Gene Stupnitsky (co-writer): There are lots of different versions of Michael Scott. Once Jim and Pam got to the condo, this entire episode was a killing field. They were usually scenes like a diversity-training seminar in the conference room. I called it a “killing field,” like it was just nonstop joke-joke-joke. Greg Daniels (executive producer/co-creator): I had an expression that I used in the writers room to describe a scene where the situation was charged, where several characters had different opinions and there was an excuse for them to all sit around and fire off great lines one at a time. And so the rhythms of this episode are slightly different. A line would happen and the audience, along with the people at the dinner, would just kind of sit there and let it hang. Lee Eisenberg (co-writer): An episode like this lives a lot in the awkward pauses. We’re such huge fans of the British Office and we wanted to write an episode more in that tone. How do you get a comedy writer to laugh? Show a guy pushing a woman down the stairs.” I’m paraphrasing, but there’s something to that. Gene Stupnitsky (co-writer): There’s a quote, “How do you make someone laugh? You show someone falling down. Jim has a talking head, and he’s like, “I’m starting to think there was no work thing.” There’s a little bit of a grudging respect to Michael.
Michael Scott is always the fool, but in this moment he outsmarts Jim and Pam because he so desperately wants to hang out with them. They’re all gonna have to stay late that night, so everyone has to cancel their plans. Lee Eisenberg (co-writer): We set it up so in the cold open Michael pretends there’s an emergency. Greg Daniels (executive producer/co-creator): In the very beginning, the episode was called “Virginia Woolf” in my notes, and the idea was to have Jim and Pam have this super-uncomfortable night seeing all the awkwardness of Michael and Jan’s relationship and watching it melt down in front of them, in a comedy version of the Albee play. We had set it up earlier, where Michael kept asking Jim and Pam for plans, and they kept having excuses. And just the world’s worst dinner party, the most awkward dinner party – with your boss. Gene Stupnitsky (co-writer): We kind of talked about “The Dinner Party” as Who’s Afraid of Jan Levinson-Gould? That was the inspiration for it. Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg joined the “Office” writing staff in Season Two, penning memorable episodes such as “The Secret” and “Women’s Appreciation.” To celebrate its 10th anniversary, we tracked much of the cast and crew for an oral history of the landmark episode.
It’s just a boiling-hot crucible of comedy.”
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It’s that pressure-cooker aspect that heightens everything, plus the decorum of the dinner party, the sort of need to rise to a different sort of social construct, as opposed to just being co-workers in an office space.
“It’s a tight, contained space where so many relationship issues are bubbling around between Jim and Pam, Andy and Angela, Michael and Jan. “The episode is a crucible for the various relationships on the show,” says Ed Helms, who played Andy Bernard.
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The result was a master class of dark comedy that few other shows would dare attempt, as well as 22 of the most brilliantly cringe-inducing minutes in TV history. The dinner party was Jan and Michael’s attempt to show off their happy home instead, they showed off how utterly dysfunctional their relationship was. Despite some huge differences with her new boyfriend – she was an accomplished, Type-A corporate executive, he an affable doofus – Jan moved from New York to Scranton and into Michael’s cheesy condo. The previous season had seen Jim and Pam finally get together after years of flirtation Michael had also found love – with Jan Levinson, his former boss. Taking the action away from the Dunder Mifflin office, “The Dinner Party” provides a rare glimpse into the home life of regional manager Michael Scott (Carell) as he hosts an impromptu get-together for three couples: salesman Jim Halpert and receptionist Pam Beesly, salesman Andy Bernard and accountant Angela Martin, and party-crasher Dwight Schrute and his former babysitter/current lover, Melvina.
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