Now that the cat is out of the bag regarding Jerome "The Bus" Bettis's guest appearance on "The Office," I thought I'd point you to this article on ESPN.com (scroll down below all that Kobe stuff) that takes a much more in-depth behind the scenes look at the cameo.

Most interesting to me is that the male half of the cast apparently play EA's Madden "every single break," and according to John K. they also "play for money."  The Steelers are Rainn's virtual team, hence the Bettis love.

Thanks to "Office Tally" for the heads up on this story.

In case you missed it, TV Guide has run a two part interview with John & Jenna about the new season.  The first part saw print last week before the premiere, and the second part came out yesterday. 

Some spoilers given below, from the article:

1. The reason Jim and Dwight terrorize each other is because deep down they are "good friends." (says John)
   
2. Pam will pretty much ignore Dwight and take on Angela as her nemesis-- in fact, Angela will get Pam kicked off the party planning committee.
3. Dwight's cousin Mose (of the beet farm) will be making an appearance early in season three and will be played by staff writer Mike Schur.
4. Both John and Jenna made movies over the Summer, and they will both be coming out in 2007.  John says he thinks Jenna's movie is "better" than his.  (Jenna was in Will Farrell's "Blades of Glory," and John was in "License to Wed" with Robin Williams)

 

Dang these late night talk shows... right after I post the first episode of TWSS and say "no guest appearances," The Tonight Show books Jenna Fischer.  And, as it so happens, I totally missed it. 

Hopefully a youtube search will prove fruitful.

On her blog, Jenna said she was very nervous, but thought it went well.  She also mentioned that B. J. Novak would also be on The Tonight Show sometime next week.

BREAKING NEWS!

Someone posted the the link to the video on Jenna's blog. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb2NkZPW0y0

It's about 8 minutes long, and JF is pretty interesting-- very manic, as well.  Good luck with that boat, Jenna!

Got stuck having to attend "open house" at my school last night from 6-9 pm, so I missed the show... thank the lord for the DVR.  Only got to watch it once so far, so just some basic impressions:

Very cool to see the gang out in the "real world."  I always find it interesting when the cast does this... makes the show seem bigger and broader in some respects.  Plus, we got to see the stylin' Dunder Mifflin polo shirt.

"Dwight got a hooker!" -- as hilarious as that was, I am a bit shocked that Ms. Martin would engage in such scandalous behavior.  Surely she knew Michael and Jim would be there...

Michael, Michael, Michael... like with the episode "The Client" last season, we start off with Michael looking like a total inept fool, and end with him brokering what seems to be a pretty large business deal.  I kept waiting for the rug to be pulled out from under him, but they let it ride.  Unfortunately, his "off da hook" party was a party of one... or TWO, when Jim showed up.  As sad as Michael might be, surely no salesman would pass up a chance for free booze during a convention? 

And Jim... why does he continue to be so darn NICE to Michael?  "You're a great boss"?  Ah well... that's just Fat Halpert for ya.  Leave it to Michael to then revive the "Jim and I are best friends" idea from "The Secret."

Toby's last name? FLENDERSON. 

And Pam... poor Pam.   Being single and now starting to date, she has become the object of attention for the office males, esp. Mr. Flenderson above.  Remember during "The Fire" when everyone admitted (including Oscar!) that they'd "hit that"?  I think things are going to get pretty awkward fairly soon.

I wasn't too impressed with the cold open-- it seemed a bit too forced.  Still, the rest of the episode was none too shabby.

Watch for the new episode of TWSS on Saturday!

So even though I am a huge fan of "The Office," I have never gotten involved in fan forums or anything of that nature... so I've only recently discovered that Jenna "Pam" Fischer has a rather active myspace page going on, where she posts both blog entries and pictures quite regularly. 

That's all fine and good, as it is, but what just blew me away is that on the bottom of her page, under "People I'd Like to Meet" she has a picture of JOE MATT!  Matt, the creator of the comic PEEPSHOW, was also one of my favorite creators from the 90's autobio boom, along with his fellow Canadians (Joe's actually an American, but he was living in Toronto) Seth and Chester Brown. 

