Twenty-Five Years of The Office - The Sitcom That Changed Comedy Forever
(Prefer to listen than scroll, here is the audio version of the blog. Read by Jacquie Sarah, so expect warmth, humour, and maybe some mistakes.)
Happy 25th birthday to The Office. Well... sort of.
On 9 July 2001, a little comedy quietly arrived on BBC Two. It wasn't surrounded by hype. It didn't have a massive marketing campaign. It certainly wasn't billed as the next big thing.
In fact, hardly anybody watched it. Imagine that happening now. A programme that would go on to become one of the most influential comedies ever made, greeted largely with a shrug.
Thankfully, this was before algorithms decided what we should all like. Instead, people did something rather old-fashioned. They told other people.
The repeats began attracting more viewers than the original broadcasts. Word spread. "Have you seen this weird office programme?" became one of those conversations people had at work. Ironically.
The rest, as they say, is television history.
I've written before about how The Office almost never happened (see post: Nearly Not Funny: The Sitcoms That Were Rescued at the Last Minute.) Had Jon Plowman not returned to the BBC, there's every chance David Brent would have remained nothing more than an idea sitting on Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant's shelf.
Television was very nearly robbed of one of its greatest comedies.
And comedy would look very different today.
A dozen episodes. A lifetime of influence.
It's extraordinary when you think about it.
Twelve episodes.
Two Christmas specials.
That's it.
Some sitcoms produce hundreds of episodes and barely leave a ripple. The Office managed to change comedy forever in just fourteen outings.
It also launched an astonishing collection of careers.
Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant suddenly became two of Britain's most exciting comedy writers. Martin Freeman, Lucy Davis and Mackenzie Crook all found themselves propelled into the spotlight.
Not bad for a programme hardly anyone watched at first.
It looked like real life.
One of the reasons The Office felt so different was because it looked... ordinary.
There were no glamorous television offices.
No impossibly attractive cast.
No bright studio lighting.
No audience laughing to reassure you that something funny had just happened.
Instead, there were beige walls, photocopiers, lukewarm tea and people who genuinely looked like they worked in Slough.
That realism made everything funnier.
It also made everything more uncomfortable.
The birth of modern cringe comedy
People often credit The Office with creating cringe comedy.
That's probably unfair to the comedians and writers who came before it, but it certainly perfected it.
David Brent wasn't a villain.
He wasn't even particularly nasty.
He simply wanted everyone to think he was funny, clever, progressive, successful and everyone's best mate.
Unfortunately, he wasn't.
That's what made him such a remarkable comic creation.
The joke was never that Brent told funny jokes.
The joke was that he genuinely believed he had.
His desperate need to be liked made every awkward silence feel unbearable.
And hilarious.
Training
Every sitcom has that episode people point newcomers towards.
For The Office, it's probably "Training".
David Brent hijacks a professional training session because he simply cannot cope with someone else being the most interesting person in the room.
Everything about it is perfect.
The motivational speeches.
The guitar.
The endless attempts to win people over.
Every decision Brent makes somehow digs him into a deeper hole. He proves he will literally say anything to win the room.
If you've ever watched it through your fingers while simultaneously laughing your head off, you aren't alone.
David Brent became part of our language
Not many sitcom characters become cultural shorthand.
Basil Fawlty.
Hyacinth Bucket.
Alan Partridge.
David Brent belongs comfortably in that company.
We've all described somebody as "a bit David Brent."
Usually a manager.
Occasionally ourselves.
Because that's the uncomfortable truth.
Most of us have had moments where we've tried a little too hard to be funny, said the wrong thing or desperately wanted approval. Me, more than others.
Brent simply did it every day.
It changed what comedies could be
This is where I think The Office deserves even more credit.
It didn't simply become successful.
It changed what television believed a sitcom could look like.
Before The Office, sitcoms largely came with laugh tracks, obvious punchlines and broadly likeable characters.
After The Office, commissioners suddenly realised audiences were willing to embrace something quieter.
More awkward.
More realistic.
More emotionally honest.
Comedy didn't have to tell you when to laugh.
Sometimes it was enough simply to point a camera at painfully recognisable human behaviour.
