Mike Schur successfully transitioned from writing at Saturday Night Live to working on some of the best sitcoms of all-time. So when Schur gave his thoughts on SNL's attempt to parody his show The Office, his opinion carried a lot of weight.
Schur joined the Saturday Night Live writing staff in 1998, a year after graduating from Harvard. Soon, he became the "Weekend Update" producer and an Emmy winner. Schur left the show 2004 and followed that up as a producer and writer of The Office.
Seth Meyers invited Schur onto The Seth Meyers and Lonely Island podcast to discuss the best "SNL Digital Short" sketches of all time. Schur emphatically stated that the 2008 Office parody "Japanese Office" does not deserve any special recognition.
"It didn't scratch the itch of reflecting in the way that I was hoping the show would be reflected somehow," Schur said. "I worked at SNL, but you still feel like SNL at some point at some level is an arbiter of what matters in the culture. And when did 'The Japanese Office,' I remember being a little bit rankled."
Schur explained that the SNL bit didn't exactly land, nor did it really have anything interesting to say. And the whole idea of filling the supposedly Japanese cast with white cast members didn't sit right with Schur, either.
"This, I was a little bit like, oh, okay. Like, it didn't feel right to me in some way," he said. "It's like, 'They stole the show from me, but I stole it from the Japanese version,' but then all the actors in the Japanese version are white people," he explained. "It sort of didn't track to me somehow."
The "Japanese Office" sketch was written by Marika Sawyer, a Japanese American writer at SNL who took steps to add authenticity to the scene. Actors spoke actual Japanese, and sketch director Akiva Schaffer said Sawyer eased concerns he had similar to what Schur expressed.
The best Office parody from Saturday Night Live starred Martin Freeman
Several Office alumni have come through Saturday Night Live over the years. And the sketch show has done a few different bits about the sitcom.
But Mike Schur is right that "Japanese Office" isn't one of the best "Digital Shorts" of all time. It's not even the best Office parody from SNL.
That honor should go to "Hobbit Office" from 2014. Martin Freeman was the host, giving SNL writers a chance to marry The Hobbit and The Office.
The sketch imagines life after Bilbo (Martin Freeman), Gandalf (Bobby Moynihan), Gollum (Taran Killam), Legolas (Kyle Mooney), and Tauriel (Kate McKinnon) save Middle-earth. It expertly matches the tone and pace of the British Office while also appealing to Tolkien fans who may not care at all for The Office.
With an Office reboot/reimagination in the works at NBC, maybe Saturday Night Live will get another chance to amuse Mike Schur and actually get it right. If not, there's always "Hobbit Office."