shoulder, we see the plant at front reception. It is a blooming plant. Oh. Whoa. What? It is a pink antherm. Huh.

Blooming. Uh-huh. Blooming plant at front reception. Lady, Jim has a big idea that is not going to go over well. It is not. It pisses literally everyone off. Jim suggests that they just do one big party rather than several parties over the course of the month.

Angela doesn't like it. No one's going to like this idea. Yeah. You know, I wouldn't have liked that. Growing up in my family, I don't want to share a birthday with my sister or with my mom. In my house, our tradition was that you got to pick your cake and you got to pick your dinner.

On your birthday, and my sister and I like different dinners and different cakes. And it's very similar to what's going to happen in the office. Everybody wants their own little thing. Uh-huh. Next up, we have a Jim talking head that has a wonderful montage that goes along with it of birthday surprises. Angela, we got more mail about this talking head than any talking head I think we've ever had.

Is it about all the different birthday parties? No. Well, I took a picture because in this montage of all the different birthday parties, there is a moment where we are all just flat out laughing. Oh, yeah. We've completely broken character. And it's when Brian takes the blow-up doll and is beating rain over the head with it. They improvised that.

That was just them being idiots. A lot of people wanted to know how much were we actually laughing in all of these clips. Our ice cream grabbed a moment, Jenna, where you can just see me and Ed Helms and Oscar just cracking up. Look at that. That is not Angela Martin. That is amazing. I will put that screen grab in stories.

We had a lot of people write in to point out that Jim says there are 13 people in the office. But shouldn't there be 14? I wrote it out. There's 14. But Keith Nichols said, is Jim leaving out Toby on purpose just like Michael would? Oh. Subconsciously. Right?

Maybe. Yes. It's 14 with Toby, 13 without. Oh, you know what is interesting to me is that it's clear that Pam knows that this is a horrible idea. She knows it's a disaster. She goes up to Jim and is like, you think this is a good idea? And he's like, I think it's a great one.

And she just kind of smells like, no, okay. Why doesn't Pam say anything? I don't know why she doesn't, but Jim does seem a little immovable here, right? He seems a little convinced that he has a great idea. And I think she's like, okay, let's play it out. Let's see how this goes, buddy. But she knows how it's going to go. Maybe she just needs to let him figure it out.

He has to find his own way. I guess so. Guys, at this point, Dwight and Michael have arrived in the woods. Michael is blindfolded and he is asked Dwight to lead him into the wilderness. Do you notice how Dwight purposely takes Michael through a bunch of weeds rather than walk him on the clear path? Yeah. He's like, don't worry.

Just some bushes and some thickets when he clearly could have walked around them. Before removing his blindfold, Dwight also insists on spinning Michael around, which I loved. There are so many deleted scenes of them in the woods. Jenna, what these men went through that week? I mean, they wrestle each other to the ground. There's just so many scenes like Dwight is doing bird calls. He's hiding.

Michael is exploring a ravine saying absolute nonsense. He's saying that like, yeah, this ravine was formed when the icebergs, like he's saying all this crazy stuff. And I kept thinking as I watched all this extra footage, what does Michael do with this footage? What does he do with all this? Who ever sees the stuff? I don't know.

I think that all the time when I see people doing things like videotaping a fireworks display, you're going to watch that later. I know. You're going to watch that seven minute video of the fireworks. And by the way, while the fireworks are going off, you want to watch your phone screen? I don't get it. Yeah. No.

So Dwight has left Michael on his own. Of course, we know he's secretly watching him. And Michael has decided it's getting hot and he takes his knife. I was so worried about his leg the whole time, by the way, that he was going to like, sever his leg. Me too. He cuts his pants into shorts. He then decides to make a hat out of the extra material.

His jacket can be a backpack. He's just saying the craziest things and he has destroyed his pants. We got a lot of mail about that scene from Jordan Y, Mary Triggs and Colby Shannon. They wanted to know was Steve really cutting his pants? Was the costume rigged in some way? I reached out to Steve because like you, Angela, I was very nervous. It looked very real. Yeah.

Steve said the costume was not rigged. He cut his pants with a real knife. Shut up! He said it was, in hindsight, it was a truly stupid thing to do. He kind of can't believe that he did it. I cannot believe this. We would have a freaking safety meeting for a lit candle. And now Steve is cutting his pants open in the middle of nowhere, by the way.

