Q&A with Michael Schur: Part 1
Thursday, February 26th, 2009 | 86 commentsTanster: Your schedule sounds absolutely brutal. I remember the day that we visited, Lee and Gene must have worked more than 12 hours that day. Is that a typical work day when you guys are in the thick of things?
Michael: Twelve hours is pretty standard during shooting. In the off-season, we generally work 10 to 6 or 7. The super-late nights end anywhere from 11:00 PM to 2 AM, but that’s pretty rare.
Tanster: How many of those first 10 episodes are you writing, and how are they going?
Michael: I am writing two, I guess you would say, but it’s going to air as one hour-long show (it will be two individual ones when they air in repeats). That’s part of this new challenge — the hour-longs should ideally be able to be broken up into two distinct parts, but still feel cohesive as one continuous hour. It’s like an obstacle course. That we perform on computers. And that burns zero calories.
Tanster: How many pages is a typical script?
Michael: Our half-hour scripts, when they’re in “shooting draft” form (meaning all the rewriting has been done and it’s ready to be shot, obviously) are usually 34-38 pages long. Figure a little over a minute a page, so we get editors’ assemblies that run about 40 minutes, which is why we have so many deleted scenes and extra stuff to put online and on the DVDs.
Greg’s theory about the show from day one was that we should write it, and shoot it, and edit it, like it’s actually a documentary — have a ton of material and then essentially do a kind of final re-write in the editing room.
A lot of the real work of the show is done by Dean Holland and Dave Rogers, our two editors, who sift through 40+ minutes of material and (with Greg and the writer’s help) cut it down to 21:09, which is our typical allotted time.
Tanster: 21:09. Wow. Precise down to the last second! And I bet y’all work hard at making sure every second is golden.
Michael: We try. One of the sad facts of network TV is that every year a few more seconds get robbed from the running time of shows, to make room for promos or extra ads. We often feel that the optimal running time for one of our episodes is about 24-25 minutes, but there’s just no way to leave them that long without supersizing or releasing longer cuts on iTunes or something. That’s where those producer’s cuts came from — the feeling that the best version of some of the episodes was around that length.
We’re trying to write shorter scripts this year, because it takes a crazy amount of time to shoot and edit that much material, and we want to shave some of that time off our week. When we were done shooting the finale last year, which was the first true hour-long we shot, the first cut that Dean and Dave put together was 73 minutes long, and it had to be I think 42:30 or something.
Tanster: Dean and Dave must dream about The Office in their sleep.
Michael: Dean is a well-adjusted and mature individual, so I think he is okay. Dave is a dangerous sociopath who refers to the actors as their character names and has a home-made action figure of his dog. I think he probably dreams about doing us great harm in some kind of “Saw III” kind of way.
Anyway, with the finale, we were half an hour too long, which was just crazy. It took Paul and me days and days just to get it into good enough shape to show Greg, and then it took him more days and more days to get it down to its final fighting weight. If we have to spend that much time on each of the first four hour-longs this year, we’ll just curl up into little balls in the parking lot and pray we get run over.
Tanster: Goodness — half an hour too long! I’m hoping most of the stuff you guys cut from “The Job” ended up on the DVD.
Michael: We put a lot of extra stuff on there. There was one Michael talking head that I particularly loved that we had to cut for time — it’s extremely funny and a great performance by Steve. You’ll know it when you see it — it includes another mention of Billy Joel.
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I hope Mike makes some more Mose cameos too. He’s hilarious. It’s too bad Dwight and Angela are broken up. That road trip idea Mike mentioned in part three sounded great.
Thanks for the OT Classic, tanster! That was almost as fun to read the second time as it was the first. :) I know Mike’s busy these days with Parks & Rec, but I hope he’s able to find time for another Mose cameo soon!
That Mose interview was really great. (Rolls eyes) I can’t wait til you interview the editors of the show. I’m sure that they’re very witty and good-looking. And very skilled at making home-made action figures of canines.
Sorry for my second post in this thread, but I’d just like to add my thoughts on Michael Schur’s comment that the time allocated to the show is likely going to shrink with each passing year. While I understand that ads pay the bills, surely there’s no need for 500 promos of “The Age of Love” during a half hour timeslot?
It’s not uncommon in the 80s for an hourlong drama to have close to 50 minutes that is dedicated to the show. Now, the average is closer to like 42 minutes, and some dramas on The CW even clock in at less than 40 minutes. This egregious decrease is exacerbated especially for half-hour comedies, where every minute given up for ads and promos takes away precious additional footage that could have been added in, as we “Office” fans know all too well.
I know there’s probably nothing that can reverse this trend. However, I think it would be great if “The Office” could put more of the extended cuts of episodes (e.g. the “Editors’ Assembly” or “Director’s Cut”) on iTunes, especially since, according to the interview, the extended cuts are already available before they are edited down for time.
This was really fabulous to get to read! It would have been better to be you!
Thanks for all the great inside information that you get us. :-)
Great interview. Thanks also for letting me know that Michael Schur plays Moes! I love that character.
Thanks so much for posting this. It’s wonderful to read interviews from people we don’t get to hear from all that much. Great interview!
This was so fun to read–thanks! What a great interview. I love Michael Schur’s writing and he seems like such a great guy. He is hilarious! Can’t wait to read part 2 of the behind the scenes look at putting the show together. Whew–what a huge amount of painstaking work and effort it takes to make an episode! No wonder this show is so consistently awesome.
What a great interview. Michael Shur sounds like an awesome guy, and you asked some really great questions. It’s always so interesting to find out about all the behind the scenes stuff that is so important. I can’t wait to read the next part!
Thanks, tanster! As an inspiring writer myself, I always am anxious to read these interviews. And you did a great job with the questions!
Michael Schur will one day be in charge of his own show, much like Daniels is in charge of The Office. Odds are high it will be absolutely fantastic.
Fantastic interview! I love getting behind-the-scenes information for the show. :)
Michael Schur might just be my favorite writer on the show. He wrote nearly all my favorite episodes for Season 3. :D
What a fun and interesting interview! I love to hear about the writers and the various shenanigans that go on around “The Office”. Can’t wait for part 2!
I would cut off my left arm to edit/write/get coffee for anyone involved with that show. Hell, I would cut off both arms. Though that would make getting coffee kind of hard, I think I could manage.
Anyways, great, fantastic, wonderful interview. It amazes me the amount of work and talent behind “The Office.” So great hearing about it. Thanks tanster and Michael Schur!
You so lucky Tanster! You really do run the best site in the whole world!! Yay to hour long episodes!
Mike was a writing machine during season 3. This is really amazing Tanster, thank you so much!
Awesome interview.
amazing interview, tanster!! it is so interesting how the show comes together…kudos to all those writers, editors, etc. behind the scenes!
Great interview! So awesome to see the uncut, non-Us Weekly take on things. Schur is probably my favorite writer, and that’s saying something on this show. Can’t wait to read the rest!
There’s a part two? You’ve got to be kidding. That was already too amazing. Thanks a million, tanster!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!