TMC
03-25-2025, 02:46 PM
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-features/the-office-20th-anniversary-season-1-oral-history-1236170945/
Greg Daniels, Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein and Michael Schur recall the early days of NBC's beloved comedy.
By Rick Porter
March 24, 2025
On March 24, 2005, NBC aired the first episode of The Office, an American remake of the universally acclaimed, Golden Globe-winning BBC comedy of the same name. The premiere, a mockumentary that introduced the staff of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company’s branch in Scranton, Pennsylvania, pulled in a decent-sized audience that night. It drew 11.2 million viewers following an episode of The Apprentice — but even with that start, expectations for the show were not high.
NBC had produced a pilot for The Office, written by King of the Hill co-creator Greg Daniels, in early 2004, just after Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s BBC show won the Golden Globe for best comedy and Gervais took home the award for best actor in a comedy. The network ordered the show to series that spring but picked up only five more episodes. After premiering on a Thursday, the remaining episodes ran on Tuesday nights, where it struggled.
“We were [thinking] we did a great show, but the numbers were iffy,” Daniels tells The Hollywood Reporter. “I remember the upfronts for the following [season], just getting these minute-by-minute calls about we were probably not — wait, we might be [renewed]. We might be if we cut the budget and also give back every bonus and every profit that we could make out the show.”
NBC did renew The Office for a second season — and seven more after that. The show (and its British predecessor) became among the more influential series of the 21st century; think about how many mockumentary shows exist on TV now, and that almost none predate The Office. It was a bedrock of NBC’s sometimes shaky primetime schedule in the 2000s and early 2010s and helped make stars of several of its castmembers. Its writers have gone on to create and run a host of beloved, award-winning series.
To mark the 20th anniversary of the premiere, THR talked with some of the people who were there at the start — the writers of season one. Daniels served as showrunner for the first four seasons of The Office, and the writers room initially included Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein, B.J. Novak and Michael Schur.
Greg Daniels, Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein and Michael Schur recall the early days of NBC's beloved comedy.
By Rick Porter
March 24, 2025
On March 24, 2005, NBC aired the first episode of The Office, an American remake of the universally acclaimed, Golden Globe-winning BBC comedy of the same name. The premiere, a mockumentary that introduced the staff of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company’s branch in Scranton, Pennsylvania, pulled in a decent-sized audience that night. It drew 11.2 million viewers following an episode of The Apprentice — but even with that start, expectations for the show were not high.
NBC had produced a pilot for The Office, written by King of the Hill co-creator Greg Daniels, in early 2004, just after Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s BBC show won the Golden Globe for best comedy and Gervais took home the award for best actor in a comedy. The network ordered the show to series that spring but picked up only five more episodes. After premiering on a Thursday, the remaining episodes ran on Tuesday nights, where it struggled.
“We were [thinking] we did a great show, but the numbers were iffy,” Daniels tells The Hollywood Reporter. “I remember the upfronts for the following [season], just getting these minute-by-minute calls about we were probably not — wait, we might be [renewed]. We might be if we cut the budget and also give back every bonus and every profit that we could make out the show.”
NBC did renew The Office for a second season — and seven more after that. The show (and its British predecessor) became among the more influential series of the 21st century; think about how many mockumentary shows exist on TV now, and that almost none predate The Office. It was a bedrock of NBC’s sometimes shaky primetime schedule in the 2000s and early 2010s and helped make stars of several of its castmembers. Its writers have gone on to create and run a host of beloved, award-winning series.
To mark the 20th anniversary of the premiere, THR talked with some of the people who were there at the start — the writers of season one. Daniels served as showrunner for the first four seasons of The Office, and the writers room initially included Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein, B.J. Novak and Michael Schur.