photo: nbc
Andy’s Play
Original Air Date: Oct 7, 2010
Shannon – Associate Editor
shannon@thetwocentscorp.com
This week in the cold open, Andy and the cast of his community theatre play break into the office singing a song from their show, Sweeney Todd. It gets mixed reviews from the staff but I actually thought it was pretty good. Oh, and Michael auditioned for that show and didn’t get a callback. Oops.
Andy gives Erin two tickets to the show but she only needs one since Gabe can’t come to the show because he’s sick. Andy wants everyone to come the show but Jim and Pam’s sitter backed out and last time Dwight went to a show a man dressed as a cat sat on his lap. Andy really wants Erin to come to the show because he has plans to make her fall in love with him by singing show tunes. Because what woman or man for that matter, can resist a man singing show tunes?
Michael comes to the show with a balloon bouquet and someone from the theatre asks him if he’s the one that did an entire Law & Order episode for his audition. Of course he was.
Everyone is at the show, even Jim and Pam. Why is that? Erin’s babysitting for them.
Michael runs into the director at intermission who very patronizingly tells Michael that if keeps auditioning they will definitely find a role for him. Michael steals a bottle of wine as payback. The bottle of wine gets passed around during the second half of the show. Also at intermission, Pam calls Erin to see how the baby is and everything is fine. Erin asks how the show is and Pam says it’s really good.
The show is going pretty great until Andy’s phone starts ringing in his pocket while he’s on stage. Andy starts riffing to cover it up and oh my gosh is it painful. Then Michael’s empty wine bottle gets dropped and his balloons go floating up to the ceiling. The bottle makes a clanking noise as it rolls downhill, hitting seat brackets on the way down. Then the balloons pop on the rafters making a baby cry. A baby? Who brought a baby? Oh, would you look at that, it’s Cece. For some reason Erin is standing in the back of the theatre with Jim and Pam’s baby and the baby is crying. Erin just wanted to come and see the show so she brought the baby along so that makes perfect sense. Also, that is one of the cutest babies I have seen in awhile. Jim and Pam leave with the baby and Erin stays. Andy and Erin hang out after the show and are hitting it off when Gabe calls asking Erin to come home with soup. Andy is frustrated because he’s trying so hard to get Erin to love him. Aww.
Andy’s feeling bad after the show so the gang finds him and tells him how awesome he was. He’s still blue so they ask him to sing another song so he sings some Macy Gray with Darryl on the piano. It’s cute.
The ending is where we get to see Michael’s audition where he does the Law & Order episode complete with the “chung chung”s. It’s as terrible as you think it is.
As a community theatre vet, I found this episode amusing, but man, it was cringe-worthy for awhile. I like when the show makes me watch through my fingers. I like that they were able to make the bit at the play uncomfortable with out exploiting the dimwitted-ness of Michael. It seems like too many times they dip from Stupid Michael well. It was nice to see just a serious of unfortunate events that weren’t necessarily at any one person’s expense. It was a decent episode for me all-in-all. What’d you think? Leave a comment!
TheTwoCents 
Like you Shannon, I’ve done the Comm Theater thing. This was very true to life – seeing your plumber in the lead role.
I think what I really liked was how Andy’s performance was very good. How people like Jim and Pam and even Dwight all were getting into how good he was. Dwight saying he worked with Andy to the stranger was Dwightly sweet! Then, of course, the Comm Theater issue with cell phones was genius, and reminded us this was a comedy.
Also, the re-flaming of Dwight and Angela could be GREAT for this show…
Hmmmm….. I missed the first ten minutes of the show, but I was glad I did. I thought the episode was garbage. For instance: the Sweeney actor responding to EVERY distraction during the play; the Sweeney actor finding Michael who booed him in the audience and being annoyed; CALLING Michael out afterwards? WHO DOES THAT? Andy being a retard and leaving his cell phone on, didn’t even crack a smile. How he didn’t toss his phone, or put it to silent the instant it went off is beyond me. JAM getting cross with Erin and the baby didn’t even get a giggle.
And what does ANY of this have to do with The Office life? I thought it was all forced and un-funny as they come. Seasons 1 – 3 were spectacular, but I’m afraid what we have left, pales in comparison.