If he did cut his leg, they were far from anything. Yeah. Steve really likes this moment, though, he said. It makes him laugh because in the movie Castaway, Tom Hanks does this and that's kind of where he got the idea. But Tom Hanks does it after he's been on the deserted island for like two years. And Michael does it after 35 minutes. Listen, lady, I think we should take a break.

And when we come back, we're going to discuss some cake drama. Oh, I can't wait. I still can't believe he cut his own pants with that knife. I know. He specifically told me he did not use stunt legs. Oh my God. Stunt legs or a stunt knife. No stunt legs, no stunt knife, and no tear away clothes, that was all real.

We are back and we have cake wars, cake wars at Dunder Mifflin, and not the fun kind where they decorate a great cake. Exactly. No, everyone wants their own cake. Meredith is like, listen, I want Devil's Food Cake. Jim's like, no problem. And then this ticks off Creed. Creed is like, it is my actual birthday.

Like Meredith doesn't get to pick the cake. I don't like Devil's Food Cake. I want Peach Pie. I absolutely love Jim and Creed scene together. It's done in this very different style. It looks totally different from any other scene. It's uptight and close, Creed's super intense. It reminds me of like an Aaron Sorkin kind of moment where it's like ret-ta-ta-ta dialogue

back and forth. And he's like, listen, tell Angela it's for Creed, she'll know what it means. Can I say something controversial? What? You don't like Aaron Sorkin? I love Aaron Sorkin. I don't like Peach Pie. Oh.

I don't like any kind of peach in a dessert. Wow. I love every other cobbler. I love berry cobbler, apples. Whatever you want to throw in there, no peaches for me. I don't know what it is. If it's a peach, I want it to stay a peach and I want to eat it as a peach. I'm not interested in it being desertified.

What is that? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what that is. I mean, do you like, like, do they do peach jam? I don't want peach as a jam. Okay. I love how strongly you feel about it.

I have very Angela Martin-esque feelings about how peaches are to be prepared. Can I share something with you? What? Okay, Jenna, this is a snarky moment for me. I'm going to share it with you and everyone listening. Okay. My whole entire life, I'm a summer birthday. So when I was growing up, they would like have the birthday celebration of whoever

at school. It was their birthday, right? It would be like some kind of birthday snack or you'd wear a birthday crown or whatever it was that your classroom did, right? Yeah. I never got one. Because I had a summer birthday and guess what, guys? If you grew up in the 70s and 80s, there was no like, this is for all the summer birthday

celebration. They didn't give a crap. You had a summer birthday. You didn't get any kind of celebration at school. Nowadays, if you have a summer birthday, they do a little thing for the kids with the summer birthdays, not when I was growing up. Cut to our time on the office. Nine years, Jenna, nine years, I watched all of you guys get a birthday cake.

Oh no. I watched the whole entire cast and crew gather around and clap and sing happy birthday and take pictures and Peter and Vartan would make a special cake for the birthday person. Nine years. Yep. We never shot the office in June, did we, Angela? Never shot the office in June. Guess who never got the office birthday cake?

Oh no. Me. Oh gosh. I never got it. I remember, like around season eight, they rolled out a cake for someone. Everyone's clapping and singing. And I literally said out loud, no one ever did this for me. Oh no.

Clearly so bitter. And someone else was like, yeah, I have a summer birthday. Where's our summer birthday cake? Did they ever do it? No. I have never gotten a birthday cake at school or work. This is my Crimea River. But when I see these scenes, I just remember like being like, yeah, well, where's my f***ing

cake? Oh my God. Lady, I'm so sorry. You're right. I enjoyed many a March birthday cake by Peter and Vartan with the candles. Sometimes they would do a photo cake and put some sweet personal photo on it. Jenna, I have multiple photos I took of other people in their cakes. Oh no.

We also did it for the crew members. I know. Yeah. Summer birthdays, S-O-L. So listen, I turn 50 in June. I expect an office lady's birthday cake and a song and applause. Okay. Done.

Did you get that, Sam, Cassie, Cody? For once in my life, I want to work birthday. You know what, Angela? I promise we will not take a vacation the week of your birthday just so that we are forced to celebrate it. I want to work on my birthday. Yeah, that's the other thing. Everyone else is like, dude, at least you were like on vacation for your birthday.

