MICHAEL SCOTT (THE OFFICE)

'Michael Gary Scott' (born March 15, 1964) is a fictional character on NBC's ''The Office'' portrayed by Steve Carell, and based on David Brent from the original British version of ''The Office''.
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Contents

Overview

Biography

Education

Work demeanor and management style

Romantic and Personal Life

Family and childhood

Characters of Michael Scott

Comparison with David Brent

Behind the scenes

References

External links

Overview

As regionale manager of the Scranton branch of the fictional paper distribution company Dunder-Mifflin, Michael thinks of himself as a combination of office comedian and business sage.^[1] His attempts at humor reflect his desperate wish to be liked, but they prove unfunny at best and are often inappropriate or even offensive. As he is socially inept, crude, tactless, and insensitive, his personality can be further described as gauche. Much of the humor of his character derives from his lack of self-awareness, which is highlighted by the awkward situations he creates for himself and his pathetic inability to extricate himself from them. Although he misinterprets the context of nearly every situation and can be unwittingly mean, Michael is quite lonely. Ironically, his incompetence in social interactions at the office contrasts sharply with his virtuoso talent as a salesman.

Biography

Michael insists everyone in the office think of him as a friend first and a boss second (he also claims he is "probably an entertainer/comedian third"). Despite a general air of braggadocio, Michael can be exceedingly insecure. This results in a general spinelessness in dealing with the staff. At times he displays insensitivity and inappropriate behavior that would get most managers fired.
Michael's constant desire to be the center of attention often manifests itself in selfish behavior. For example, when he injures his foot in "The Injury", he expects Pam and Ryan to tend to his needs. When invited to be a part of "Phyllis' Wedding", he assumes that his participation will be the high point of the ceremony and pouts when he is upstaged.
While ignorant, often unaware of what really goes on around the office and failing to research ideas thoroughly, Michael is not intentionally hostile; he often finds himself backpedaling after making a racist, sexist or ageist comment. This, combined with his penchant for lowbrow humor, gives Michael the ironic character flaw of being too juvenile to realize that he is generally incompetent as a manager and widely disliked as a person.
In spite of everything he does wrong, Michael often comes off as a sympathetic character, due to his general lack of malice and a genuine desire to make everyone around him happy. Also, in rare instances, Michael has shown surprising insight and ability for decisive action to the benefit of those around him.
On the other hand, Michael has been known to purposely point out other people's character flaws and personal problems when it serves his agenda. For example, Michael is quick to bring up Toby's troubled marital history whenever he feels jealous or threatened by Toby. Moreover, Michael can be exceptionally superficial. In Christmas Party, Michael buys Ryan a $400 iPod for Secret Santa and becomes particularly affronted when he receives an oven mitt that Phyllis knitted especially for him (complaining that Phyllis deemed him to be worth no more than a "homemade oven mitt"); his resultant replacement of Secret Santa with Yankee Swap fully discounted the sentimental and personal value of the gifts the employees had bought each other in favor of their monetary value.
Michael is also a poor judge of character, given his tendency to judge people based on their looks (or race) rather than their talents. Michael's biggest asset is his ability to interact with children (he has often been compared to a child himself), and his fondest desire is to have a child of his own.
The people who surround Michael are well-aware of his weaknesses, allowing him to be easily manipulated. For example, Jim goads Michael into challenging Dwight to a fight in "The Fight", and Jan easily wins back Michael's affections in "The Job" with the help of breast augmentation surgery.
In the episode "Hot Girl", it is revealed that Michael owns a futon when Michael asks Pam how women feel about them. Pam immediately tells Jim and they joke about it behind Michael's back.
The death of Ed Truck, his immediate predecessor as office manager, hit him very hard; it made him realize he may one day die alone and friendless.
In Season One, Michael is sometimes portrayed as being slightly overweight, unathletic, and unattractive, especially in deleted scenes: In a scene cut from "Basketball" he compares himself to Allen Iverson, then of the nearby Philadelphia 76ers, saying "Iverson has maybe got me beat by like 20 pounds, 3 inches" to which Roy replies, "What? Iverson's not fat" to which Michael responds, "Neither am I, we both look good." In a deleted scene from "Hot Girl", Jim Halpert gives Michael's age as 44 and makes references to his weight and rapidly thinning hair. However, by Season Two, he has lost a lot of weight, no longer gels his hair straight back, and is portrayed much more sympathetically than in Season One.
Michael also occasionally seems to have a somewhat feminine side. He is seen using a women's restroom and says he prefers sitting down, and on one occasion, he accidentally finds a woman's suit and wears it into the office.
Michael's most common catch phrases are "That's what ''she'' said" and a whispered "Shut it" (most often said to Dwight, when he says something Michael deems inappropriate). When he does an impression or otherwise makes a reference to a person or character, he feels compelled to identify the source (although he often identifies it incorrectly).

