Dunder-Mifflin is one of the most famous fake business brands in entertainment, but it won’t be the setting of Greg Daniels’ upcoming The Office spinoff, which was recently confirmed to be on the way for fans with Peacock subscriptions. Now that the news has been fully cemented, the O.G. UK series’ co-creator Stephen Merchant has shared his thoughts about the expanding fictional universe, and offered up a jokey suggestion that I hope gets ignored at all costs. (Sorry, Stephen.)
Merchant, who is set to return to the role of Gregory Dillard in Season 3 of Prime Video’s The Outlaws, spoke with Deadline at the BAFTA TV Awards and offered his preliminary opinion about Daniels’ bringing a new approach to this beloved comedy universe. But I think we can all agree his Zoom-related idea shouldn’t be given any real consideration, at least when it comes to the project’s overarching aesthetic. In Merchant’s words:
I like the idea … that it’s within the universe of The Office, but not necessarily in the same office. I just hope they represent what office life must be like now. I guess the whole show will just be on Zoom and people only come in like twice a week.
While I can pretty easily get behind just about any kind of project’s formatting — regardless of visuals, language barriers, musical choices, questionable characters, etc. — there’s something entirely unpleasing about shows that hinge on webcams being used as the windows into the main characters’ lives. It’s not the absolute worst, and has been utilized quite properly by certain projects in the past two decades, but I don’t think I could make it through an entire TV season of workplace comedy taking that approach. (Lisa Kudrow’s Web Therapy is something of an exception, since that show is based around the visual concept.)
I’m definitely behind the idea of the new Office spinoff reflecting the most up-to-date take on workplace life, assuming there is in fact a central brick-and-mortar workplace to attend, which is pretty much a necessity in the world of print newspapers. So if Greg Daniels wanted to take Stephen Merchant’s Zoom-y suggestion with just one employee working from home, that could be interesting, but that’s about it.
For what it’s worth, Daniels’ presumably won’t be seeking out any advice from either Stephen Merchant or Ricky Gervais for the new project. The Ladies Man vet clarified that his involvement in the streaming spinoff is pretty much limited to being labled an “executive producer.” As he put it:
They just make us sign bits of paperwork to say they can do it and I’m looking forward to it.
He didn’t seem to be fully cognizant about all of the details about the spinoff, which speaks to the idea that Daniels and co-developer Michael Koman (of Nathan for You fame) will keep to themselves when building out this small-town universe. Here’s hoping they at least bring Merchant in for a guest-starring role; while he didn’t appear in the U.S. version of The Office alongside Michael Scott, he did cameo in The Good Place, which was created by former Office writer/producer Michael Schur, so the connections are all seemingly in place.
Peacock’s series order confirmed that the new spinoff will star Domhnall Gleeson and Sabrina Impacciatore, and will take place within a fledgling local newspaper in the Midwest, with the documentary crew following the publisher’s plans to bring the publication back up to snuff via a staff of volunteering reporters. So it’s still a paper company, just not the same kind of paper.
When asked if Greg Daniels’ idea to shake up the setting for the U.S. series could spark inspiration to craft a similar spinoff for the U.K. comedy that introduced David Brent to the world, Stephen Merchant didn’t toss the idea out straightaway. Saying “Maybe,” the writer said he wants to see how well Gleeson’s spinoff does before deciding whether that’s a creative well worth returning to. (Hopefully without any Zoom calls in the mix.)
While waiting for the new project to show up on Peacock, presumably after the 2024 TV season is over, fans can find former live-action co-stars John Krasinski and Steve Carell reuniting for IF, Paramount Pictures’ new animated comedy that also co-stars Ryan Reynolds and Emily Blunt.