I was stuck at work. At least I got a cake. I want to work on my birthday and I want a cake. We'll make that happen for you this year, Angela. I promise. Thank you. I really appreciate it. Should we talk about Andy's cake demand?

Yes. He wants a fudgy the whale ice cream cake and pizza rolls and mushroom caps. Oh, lady. Do you remember the fudgy the whale? Do you remember this on set? It was a big deal. I do because it's a special cake brand. Yes.

It's Carvel, right? And I had never heard of fudgy the whale, which I remember a few of the crew and Cass were like, are you kidding me? You've never heard of fudgy the whale? But it was an East Coast thing. I'd never heard of it. It's totally an East Coast thing. Well, last night, somebody might have done what she likes to call a mini dive.

Oh, you mini-dived fudgy the whale. I mean, that does sound inappropriate, but I like it. There you go. All right. Here's everything you need to know about fudgy the whale. Carvel was founded by Tom Carvel, who, by the way, is fascinating. That would be a whole other deep dive about his life and how he really gave birth to like this whole franchise ice cream phenomenon.

But here's the famous story. It's on their website. It's in multiple places online. Even has it, Tom Carvel had an ice cream truck that broke down and his ice cream started to melt. So he was really trying quickly to sell off all this ice cream before it melted. And he found that the customers actually liked it soft. So he was like, wait a second.

And he started serving soft serve ice cream. And no one else was doing that. And so it became a whole thing, right? He developed a soft serve ice cream machine. He even patented it. He sold it to other franchises. This man, Jenna. He was a boss lady.

He was a boss dude. He was a boss daddy. There we go. He was a boss daddy. And he started the very first Carvel ice cream shop on the exact spot where his truck broke down. That is boss daddy. So there are Carvel stores, they're franchised.

There is one now in Los Angeles, Jenna. Really? There used to not be, but there is one now in Los Angeles. And they became famous for a few cakes. In the 70s, they created this cake called the Cookie Puss. Oh boy. I know. The Hug Me Bear.

And then Fudgy the Whale followed in June of 1977. He was all Tom Carvel's idea. He was like, we need a cake for Father's Day. I want it to be a whale. And I want the slogan to say, for a whale of a dad. Oh my God, I am loving so much about this. I looked up the expression. I'd never heard of this, a whale of a something.

I don't know if you've heard of that expression. I hadn't. But that was an expression and it referred to a very great amount of something or a very good thing. So to be a whale of a dad was, you were a great dad, right? Fudgy the Whale was so successful. They kept the mold and talk about reuse, repurpose. At Christmas time, they flipped Fudgy the Whale on its head and made his tail like the

Santa hat and made him into a Santa. And to this day, you can still get Fudgy the Whale and you can also get a female Fudgy the Whale. They'll give her pink piping and like eyelashes and a little bow and more than 50,000 Fudgy the Whale ice cream cakes are sold every year. All the cakes come with two layers of chocolate and vanilla separated by a layer of what they call crunchies. They don't tell you what's in their crunchy recipe and you can customize it with favorite

flavors and a different type of center and there you have it. That's Fudgy the Whale. But I have one other thing I want to play you. Tom Carvel himself would do all the jingles and commercials for Fudgy the Whale. No way! Yep. All right, Jenna. Here's Tom Carvel talking about Fudgy the Whale for their ad.

Fudgy the Whale is back. That's a whale of a cake for a whale of a dad that you participate in Carvel Ice Cream Store. Yeah. And this year, your Carvel Nealer makes you loaded with Fudge and nuts and you can get a Fudgey the Whale with an ocean to serve 20 people and if you want to send Fudgey the Whale to a whale of a dad anywhere in Carvel territory, you call them the phone number that you see here.

Thank you and have a happy day, dad. I don't want to tip my hand too much. Am I going to get a Fudgey the Whale for my 50th birthday? How could we not get you a Fudgey the Whale now? Oh my God. I am so excited already. I want to eat one of those so bad now that you've described it. I know.

I went on Carvel's website. There's so many cool looking cakes. They do a lot more now. I'm not going to lie. The cookie puss is kind of odd looking. What is it? A cat? I took a picture of it.

Here were their first three cakes that were like their famous cakes. Okay. I can't wait for you to see this. This is the cookie puss. Oh, well, it has a full ice cream cone as a nose. Yeah. And then on its cheeks, it has little arms drawn on it, it has cookies for eyes. Are they arms?