Education

Michael's plans for a college degree were thwarted when he lost his college savings (earned while employed at an Arby's Restaurant) in a pyramid scheme (a trap that would ensnare him again as an adult). He is moderately insecure about his lack of a degree, especially when he feels threatened by people with more education; Ryan Howard's business school attendance is especially destructive to his ego.
At times, Michael struggles with his vocabulary and tends to mispronounce words such as "prodigal" ("The Convention"), or completely confuse words, such as when he calls himself a "philanderer" when he obviously meant "philanthropist" ("Casino Night"). Occasionally, in order to fit in, he implies that he attended college, though his specious "recollections" of his college days come across as bizarre (e.g. inviting professors to a college party, although some might debate whether or not that was said to have himself invited to Jim's party in the episode "E-mail Surveillance"). Other times, Michael boasts of his executive status despite his lack of a degree. He was on the fast track to upper-level management, enjoying a brief career as a sales rep before being promoted to his current position.

Work demeanor and management style

Still a talented salesman, Michael has a way of relating to potential clients through regular conversation that has helped land his branch some big accounts. However Michael's almost savant-like sales skills do not translate into good management skills. His laid-back approach more often results in workplace productivity not reaching 100% on a daily basis, particularly when Michael places his personal interests as a priority over work (such as his birthday, someone else's birthday, or a funeral for a deceased bird). Staffers have noted they find "little time" to get work done while putting up with Michael's daily antics, which are a major distraction. To avoid being disciplined for his foolish actions, Michael often resorts to scapegoating employees to cover himself. This often backfires on him when he opens his mouth and ends up contradicting the facts.
Although his position as Regional Manager gives him broad decision-making authority on branch operations, he often places those responsibilities secondary to his desire to be friends with with his employees. For example, he shirks the unpopular task of cutting medical benefits by assigning it to Dwight ("Health Care"). On the other hand, he also oversteps his authority by hosting events that Corporate disapproves of ("The Dundies", "Booze Cruise").
Michael fancies himself an entertainer, particularly a comedian with a variety of middlebrow influences, including Dane Cook, Eddie Murphy's "Raw", and Chris Rock, the latter of whom he once quoted the famous "Niggas vs. Black People" routine. He keeps several joke books in his desk for reference and has a turban so he can imitate Johnny Carson's Carnac the Magnificent. Michael stages an annual full comedy show during "The Dundies" office party and awards show.
Michael also idolizes Drew Carey and Ryan Stiles of "Whose Line Is It Anyway?", as well as Robin Williams and Jim Carrey. He considers himself "a student of comedy," going so far as to enroll in an acting improv class. He finds himself an outcast among his classmates due to his obnoxiousness, which includes shooting the other participants with an imaginary gun in every improv sketch.
Michael enjoys telling jokes and tortures the office staff on a daily basis with them, many of which are offensive or insensitive to his diverse audience. This often results in his backing up and trying to deliver the joke in a less offensive manner to remain "popular" among his staff. Michael, on multiple occasions, has expressed interest in basketball (in "The Fire" and "Basketball") and idolizes players such as LeBron James, Tracy McGrady, Allen Iverson, and Kobe Bryant. In "The Fire", he justifies not attending business school by saying that none of his favorite players did either. He immediately took the comment back though, realizing there was no connection.
One of the more frequent things Michael does is host seminars that range from diversity, sexual harassment, the handicapped, public speaking, drugs, homosexuality, grief counseling, prison, and women's appreciation in an attempt to educate his staff, who all seem more aware of and mature about the subject matter than Michael. Michael's ignorance results in these seminars being an embarrassing disaster every time, alternately amusing and shocking the staff. When other people try to lead seminars either employees or people outside the company, Michael often thwarts these when he tries to take the seminar over, or lead his own seminar which often makes up for some awkward amusement.
One particular prank in trying to rally the employees of the Scranton-Stamford merger had Michael taking the air out of their cars' tires and blaming it on several employees who had recently quit. Michael was revealed to be the culprit when one of the staff noticed his tires were not flat.
Michael's relationship with the company warehouse employees, particularly supervisor Darryl, is tense. Michael has a tendency to disrupt their daily work flow, even breaking their record of more than two years without any on-the job accidents. In a talking head interview, Darryl reveals that they have never been able to make a full year since, because of Michael's antics. It's also during another talking head interview, Darryl is on crutches because of Michael's attempt to joke by shouting "Hey, Darryl, how's it hangin'?" before kicking the ladder Darryl was standing on and causing him to fall. Lonnie, another warehouse employee, cannot stand Michael and shares Darryl's respect for workplace safety. Lonnie makes no attempt to hold back by insulting Michael in front of the staff after Michael makes another immature remark.
Michael occasionally uses dated phrases such as "T.M.I." and goofy slang, calling pizza "'za" and Starbucks "the 'Bucks". One of his favorite gags is adding the phrase "that's what ''she'' said!" to some perfectly normal statements, implying a sexual connotation. He has, however, retired "don't go there" from his phrasebook because it is "lame."
