The Office: The Accountants
| The Office: The Accountants | |
|---|---|
 A website banner advertisement | |
| Genre |
Mockumentary Comedy |
| Written by |
Michael Schur Paul Lieberstein |
| Directed by | Randall Einhorn |
| Starring |
Brian Baumgartner Oscar Nunez Angela Kinsey |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 10 |
| Production | |
| Running time | 2–3 minutes |
| Production company(s) | NBC Studios |
| Release | |
| Original network | NBC.com |
| Original release | July 13 – September 7, 2006 |
| Chronology | |
| Followed by | Kevin's Loan (2008) |
| Related shows | The Office |
| External links | |
| Website | |
The Office: The Accountants is an American comedy web series, spin-off from the television show The Office.[1] The series depicts office accountants in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company trying to find $3,000 missing from the office budget. The webisodes generally became available as they were uploaded onto NBC's website for free streaming on Thursdays from July to September 2006, and were later included as a special feature in the second season's DVD releases.
The project was announced in March 2006. The series was shot over two days in Van Nuys, Los Angeles, and produced by the same crew with the same cast as the television series. The series won an Emmy Award in 2007.[2]
Production
Development
In March 2006, while the second season of The Office was airing, NBC announced that 10 webisodes were expected to be produced.
It took two days to film the series.[3]
Release
A new webisode would generally become available each Thursday on NBC's website. The webisodes were later released as special features on the DVD sets of The Office – Season Two in the second half of 2006.
In November 2007, the webisodes became a point of argument for the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, as none of the writers or actors featured in the webisodes received residuals for their work.[4] Greg Daniels and many of the cast members who double as writers posted a video to YouTube shortly after the strike began, particularly upset that they weren't compensated for The Accountants, which NBC considered promotional material despite the embedded commercials.[5]
Crew
The Accountants was produced by NBC. The Office director Randall Einhorn directed each webisode, with writing duties divided between producers, screenwriters and actors Michael Schur and Paul Lieberstein.[3]
Plot
Cast and characters
The Accountants retained many of the cast members from the television series. Brian Baumgartner plays Kevin Malone, who is based upon Keith Bishop. Oscar Nuñez acts as Oscar Martinez. Angela Kinsey portrays Angela Martin, the uptight Head of the Accounting Department, Office Safety Officer and Head of the Party Planning Committee.
Guest stars Melora Hardin, Phyllis Smith, Kate Flannery, Leslie David Baker, David Denman and Rainn Wilson reprise their roles of Jan Levinson, Phyllis Lapin, Meredith Palmer, Stanley Hudson, Roy Anderson and Dwight Schrute, respectively.
Webisodes
| No. | Title | Directed by | Written by | Original air date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | "The Books Don't Balance" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | July 13, 2006 |
| The accountants inform Jan that the books don't balance and $3000 is missing. The accountants decide to interrogate the other office employees, but Oscar is sure Michael took it. | ||||
| 2 | "Phyllis" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | July 13, 2006 |
| The accountants question Phyllis and she makes a confession that she borrowed $14 and forgot to report it. | ||||
| 3 | "Meredith" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | July 20, 2006 |
| Meredith is the next employee to be questioned. She claims that she wouldn't be at work if she did and wouldn't risk getting arrested because she has a son to take care of. She also indicates she has already lost custody of her other child, a daughter, so would not risk it. | ||||
| 4 | "Stanley" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | July 27, 2006 |
| The accountants talk to Stanley. Stanley thinks whoever did it is smart to steal that much. | ||||
| 5 | "Someone in the Warehouse" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | August 3, 2006 |
| Kevin thinks Angela has a crush on Roy, who ends up being questioned next, but he doesn't even know how to take $3000 out of petty cash. | ||||
| 6 | "The Memo" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | August 10, 2006 |
| Kevin types a memo for the thief to come forward. Kevin gets ticked off that Angela is bossing him around and makes a fake memo for himself. | ||||
| 7 | "Things Are Getting Tense" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | August 17, 2006 |
| With new developments, the accountants start turning on each other. | ||||
| 8 | "You're Mean" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | August 24, 2006 |
| The accountants wait for Michael to leave his office so that they can check to see if he stole the money, and Angela is mean to Kevin. | ||||
| 9 | "Michael's Office" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | August 31, 2006 |
| The accountants check Michael's office for evidence of the money. After finding nothing but inexpensive, useless novelty items, Oscar and Kevin unanimously decide Angela must talk to him. | ||||
| 10 | "The Best Day of My Life" | Randall Einhorn | Michael Schur & Paul Lieberstein | September 7, 2006 |
| Dwight confronts Angela about her decision to accuse Michael of taking the money. Kevin and Oscar discover that the missing funds are merely an accounting mistake made by Angela, upon which Kevin declares "this is the best day of my life." | ||||
Reception
The series won an Emmy Award in the "Outstanding Broadband Program – Comedy" category at the 34th Daytime Emmy Awards in 2007.[2] Tim Stack of Entertainment Weekly graded the series with an "A-" and wrote, "While we miss Jim and Pam (not to mention star Steve Carell), these shorts prove that spending time with their excessively awkward co-workers can be just as sweet."[6]
References
- ↑ "Webisodes: The Accountants". NBC.com. Retrieved 2008-08-25.
- 1 2 "34th Annual Creative Arts & Entertainment Emmy Awards". EmmyOnline. 2007-06-14. Retrieved 2008-04-22.
- 1 2 Zoromski, Brian (2006-07-12). "Exclusive Interview: The Office Webisode Writers". IGN. Retrieved 2008-04-22.
- ↑ "Greg Daniels: We've seen the future, and it is us". Variety. 2007-11-07. Retrieved 2008-08-23.
- ↑ Greg Daniels, Michael Schur, Mindy Kaling, B.J. Novak and Paul Lieberstein (6 November 2007). The Office is Closed (online video). YouTube. Event occurs at 00:36. Retrieved 2008-04-10.
- ↑ Stack, Tim (2006-08-18). "The Office: Webisodes (TV Review)". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2008-08-24.