Night Out
Encyclopedia
"Night Out" is the fifteenth episode of the fourth season of the American comedy television series The Office, and the show's sixty-eighth episode overall. The episode was written by Mindy Kaling
and directed by Ken Whittingham
. It first aired in the United States on April 24, 2008 on NBC
. "Night Out" was viewed by a measured audience of over 7.5 million people, bringing in the lowest number of estimated viewers that The Office received among 12 episodes. "Night Out" received mixed reviews from critics.
In the episode, Michael and Dwight travel to New York City to party with Ryan. Ryan starts acting erratically, and it is revealed that he is under the influence of drugs. Meanwhile, the remaining employees are going to be forced to work on a Saturday. Jim proposes that they work late on Friday, so they do not have to come in the next day. Once Jim and his co-workers finish working, they find that they are locked in, and everyone quickly places the blame on Jim.
(B. J. Novak
) arrives at the Scranton, Pennsylvania
branch of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company and is noticeably friendlier than on his previous visits. Ryan shows the staff at the branch the new Dunder Mifflin website, "Dunder Mifflin Infinity 2.0", the previous version of which was shut down because sexual predators had invaded the social networking component of the site. As Ryan leaves, he tells Michael Scott
(Steve Carell
) of the women he meets in clubs in New York City
. Michael and Dwight Schrute
(Rainn Wilson
) subsequently decide to go to New York, locate Ryan, attend parties with him, and try to meet women while doing so.
In New York, Michael and Dwight locate Ryan after discovering which club Ryan frequents; Ryan is thrilled to see them but appears to be under the influence of drug
s but Michael and Dwight do not notice. Later, Michael, Dwight, Ryan, and Ryan's colleague, Troy Undercook (Noel Petok
) (who Dwight is certain is a Hobbit
due to his short stature) wait outside another club, but fail to get in because they do not have dates. Dwight comes to the rescue when he manages to pair each of them with members of a women's basketball team, who are also waiting in line. Inside the club, Ryan's dancing becomes erratic and aggressive, and he accidentally hits a girl, prompting her friends to attack Ryan. Dwight and Michael escort him out of the club, and after Troy advises them not to take Ryan to a hospital, he runs off. Michael and Dwight bring Ryan back to his apartment, where he tells them that he thinks "his friend Troy" has a drug problem, and asks what he should do about it. Michael, oblivious to the fact that Ryan is obviously referring to his own drug addiction, gives him hypothetical advice involving a wiretap and snitching on a drug dealer. He then tells the camera that he has been watching The Wire
but does not understand what is going on in the show.
Back in Scranton, the rest of the employees are going to be forced to work on a Saturday to record their own sales as the website's sales, which is, according to Ryan, "a temporary procedure to increase the legitimacy of the website." With no one eager to participate, Jim Halpert
(John Krasinski
) decides to ask everyone to stay in the office late instead of coming in for the Saturday. They all agree to the plan, and after working until 9:00 pm, they are shocked to find the parking lot gates locked. Jim had forgotten to tell the security guard that they were staying late. They are unable to return to the office because Pam Beesly
(Jenna Fischer
) locked the door from the inside, and Dwight, miles away in New York, has both the spare and master keys. Jim repeatedly calls Hank the security guard (Hugh Dane). Sitting in the lobby area waiting for the security guard to arrive, the employees exchange jokes and during a moment of levity, Toby Flenderson
(Paul Lieberstein
) affectionately places his hand on Pam's knee. After an awkward silence, Toby proclaims that he is moving to Costa Rica
; he then hops the parking lot fence and runs away. The cleaning staff arrives and lets the group out.
At the end of the episode, Hank finally shows up but is upset because the staff is gone.
"Night Out" was the seventh episode of the series directed by Ken Whittingham
. It was written by Mindy Kaling
, who also acts in the show as customer-service representative Kelly Kapoor
. The episode was the eighth of the series to be written by Kaling. "Night Out" was the third new episode of The Office to be broadcast since the episode "The Deposition" on November 15, 2007, due to the effects of the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike
. Filming of The Office immediately halted on that date, because many members of the cast including Carell, Novak, Kaling, and Lieberstein are members of the WGA and refused to cross WGA picket lines. If not for the writers' strike, this episode would have most likely been filmed in November 2007.