Matt was always one of those guys who I felt just never lived up to his artistic potential... he rarely got a book out, and just never had the work ethic (if you believe his own stories) to buckle down and crank the stuff out... not like he made the serious cash on Peepshow or anything, but still... he's been missed.  Of of my friends told me that he's finally coming out with a new book in October, so that's something to look forward to.

Check out his stuff if you haven't done so already.

Episode # 1.0 is here, along with the season opener of THE OFFICE...Join Matt and Ian as they discuss the ins and outs of the Emmy award winning NBC sitcom...Music by The Fire Apes, courtesy of music.podshow.com... Contact us at TWSSpodcast@gmail.com, and drop by our blog page at thatswhatshesaid.libsyn.com...THANKS!

Holy S#!t.

So much to process here... in fact, I'm not sure what to think of this episode yet.  It is literally darker than the dark, dark space under Dwight's porch. 

Do you remember when you went off to college?  And then you came home that next summer and hooked up with all of your old high school  friends... but things just seemed OFF in some way?  That was my initial reaction to the show... holy cow, everything we knew, everything we THOUGHT we knew, it's all different now.  I mean, SHIT... Jim eating a tuna sandwich?  Has the WORLD GONE MAD?! Where will it all end?  Won't someone think of the children?

Seriously, though, it's really odd to see Jim alone in the Stamford office... Ed Helms as "Andy" definitely isn't a real fun guy-- he seems like the worst aspects of Dwight and Michael merged into a creepy package.  Word of warning-- don't put anything of Andy's in jell-o.  He's not down with it.

Like REALLY not down with it.

Moment of zen?  Meredith eating/licking the hand sanitizer.

Or was it Creed, saying a man "may have slipped in there"?

"We're all homos... HomoSAPIENS."

True dat, Michael. 


-Matt-

Another last minute TV show appearance for John K-- he's supposed to show up on Conan on Thursday, 9/21/06... so that makes it TWO hours of late night talk show's I'll have to set the old DVR for on this particular Thursday (Steve Carell is on Leno).

With his appearance on TODAY, doing a signing in the NBC store, then showing up for the Conan taping, looks like John's in for a busy day... and that doesn't even account for the actual show premiere. 

EDIT:

Man, even more add-ons... Rainn Wilson will be on the fledgling "The Megan Mullally Show" on Thursday.  Megan's show just launched on monday of this week, and so far people don't seem to be too impressed... yet maybe her interview with Rainn will be a bit more scintilating than Ellen's.  Wow... do I REALLY have to watch this now that I'm doing the podcast?? ;)

So Rainn Wilson was on the Ellen show yesterday, and I have to admit this is the first time I've ever watched her show... is this how it is all the time?  Yikes.  Definitely not what I'd call "polished."

Rainn was on stage for about 10 minutes, but during those 10 minutes I learned literally nothing about season 3 of THE OFFICE, and only 1 or 2 tidbits about the man himself.

First off, they played a brief scene from the new season between Dwight and Angela in the break room-- they weren't looking at each other (still in secrecy apparently), but Angela was yelling at Dwight for going away to a business conference... she didn't know why he was going anyway, since it was for managers.  Dwight ensures his "monkey" that he is an ARN (assistant regional manager) and therefore must attend.  Disappointed that they aren't spending enough time together, Angela retorts with a "don't 'monkey' me" before she leaves the room.

Trouble in paradise, I guess.  I suppose it's only natural... gas ain't free, after all.

Other than that, Rainn jokingly suggests that as an actor he creates characters through hairstyles (just like Brad Pitt), shows off a recent thrift store art find of two monkeys in wedding clothes holding asparagus (!), mentions that he and his wife went to Hawaii over the Summer, and that he (possibly) plays the bassoon.  That was about it.  I'll put one or two audio clips from the show in this week's TWSS episode.

Oops... missed this one: 

Before appearing at the NBC store at Rockefeller Center from 9-9:30am on Thursday, September 21st, John and Jenna will be doing the TODAY SHOW. 

First post here... still trying to iron everything out before the official launch of the first episode.  Stay tuned!