About a year ago, Oscar Nunez went for lunch with his old fellow fellow Greg Daniels, a leading comedy television guru who developed the American version of “The Office.”
“I’m working on a new show,” Daniels told him. “What do you think about coming back as Oscar?”
“I’m a game, of course,” Nunez said. He continued to meet Daniels several more times as the writer-producer embodied his ideas. At one point, Daniels told Nunez that paper, a product sold at Dunder Mifflin, where the “office” spins, was a central component of the new project.
Eventually, Daniels took Nunez to meet the writer. “Ah, no,” Nunez remembers thinking. “This is really happening.”
On September 4th, Peacock will drop all 10 episodes of “The Paper.” This is a very loose spinoff of “The Office,” following the staff of Ohio’s struggling local newspapers, and an avid editor-in-chief hoping to bring life to the dying medium. In the first minutes of the series, Oscar gets caught up in the Midwest and is explained as an accountant for Toledo Truth Terror alongside the Ragtag group of Ragtags: Donhall Gleason, Sabrina Impaxiatore, Chelsea Frey, Melvin Greg, Melvin Greg, Gabemisola Icumero, Ramonaman, Alex Edelman, Alex Edelman and Alex Edelman. Oscars aren’t just lines between projects. The invisible camera crew, who captured all workplace antics at the Scranton branch of Dundermifflin, found a new paper-related subject in Ohio.
“When we first started, I was a little nervous,” Nunez tells Variety about the upcoming series. “We didn’t know who the characters were, what the episode would turn out, or how it would unfold.” His concerns were eased when he arrived on the set and witnessed the cast and crew paying attention to detail. He specifically nurtures Gleason, who plays the new boss of the paper starry sky, Ned Sampson. “He’s a very thoughtful young man,” says Nunez. “He really cared about his personality and asked a lot of questions. I thought it was really cool.”
Chelsea Frey and Nuñez from “Paper”
Troy Harvey/Peacock
“The Office” ended in 2013, but seven years after it aired, it became America’s most streamed show. (It recorded 57 billion viewing times in 2020, 17 billion more than the second-streamed series, Gray’s Anatomy.) The workplace comedy was an adaptation of a British cult hit led by Ricky Gervais, changing each and every cast member into a generic name. As for Nuñez, he drove the Cuban-born actor from an unknown day player to a fixture of one of the biggest television shows ever. For nearly 20 years, Nunez couldn’t leave the house without strangers screaming “Oscar!” (It helps him share the name of his character.)
In the years following the finale, when he asked constant questions about reboot rumors and spin-off ideas, Nunez continued to embrace his character, introducing him as “Oscar from Oscar ‘Oscar'” in a cameo, appearing in fan customs alongside his former castmate. However, when the new show premieres, the characters will be returned to the back of television and office desks for the first time in over a decade.
Nuñez is excited, but Oscar Martinez isn’t that much. In the first episode of “The Paper,” the accountant is disappointed to find the same documentary crew who chased him in Scranton, wandering around his new workplace. In the first episode, he told the photographer: “You can’t use my voice, my likeness, my face, anything!”
Ask the title card to be different: “Yes, we can. There is no end date for the Oscars signed in 2005.”
“Oscar is not in his early 20s. He doesn’t need to join Instagram,” says Nunez. “He’s pseudo-intelligent. He wants to work and find a boyfriend and go to some theater. He wants to enjoy life without taking part in documentaries. Some don’t want to be an actor.
After the “office” ended, Nunez said in an interview that he imagined that Oscar might one day leave Dunder Mifflin and run for the political office. But “paper” finds him more or less where we left him, albeit in another city.
“His company was bought by a larger company and they decided to have him on board,” Nunez said of his character. “Do you want to continue working for this company? You’ll have to move.” It’s the same peer, but in another city, if he negotiates properly, he will probably make more money. ”
But while he works in the back office as a counter for beans removed from his daily duties in newspaper publication, Toledo Truth Terror’s revitalization stirs something at Oscars.
“Does he just want to make money and be cynical, or does he want to do something?
Nuñez is the only “Office” alum ever to appear in the cast of “The Paper,” but there’s more Mifflin DNA on the show. Paul Lieberstein, author-producer of the original series, who played the loving HR Head Toby, worked on “paper” with other “office” directors, Jeffrey Blitz, Dave Rogers, Matt Son, Jennifer Selotta and Ken Kwapis. And as a bonus, Daniels created the series with Michael Coman. Michael Coman’s Ellie Kemper appeared in “The Office” as Erin. Without being corrupted, the peripheral characters from “The Office” appear early in the season, with another fan favorite being mentioned. Nunez lists his former co-stars who wanted to see him make a cameo on “paper,” saying, “It would be weird to see Creed come back, or Angela – I don’t know what she’s doing.”
However, Nunez is surrounded by a brand new ensemble of actors, but he didn’t worry about trying to produce the same comedic alchemy that he clicked “Office.” The foundation was already in casting.
“They’re all very good,” Nunez said of his castmates. “All you really have to do is show up, do your thing and catch up with them. And I believe you’re there too.”
When it comes to writing, it doesn’t look like “office.” It was crazy, but this wasn’t too crude. ”
Duane Shepherd Sr. and Nunez of “Paper”
John P. Freener/Peacock
Reminiscing his favorite episode of “The Office,” Nunez introduces “Gay Witch Hunt.” This is the premiere of season 3 where Michael Scott (Steve Carell) finds out that Oscar is gay, kissing the lips in front of the office in a horrifyingly misguided attempt to prove that he is sexually comfortable with the employee. With Michael’s actions, the company will step in and provide Oscar with three months of paid leave. By chance, Nuñez’s absence from the next eight episodes allowed him to create and star in the comedy central series “Healtway Home,” which ran for a season in 2007.
To the surprise of many fans, Oscar was not initially considered a gay character. Shortly before the season 2 episode “The Secret,” Nunez remembers Daniels approaching him and saying, “Can I ask you something? Can you make your character gay?” Nunez said, “No, I don’t care,” and Daniels replied.
In the next 20 years, Oscar has become a kind of strange icon. “I often forget that my characters are gay,” says Nunez.
“It’s so cool,” Nunez says. “That’s the best part about it.”
In Nunez, “paper” is, of course, more of a topic show than “office.” By the end of this year, the country is projected to have lost a third of its print newspapers in the past 20 years, as more than two publications are closed per week in the US. According to a Northwestern University report, 55 million Americans have not restricted access to local news. And the recent federal attacks on national media outlets have undoubtedly put the media ecosystem even more at risk.
“It’s dying,” Nunez says journalism is a viable career path. “It continues to be about investigating what it needs to be out there and investigated for those who believe in the free press, the noble profession.”
Still, Nuñez can do so without a press Junket for the upcoming press conference. There you can ask the same questions as hundreds of journalists. “It’s not something I like,” he smiles. “I hope no one will kill you.”