Most of "Night Out" was shot during the night. The scene that has Toby putting his hand on Pam's knee was shot at 2:30 am on a Friday. The scene was shot about eight times because according to Kaling, "everyone kept breaking because Toby was so vulnerable and awkward." Kate Flannery
did her stunts in the scene where Pam throws a football and hits Customer and Supplier Relations worker Meredith Palmer
(Flannery) in the face. Flannery had a stunt double on the set, but she was never needed for the scene. Kate recalls that she "didn't get a scratch in all 14 takes that we shot." Lieberstein on the other hand used a stunt double for the scene in which Toby climbs over the fence. Although Lieberstein offered to do the stunt himself, executive producer and show runner
Greg Daniels
decided against it.
When casting "Tall Girl #1" (the woman who would kiss with Dwight), the show was looking for a girl6'1 or taller. Actress Cassie Fliegel, who is 5'11 , auditioned for the part anyway. After getting a callback, Fliegel went to a gym to work out, attempting to gain muscle to look more like a basketball player. On the day of the callbacks, Fliegel remembers being next to a girl who was 6'8 . Despite her size, Fliegel, a former basketball player herself, was cast for the part. Initially, she did not know that her character was going to make out with Dwight. Fliegel recalls that when she first heard about kissing Dwight she "was like, I don't think so". However, after finding out that she had her own trailer, Fliegel warmed up to the idea. The music in the club was chosen by Novak, Kaling's then-boyfriend Benjamin Nugent
, and Daniel Chun
. When filming Ryan dancing in the club, the girl that Ryan hit was actually a stunt woman. Pads had been placed on the floor so Novak could fall down safely. The German lullaby that Dwight sang to Ryan was script supervisor Veda Semarne's idea. Semarne's Austria
n grandmother sang the same song to her when she was a child.
. This means that four percent of all households with an 18 to 49 year old living in it watched the episode, and ten percent had their televisions tuned to the channel at any point. The episode was watched by 7.56 million viewers. "Night Out" did not do as well as "Chair Model
" did the week before, losing 20 percent of the previous episode's viewers. Some attribute the loss of viewers to a lack of Grey's Anatomy
and a repeat of CSI
the previous week. With 7.69 million, "Night Out" had fewer viewers than any other episode of The Office from the fourth season, except for "Job Fair
", which garnered only 7.16 million viewers.
Reviews for "Night Out" were mixed. M. Giant of TelevisionWithoutPity.com rated the episode with an "A-". A writer for GiveMeMyRemote.com said that "Dwight Schrute was on his game last night", and that he was "big fan of last night’s episode." Zap2It's Rick Porter thought that although it wasn't "as sublime in its Needy Michael-ness as last week's (episode)" and "in some ways, though, it was maybe even a little sadder", "Night Out" was "still pretty darn funny". Porter went on to praise the acting work of both B.J. Novak and Paul Lieberstein
, as well as the writing of Mindy Kaling. TV Squad's Jay Black said that Michael summed up "Night Out" perfectly when he said "Best. Night. Ever." Black went on to praise both of the storylines, and the ability of the show to achieve success both in as well as out of the Dunder Mifflin Scranton building. Similar to Black's statements, Gretchen Hansen of Entertainment Weekly
stated that "'Best. Night. Ever.' Oh, so true, Michael." She also stated that "I guess I knew it was going to be a good episode of The Office when I had two pages of scribbled notes before the first commercial break." Hansen went on to praise both the acting and the writing of the episode as points that contributed to the success of the episode. Rachel Cericola, of TV Fodder, praised the writing of the episode by Mindy Kaling. She also praised the storyline of the episode that didn't involve Michael and Dwight, saying "The second plotline was its usual funny filler. However, it was Toby's revelation that made it all worthwhile."
