stars Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey have revealed the backstory behind the infamous cheese ball scene in The Office season 5, noting that the cheddary cold open was uncharacteristically slapdash compared to other tirelessly scripted intros. An American adaptation of the British series of the same name, The Office began airing on NBC in 2005 and ran for nine seasons. The comedy follows Michael Scott (Steve Carell), the well-meaning yet incompetent manager of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company, and his cadre of employees.
In The Office season 5, Michael quits Dunder Mifflin and starts the Michael Scott Paper Company, with Pam (Jenna Fischer) and Ryan (B.J. Novak) joining the new venture. Though the new business struggles at first, they eventually prove to be a legitimate competitor with Dunder Mifflin, snapping up the larger company’s core clients. By season’s end, the fledgling enterprise is reabsorbed back into Dunder Mifflin.
Perhaps the most memorable moment from the Michael Scott Paper Company’s short-lived run is when the three co-workers become skilled at throwing cheese balls into each other’s mouths. On Fischer and Kinsey's Office Ladies podcast, The Office writer Ryan Koh admits that the scene was born of sheer exhaustion in the writer's room. The cheese ball-throwing theatrics occur in the cold open for “Heavy Competition,” the 24th episode of Season 5. Says Koh, the writers were too burnt out to think of anything more involved. Thus, the cheese ball scene was born. Read Koh’s recollection below:
"At this point in the season, all the writers were really exhausted. In Season 5, as you recall, we did 28 episodes and they were shot in 10 consecutive weeks of production, then a break so Steve could do a movie, and then 18 straight weeks of production. Other shows I've been on, I've told them that there was a stretch of 18 straight weeks of production and they do not believe we did that."
"So anyway, we were all very spent and we were trying to come up with a new cold open, and it was either [writer] Aaron Shure or Paul [Lieberstein, writer/actor/co-showrunner]. They were both the guys that were really good at making something out of nothing. One of them said, 'I don't know. They're throwing cheeseballs at each other?' And everyone's like, 'Great. We don't have to write anything. That's awesome. OK, that's the cold open. Cheese balls. All right, next.'"
Though the cheese balls were a fortuitous cop-out for the mentally drained Office writers, Fischer assures fans that the feat was more laborious for the actors, who spent an entire afternoon filming the sequence. “I want everyone to know those are real cheese balls,” she adds. Still, fun was had by all: “We had the best time shooting this.” Fischer particularly remembers the epic conclusion, where the actors succeed in a three-way toss. "That was the hardest one. You know that reaction that you see at the end when we finally make it? That was real. I think you can see the look on my face.”
The cheese ball remembrance occurs on the 100th episode of Office Ladies, the Office podcast hosted by Fischer and Kinsey. The actors launched the podcast in 2019 and look back at every episode of the beloved comedy series, providing behind-the-scenes tidbits. They also provide tie-ins with contemporary pop culture, such as a recent episode where they compare Michael Scott and Ted Lasso. Fischer and Kinsey have also discussed other iconic cold opens in the show’s history. “Heavy Competition,” however, holds a special place in Fischer’s heart, with the actress calling the cheese ball sequence “without a doubt” one of her favorite scenes to shoot over the course of The Office.
Source: Office Ladies