Greg Daniels Better Not Book Too Many Hot Actors for the New ‘Office’ Show

The Office (U.S.) was never supposed to be a show about people in the movie star class of attractiveness — John Krasinski got those abs after the finale.

Sitcom savant Greg Daniels and TV comedy veteran Michael Koman just locked in the first two cast members for their potential new series set in the universe of The Office (U.S.), with Star Wars star Domhnall Gleeson and Sabrina Impacciatore of White Lotus fame officially onboard for the project. Daniels began development on the possible sequel/spin-off series for one of his many smash hit TV comedies back in January, and, with the addition of two very in-vogue actors, his and Koman’s co-production certainly seems to be trending toward actualization, although Daniels, Koman and The Office studio Universal Television remain cagey on any specific details regarding the potential show.

The prospective new series would follow the mockumentary format of its predecessor while exploring subjects other than the day-to-day dealings of a regional paper supply company in Middle America. With the addition of two striking, stylish prospective leads to the project, we must wonder whether the new series will abandon their commitment to making average, ordinary people the stars of the show — or if Daniels has just spent so much time around the A-list that he thinks it’s normal for guys to look like this:

Now, obviously, the main Office cast wasn’t without its share of conventionally attractive comic actors; hell, even the characters who were explicitly written to be unsightly sure cleaned up nice for red carpets. Critically, however, the vast majority of characters on the show looked — and I write this with love and admiration — like average, ordinary people whom the denizens of Scranton, Pennsylvania could feasibly see hosting a sad, in-office awards show at a Chili’s on a Tuesday night. Famously, when Rainn Wilson auditioned for the role of Dwight Schrute, he specifically asked for his stylist to give him the most un-stylish haircut imaginable to make him appear to be a humble beet farmer with an additional fondness for bears and Battlestar Galactica. 

The commonplace aesthetic of The Office is essential to what makes the world of Dunder Mifflin so believable and so inviting. And, when a movie star-level beauty appeared in the show, all the ordinary people on the show reacted to Amy Adams selling handbags in the conference room the way you’d reasonably expect normal people to react to an unexpected hot person in their midst — they (i.e. Michael Scott) talked about it constantly. A show that creates comedy out of the mundane can’t have too many distractingly well-groomed characters, or else the audience will miss those brilliantly understated jokes while they gawk at their screens like Michael peeking at Ryan through the blinds.

So, as the cast list for this potential new Office show continues to grow, Office fans should pray not just for another Krasinski-type A-lister who pulls off that delicate balance between being hot and funny, but for the addition of normal-looking character actors who can be our new Creeds, Kevins and Stanleys. After all, we know that Stanleys don’t grow on trees.