What's the puss part? Is it meant to be a cat? I don't know. I don't understand what it is. Here's the best part. For St. Patrick's Day, you can get a cookie opus, the Irish version. I don't understand it. I want to eat it.

I don't know. I went real deep onto the Carvel site, but I'm very excited. I want to fudge you the whale for my 50th birthday. Done. I can't wait. I don't remember it being on set. Isn't that funny? I remember everyone talking about it and I remember people saying, what is it?

But I don't remember ever having one. I totally remember it. I mean, my character didn't eat it, but I remember Ed eating it in the scene. Wow. Well, when we eat your cake for your birthday, it's going to be all new to me. Lady, should we go back out into the wilderness? Oh, definitely we should. I have a crew catch at 13 minutes 15 seconds.

Oh, what'd you catch? You can see our cinematographer Randall Einhorn's hand come into frame and brush some tree branches away that were probably going to hit his camera. He's walking behind Dwight. Oh, Jenna, that's a great catch. I didn't see that. What's the time code? 13 minutes 15 seconds.

I was not the only person to catch it, but I want to say that I saw it before I saw our male, but Tim Wong, Jonah T, Addy H, and Keanna Raeber also wrote in about Randall's hand. Well, great job, guys. Great job. We also had Jasper Anders and Morgan Elridge write in to ask, what did Phil Shea use for the bird eggs that Dwight finds and cooks? They kind of look like they might be small potatoes. Guess what?

What? They were small potatoes. Really? Teeny tiny potatoes meant to look like eggs. I totally thought they were eggs, but I was trying to think what kind of bird makes a nest like that up in a tree. What? What?

Many birds? So many birds? That was such a big nest, though. Like those eggs look like a bird that would like lay them on the ground, to me. Or I would, I mean, I guess, what? Or maybe they're the eggs of a bird that would nest really up high. Exactly. They didn't look like the type of eggs that you could just reach with your hand.

I think you would either find them on the ground or they'd be up on a cliff top. I think that that's a good way to say it. When you said what kind of bird lays eggs in a tree, I was confused. This is my mom. But I'm hearing your point now, and I hear it, and I think it's a good point. Thank you. I need to talk about this shot of Michael singing Happy Birthday because it is just wonderful. Michael has just made a spear, the teeniest, tiniest spear on the end of a very crooked

stick. Can you point out that he made a spear when he has an amazing knife, like you would think he would attach the knife to the end of the stick? With his duct tape, with his duct tape, he might have used all his duct tape to fashion his tent out of his pants. That's coming up, I guess. But yeah, there's this shot that pulls so far back. And what's amazing about it to me is, guys, Steve was really in the middle of nowhere

and our crew was far back as this shot reveals. Yeah. I thought it was a beautiful shot. I also love these moments when Michael remembers things like sprinkles, like Creed's birthday. You know, when he sings a song and he's like, Happy Birthday, buddy. These are those very sweet Michael moments. This shot also made me think about how Steve Carell wrote this episode. He wrote himself a very difficult shoot day out in the woods.

He did, where he gets tackled by Dwight. Oh my gosh. If I were writing an episode for myself, I would make it pajama day at the office, where we all wear our pajamas and there are no stunts. I would write a very different episode, so I applaud Steve for really going for it in the name of comedy. Back in the office, we have bitching in the break room. Oh, I love this.

Everyone is in the break room and they are complaining about Jim's new birthday ordinance. And it's just a gripe fest. Look what I wrote as part of the scene. I've never had a cake at work for my birthday. Wow. As everyone was griping about the cakes and the birthdays. Angela, this episode really triggered you. Really so.

Right about this time, Jim walks in and Creed delivers some major sass. Oh, Creed sass. Some real, real good passive aggressive sass from Creed. And right after some real serious Creed sass, Jim is going to have to deal with Toby. Oh, this is such a good scene. It's so good and you see in Jim's eyes, oh my God, Michael, I get it. Yeah. He has a talking head where he says, you know, Toby is sometimes a bit much.

Yeah. Well, listen, Toby's birthday is not right now and he's piling on Jim. He says, I'd really like to be included because when we did celebrate my birthday, it was in the parking lot at 4.58 p.m. And so Toby would now like to be included. Jenna, am I the Toby of this moment today? No, am I the Toby? Am I like, I know it's not my birthday, but I want to be included.

