ABSTRACT
What does it mean to be improvisational, and what does it mean to not be? An episode of the highly acclaimed NBC television series “The Office” gives us a hint. In it, the notoriously narcissistic boss, Michael Scott (actor Steve Carell) attends an after-office-hours improvisational acting class. Throughout the show’s first two seasons, fans of “The Office” became eminently familiar with Michael—recurrently being the buffoon—especially, through his grandiosely inflated self-perceptions. These include, among other things, that he is at heart a really great actor. It is in his improvisation class, however, that they see most clearly why Michael recurrently fails in work, in love, and finally, even in play.
