Ode to Michael Scott

Here's the thing about The Office: i love it, but not as much as i love Steve Carell in it. Yes, everyone knows he's a talented comedic actor, and yes, he did wonderful dramatic work in Little Miss Sunshine, but i think his Michael Scott is transcendantorist. (It's a word. Look it up.) Here is a character that can make you SO uncomfortable that you want to leave the room or turn off the television (my friend Mary Beth simply cannot watch this show because of the awkwardness created by this character), or make you so angry that you want to hurl your mircowave at the screen, but you root for him. Everytime. You want him to find the right woman and have kids even though he'll be a terrible father. You want him to be loved by his employees even though he's a disaster of a boss. You want people to laugh at his jokes even though he's excrutiatingly out of touch. And yeah, much of the success that is Michael Scott is due the writers and the British version that came before it, but i'm ignoring the British version right now because this is my blog and you can't post comments to argue with me. Besides, in long-running television situations like these, the evolution of a character is a collaboration between actor and writer. For me, watching Steve Carell on The Office is as fascinating as watching any critically acclaimed method-actor type in an Oscar-bait film. i'm rapt. The nuance is is impressive, the timing is impeccable, and i think it takes courage to commit so thoroughly to such a character. i love it. It's beyond 'appointment television' to me because it's like going to the theater or a museum and observing the excellence of an art form.