"The Office" that You Wish You Worked In

The hit NBC series, The Office, is an Emmy Award and Peabody Award winning television series. The Office is based on the popular British television series of the same name. The show focuses on the lackluster daily life of employees working at Dunder Mifflin, a fictional paper supply, company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. The show honors the daily drudgery of office life with a superb ensemble cast in this weekly comedy. Although the show is both fictional and scripted, it takes the form of a documentary with the presence of the camera often acknowledged.

The Office was developed for American audiences by Greg Daniels, whose impressive writing credits include Saturday Night Live, King of the Hill, and The Simpsons. It is co-produced by Greg Daniels' Deedle-Dee Productions and Reveille Productions, in association with NBC Universal Television Studio. NBC commissioned the American version of The Office after the original British series won two Golden Globe awards. The American version is notably more fast-paced than the original British series. All of the characters were renamed for the American series.

Michael Scott, the pompous and deluded regional manager of Dunder Mifflin, is superbly played by Steve Carell. Carell received the 2006 Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Television Comedy for his portrayal of Michael Scott. Carell, along with co-writer Judd Apatow, also received a Writer's Guild of America nomination for Best Original Screenplay for the summer box-office hit "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" from Universal Pictures. Due to his insecurity, Michael Scott prides himself in being "a friend first and a boss second". Although Michael tries to be a friend to everyone in the office, his lack of self-awareness and unwittingly mean humor often create awkward situations which he is unable to extricate himself from. Michael is not intentionally hostile, just ignorant. Michael has been known to make sexist, ageist, and even racist comments around the office and is forced to backpedal, leading Michael to say the complete opposite of what he said previously in an effort to save face in front of the staff. On the contrary, Michael comes off as a sympathetic character due to his general lack of malice and genuine intent to make everyone around him happy (although he continually fails to do so).

Rainn Wilson plays Dwight K. Schrute, assistant to the regional manager. Wilson has been seen on the big screen in Ivan Reitman's comedy, "My Super Ex-Girlfriend," starring with Uma Thurman and Luke Wilson, in "Sahara" with Matthew McConaughey, Steve Zahn, and Penelope Cruz, "Baadasssss," Steven Soderbergh's "Full Frontal," Cameron Crowe's "Almost Famous," "American Sweethearts," "House of 1,000 Corpses" and "Galaxy Quest." Wilson expertly portrays Dwight Schrute, the eccentric paper salesman whose ego knows no bounds in The Office. It is a running joke on the show for Dwight to refer to himself as assistant regional manager only to have one of the other office employees correct him by saying "to the". Dwight is an excellent paper salesman, possessing the highest sales in the office. Dwight is extremely arrogant and craves authority over everyone else in the office. Dwight fancies himself as survivalist, based on his dog-eat-dog views on health care and his belief that a hero is "someone who kills people that wish him harm." Dwight's fashion sense exhibits his nerdiness in subtle ways. He wears a short-sleeved shirt to work regardless of the weather and he wears a Casio calculator watch. He also cuts his own hair ("Michael's Birthday" episode). Dwight keeps an extra pair of Birkenstock sandals in his car "for special occasions" ("E-mail Surveillance" episode). Dwight has a very rigid personality and belief system. Dwight firmly believes that "the only thing that separates humans from animals is rules". Dwight's rigid adherence to rules irritates others at times, such as his immediate need to noisily shred documents and credit cards. He is frequently the victim of practical jokes by coworkers Jim Halpert and Pam Beesly. As a result of this, Dwight and Jim have an ongoing feud that reaches a head in the "Conflict Resolution" episode, when Dwight threatens to quit unless Jim is transferred. Despite Dwight's rigid and arrogant personality, he does have a girlfriend. Dwight is in a secret relationship with Angel Martin, the cat-loving, religious conservative, judgmental, uptight head of the accounting department.