Michael also greatly enjoys franchise restaurants such as Sbarro, choosing to eat there on his visit to New York City instead of one of the local specialty restaurants. He has held business meetings and company award nights at Chili's and scheduled others at Hooters. He also enjoyed a day out at the Japanese steakhouse Benihana and took a waitress back to the office Christmas party, though he could not tell the young Asian woman apart from a female friend she brought with her. He often unintentionally harasses his female employees, especially Pam Beesly, who always is shocked by his behaviour, although it is always a juvenile attempt at comedy.
Salesman Dwight Schrute, Michael's assistant in name only, hero-worships Michael; Michael tends to put down Dwight but apparently likes the attention. Michael sometimes panders to Dwight by giving him more responsibility than he deserves, such as appointing Dwight to choose a health care plan for the office, ordering Dwight to urinate in a cup for him so he could pass a drug test, making Dwight an honorary security guard for the building, and changing Dwight's job title from "Assistant to the Regional Manager" to "Assistant Regional Manager" (which Michael later admits is meaningless).
Many of these duties stem from Michael's need to compensate for being liked, or to save himself from getting in trouble. Michael is also listed as Dwight's emergency contact. While Michael often tries to distance himself from Dwight, they do spend some time outside of the office together: It is revealed in "The Fight" that they spent one New Year's Eve together watching ''Armageddon''. Michael's respect for Dwight seems to be threatened by the presence of Andy Bernard, an obnoxious employee from the Scranton-Stamford branch merger, with designs on moving up the corporate ladder.
Eventually, Andy manages to push Dwight out by taking advantage of Dwight's attempt to steal Michael's job. Dwight later resigns when it is revealed he went to the Dunder-Mifflin corporate offices in New York City, arousing Michael's suspicion that Dwight went behind his back again. It later turns out, though, that Dwight was protecting Angela from repercussions over missing a deadline.
Michael's and Dwight's friendship is later mended when Michael learns the truth behind Dwight's resignation, and Dwight gets his job back. In turn, Andy is at odds with Michael when Andy's overbearing attempts to brown-nose Michael both creep him out and irritate him. Michael later says of both Andy and Dwight, "I don't want somebody sucking up to me because they think I'm going to help their career. I want them sucking up to me because they genuinely love me," oblivious to the fact that people who suck up to others usually want something from someone and usually do not care about the person in question. Andy is out of the picture when Michael and corporate order him to attend a 10-week anger management training—which Andy refers to as "management training"—after blowing up at both Michael and a prank by Jim Halpert and punching a hole in the wall.
Michael is particularly cruel toward Toby Flenderson, the human resources representative, partially because Michael considers his position "corporate," and therefore not a member of the Scranton branch "family." Ironically, Michael, being in "upper management" once claimed, "I am corporate." Completely resenting Toby, Michael freely insults him by either bringing up his divorce or making hurtful remarks. He has even resorted to physical oppression by checking him into the boards during Michael's birthday trip to a hockey rink, and wrestling away a file folder belonging to Toby (ironically, in asserting his role as mediator of office conflict).
Michael has asked employees on many occasions if Toby is the reason they are unhappy or want to leave Dunder-Mifflin (it never is). Toby took away Michael's corporate credit card after it was used to buy $80 worth of magic tricks to entertain potential customers. More often than not, Toby has to correct Michael on Dunder-Mifflin policy. Secretly, Toby archives staff complaints against Michael on a quarterly basis and stores them away in the office warehouse. However, on a personal note, Toby offers helpful one-on-one conversation with his enemy after a dejected Michael is forced to face the reality that he has not settled down with a family, and Michael bonds with Toby's young daughter.
Michael also has a tendency to reveal personal information about staff members to the entire office. Notable examples include Michael reading aloud confidential complaints given to Toby by staff, revealing Jim's feelings for Pam, and outing Oscar Martinez. This has frequently led to tensions in the office. One particularly infamous incident involving Michael was revealing a spicy photo of Jan Levinson on a vacation he took with her, a photo he intended to e-mail to his obnoxious friend Todd Packer but accidentally sent to "Packaging" (a.k.a. the warehouse staff), who do not particularly respect Michael to begin with.
The photo was passed around the office via e-mail (and summoning Dwight to cover Michael's tracks for him). After "The Merger", his attempts to "educate" the newly constructed staff resulted in three resignations from former Stamford employees, given Michael's inadvertent manner of humiliating them. Michael thinks they are just quitters but has no clue it is actually his incompetence as a manager that is prompting them to quit.
Though Michael is usually seen as clueless, he is typically the voice of reason for Assistant Regional Manager Dwight Schrute, such as correcting him on his job title and stopping him from doing absurd things.
In "The Negotiation," Michael researches negotiation tactics using Wikipedia. He tries to use these on an employee who wants a raise. He describes it as "the best thing ever" because anyone in the world can write about any subject, so "you know you're getting the best possible information."^[2] He cites "refusing to speak first" and "changing the location at the last minute."

