NBC is closing The Office.
The veteran comedy — and NBC’s highest-rated scripted series (gulp!) — will conclude after the upcoming ninth season.
Despite its status as the network’s top entertainment program, the show fell to an all-time ratings low last season following the exit of Steve Carell and general sense among fans that the comedy’s best days were behind it. Now original showrunner (seasons 1-5) Greg Daniels is retaking the creative reins for one last season.
“This year feels like the last chance to really go out together and make an artistic ending for the show that pays off a lot of the stuff that matters most to fans,” Daniels announced to reporters Tuesday. “This will be the last season of The Office. And we’re planning a very big exciting last season. We’re going to have a lot of faces coming back … There are a lot of things that I’ve personally been wanting to do since season two … All questions will be answered this year. We’re going to see who’s behind the documentary … Now that we know we have an end date we can blow things up and take some chances and it will be very freeing, creatively.”
The decision was partly driven by the sense that many of the actors would likely not be around for a tenth season (either due to commitments on other projects, like Mindy Kaling and Rainn Wilson, or due to the rising cost of the show’s key players, like John Krasinski and Jenna Fischer). “You have a choice — only tell the beginning of story and the middle, or allow a story to end,” Daniels said. “If we didn’t let it end this year, I don’t think we would have been able to tell the ending stories of so many characters… we couldn’t count on getting everybody back for season 10.”
That said, creatively rebooting the show was considered. “You could see a world where new people keep coming on the show,” Daniels said. “But I think [we want to] do justice to the existing characters in the most creative and explosive way and that means the show will be changed to such a degree that if anything was to continue it wouldn’t be the same show.”
The showrunner said to expect some “crazy Dwight” stories, a lot of drama in the Jim and Pam storyline, to see Roy’s wedding and David Wallace running Dunder Mifflin. But will the show’s former star, Carell, be back? “We would certainly wish for it,” Daniels said. “We’re not going to put so much pressure on Steve by writing something that would only work if he would return. He really loves how he was exited. He’s probably anxious about not messing up such a stylish exit. It’s a perfectly legitimate point. We’ll see.”
Here’s Daniels talking to EW.com about The Office a few days ago (and much more vaguely): READ FULL STORY »
