Jenna Well, he also wanted to make sure that we had an episode that featured that classic Jim Dwight dynamic. That is what inspired this episode. You know, Jim's been gone. We haven't had this playful Jim Dwight business. 

Angela Yeah. 

Jenna And so that is what inspired this episode. 

Angela Well, I love Dwight and Jim, you know, So it made me very happy to see them and their shenanigans again. 

Jenna Well, Warren and Halstead said they also just loved having plotlines in general with Rainn and John together, similar to their script After Hours with the bedbugs. Warren said that he and Halstead would often approach Jim/ Dwight scenes as if they were a buddy cop movie where both cops want the same goal but their methods to achieving that goal are always fraught with squabbling and misunderstandings, but in the end, they have a bit of a friendship. And I thought that was just such a fun way to explain Jim and Dwight, especially in this episode. 

Jenna Dwight's going to leave the conference room, and he's going to have a nice moment with Jim. He's going to realize Jim really was being his friend. It's a really sweet kind of moment in the hallway. He offers Jim his hand to help him up off the ground. Jim hasn't moved. He's very tired. 

Angela I saw a few people write in and say they wondered if this was a turning point for Jim and Dwight. 

Jenna Yeah, that's true. There were people who remembered what Greg Daniels said about how Jim and Dwight were never to become friends, but they thought there have been a couple of nods in the last few episodes, them having their desserts in Florida and then this moment in Florida. Yeah, don't worry, they'll fight again. 

Angela I thought it was so funny when he started doing his little foot back and forth motion on the carpet. Jim was like, I know what you're doing. It doesn't work. This is when they reminded me of two brothers that just know each other so well. 

Jenna Oh, yeah, That's such a good observation. So we got a lot of fan mail about this fight. People wanted to know if they were just playing around or if it was choreographed. And I reached out to Steve Burgess, and, you know, he reminded me that this was actually the action here was meticulously scripted and that it was all worked out with our stunt coordinator, Bret Jones. It was all choreographed. He said for some of the close up shots, we had fall pads on the ground and then they would pull them out for the wider shots. But they did such a great job of making it look like it was just happening in the moment. 

Angela Robert Padnick said this moment between Jim and Dwight was one of the highlights for him of the episode. 

Jenna Well, I went to the script and I pulled out all of the stage directions that Robert wrote and they really executed them perfectly. 

Angela We should read them because they're so detailed. 

Jenna I know. Okay, so here are all of the scripted actions. It starts with this. Jim has dragged Dwight away from the conference room into another room. Dwight clings to the wall as Jim pulls on him. Jim puts his hand over Dwight's mouth to stop him from yelling. After a moment, he pulls away. Dwight starts kicking at Jim's crotch. Jim tugs on him harder. Now, I don't remember that part. Hmm. Now we get to the part where he's supposed to act like a bull, and it says, Still doubled over, Dwight charges Jim like a bull. Dwight starts scuffing his foot on the floor. Then he starts running in place. Dwight charges at Jim then veers at the last second. He tries to run up the wall and over Jim but crashes to the ground. 

Angela It continues, guys. You think you're done there? No. It says Dwight and Jim, both tired, continue to tussle. Dwight is arduously dragging Jim. He stops, exhausted. Then it says Dwight pokes a finger into Jim's kidney. 

Jenna I don't remember that. 

Angela I'm trying to think if that happened. 

Jenna Maybe it did, though. And we cut down. Maybe this was a bigger fight for them. 

Angela It says that Dwight lifts Jim up, but can only get him a few inches off the ground. 

Jenna I liked that detail. That was funny. 

Angela He slams him down. By the way, I loved it when Jim grabbed the plant. That's not in the direction, but it cracks me up. 

Jenna Yeah. Basically, it ends with them both on the ground and Dwight rolling over and getting up with a groan, it says. 

Angela Jim stays on the ground. He's done. He tried. 

Jenna Now that is trying! 

Angela Okay, Pam. Okay. 

Jenna I just want to say. Now, you can say you've tried. 

Jenna  So it was scripted that Dwight is supposed to take off his glasses in that one moment and get really face to face with Jim. And it was also scripted that he hold Jim's face in his hands. But Brent said that Rainn seemed determined to make John Krasinski laugh while they were shooting this scene, and he said he did it by like caressing John's face in different takes. And Brent said, In my experience, almost every time one actor has to touch another actor's face, like in a tense scene, they almost always burst out laughing. He said he's surprised they got even one usable take when they were shooting the scene. 

Angela  I would even say that if you put these two guys in close proximity. 

Jenna Yes. 

