The Office: Series 1

Cast
David Brent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Ricky Gervais
Tim . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Martin Freeman
Gareth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Mackenzie Crook
Dawn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Lucy Davis
Neil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Patrick Baladi
Rachel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Stacey Roca
Trudy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Rachel Isaac
Lee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Joel Beckett
Keith . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Ewen Macintosh
Oliver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Howard Sadler
Brenda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Julie Fernandez
Glynn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .David Schaal
Chris Finch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Ralph Ineson
Jennifer Taylor-Clarke . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Stirling Gallache
Production Credits
Written and directed by............................... Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant
Producer..................................................... Ash Atalla
Executive Producers.................................... Anil Gupta , Jon Plowman

BAFTA? Awards
2004 ? Best Comedy Performance - Ricky Gervais
2004 ? Situation Comedy Award ? Ash Atalla, Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant
2003 ? Best Comedy Performance - Ricky Gervais
2003 ? Situation Comedy Award ? Ash Atalla, Anil Gupta, Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant
2002 ? Best Comedy Performance - Ricky Gervais
2002 ? Situation Comedy Award ? Ash Atalla, Anil Gupta, Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant

British Comedy Awards?
2002 ? Best Comedy Actor ? Ricky Gervais
2002 ? Best TV Comedy
2001 ? Best New TV Comedy

Golden Globes?
2004 ? Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series ? Musical or Comedy ? Ricky Gervais
2004 ? Best Television Series - Musical or Comedy

?...one of Britain's all-time top five comedies... a show of such towering comic genius it could single-handedly eradicate the curse of goatee beards, reverse baseball caps, management-speak, Ali G impressions,Tina Turner's Simply the Best, and Chuck Norris.? -News Of The World
?You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll watch through the cracks in your fingers.... Welcome back to the all-too-real world of David Brent ... Everything a British comedy should be: edgy, laugh-track-free with a dark pathos underpinning it all.? -Observer
?...continual brilliance ... Like a motorway crash, it is so excruciating that you want to look away but so transfixing that you can't. And what you really want is to see more.? -The Times
?The Office is a work of genius and the thought of it not being here to dull the pain of Monday nights is already making me feel quite weepy.? The Times
?...what a great comedy god Ricky Gervais is. The Office gets better and better.? -Express
?The Office is great, and the second series gets so excruciatingly cringe-making in places that the Gestapo could have used it to crack captured SOE agents.? -The Times
?British sitcoms are enjoying something of a renaissance right now ... but The Office is the best of the lot.? Observer
?...still the funniest show on TV.? -People
?One of the funniest sitcoms in recent years ... and the good news is that the second series continues exactly where the last one left off.? -Daily Star
?...beautifully observed ... the freshest and most consistently clever comedy in years.? -Independent On Sunday
?...the best comedy on television at the moment.? -Daily Mail
?...ranks alongside Fawlty and Mainwaring as one of the greatest sitcom characters.? -Daily Star
?The Office's David Brent is vying with Ozzy Osbourne as our new national hero.? -Sunday Times
?...good and original ... combining the rock-solid characterisations and sucker-punch storylines we've secretly become hooked on. Like Waiting for Godot, but with paperclips, The Office is an existential triumph.? -Express
?The funniest thing you?re likely to see all year ... Now, if you think that statement is a bit outlandish, given that it?s still January, try this: It?s also funnier than anything you saw last year.? -San Francisco Chronicle
?How many times do you have to be told to watch the funniest show on television?? -Salt Lake City Weekly
?The funniest show on television.? -Detroit Free Press
?Great television ... The Office is one of those programs that shouldn?t be missed.?- Knoxnews
?The funniest British sitcom to pass our shores since Fawlty Towers.? -Wilmington Sunday News Journal
?The Office is the funniest British export since Monty Python and maybe the most telling sitcom ever about office politics. Stop reading Dilbert and check this out instead.? -Star Tribune
?The British series puts all the network sitcoms to shame with its biting wit and understanding of office culture and politics." -Mercury News
?...hysterically funny, an apt reflection of the nightmares that befall any workplace.? Syndicated Article: -Akron Beacon Journal,Winston-Salem Journal
?...truly entertaining new series.? -Cable Guide
?This workplace comedy manages the incredible feat of eliciting from its audience both hearty laughter and painful winces of recognition. Brilliantly conceived and underplayed with subtle perfection by its cast.? -TV Zone
?Fantastic TV ... the casual hypocrisies are so outrageous, and familiar, you don?t know whether to laugh or hide your eyes.? -Oregonian
?Like the best moments of This Is Spinal Tap or Waiting for Guffman,The Office offers up breathtaking slices of deadpan humor and amazing comic timing." -Salon.com
?Capable of inspiring both uproarious laughter and painful winces of recognition, usually at the same moment.? -Los Angeles Daily News
?This U.K. comedy is more real than any reality show ? and still makes viewers squirm.? -US Weekly
?It?s bleak baby. And that?s the wincing perfection of this award-winning hit series from Great Britain.? -Seattle Times

