Jenna And we got a lot of mail about it, Angela. We had a fan question from Saundra C in Georgia and many others who said, In this episode, we see a life size cutout of Chuck, played by Zachary Levi, displaying his love of the Pyramid phone. This is not addressed in the episode and is never explained. Was Zachary Levi in on this? Did he have to give permission? Well, first of all, just for anyone who doesn't know, Chuck was a very popular television show running during this time. It was created by Josh Schwartz.
Angela It was also on NBC.
Jenna It was. The plot was, Computer geek Chuck Bartowski opens an email that has been encoded subliminally with vital government secrets, triggering a massive download of critical information into his brain, prompting both the CIA and NSA to assign an agent to protect him so that no one can exploit this downloaded information in his brain.
Angela Yeah, like his old college roommate emailed it to him and somehow he got all this information in his brain.
Jenna Kind of a la The Matrix.
Angela Kind of.
Jenna Without the spigot thing, you know, without going without the poky thing that goes in the back of his- you have to plug in.
Angela Oh, yeah, yeah. Not plugged in. Yeah.
Jenna Right. To download it. This was a wireless download.
Angela Yeah.
Jenna Well, when this episode aired, the series finale of Chuck had just aired. It was a big event.
Angela The whole series?
Jenna The whole series had just ended.
Angela Oh.
Jenna But in order to get and use this cut out of Zachary Levi, Steve Burgess said we had to ask Warner Brothers because they own the character of Chuck. And they said yes, but we had to pay them in order to use their character. And then we contacted Zachary Levi to see if we could take some photos of him for our cut out, but he wasn't available. So Warner Brothers let us use like a publicity photo that they had for the TV show. And Warner Brothers said that their only stipulation was that we had to give them credit and we could not use Chuck in any derogatory way, which we did not.
Angela We did not. There was an extended scene when everyone is arriving for the day to come work in the new Sabre store.
Jenna Mm hmm.
Angela Each Dunder-Mifflin Sabre employee walks past the Chuck poster, and they all do, like, you know, the two fingers where you kiss the two fingers, and then you pat it on something.
Jenna Like a good luck thing?
Angela Yeah. They all go (KISS NOISE) and they, like, kind of pat his forehead. Everyone does it except Erin, who hugs him, and Stanley just walks by him indifferently.
Jenna Brent shared that Mindy was very fond of this cardboard cutout.
Angela She was. I remember it.
Jenna Yes. Because after the episode was over, do you remember she put it in her office?
Angela Yeah. In the corner.
Jenna Yes. And she would hang things on it, like she'd put her hat on it or a hoodie.
Angela Her coat. Yeah.
Jenna Yeah. So you could go in there and it would be sort of like a dress up cut out.
Angela Yeah. And if her door was open, if you were walking down the hallway, you always saw it. It's really funny.
Jenna Yes! And sometimes you'd forget and think a person was in there. Or that Zachary Levi was in there.
