‘Office Ladies’ Podcast Reveals the Names of Michael Scott’s Children From Unfilmed Scene in ‘The Office’ Series Finale
On their podcast episode breaking down the series finale of “The Office,” the “Office Ladies” — Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey — performed their rewatch ritual for listeners one last time, going minute by minute to describe everything that brought the Emmy-winning NBC comedy to its conclusion after nine seasons on May 16, 2013. In the episode, posted on Oct. 30, titled “Finale, Part 2,” Kinsey and Fischer spilled a tonnage of behind the scenes details about how the finale came together, including how showrunner Greg Daniels had kept Steve Carell’s return as Michael Scott a secret from NBC executives until the day before the episode aired, so they couldn’t spoil the surprise by promoting his appearance.
In Carell’s farewell episode, “Goodbye, Michael,” which aired toward the end of Season 7, Michael moved to Colorado to begin a new life with Holly (Amy Ryan), the love of his life, and to start the family he’d always wanted. Michael’s return to Scranton in the series finale in Season 9 — for the occasion of the wedding of Dwight (Rainn Wilson) and Angela (Kinsey) — meant that “The Office” writers had to come up with some ideas about what Michael had been up to since he’d left Dunder Mifflin. In the finale, Michael’s visit is a surprise to everyone, having been arranged by Jim (John Krasinski) to make Dwight happy on his wedding day. When Michael arrives at Schrute Farm — with one final “That’s what she said,” after Dwight says, “Michael, I can’t believe you came” — Jim cedes his position of being Dwight’s “bestisch mensch” to Michael. (“Best prank ever,” Jim says to the camera.) Later, at the wedding, we see Michael and Pam (Fischer) laughing as they look at his phone together. As they continue to look through Michael’s phone, Pam says in voiceover: “Michael has so many pictures of his kids, he had to get two phones with two numbers — and he pays two bills. He’s just so happy to have a family plan.”
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As they discussed that scene, the “Office Ladies” revealed a detail that didn’t end up making it on screen: the names of Michael and Holly’s children. The news would have been delivered by Holly during a prototypical “Office” talking head — but Ryan’s schedule had precluded her from appearing in the finale. Her interview for the documentary had even been scripted, as Holly held her and Michael’s two children: “Irish twins,” Fischer said. Fischer characterized the number of questions they’d gotten about Michael’s return as a “fanmail flurry,” which is an “Office Ladies” term of art — and a listener from Toronto asked whether Michael had gotten “his third vasectomy reversed?” It seems he had.
Another listener asked whether there was any evidence of the kids’ names, which is when Fischer read Ryan’s lines, which were never filmed. “Life is good,” Holly would have said. “We have two sons: Chebonshur and Lowshebin. Michael named them. He said it was based on the feeling he had when he first saw them.” (Fischer spelled the names to Kinsey; to listen to their pronounciations, here’s a link to the podcast.)
Holly’s talking head would have been during the wedding as Michael and Dwight danced in the background to Bruce Springteen’s “Rosalita.” (Another salient detail: Springsteen, they said, had personally approved the use of the song, and it cost the production $100,000.)
And now their rewatch has ended — with this episode of “Office Ladies,” Fischer and Kinsey have concluded their recaps of the series, having chronicled 201 episodes of “The Office.” But as Variety reported earlier this month, “Office Ladies” is entering a new era. Having made a new deal over the summer with Audacy, “Office Ladies” will now drop twice a week. “Office Ladies 6.0,″ the duo’s typical Wednesday show, will continue their deep dives into “The Office,” with in-depth character studies, recaps of the webisodes and interviews with key figures from the show — casting director Allison Jones will be their first guest. On Mondays, “Office Ladies” will be dropping encore editions of the rewatch from the beginning, along with new material.
The episodes will also continue chronicling the best friendship of Fischer and Kinsey. On Oct. 8, Fischer revealed on Instagram that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer late last year — she is now cancer free — and had worked through her treatments, with Kinsey’s loving support.
Fischer and Kinsey concluded the episode for “Finale, Part 2” with guest Creed Bratton joining them in their studio in Hollywood. He says that before Daniels wrote the finale, the showrunner met with him to ask him how he wanted his character — named Creed Bratton — to leave the show. Bratton said he told Daniels about a song he’d written in 1970 called “All the Faces,” and that he thought it could make a nice send off for the characters of “The Office.” He didn’t hear anything more about it, Bratton said, until showing up on the NBC lot for the final table read, when Daniels had written the song into the finale, playing as the episode comes to a close. And so in the “Office Ladies” studio, Bratton sang his song “All the Faces,” saying to Fischer and Kinsey after he finished, “I love you, girls.”
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