Episode 1- Head office is threatening to close its Slough branch and the threat of imminent redundancy hangs heavy over the entire staff. Far from making cuts, however, David Brent is showing a new temp, Ricky, around the office and assuring everyone that their jobs are safe. A practical joke to raise morale only succeeds in annoying everyone. Meanwhile, Gareth and Tim are locked in battle over who should have the stapler.

Episode 2- Donna arrives at the office on work experience. After the obligatory innuendo of the introductions, her first day is dominated by a dirty picture of her boss that?s been emailed around the office.David Brent is disgusted; it degrades women. But who did it? Gareth commandeers the meeting room as his own office and ? after extensive investigations ? the wrong man is eventually accused.

Episode 3- It?s Tim?s birthday ? but plans to celebrate are quickly scaled down when manager David Brent points out that it?s also the annual quiz night. Will Brent and his mate Finchy (from the University of Life) be able to beat the educated young pretenders,Tim and Ricky? Things quickly become over-competitive, and it all comes down to a tie-break which Tim and Ricky eventually win. But Brent and Finchy don?t give up that easily and Tim learns a valuable lesson about letting the boss win.

Episode 4- Rowan, a management consultant, has come to Wernham Hogg to give the staff a special training day. As usual, Brent thinks having a laugh is more important than work and soon starts to undermine him, even fetching his guitar and regaling the staff with an excruciating song and tales of how he had once been in a band, who were supported by "a little-known Scottish outfit called Texas". Meanwhile, Dawn is weeping silently after splitting up with her fianc?, Lee, and Tim is questioning his whole life and decides that he is wasting his time in a bad job.

Epiosde 5- Even though some staff may be made redundant, Brent decides to take on a new secretary. Naturally, he chooses the pretty young woman.Tim is suffering, having asked out Dawn without realising she was back with her boyfriend. David is trying to find out whether Donna, the work-experience girl in his care, has slept with someone in the office. But all is forgotten as they go on a drunken night out to Slough?s premier night-club, Chasers, where David fails to impress his prospective new secretary Karen.

Epiosde 6- It?s judgement day on whether the office is to be downsized. Jennifer, from head office, tells Brent it?s bad news ? the Slough branch is to close. But though there will be job losses, his position is safe. Moreover, he is to get a promotion, running the new and bigger combined branch. Will Brent sell his team down the river? At the party that night, he makes the big announcement...

A brilliant and cringe-makingly funny ?mocusoap' set in a paper merchants in the heart of middle England. David Brent is a lower-middle-ranking manager in charge of a lower-middle-ranking office. His workplace is the antithesis of TV's glossy law firms full of bright professionals. Instead of mutual respect and intelligent dialogue, David's office is a place of backfiring practical jokes, failed flirting and bad showing off.

2004 Golden Globe? Winner for Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series - Musical or Comedy (Ricky Gervais) and Best Television Series - Musical Or Comedy.

Welcome to Wernham Hogg, a paper company trapped in the suburbs of England where "life is stationery." Critics and fans alike have lauded this hilarious, biting look at everyday office life, played out in the deadpan mockumentary style of cult comedy classics such as This is Spinal Tap and The Larry Sanders Show.

Unlike television's usual glamorous offices full of polished professionals and fulfilled ambitions, the soul-suckingly droll environment of Wernham Hogg teems with a bitter fog of office politics revolving around an oblivious manager and his mediocre cast of employees. David Brent, (a classic character widely compared to Basil Fawlty) the wince-worthy general manager who instigates petty office rivalries and considers himself "a friend first and a boss second...probably an entertainer third" is far worse than your boss. Brent's yes-man, Gareth, is far more irritating than the jackass in the cube next to you. Tim, the apathetic sales rep, wears his boredom on his sleeve and is far wittier than the pony-tailed IT guy at your water cooler, and lovely Dawn, the engaged-to-be-married object of Tim's unrealized affection, is far more endearing than your back-sassing receptionist. Work is hell...but one man's misery is another man's hilarity. Welcome to The Office.