Am I the Toby? Well, you're not asking us to throw you a party on someone else's birthday. You're just saying, this year, don't skip my effin birthday just because it's in the summer. I think it's very different. Thank you. Jim agrees to just add Toby to the mix and Angela overhears this. She's so furious.

She's like, you can't go willy-nilly with all of this, Jim. You know, we already have several cakes and a pie and mushroom caps. And Toby's like, I'm allergic to mushrooms. Well, that's the last straw. Jim storms out of his office and he says, conference room. And Pam's like, five minutes. And he's like, yes, conference room, five minutes. And he's like, no.

I mean, no, we're going to deal with this right here. I have something to point out in this scene. It's a little background catch. Mm-hmm. Both Creed and Meredith have a free-sell game open on their computer. I have a little background catch in this scene as well at 17 minutes 36 seconds. I am leaning up against Michael's doorframe, standing next to Toby, and you can see the beginning of my baby belly.

Oh my gosh, are you serious? I am serious. And I rewatched this episode with my daughter, and I didn't say anything to her. And as she was watching it with me, we got to the scene and she said, mom, is this when you were pregnant with me? And I said, it was. Look, Jenna. Oh my gosh.

And you have your hands in front of your stomach to kind of try to hide it. But Angie, I thought I could kind of see it earlier in the episode when you have your first scene walking up to Jim's desk. Really? I tried to position you a little bit behind his computer screen, but maybe because I know I felt like I had a belly spot. Well this will be the beginning of the belly tracking because we had to get really creative over the next few weeks.

I'm ready to head back out to the forest, Angela. Okay. Because I have a lot to say about this scene where Michael finds some mushrooms growing under a tree and he starts to eat them and Dwight tackles him and forces them out of his mouth. Mm-hmm. It's pretty amazing. It's so great.

I had to know more about these mushrooms. What'd you find out? According to Dundrpedia, the species of mushroom that Michael was about to eat are called hypheloma fasciculare. I'm sure I got that wrong. I would never be able to say that. They are more commonly known as the clustered wood lover. Okay.

I deep dived on these mushrooms. I'm guessing they grow on wood. They do. It is a type of mushroom and they grow on rotten trees, stumps, or trunks. The taste is very bitter if you eat them raw, but they are not bitter if you cook them. They are poisonous either way, cooked or raw. Why would anyone cook them if they're poisonous? How do we even know what they taste like?

I'll tell you, because a common poisoning technique would be to cook these mushrooms with non-poisonous mushrooms and then feed them to your enemy, and it's sort of like an undetectable way to poison someone to death. So morbid. So clearly this has been done. Yeah. Did you see the movie Phantom Thread starring Daniel Day Lewis because this is a plot point in the movie?

No. And if you tell me to watch it, I'm going to watch the movie. It's the first 15 minutes of it. Well, you're going to miss the mushrooms because they happen later. Let me tell you. What? Here's what happens to you if you eat these mushrooms. Okay.

Diarrhea. Okay. Nausea. Mmm. Vomiting. Well. Convulsions. Oh.

Impaired vision. Hmm. Paralysis. Oh. And collapse. It can take up to five to 10 hours before you get symptoms. Now most of the time the symptoms will resolve themselves after a few days, but you get real sick, but they can cause death if you eat too many.

So guys, spoiler alert. Phantom Thread is an amazing movie. Everyone should watch it. I'm not going to watch it. As if anyone's ever going to take my movie recommendations again. I did watch this one all the way through twice. I loved it so much. Stop listening here for 10 seconds if you don't want me to spoil the movie for you,

but someone gets poisoned with mushrooms. Do they have a little towel by their coffee pot? No. But they have a wonderful English kitchen that looks like it's really fun to cook in. So there is some great shots of a great kitchen. I'll be sure and check out the shots of the kitchen. Oh my God. Oh, dear.

Let John Wick go, Angela, let it go. Maybe once you get your Carvel cake, you'll forgive me. Once I join everyone who's ever celebrated their birthday at work or school. Anyway, that is the download on the mushrooms. Well, you know the scene where Dwight tackles Michael to the ground? Yeah. There was much more of this in the deleted scenes. There's a great talking head where Michael's like, you know, when Dwight tackled me to

the ground and was fishing the mushrooms out of my mouth with his finger, he like says it. He's like, when Dwight had his finger in my mouth, he said, I laid back and I looked at the sky and the birds were chirping and there were clouds and it was so beautiful. And then I vomited because it was really gross. It's really funny that he had this sort of beautiful moment while Dwight was trying to fish the mushrooms out of his mouth. I have to ask, is that talking head?

