Sometimes things got scary on “The Office”.
On Monday night, actor Bryan Cranston appeared on Global’s “The Late Show” and remembered directing the episode of “The Office” known to cast and crew as “The Death Bus” episode.
“So it’s not fair that it’s called ‘Death Bus’ because no one died,” Cranston joked. “It was– I’ll admit, it was my aim.”
In the episode, which was actually titled “Work Bus”, the office had to work on a cramped bus due to one of Jim’s failed pranks on Dwight.
But because the air conditioning on the bus was too loud during filming, the crew attached a trailer with a refrigeration system, only it wasn’t set up properly.
“What they didn’t plan on,” Cranston explained, “they didn’t think that where the intake for the refrigeration system was, was exactly lined up to where the tailpipe of the bus was. So the exhaust of the bus was going right to the intake.”
In the end, it was Jenna Fischer, who played Pam, who helped save the day.
“Jenna Fischer actually saved everyone’s life,” Cranston recalled. “Well, she said, ‘I smell exhaust. It’s coming inside the bus.’ And I’m thinking, Jenna, I mean, come on. How is that possible? It’s not possible.”
After checking out the situation for himself, the actor realized Fischer was completely right.
“I got a chair and I stood up on the thing and I stuck my nose up in there and sure enough, it was billowing down. It was carbon monoxide,” he said. “I wasn’t quite sure so I got a second wind, I got some more, I got nice and dizzy, and then realized, Oh my God, we could have all been dead. It would have been one hell of an episode. It would have been the finale before they would have planned that though.”
READ MORE: Hilarious New Fan Video Mashes Up ‘Severance’ & ‘The Office’
Fischer and co-star Angela Kinsey, who co-host the podcast “Office Ladies”, shared the story of the “Death Bus” in their recent book The Office BFFs: Tales of the Office From Two Best Friends, also revealing another scary incident.
The incident occurred when the bus they were in was supposed to do a swerve, and they called in a stunt driver to pull it off.
“The stunt driver swerved hard,” Fischer writes, according to People. “I mean, he cranked that wheel like [Tom Cruise’s] Cole Trickle in ‘Days of Thunder’. As a result, the entire cast and contents of the bus went flying into the side of the party bus!”
She continues, “What no one had considered when they told this stunt driver to swerve as hard as he could without flipping the bus over was that none of our office furniture, props, or set decorations were securely tied down.”
Talking about the air conditioning issues, Fischer writes, “So that hose was sucking in exhaust and blowing it straight into the sunroof of the bus. We were all being slowly poisoned. Or not so slowly, actually.”
Recalling the episode was directed Cranston, Kinsey adds, “Poor Bryan Cranston. I gave him a big hug. He was so calm and kind even as the wheels were literally coming off the Dunder Mifflin bus.”