Travis Fickett of IGN
said that the episode was "still satisfying, even when it's not one of the show's funnier episodes", but "it's a bit of a shame this episode wasn't a home run, because having Dwight and Michael hit the clubs is a funny idea." Fickett went on to praise the episode's awkward moment between Toby and Pam, when Toby placed his hand on Pam's leg, and Toby's subsequent escape by hopping the fence. Fickett stated that, for Toby's growing love of Pam, and growing jealousy of Jim, "this is pretty great pay off". Claire Zulkey, a writer for the Los Angeles Times
, was not as pleased with the episode. Zulkey wrote "that when it's at its zaniest, The Office is at its worst", and the episode was "just too silly to be funny". Zulkey did say that "it was hilarious to see him (Toby) let his hand more-than-linger on her knee and then abruptly flee the premises by jumping over the fence and running home." In a poll done by Office fansite OfficeTally.com, viewers ranked "Night Out" as the thirteenth most popular episode out of the fourteen episodes of season four.
Mindy Kaling
Vera Mindy Chokalingam , better known as Mindy Kaling, is an American actress, comedian, writer and producer who plays Kelly Kapoor on the NBC sitcom The Office. Kaling is also a co-executive producer and writer of several of the show's episodes.-Early life:Kaling was born Vera Chokalingam in...
and directed by Ken Whittingham
Ken Whittingham
Ken Whittingham is an American television director.His most notable directorial work includes a number of episodes from each of the television series 30 Rock, Parks and Recreation, Suburgatory, The Middle, Parenthood, The Bernie Mac Show, Scrubs, Everybody Hates Chris, The Office, My Name Is Earl,...
. It first aired in the United States on April 24, 2008 on NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
. "Night Out" was viewed by a measured audience of over 7.5 million people, bringing in the lowest number of estimated viewers that The Office received among 12 episodes. "Night Out" received mixed reviews from critics.
In the episode, Michael and Dwight travel to New York City to party with Ryan. Ryan starts acting erratically, and it is revealed that he is under the influence of drugs. Meanwhile, the remaining employees are going to be forced to work on a Saturday. Jim proposes that they work late on Friday, so they do not have to come in the next day. Once Jim and his co-workers finish working, they find that they are locked in, and everyone quickly places the blame on Jim.
Plot
Ryan HowardRyan Howard (The Office)
Ryan Bailey Howard , played by B. J. Novak, is a fictional character on the US television sitcom The Office. He is based upon Ricky Howard from the original version of The Office , but his role is significantly expanded and he is a main character.-Character profile:Little is known about Ryan's...
(B. J. Novak
B. J. Novak
Benjamin Joseph Manaly “B. J.” Novak is an American actor, stand-up comedian, screenwriter, and director. He is best known for being a writer and co-executive producer for and playing the role of Ryan Howard on the US version of The Office, as well as appearing in Inglourious Basterds...
) arrives at the Scranton, Pennsylvania
Scranton, Pennsylvania
Scranton is a city in the northeastern part of Pennsylvania, United States. It is the county seat of Lackawanna County and the largest principal city in the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre metropolitan area. Scranton had a population of 76,089 in 2010, according to the U.S...
branch of the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company and is noticeably friendlier than on his previous visits. Ryan shows the staff at the branch the new Dunder Mifflin website, "Dunder Mifflin Infinity 2.0", the previous version of which was shut down because sexual predators had invaded the social networking component of the site. As Ryan leaves, he tells Michael Scott
Michael Scott (The Office)
Michael Gary Scott is a fictional character on NBC's The Office, portrayed by Steve Carell, and based on David Brent from the original British version. Michael, the central character of the series, was the manager of the Scranton branch of paper and printer distribution company Dunder Mifflin Inc...
(Steve Carell
Steve Carell
Steven John "Steve" Carell is an American comedian, actor, voice artist, producer, writer, and director. Although Carell is notable for his role on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, he found greater fame in the late 2000s for playing Michael Scott on The Office...
) of the women he meets in clubs in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. Michael and Dwight Schrute
Dwight Schrute
Dwight Kurt Schrute III is a character on NBC's The Office portrayed by Rainn Wilson. He originally exactly resembled Gareth Keenan from the original UK version of The Office. Dwight is the top salesman and former acting manager for the Dunder Mifflin Paper Company and has won numerous awards for...
(Rainn Wilson
Rainn Wilson
Rainn Dietrich Wilson is an American actor and comedian. He is primarily known for his role as the egomaniacal Dwight Schrute on the American version of the television comedy The Office...