You can still see its fingerprints everywhere
Its most obvious child is, of course, the American version of The Office.
Initially a fairly faithful remake before becoming one of the biggest sitcoms in television history.
Then came Parks and Recreation, Modern Family, Abbott Elementary and What We Do in the Shadows, all using the mockumentary format in different ways.
Back here in Britain, you can see its influence running through shows such as People Just Do Nothing and This Country, where ordinary people remain blissfully unaware of how ridiculous they appear.
Even sitcoms that abandoned the documentary style borrowed something more important.
The confidence to trust the audience.
Perhaps the most fascinating example comes from Rob Mac, creator of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. He has said that if he hadn't seen the British Office, he never would have conceived Sunny.
Not because it copied the format.
Because it proved television didn’t have to be set in bright studios and can look ordinary and still be funny.
That's quite a legacy.
Some things have aged...
Let's be honest.
Not everything in The Office would be written today.
Society changes.
Comedy changes.
That's inevitable.
But the reason it still works isn't because every joke survives untouched.
It's because the relationships do.
People still stay in jobs they don't enjoy.
People still fancy colleagues they can't quite tell.
Managers still think they're more inspirational than they are.
Office politics still exist.
The stationery cupboard probably still contains three broken hole punches.
The technology has changed.
Human nature really hasn't.
The heart of The Office...
There are lots of sitcoms that make you laugh. There are far fewer that make you care.
Brent gets all the headlines because he's the outrageous character, but Tim and Dawn are the emotional glue. Without them, The Office would just be two series of awkward meetings and inappropriate jokes.
One thing that struck me on my last rewatch is how understated the romance is.
There isn't a grand declaration.
There isn't a will-they-won't-they stretched out for eight seasons.
There isn't a love triangle every five minutes.
It's simply two people who make each other's working day a little bit better.
That's so recognisable because most office romances don't begin with fireworks. They begin with someone making the Monday morning meeting bearable.
And then there's what I think is one of the cleverest moments in sitcom history.
Tim takes off his microphone.
That tiny act says everything.
For two series we've been watching these people through the lens of a documentary crew. Every important moment has been captured for us.
But when Tim finally tells Dawn how he feels, we don't get to hear it.
Because that moment isn't for us. It's for them.
I genuinely think it's one of the most romantic scenes ever written for television. Stephen Merchant once said they wanted to avoid a Hollywood ending, and that's exactly what they did. The camera stays back, the crew respect the moment, and we're left to fill in the blanks ourselves. It's beautiful because it trusts the audience.
Martin Freeman deservedly gets praised, but Lucy Davis's performance is extraordinary. Dawn could easily have become "the girl Tim fancies". Instead she's funny, quietly frustrated, loyal to a fault, lacking confidence and completely believable. She isn't a sitcom fantasy. She's just... real.
When Dawn walks back into the office, she isn't rescuing a romance. She's rescuing her own future. Choosing Tim is simply the first decision she makes after deciding to stop settling. Tim didn't save Dawn. He simply spent two series (and the Christmas specials) reminding her she was worth saving herself.
That's why, twenty-five years later, people still root for them.
Everyone remembers David Brent. Everyone quotes Gareth. But when people talk about why they love The Office, sooner or later they end up talking about Tim and Dawn.
That's the difference between a clever comedy and a great one.
Thank you...
I'll admit something.
Ricky Gervais's current comedy isn't really for me anymore.
That's absolutely fine.
Comedians evolve.
Audiences evolve.
Tastes evolve.
But none of that changes what he and Stephen Merchant achieved together.
For fourteen episodes, they fundamentally changed the direction of television comedy.
Very few writers can honestly say that.
Twenty-five years later
It's quite fitting that a programme built around ordinary people has had such an extraordinary legacy.
Nobody involved could possibly have known that a mock documentary set in a paper company in Slough would influence sitcoms around the world.
Yet here we are.
Twenty-five years later, David Brent remains one of Britain's greatest comic characters.
Tim and Dawn are still one of the sitcom's loveliest romances.
I could finish by talking about its awards, influence, or legacy, but instead, I have only one question.
Will there ever be a boy born who can swim faster than a shark?
What are your favourite The Office moments? Let me know by clicking here.
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