Is he wearing his torn up clothes or is he wearing Dwight's sweatshirt? No, it would have been like a wrap up talking head about his day and he was in his office with the Battlestar Galactica sweatshirt. Well, I love this idea that his clothes are tattered. He's probably vomited on them and Dwight has to give him this rescue sweatshirt that was in his trunk. Well, Jenna, I want you to know at 18 minutes 31 seconds when Dwight and Michael come back and they walk in the party and Michael immediately starts hitting those high notes, right?

He doesn't miss a beat. The camera pans the conference room and Toby, Pam, Angela and Oscar are all standing together and they are smiling so big. And I thought, oh my God, Toby and Angela are happy to see Michael and Oscar. Yeah. I expect Pam to smile at him, you know, but the fact that Toby and Angela were relieved to see Michael. Well, they did not enjoy Jim being in charge.

No. We had a fan catch in this scene, Angela. Okay. From Andrea T. Who would like to know who made the peach cobbler for Creed? Because it's in a Pyrex dish. It's clearly homemade. Did Angela go home and make this cobbler because she is so dedicated to throwing the perfect birthday party?

So listen, I thought about this too. And I think Angela did. I think when Creed said to Jim, tell Angela it's for Creed, she'll know what to do. Angela went home and made his favorite peach cobbler pie. I'm impressed. Mm-hmm. Well, at 18 minutes 56 seconds, you guys, there is a great shot of the fudgy, the whale cake.

Oh, so there you go. That was there. Proof of fudgy. Proof of fudgy. And Jenna, as we're wrapping up this scene, Jim and Michael have this fantastic moment where Jim is like, I tried to do all of their parties on one day and Michael's like, oh, yeah, I did that. Yeah.

Rookie mistake. You'll figure it out. This scene is so beautiful. It's this glimpse into Michael where he's kind of talking to a peer, right? He's always managing us or always wanting to be in that position of status to us. But here he is talking manager on manager to Jim. It's amazing. It's so great.

And it's such a human moment. You know, Jim's like, I'm not going to be here in 10 years. And Michael's like, yeah, that's what I said. So as we close out this episode, Jenna, I thought we could hear just the final end of Jim and Michael's scene together. Sam, can you play that? Sure, glad you're back. You are relieved.

You have no idea. So what did I miss? Well, I tried to put all the birthdays together at once. Oh. Terrible idea. Yeah. Okay. I did that.

Rookie mistake. You did do it? Uh-huh. No. Just wait. 10 years. You'll figure it out. Well, I don't think I'll be here in 10 years.

That's what I said. That's what she said. That's what who said? I never know. Let's just say it. I say stuff like that, you know, to lighten the tension when things sort of get hard. That's what she said. Hey.

Nice. Really good. Bravo, my young ward. I have a question. Yeah. Is Michael finally eating what was in the bag? It sounds like he's eating nuts. Yeah.

I looked at it and it's like, I can't tell what they are, little pretzel bites. You know what they look like? If you get a Chex mix, there are these little stubby pretzel bite things. I don't know. Or they look like slivered almonds or pecans. It's such a mystery. But as I watched that lovely scene that I absolutely love, I was wondering, what is he eating?

I'd forgotten about it. I'll have to go back and look. Well, you guys, that was survivor man. I don't think I'd make it out in the woods. I do think I'd make it at party planning. I'd make sure everyone had their dang cake. Next week, we have the deposition that has some of my favorite scenes of all time. Brilliant.

Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for sending in your questions and your comments. We love it. We love you guys. Everyone send Angela a cake on her birthday. No, no, no. No, my gosh. All right.

Bye, guys. Bye. Thank you for listening to Office Ladies. Office Ladies is produced by Earwolf, Jenna Fisher, and Angela Kinsey. Our show is executive produced by Cody Fisher. Our producer is Cassie Jerkins. Our sound engineer is Sam Kiefer. And our associate producer is Ainsley Bubakow.

Our theme song is Rubber Tree by Creed Bratton. For ad-free versions of Office Ladies, go to StitcherPremium.com. For a free one-month trial of Stitcher Premium, use code OFFICE.