"If stuck in an elevator, he would probably start drinking his own urine"—Jenna Fischer shares wild Dwight Schrute casting notes on the Office Ladies

Jenna Fischer, the host of the Office Ladies podcast, shared the casting guidelines for Dwight Schrute from The Office from the showrunner's notes in the March 26 episode of the podcast.

Their guest of the day was Greg Daniels, who was also the developer and executive producer of the popular sitcom. In the episode, Fischer said that the show’s casting director, Allison Jones sent her the casting descriptions for the main cast, like Jim Halpert, Pam Beesly, Michael Scott, and Dwight Schrute.

While reading Schrute's notes from the director, Fischer stated:

"His unpleasant social habits and annoying personality suggest an unsocialized loner, a sort of Caliban or Gollum. If stuck in an elevator, he would probably start drinking his own urine after 10 minutes."

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The Office Ladies podcast talked about Dwight Schrute's casting directions

In the same March 26 episode of the Office Ladies podcast, while discussing Dwight Schrute’s casting directions from showrunner’s notes, Fischer read out:

“Dwight is the team leader and Michael Scott's sidekick. He really admires Michael Scott, although it is unclear if this is due to Scott's personality or Dwight's inclination to look up to whoever is above him in the hierarchy.”

She then added that Dwight was obsessed with survival, personal security tactics, and other fantasies like a nerd. Serving as a volunteer policeman on the weekends, he took any excuse to go on a power trip in the office.

Additionally, he reportedly had no idea how to behave with women. His "unpleasant" social habits and personality suggested an unsocialized loner. The notes further read that his lack of social skills always made him the punchline of the office jokes.

Fischer then continued:

“If Scott is redeemed by having the heart of a nine year old, then Dwight can perhaps be pitied for his interior teenage geek. We need someone who can be believable as a geek, someone who has no desire to be likable or please an audience except through total identification with his character.”

She finally concluded:

“Someone who can seem reasonable to himself while saying insane things, who understands the comedy of playing it straight. Late 20s to 30s.”

This was not the first episode that discussed Dwight Schrute and his fate on the show. The podcast episode came almost one and half years after the duo talked elaborately about Dwight’s character in episode 180 of the podcast, which was uploaded on October 4, 2023.

During the same, they talked about why Dwight Schrute was in The Office opening credits as manager, in spite of not being one. According to a Deadline article on October 9, Fischer said that she reached out to David Rogers, who oversaw the sitcom's last season.

Rogers said that there had been debate about including a shot of Dwight as manager at the conclusion of this title sequence. However, ultimately, the showmakers believed that the character's personal life had already overshadowed the question of who the manager was at that point. They then planned to utilize Pam and Jim's kissing as the last image in the main title for multiple episodes.

Additionally, Rogers also told her that they were also more concerned with summarizing Jim and Pam by the final episode. Hence, they actually did not have time to film a new manager title with Dwight.

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Meanwhile, Rainn Wilson, the actor who played Dwight Schrute has yet to respond to the comments.