How Mindy Kaling's Complaints About The Office's Jim And Pam Storyline Inspired The Mindy Project
Highlights
- Mindy Kaling was bothered by aspects of Jim and Pam's relationship in The Office.
- Kaling wanted to create a TV relationship in The Mindy Project that wasn't as compatible and flawless as Jim and Pam's.
- Aspects of The Mindy Project were inspired by The Office.
Throughout television history, there have been several huge stars who've been paid $1 million per episode. At the height of The Office's success, none of the show's stars were paid that much even though many of them became rich. However, the stars of The Office got something arguably even more special, they have gone down in history.
Now one of the most beloved shows in history, fans adore The Office's cast and their characters including Jim and Pam. Unlike fans, The Office star Mindy Kaling was bothered by aspects of Pam and Jim's relationship. That frustration wound up inspiring a major part of her sitcom, The Mindy Project.
What Mindy Kaling Didn't Like About The Office's Jim And Pam Romance?
In the years since The Office came to an end, it has become one of the most beloved sitcoms in television history. Since The Office is so popular, the show's former cast members tend to get asked about the sitcom during every interview. Unsurprisingly, Mindy Kaling isn't an exception to that trend.
Similar to most of her former The Office co-stars, Kaling has expressed a lot of gratitude for her time starring in The Office. Kaling even once told an NBC News interviewer that The Office saved her mentally and emotionally.
It is also worth noting that Kaling has repeatedly expressed how much she adores her former The Office co-stars. In fact, Kaling loves her former The Office co-stars so much that she gave lots of them roles in The Mindy Project.
Now that it is clear that Kaling has a lot of love in her heart for The Office, it is possible to look at her feelings about the show in the full context. The fact is that in the past, Kaling has been open about her criticisms of The Office and a lot of them revolve around Jim and Pam.
In 2009, Kaling answered questions from the users of the website Office Tally. During Kaling's Office Tally interview, she talked about how she argued with The Office's boss Greg Daniels over a major Jim and Pam moment. As Kaling explained, she was vehemently against Jim and Pam's first kiss.
"Given my personality, people usually think I'd probably gravitate towards the 'romantic' part of romantic comedy. Actually, I tend to worry too much that things will get sappy and slow. We're a comedy, after all. So I err on the side of LESS romance."
Kaling continued, "Interestingly, Greg (who is probably the funniest person I know) has a great love for pure romance. Five years ago, Greg directed The Dundies, which I wrote, and we had a long protracted battle over whether Jim and Pam should kiss."
"Greg was for it, and I was against it!" In the end, Kaling wound up changing her mind and agreeing with Daniels. "Can you believe the terribleness of my choice? And I, like, FOUGHT him about it."
How Did Jim And Pam From The Office Inspired The Mindy Project?
During The Office's nine seasons on the air, one of the show's main focuses was Jim and Pam's relationship. In that sense, The Office had a lot in common with other shows including Mindy Kaling's next show, The Mindy Project.
Especially during the first four seasons, The Mindy Project focused on the relationship Danny Castellano and Mindy Lahiri shared. After initially hating each other, Mindy and Danny eventually fall in love, get married, and become parents together.
Based on that summary of Danny and Mindy's relationship, their portrayal doesn't seem groundbreaking. However, as Mindy Kaling revealed during interviews, Danny and Mindy's storyline was inspired by what she didn't like about Jim and Pam's relationship from The Office.
In 2012, Kaling was interviewed by Entertainment Weekly. During the resulting conversation, Kaling explained that she wanted Danny and Mindy to not be as compatible and flawless as Jim and Pam usually seemed to be.
"In The Office were Jim and Pam, characters that are so deeply good and in many ways don't have a ton of flaws. But they were so compatible that in many ways maybe their personalities overlapped with each other's." Kaling also expressed that she wanted to see a TV relationship that reminded her more of her real-life relationships.
"I love fighting with guys, and that's something that I don't get to see: arguing at a high level with a member of the opposite sex. That didn't really happen that much on The Office. I just like that Moonlighting, Benedick-Beatrice type of thing."
Months later in 2014, Kaling was interviewed by US Weekly and spoke about a passionate kiss from The Mindy Project. During that interview, Kaling explained that she wasn't satisfied by the kisses Jim and Pam from The Office shared.
“I was in The Office when Jim and Pam kissed, and that was a very chaste, romantic kiss.” Once Kaling was in charge of The Mindy Project, her frustrations with Jim and Pam yet again inspired her portrayal of Danny and Mindy's relationship.
This time, Kaling wanted to make sure that a kiss Danny and Mindy shared was a lot more passionate.
Speaking about a kiss Danny and Mindy shared, Kaling told US Weekly that she wanted the moment to be intense. "This was, like there was sexual tension building up, and this was it exploding. I thought while the episode had romantic parts to it, but I thought the kiss was actually more of like a makeout.”
On top of Kaling finding Danny and Mindy's passion compelling, she also believed that their kiss had great storytelling potential. As Kaling told US Weekly, passionate and spur-of-the-moment kisses often have a lot more emotional fallout.
“Well, the good thing about them is the kiss can go so many ways. Because it was more of like a frantic makeout, because it was more of an expression of lust than romance, those are the kind of things that people often regret."
Kaling continued, "So I feel like that left it open in a lot of ways for us. But in the first episode back, it deals with it in such a funny way that I’m just excited for you guys to see it.”
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