Romantic and Personal Life

In a childhood appearance on the fictitious children's show ''Fundlebundle'', Michael stated his intentions as a grown-up: "I want to be married and have a hundred kids so I could have a hundred friends and no one could say 'no' to being my friend."
At 43, Michael is still single, but says he "does all right."
Michael is experimenting with online dating for which he intends to highlight to potential dates his affection for children by going under the username "littlekidlover," which obviously could be terribly misconstrued and make Michael look like a pedophile. Despite this, he does get along rather well with kids.
Michael also began dating Carol Stills (played by Carell's spouse, Nancy Walls), a real estate agent with whom Michael worked to buy his condominium; according to Michael, he and Carol have had sex. He frequently claims he is dating two women at the same time: Carol and Jan. Michael proposed to Carol during a "Diwali" celebration, but since they had only gone on nine dates up until that point, she rejected him and left the party angrily. Carol breaks up with Michael soon after due to a Christmas card of Carol's family that he sent out, with his head photoshopped in place of her ex-husband's head, leaving him heartbroken. But later in the same episode, Michael invites an unknown woman to go on a trip to Jamaica with him that he originally intended for Carol. In the following episode, "Back From Vacation", it is revealed that the woman Michael invited was Jan Levinson, his superior at Dunder-Mifflin, who later confesses she is attracted to Michael but admits he is totally wrong for her. Michael also admits in the same episode that their relationship has become sexual.
They are still dating in "Ben Franklin," at which point Michael worries he has put his relationship with Jan in jeopardy during a bachelor party for Bob Vance (of Vance Refrigeration). After asking the stripper for advice, Michael calls Jan and confesses, at which point Jan tells him she is closer to firing him for throwing a bachelor party during business hours. She does not appear upset about the stripper, which leads Michael to telling her she is "the best GD (goddamn) girlfriend in the world." Jan whispers that she will talk to him later and promptly hangs up on him.
In "Cocktails," Michael is thrilled at the prospect that he and Jan are making their first public appearance as a couple, though this leads to some friction between them at the cocktail party of CFO David Wallace (where their relationship is to first become public). At one point after Michael refuses a bathroom tryst, Jan storms off and leaves Michael distraught that "something's wrong with Jan." Later in the car, Michael confesses to Jan he wants a future with her—he wants a house with a picket fence, ketchup fights, tickling, and giggling. Jan takes back her comment that making their relationship public was a mistake, and Michael tells Jan he loves her.
In "Safety Training", Michael admits his relationship with Jan is "complicated" and he is not happy. Two weeks later, in "Women's Appreciation", he breaks up with her after realizing their relationship is making him unhappy. However, in the season finale "The Job", Michael gets back together with Jan, mostly because of her new breast implants. At the end of the episode, after Jan is fired from corporate, she breaks down crying and is almost delirious, saying that she now can spend time with Michael all the time. Michael is obviously not happy with the relationship.
Michael fixates on Ryan Howard, an employee (temp in Seasons 1-2, full-time in Season 3) at the office. He views Jim as a friend and shortly after Jim's admission to Michael of his crush on Pam (an admission Jim comes to regret), Michael began mimicking Jim's appearance (rolling his sleeves up, loosening his tie and collar, combing his hair down). This phase of the relationship ended after Michael was unable to keep Jim's "secret," but Jim has since claimed to be Michael's "friend" ("The Convention").