) subsequently decide to go to New York, locate Ryan, attend parties with him, and try to meet women while doing so.
In New York, Michael and Dwight locate Ryan after discovering which club Ryan frequents; Ryan is thrilled to see them but appears to be under the influence of drug
Drug
A drug, broadly speaking, is any substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function. There is no single, precise definition, as there are different meanings in drug control law, government regulations, medicine, and colloquial usage.In pharmacology, a...
s but Michael and Dwight do not notice. Later, Michael, Dwight, Ryan, and Ryan's colleague, Troy Undercook (Noel Petok
Noel Petok
Noel Petok is an American actor, best known for his role as Troy Underbridge , the friend and co-worker of character Ryan Howard on the NBC sitcom The Office, who quite possibly may have been supplying him with cocaine. Troy is teased by Dwight Schrute about being a hobbit . Noel also works behind...
) (who Dwight is certain is a Hobbit
Hobbit
Hobbits are a fictional diminutive race who inhabit the lands of Middle-earth in J. R. R. Tolkien's fiction.Hobbits first appeared in the novel The Hobbit, in which the main protagonist, Bilbo Baggins, is the titular hobbit...
due to his short stature) wait outside another club, but fail to get in because they do not have dates. Dwight comes to the rescue when he manages to pair each of them with members of a women's basketball team, who are also waiting in line. Inside the club, Ryan's dancing becomes erratic and aggressive, and he accidentally hits a girl, prompting her friends to attack Ryan. Dwight and Michael escort him out of the club, and after Troy advises them not to take Ryan to a hospital, he runs off. Michael and Dwight bring Ryan back to his apartment, where he tells them that he thinks "his friend Troy" has a drug problem, and asks what he should do about it. Michael, oblivious to the fact that Ryan is obviously referring to his own drug addiction, gives him hypothetical advice involving a wiretap and snitching on a drug dealer. He then tells the camera that he has been watching The Wire
The WIRE
the WIRE is the student-run College radio station at the University of Oklahoma, broadcasting in a freeform format. The WIRE serves the University of Oklahoma and surrounding communities, and is staffed by student DJs. The WIRE broadcasts at 1710 kHz AM in Norman, Oklahoma...
but does not understand what is going on in the show.
Jim Halpert
James Duncan "Jim" Halpert is a fictional character in the United States version of the television sitcom The Office, played by John Krasinski. The character is based on Tim Canterbury from the original version of The Office...
(John Krasinski
John Krasinski
John Burke Krasinski is an American actor, film director, and writer. He is most widely known for playing Jim Halpert on the NBC sitcom The Office...
) decides to ask everyone to stay in the office late instead of coming in for the Saturday. They all agree to the plan, and after working until 9:00 pm, they are shocked to find the parking lot gates locked. Jim had forgotten to tell the security guard that they were staying late. They are unable to return to the office because Pam Beesly
Pam Beesly
Pamela Morgan "Pam" Halpert is a fictional character on the U.S. television sitcom The Office, played by Jenna Fischer. Her counterpart in the original UK series of The Office is Dawn Tinsley....
(Jenna Fischer
Jenna Fischer
Regina Marie "Jenna" Fischer is an American actress and director. She is most widely known for her Emmy-nominated portrayal of Pam Halpert on the NBC situation comedy and mockumentary The Office, and has also appeared in several films, including Blades of Glory, Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story,...
) locked the door from the inside, and Dwight, miles away in New York, has both the spare and master keys. Jim repeatedly calls Hank the security guard (Hugh Dane). Sitting in the lobby area waiting for the security guard to arrive, the employees exchange jokes and during a moment of levity, Toby Flenderson
Toby Flenderson
Toby Wyatt Flenderson, M.S.W. born 1971 is a character from the US television series The Office. He is played by Paul Lieberstein. He is an original character and has no equivalent in the British version of the show, The Office.-Overview:...
(Paul Lieberstein
Paul Lieberstein
Paul Bevan Lieberstein is an American screenwriter, actor and television producer. An Emmy Award winner, he is most widely known as a writer, producer, and as supporting cast member Toby Flenderson on the U.S...