Five year veteran at Dunder Mifflin and office prankster, Jim Halpert, is played by actor John Krasinski. Krasinski was mostly an unknown actor before The Office. Among Krasinski's television credits are appearances in NBC's "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" and "Ed." The successful but unmotivated Jim spends much of his time conspiring with office receptionist Pam Beesly to engineer pranks on his annoying deskmate Dwight Schrute. Jim's pranks range from simple and harmless (e.g. encasing Dwight's stapler in Jell-O) to complicatedly orchestrated and mean (e.g. putting all of Dwight's personal items into the vending machine, forcing him to buy all of his stuff back). Jim's crush on the receptionist, Pam, is on-going office soap opera. Jim and Pam share a great bond, and it seems that Pam may like Jim romantically as much as he likes her, but she was engaged to warehouse worker, Roy Anderson, during seasons one and two preventing any love match to occur for the two. However, Pam, realizing that Roy is not "the one" for her calls off her wedding. By this time, Jim has already transferred to the Stamford Dunder Mifflin branch where he meets Karen Filippelli whom he begins dating. Eventually the Stamford branch merges with the Scranton branch and Jim settles back into his old desk at the Scranton office. His new girlfriend from the Stamford branch, Karen, joins him much to Pam's disappointment. Jim doesn't seem completely happy in his new relationship, but is afraid of being turned down again by Pam.

The sensitive, fun-loving receptionist, Pam Beesly, is played by actress Jenna Fischer. No stranger to television, Fischer includes among her credits guest starring roles on "Six Feet Under," "That '70s Show," "Cold Case," "Miss Match," "Strong Medicine," "What I Like About You," "Off Centre," "Undeclared" and "Spin City." As Pam, Fischer is the friendly but put-upon receptionist at the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin. Pam counts fellow Scrantonite, Jim Halpert, as her best friend and partner in prank crimes. The two relentlessly engage in pranks against Dwight Schrute. Once, Pam sent Dwight emails over the course of several months posing as a CIA operative claiming to be considering Dwight for employment at the agency. The episode ends with Dwight standing of the roof of the building waiting for the CIA to come and pick him up. At the beginning of the series, Pam was engaged to warehouse worker, Roy, whom she had been dating since high school. The two had been engaged for three years with no wedding date set until a liquored up Roy announced to the entire office that it was time to set a date while they were all on a Booze Cruise. Pam appears to be ecstatic by this news. Jim, who is very in love with Pam, is crushed by this news. Pam eventually realizes her feelings for Jim and calls off her wedding, but Jim has already transferred to another Dunder Mifflin office by then. Jim eventually returns to the Scranton branch after a merger. Pam is excited to see Jim back and asks him if he would like to get some coffee after work the day that he returns. He abruptly declines, which catches Pam off-guard. As the two are leaving work that day, Jim tells Pam that he has started seeing someone. Pam soon learns that Jim is dating another co-worker, Karen. It is obvious though that Jim still has strong feelings for Pam. Pam realizes that not being more brave and acting on her feelings might have costed her the love of her life. She makes a vow to be more brave which she proves during the Beach Day episode. Michael takes everyone to the beach and sets up different ridiculous challenges for everyone to complete so he can decide who should replace him because he is interviewing for a job at the corporate office. For one of the challenges, Michael tries to get the salesmen to walk on hot coals. Pam says that she would like to try it, but Michael claims that she can't because she is just a receptionist. Later on, while everyone else is sitting around the campfire Pam summons all of her courage and walks across the bed of hot coals. Feeling proud of herself and still having an adrenaline rush, Pam runs over to where the office gang is sitting and tells Jim (and everyone else) that she called off her wedding for him and she is sad that they aren't even friends anymore. Jim later tries to comfort Pam and they seem to have their friendship back. Jim's girlfriend, Karen, was present for Pam's outburst and was offended by what Pam said. Upon returning to work, the others begin to make fun of Pam's speech at the beach. Pam does regret her moment of bravery and continues to remain assertive. When Jim, Karen, and Michael all go to interview for the same job at corporate, Pam claims to be happy for Jim and Karen even saying that she too hopes to find a love like that someday. Pam's proclamation here doesn't seem to be true. She also states that she hopes that Karen gets the job, which is probably true. Karen would then be out of the Scranton office. Neither Karen, Jim nor Michael get the position they interviewed for. Jim returns to the office without Karen and asks Pam out to dinner. She accepts and he says, "It's a date." Season three ends with Pam and Jim finally having a date after all of the flirtation and frustration.

A fourth season of The Office has been ordered by NBC. Fans of the hit television showed are relieved that their favorite characters get a chance to come back for a full season in the fall of 2007. It has been reported that NBC ordered 24 episodes of the hit show including four one hour episodes. The Office is both a critical hit and a ratings hit. For those (few) that haven't seen The Office yet, there is time to catch up on the series before the fourth season kicks off in September. The rest of us will just have to impatiently wait for our favorite hit show to return. Until then, we will be watching Jim torture Dwight in the re-runs.