It may be inferred that Michael has a thing for Pam, since he once claims that he "likes her boobs" and suggests that his position as her boss precludes him from taking a bath with her ("Sexual Harassment"). Michael has been caught staring at her (or Ryan; this could be a habit, as Jim did it as well) from his office. More often than not, Pam has had to deal with Michael not so much as a boss, but as a child behaving badly either by comments he makes or job duties he does not perform as required. In "Diwali", Michael tries to make an awkward pass at Pam (who tries to console him after Carol rejected his marriage proposal) during a conversation, which Pam quickly rejects.
In "Gay Witch Hunt," Michael outs a gay employee (Oscar) and after constantly denying that he himself is gay (although claims he would be the most flamboyant gay person), hugs and subsequently kisses Oscar in an effort to prove how non-homophobic he is.
Although Michael has been seen talking to his mother on the phone, his emergency contact is "friend" Todd Packer—arguably the most obnoxious person on the show. In a deleted scene, Michael recalls a convention to which he and Todd went in Hartford, Connecticut, "a couple years ago" that ended up with Michael being abandoned by Packer in the parking lot of a bar, and left with a group of angry bouncers Packer had offended when he made out with one of their girlfriends. The group beat him badly enough that it was featured in the local paper.
Michael drives a Chrysler Sebring convertible (license plate 7640
★ LPS or WWS
★ 805^[3]) and pays a mortgage on a condominium. He is an excellent ice skater and says he thought about playing in the NHL ("Michael's Birthday") but wanted to settle down with a family instead, which he has yet to do.
Michael attends classes in improvisational comedy and believes his skills are among the best in the world. In improvisational skits, he tends to play his tough-guy alter-ego (FBI agent "Michael Scarn", the main character in a motion picture screenplay he authored or his prisoner counterpart, Prison Mike), and guns down all the other players to steal every scene. He constantly compliments his own performances, from joke-telling to impressions to videotape skits he creates for presentation in the office.
Dwight has stated that Michael's favorite song is "The Longest Time" by "William Joel." Michael prefers the song as heard on the radio and is less impressed with toy recorder renditions. Dwight has also stated that the only thing Michael Scott is scared of is "nothing" (and also "snakes"). Michael's cell phone ring tone was "Mambo No. 5" but was changed and heard to be "My Humps" by the Black Eyed Peas during the convention, which is later revealed to be personalized for Pam. He thinks he might have experimented with cannabis at an Alicia Keys concert, under the impression that it was clove cigarettes.
Michael is a Pittsburgh Pirates fan and likes Night Swept (a Drakkar Noir imitation sold at Rite Aid), Blue Blast thirst quencher, and Filet-O-Fish sandwiches. Michael also has a daily tradition of cooking bacon on the George Foreman Grill just before waking up, so he can wake up to the smell of freshly cooked bacon (a practice that resulted in his burning his foot and considering himself "disabled" in "The Injury").
Michael also has an extreme reaction when ingesting large amounts of sugar, which causes him to become hyperactive and in turn, distract the office. His haircut is an "Adult Cut Plus" from Fantastic Sams ("Conflict Resolution").
Michael also loves wearing jeans, in particular a white pair he refers to as his "Fun Jeans." ("The Convention"). He is so fond of his jeans that he gets them dry cleaned; Pam surmises that he instituted Casual Friday just to show off his jeans ("The Client").
Michael treasures his "World's Best Boss" mug, even though he bought it for himself at Spencer Gifts. He keeps several spare mugs in his desk in case the original is broken ("The Secret" deleted scene).
The framed certificate behind Michael's desk reads "Michael Scott is the proud owner of a quality Seyko [sic] timepiece."