) affectionately places his hand on Pam's knee. After an awkward silence, Toby proclaims that he is moving to Costa Rica
Costa Rica
Costa Rica , officially the Republic of Costa Rica is a multilingual, multiethnic and multicultural country in Central America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, Panama to the southeast, the Pacific Ocean to the west and the Caribbean Sea to the east....
; he then hops the parking lot fence and runs away. The cleaning staff arrives and lets the group out.
At the end of the episode, Hank finally shows up but is upset because the staff is gone.
Production
Ken Whittingham
Ken Whittingham is an American television director.His most notable directorial work includes a number of episodes from each of the television series 30 Rock, Parks and Recreation, Suburgatory, The Middle, Parenthood, The Bernie Mac Show, Scrubs, Everybody Hates Chris, The Office, My Name Is Earl,...
. It was written by Mindy Kaling
Mindy Kaling
Vera Mindy Chokalingam , better known as Mindy Kaling, is an American actress, comedian, writer and producer who plays Kelly Kapoor on the NBC sitcom The Office. Kaling is also a co-executive producer and writer of several of the show's episodes.-Early life:Kaling was born Vera Chokalingam in...
, who also acts in the show as customer-service representative Kelly Kapoor
Kelly Kapoor
Kelly Rajnigandha Kapoor , is a fictional character from the US television series, The Office. She is played by Mindy Kaling, who is also a writer and producer for the show....
. The episode was the eighth of the series to be written by Kaling. "Night Out" was the third new episode of The Office to be broadcast since the episode "The Deposition" on November 15, 2007, due to the effects of the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike
2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike
The 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, more commonly referred to as simply the Writers' Strike, was a strike by the Writers Guild of America, East and the Writers Guild of America, West ....
. Filming of The Office immediately halted on that date, because many members of the cast including Carell, Novak, Kaling, and Lieberstein are members of the WGA and refused to cross WGA picket lines. If not for the writers' strike, this episode would have most likely been filmed in November 2007.
Most of "Night Out" was shot during the night. The scene that has Toby putting his hand on Pam's knee was shot at 2:30 am on a Friday. The scene was shot about eight times because according to Kaling, "everyone kept breaking because Toby was so vulnerable and awkward." Kate Flannery
Kate Flannery
Katherine Patricia "Kate" Flannery is an American actress best known for playing the role of Meredith Palmer on the NBC hit series The Office.-Personal life:...
did her stunts in the scene where Pam throws a football and hits Customer and Supplier Relations worker Meredith Palmer
Meredith Palmer
Meredith Elizabeth Palmer is a fictional character from the US television series The Office. She is played by Kate Flannery. She is an original character and has no equivalent in the British version of the show, The Office....
(Flannery) in the face. Flannery had a stunt double on the set, but she was never needed for the scene. Kate recalls that she "didn't get a scratch in all 14 takes that we shot." Lieberstein on the other hand used a stunt double for the scene in which Toby climbs over the fence. Although Lieberstein offered to do the stunt himself, executive producer and show runner
Show runner
Showrunner is a term of art originating in the United States and Canadian television industry referring to the person who is responsible for the day-to-day operation of a television seriesalthough such persons generally are credited as an executive producer...
Greg Daniels
Greg Daniels
Gregory Martin "Greg" Daniels is an American television comedy writer, producer, and director.-Life and career:...
decided against it.
When casting "Tall Girl #1" (the woman who would kiss with Dwight), the show was looking for a girl
Benjamin Nugent
Benjamin Nugent is an American writer, best known for the book American Nerd: The Story of My People.-Biography:Nugent grew up in Amherst, Massachusetts. He was the original keyboardist for The Cloud Room, an indie rock band based in Brooklyn, New York...
, and Daniel Chun
Daniel Chun
Daniel Chun is an American comedy writer. He has written for The Office and The Simpsons. He received a Writers Guild Award nomination and an Annie Award for his work on The Simpsons. He is now Head Writer and Co-Executive Producer of The Office...
. When filming Ryan dancing in the club, the girl that Ryan hit was actually a stunt woman. Pads had been placed on the floor so Novak could fall down safely. The German lullaby that Dwight sang to Ryan was script supervisor Veda Semarne's idea. Semarne's Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n grandmother sang the same song to her when she was a child.
