When he realized he didn’t get any kind of response from them, he thought, ‘Oh, maybe they don’t really care if I leave. They didn’t call and say, ‘What? You wanna leave?’ He said he didn’t get any kind of response from them. Then what he said was the people connected to the show had no reaction to it. He was kind of thinking out loud, but he did it in an interview in public and it created news. He didn’t plan on saying it out loud and he hadn’t decided anything. He was doing a radio interview and he haphazardly mentioned, almost unconsciously, that it might be his last season. “I sat with him one time and he told me the story. With the final year of his contract looming, the actor noted that Season 7 would “probably be my last year.” But as Carell explained to The Office boom operator/sound mixer Brian Wittle, it was the reaction to these off-the-cuff comments that actually convinced him it was time to leave: It all started when Carell gave an interview in April 2010 to the BBC.
Interviews in Andy Greene’s newly released book The Office: The Untold Story of the Greatest Sitcom of the 2000s claim that Carell’s decision to leave The Office had more to do with network ambivalence than a burning desire to break free from the constraints of a broadcast sitcom.
Some shows can soldier on with cast changes, but when it came to The Office, the series was a shell of its former self without Michael Scott.īut new revelations have pulled back the curtain on the circumstances of Carell’s exit-namely that the insanely talented performer wasn’t actually itching to leave the show at all, and was game to return for at least Season 8.
After Carell’s exit in the show’s seventh season, the NBC series had serious trouble recovering, and the quality certainly dipped in its final two seasons.
For seven seasons, Carell amazed with his phenomenally nuanced performance as Michael Scott-at once the world’s worst boss, but also a deeply empathetic and lonely human.
9 Season 8 (2011 - 2012): 7.Few actors have left as big a void on a TV series than Steve Carell on The Office. That makes it even more interesting to look back upon when the show was truly at its peak, to find out what the best season of The Office was. Many shows have used its format and some similar plotlines to varied success. Updated on July 17th, 2021 by Kevin Pantoja: Even with all of its popularity and critical acclaim, it's still difficult to explain just how impactful and influential The Office truly was. The success of each season from the audience standpoint fluctuated but was often great. When Steve Carell left the show, ratings did fall, but the rest of the talented cast and the devoted fanbase ensured that The Office would still go out on a high note. Like any long-running show, its tone, quality, and the cast of characters fluctuated over its nine seasons. RELATED: 10 Hilarious Things Fans Noticed In The Background Of The Office Its popularity and quality have ensured its spot as one of the best sitcoms of all time. In the time since it aired, The Officehas become one of the most-watched and most commonly referenced shows on TV and available to stream.