Family and childhood

Michael was born on March 15, at 11:23am. He notes the fact he and Eva Longoria share a birthday would make good conversation if he were to meet Teri Hatcher. Michael considers himself "a virtual United Nations" being of English, Irish, German, Scottish, and (according to him) "Native American Indian" descent.
Michael grew up in Scranton a lonely child, and his high school classmates (among them Phyllis Vance) believed he might have been gay.
In "Michael's Birthday," Michael recalled a number of childhood memories that revealed the unfortunate trend of something embarrassing or traumatic happening on his birthday. Michael has at least one brother and came from a broken home, once comparing an office situation to the time his mother "moved in with Jeff," and he "had to fix it." At one time, he shows the camera the video of his performance as a ring-bearer at his mother's second wedding: He wet his pants and threw the ring at his step-father, screaming "I hate you!" before running off.
In a childhood television appearance, Michael said his goal was to grow up and have a lot of children because they would have to be his friends. When reminded that he has failed to find love as an adult, he gets very moody and depressed. He tends to attach himself too quickly to women, reading more into his evening spent with his boss, Jan Levinson, and proposing marriage to Carol Stills after only nine dates. He also invited a young waitress from Benihana to join him at Sandals, Jamaica despite not even knowing her name.

Characters of Michael Scott

Given his proclivity of constantly trying to keep his employees entertained (and coupled with his juvenile personality), Michael has created a variety of different characters which he uses for both entertainment, and, at times, educational purposes.
'Ping' ("The Dundies") - As part of his variety show during Dunder-Mifflin's annual Dundies award ceremony, Michael portrays Ping, a racist and stereotypical Asian caricature. Ping wears thick-framed black glasses, has an extreme overbite, and speaks in a bold "Engrish" manner. In deleted scenes, Kevin remarks that he finds Ping very amusing, and Oscar and Kelly ask Michael to stop performing the Ping character. Michael dismisses their concerns. "Neither of you are Chinese."
'Agent Michael Scarn' ("The Client", "E-mail Surveillance") - During what is assumed to be a massive amount of downtime spent in his office, Michael has written a screenplay entitled ''Threat Level: Midnight'' (which Kevin eventually gives "two thumbs down"). Michael also used ''Threat Level: Midnight'' to describe the status of the office when an inappropriate water mark was found on recently shipped paper. In what is clearly an action-adventure picture in the James Bond mold, Michael has written himself as the central character, an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation named Michael Scarn. When not thwarting dastardly villains such as Goldenface from world domination or putting up with the antics of his sidekick Samuel L. Chang (modeled and originally named after Dwight), Agent Scarn enjoys a life of luxury with his secretary and lover, Catherine Zeta-Jones. Michael frequently uses the character while performing in his improv class, forgoing the opportunity to base his dialogue off of his classmates and instead choosing to pretend to shoot everyone in the room, regardless of their participation in the scene.
'Prison Mike' ("The Convict") - Created by Michael in an attempt to scare his employees straight after they noted that life in prison seems more appealing than life at Dunder-Mifflin, Prison Mike is practically a collection of jailbird stereotypes. Prison Mike wears a dark blue bandana, suffers from an eye deformity (most likely due to fighting), and speaks in a hardcore New York accent. He mentions stealing things, as well as kidnapping the President's son as the reasons for his imprisonment (although he claims he was never caught for his crimes). Prison Mike notes that the only food served in jail is gruel, with which they are forced to make sandwiches and omelettes, and claims that the worst thing about prison is the Dementors. He also suffers from streaks of violence and misogyny, calling Angela a "bee-yotch" and threatening to slam her against a wall. As a result of these traits, Prison Mike took place in incidents of rape and abuse while in jail, stating that inmates are forced to becomes someone's bitch and that Ryan in particular would be "da belle of da ball". Regardless of his personality and demeanor, Prison Mike cares for the Dunder-Mifflin employees and encourages them to continue on the right path, because they do indeed have good lives.
'Michael the Magic' ("Cocktails") - A result of many hours training in a magic camp primarily attended by children, Michael focuses his skills of showmanship and sleight-of-hand into his mysterious alter-ego, Michael the Magic. As a means of creating a spooky environment for his audience, he begins his performances by emerging from unseen parts of the office while whispering, "Magic, magic, magic, magic...". In what is most likely his debut, Michael the Magic has Dwight strap him securely into a straitjacket, from which he will escape before the audience's collective eye. Unfortunately, the key used to unlock the harness (which Michael hides quite conspicuously in his mouth) is dropped on the carpet before he is able to use it, and Jim, in typical fashion, hides it under his foot. Instead of revealing his secrets, Michael the Magic screams out in a violent rage and struggles to the floor to remove the jacket, eventually locking himself in his office and sobbing out of discomfort and frustration.