Angela Like just standing that close to one another, being ridiculous, like they're going to start laughing.

Angela   Jim wants Dwight to work in the phrase "shagadelic, baby" into conversation with Jo and do jazz hands any time Jim coughs. But there was more. 

Jenna There were more demands that we didn't see? 

Angela Yes. That we filmed because they were in the shooting draft.

Angela Jim is now going to give Dwight a little Valentine, you know, like those ones that you buy for your kids, and they're perforated and they're little squares, and sometimes they come with candy? I guess Jim's handing those out because he's a little tipsy. But in deleted scenes, there was a bigger moment here. Jim goes on to give Dwight a compliment, and we find out what Dwight finds funny. 

Jenna Oh? 

Angela Here it is. 

Jim  You know, Dwight, I don't tell you this enough, but I think you're really funny. 

Dwight Thank you? 

Jim Welcome. 

Dwight (TALKING HEAD) I'm not known for my sense of humor. That would appall me. But I have one. I find inversions of fortune funny, upside down houses, how a man spends his hard earned money on art, how a map distorts the size- tickling always makes me laugh. 

Jenna Tickling. 

Angela Tickling. I like that he would be appalled if he was known as funny. 

They're going to go on to have what I'm calling, I don't know, a handshake fight? Yes. Where they won't let go of each other's hand, which I think Jim also instigated. -Angela & Jenna

Angela  Yeah, but of course, this is going to give Jim an idea. He's going to go outside and form a snowball, which really just looked like packed ice. That looked like a pretty hard snowball. He's going to go in. And then, Jenna, I remember this so clearly. I don't think John meant to hit Rainn square in the mouth, but that's where he hit him. Hard. And you see everyone's reaction, and we're all like, Oh, dang! If you go to 5 minutes, 49 seconds, you can see that Rainn's nose and lip chin area are still red from the impact.

Jenna  I think we only did one take of the impact, if I remember correctly, because it hit him, like you said, square in the face. And Rainn didn't break.

Angela Nope.

Jenna  He was also directing this episode, so he probably knew, I need to hold it together. Yeah, I remember that too.

Angela Phyllis's reaction is just so honest. She's like, Ohh.

Jenna We had a fan question from Hannah L in California who said, It looks like Pam disagreed with Jim throwing the snowball at Dwight's face. Jenna, was this an acting choice or direction from the script? Well, Hannah, thank you for asking. I made a choice here.

Angela  Oh, Hannah, she's so delighted. I wish you could see her face right now.

Jenna  She picked up on something here. It was not a scripted reaction. I decided that Pam has planned this amazing party. We have established that there is no drama. And I didn't feel like Pam was pleased with this move by Jim.

Angela  It's so awkward. 

Jenna  Well, it gets more awkward because of all the things that Dwight makes Jim do in order for him to stay. 

Angela  Ugh. 

Jenna Dwight makes Jim feed him a piece of pizza. 

Angela  Crust first. 

In the shooting draft says Jim has taken Dwight's megadesk configuration and rearranged it. Three desks stacked on top of each other. Each desk still has all its equipment, computer, phone, etc. There is a step ladder set up as a chair. And Jim is standing on the step ladder working at the top level desk when Dwight enters. Dwight says, What the hell is this? Where's Megadesk? Jim says, Gone. Replaced by something better. Tower desk.  Ooh. Tower desk. Then Dwight has this talking head where he's like, well, now I want a tower desk. I'm going to make one at home. Four levels. I have a silo. I can have five levels. Wow. So that was the alternate. But instead, we ended up with quad desk and a teeny tiny little desk underneath them all for Dwight. -Angela & Jenna 

They had some improv around what's written. -Angela

So our production designer, Michael Gallenberg, and his construction team rented a matching utility pole. You can do that, I guess. Where is that? I mean, seriously, how do they know these things? This is the crazy part of Hollywood magic. Oh, you know what I'm going to do today? I'm going to rent a fakey telephone pole. That's huge! Huge. Well, they put it up in our parking lot between the two soundstages and they put like a green padded platform around it. In case you fell? Yep. And they put up a big green screen behind the whole thing. And then they brought Rainn out along with like a stunt coordinator and a safety officer, and they had Rainn climb up. It was only a few feet that he had to climb. And then in post-production, they had their visual effects team digitally add Rainn to the real pole over Jim's shoulder. They superimposed like, one pole onto the other. Yes, yes. Got it. Even though Rainn was really only a little bit off the ground, they could, like, hike it up so it looked like he was like halfway up the pole. Yeah, that's movie magic, folks. That is some good movie magic.  

-Angela & Jenna