What do Amy Adams, David Costabile, Chris Pine’s dad, and Christian Slater all have in common? Cameos on The Office, of course!
On the latest episode of Stitcher’s Office Ladies podcast, co-hosts Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey rewatched the Season 6 episode “Sabre,” which has quite the story behind it. Not only was “Sabre” directed by *the* John Krasinski, but it introduced several new characters, showed Sabre acquiring Dunder Mifflin, and featured a uniquely hilarious cameo by Slater.
For those who need a refresher, Slater appears in the episode as himself while starring in Saber’s introductory video, which Gabe (Zach Woods) plays for everyone in the conference room.
“So you’ve just been bought by Sabre. Probably got a lot of questions. Hi, I’m Christian Slater. What’s it like to work for Sabre? Let’s find out together. Working at Sabre means taking on the challenge of the road that rises to meet you. Sabre: Respecting the past, but opening the window to the future. Have you ever tasted a rainbow? At Sabre you will,” Slater says in the clip.
Now, if you’re wondering how the hell Christian Slater got cast on The Office, that’s understandable. Turns out fans have Krasinski to thank for the delightfully unhinged cameo.
Kinsey explained that she found an interview Slater had done with Entertainment Weekly in 2010 about his time on the show. Here’s what Slater had to say:
“John Krasinski directed the episode, and he and I sort of know each other from different types of events, and he’s a really nice dude. He called my agent and was wondering if I’d be available to do this fantastic PSA [on Sabre, the company that bought Dunder Mifflin], and somehow we worked it out with the schedule. It was kind of incredible.”
Krasinski then told Fischer and Kinsey that working with Slater in “Sabre” was a career highlight for him.
“One of the greatest memories for me in directing this episode was directing that industrial video for Sabre. I mean, just being on set with Christian Slater was a pretty big highlight of my career,” he said. “Not only was he one of my favorite actors growing up, but he was the nicest, nicest human being and was such a big fan of the show and you could tell. He actually just exuded this excitement to be on set, totally understood the joke and knew what he was doing, and it was just so much fun.”
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Line producer Randy Cordray also told Kinsey that Slater was “a dream to work with” and everyone on set loved him. “When [Slater] wrapped his work, [Randy] witnessed Christian giving up his seat in a courtesy shuttle van so that the entire hair and makeup team could travel together,” Kinsey explained.
Sadly, most of the cast, including Fischer and Kinsey, didn’t get to meet or work with Slater because his interior scenes were filmed at the Lakeview Corporate Center in Westlake Village, California, and the exterior scenes were shot at the Baxter building.
Kinsey also noted that Entertainment Weekly asked Slater if he ad-libbed anything during his scenes, to which he replied:
“The thumbs-up was a spontaneous moment. I just kind of thought, ‘What would be the cheesiest things to do?’ John wanted it to really look like Kathy Bates [who plays the new boss] paid for this actor to come in and directed him on what to do behind-the-scenes. So I just kept thinking ‘What would Kathy Bates tell me to do?'”
Be sure to check out the full podcast episode to hear more behind-the-scenes stories about filming the episode, “Sabre.”
You can stream episodes of The Office on Peacock and follow along with the podcast every week on Earwolf, Apple Podcasts, or Stitcher.