Comparison with David Brent

Although originally based on David Brent, Scott has developed to become a significantly different character to the original UK version of the character. Whereas Brent is shown to be irredeemably incompetent, Scott is portrayed as an outstanding salesman, who was unwisely promoted to a management role to which he is completely ill-suited (see Peter Principle). Scott's social immaturity and inability to cope with responsibility is balanced with a personality that is much more caring than Brent, even if he retains the ability to make unwise comments in the heat of the moment. Unlike Brent, who pretends to be friendly with many of his employees purely for the benefit of the cameras, Scott seems to genuinely like his colleagues, with the sole exception of Human Resources Director Toby Flenderson.
Despite his shortcomings, Michael's subordinates do sometimes acknowledge his virtues, such as his intense loyalty to his office colleagues. When Stamford boss Josh Porter accepts a job at Staples, dooming the Stamford branch and putting most of his employees out of work; Jim muses to the camera during an interview: "Say what you will about Michael Scott, but he would never do that". This is a particularly telling comment, as Brent does much the same thing as Josh, readily accepting promotion to a corporate job, fully aware that it will mean sacrificing the jobs of many of his branch's staff. In Brent's case, however, he fails the mandatory medical examination and the offer is withdrawn, meaning that Brent remains at his branch but is denied the redemption that the US writers afford to Scott.
The DVD commentary to the Pilot episode suggests that Scott's character continues a process begun in the second UK series, in which Gervais and Merchant intentionally made Brent less nasty, and more of a buffoon. It is said in the commentary that Gervais and Merchant suggested that this be applied to Scott. This also reflects a general change in the US version's attitude, which is more sympathetic to the characters, and tones down the cruel humour of the original.

Behind the scenes

★ Creator Greg Daniels envisioned Michael Scott behaving as if "I was hoping that the documentary about this would one day be seen by Jennifer Aniston, and I was just trying to impress her any way I possibly could."^[4]

★ Creator Greg Daniels notes the occasional need to show Michael being competent or even effective, to justify why he is not simply fired.^[5]

★ Writer B.J. Novak explains that Michael Scott drives a Sebring because it is the most ostentatious car he can afford, opting for a convertible even though the climate in Scranton is cool even in the summer.^[6]

★ The script for "Gay Witch Hunt" called for Oscar to turn his head and Michael to kiss him on the cheek. Steve Carell improvised the lip-kiss.

★ In most episodes written by Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupinsky, Michael will make a reference to Pam's breasts.

★
★ In "The Secret", Michael tells Jim that what he likes best about Pam is "her boobs, definitely."

★
★ In "Michael's Birthday", Michael tells Pam she should give herself a breast self-examination. "Those things are like ticking time-bags."

★
★ In "The Convention", Michael advises Pam to "unbutton that top button, let those things breathe" when she goes on her date.

★
★ In "Traveling Salesmen", Michael uses a speech synthesizer to say "boobs" after Pam leaves the room.

★
★ In the producer's cut of "The Return", Michael holds a pair of maracas in front of his chest and tells Pam, "I will shake mine, and then you will shake yours."

★
★ In "Women's Appreciation", Michael says, "If Pam wants to show more cleavage, she should be able to. I encourage it." In a deleted scene, Michael suggests that Pam "show 'em the twins" to entice a passing motorist to stop and help.

References

1. About The Office
2. 'Office' fans, inspired by Michael Scott, flock to edit Wikipedia April 12, 2007
3. Photo of Michael Scott's Sebring
4. Writing 'The Office' ''Fresh Air''
5. Daniels, Greg (Producer). 2005. "Valentine's Day" [Commentary track], ''The Office'' Season One (US/NBC Version) [DVD], Los Angeles, CA: Universal.
6. Novak, B.J. (October 4, 2005). "Michael and Co. Hit the Road", ''TVGuide.com''

External links

★ Michael Scott Quotes

★ The Office Fan Site / Michael Scott's Blog — a fan site written under the persona of Michael Scott