Steve Carell will not appear in The Office spin-off series, but he did convince Domnhnall Gleeson to star in the Peacock show.
The two actors previously worked together in FX’s 2022 limited series The Patient, which earned Carell a Screen Actors Guild award nomination. Gleeson, meanwhile, was nominated at the Golden Globes and Critics’ Choice Awards.
“I know Domhnall Gleeson – who I did ‘The Patient’ with – is going to be one of the leads. I know that for sure,” Carell told Jimmy Fallon during a recent interview on The Tonight Show. “He’s an excellent actor. And he actually called me and asked, you know, ‘Should I do this? Is this something… Did you enjoy it?’ I said, ‘Of course.’”
Gleeson is leading the The Office spin-off alongside The White Lotus Season 2 star Sabrina Impacciatore. Production on the new series is expected to begin in July.
As previously reported, the show is not a reboot The Office, and will instead focus on a new set of characters in the same universe. Greg Daniels, who developed the American version of the series, is co-creating the new show with Michael Koman.
The official longline from Peacock states: “The documentary crew that immortalised Dunder Mifflin’s Scranton branch is in search of a new subject when they discover a dying historic Midwestern newspaper and the publisher trying to revive it with volunteer reporters.”
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Carell has previously confirmed that he will not be reprising the role of Michael Scott for the upcoming spin-off. In 2018, he told Collider that he would never be interested in bringing The Office back, and more recently told The Hollywood Reporter that he will not be making a cameo in the new series.
“I will be watching but I will not be showing up,” Carell said. “It’s just a new thing and there’s really no reason for my character to show up in something like that. But I’m excited about it, it sounds like a great concept. I love the idea — I guess it’s set in a failing newspaper company.”
It’s currently unclear if other actors from the American version of The Office will appear in the spin-off. John Krasinski, who played Jim Halpert on all nine seasons of the show, told People last month: “The truth is I’d do anything Greg Daniels asked me to do.”
When plans for The Office spin-off were first announced last year, they were met with a mixed response from fans.