Reception
"Night Out" received 4.0/10 in the ages 18–49 demographic in the Nielsen ratingsNielsen Ratings
Nielsen ratings are the audience measurement systems developed by Nielsen Media Research, in an effort to determine the audience size and composition of television programming in the United States...
. This means that four percent of all households with an 18 to 49 year old living in it watched the episode, and ten percent had their televisions tuned to the channel at any point. The episode was watched by 7.56 million viewers. "Night Out" did not do as well as "Chair Model
Chair Model
"Chair Model" is the fourteenth episode of the fourth season of the American comedy television series The Office, and the show's sixty-seventh episode overall. Written by B. J. Novak, and directed by Jeffrey Blitz, the episode first aired in the United States on April 17, 2008 on NBC.In the...
" did the week before, losing 20 percent of the previous episode's viewers. Some attribute the loss of viewers to a lack of Grey's Anatomy
Grey's Anatomy
Grey's Anatomy is an American medical drama television series created by Shonda Rhimes. The series premiered on March 27, 2005 on ABC; since then, seven seasons have aired. The series follows the lives of interns, residents and their mentors in the fictional Seattle Grace Mercy West Hospital in...
and a repeat of CSI
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
CSI: Crime Scene Investigation is an American crime drama television series, which premiered on CBS on October 6, 2000. The show was created by Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer...
the previous week. With 7.69 million, "Night Out" had fewer viewers than any other episode of The Office from the fourth season, except for "Job Fair
Job Fair (The Office)
"Job Fair" is the seventeenth episode of the fourth season of the American comedy television series The Office, and the show's seventieth episode overall. Written by Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky and directed by Tucker Gates, the episode first aired in the United States on May 8, 2008 on NBC...
", which garnered only 7.16 million viewers.
Reviews for "Night Out" were mixed. M. Giant of TelevisionWithoutPity.com rated the episode with an "A-". A writer for GiveMeMyRemote.com said that "Dwight Schrute was on his game last night", and that he was "big fan of last night’s episode." Zap2It's Rick Porter thought that although it wasn't "as sublime in its Needy Michael-ness as last week's (episode)" and "in some ways, though, it was maybe even a little sadder", "Night Out" was "still pretty darn funny". Porter went on to praise the acting work of both B.J. Novak and Paul Lieberstein
Paul Lieberstein
Paul Bevan Lieberstein is an American screenwriter, actor and television producer. An Emmy Award winner, he is most widely known as a writer, producer, and as supporting cast member Toby Flenderson on the U.S...
, as well as the writing of Mindy Kaling. TV Squad's Jay Black said that Michael summed up "Night Out" perfectly when he said "Best. Night. Ever." Black went on to praise both of the storylines, and the ability of the show to achieve success both in as well as out of the Dunder Mifflin Scranton building. Similar to Black's statements, Gretchen Hansen of Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
stated that "'Best. Night. Ever.' Oh, so true, Michael." She also stated that "I guess I knew it was going to be a good episode of The Office when I had two pages of scribbled notes before the first commercial break." Hansen went on to praise both the acting and the writing of the episode as points that contributed to the success of the episode. Rachel Cericola, of TV Fodder, praised the writing of the episode by Mindy Kaling. She also praised the storyline of the episode that didn't involve Michael and Dwight, saying "The second plotline was its usual funny filler. However, it was Toby's revelation that made it all worthwhile."
Travis Fickett of IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
said that the episode was "still satisfying, even when it's not one of the show's funnier episodes", but "it's a bit of a shame this episode wasn't a home run, because having Dwight and Michael hit the clubs is a funny idea." Fickett went on to praise the episode's awkward moment between Toby and Pam, when Toby placed his hand on Pam's leg, and Toby's subsequent escape by hopping the fence. Fickett stated that, for Toby's growing love of Pam, and growing jealousy of Jim, "this is pretty great pay off". Claire Zulkey, a writer for the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, was not as pleased with the episode. Zulkey wrote "that when it's at its zaniest, The Office is at its worst", and the episode was "just too silly to be funny". Zulkey did say that "it was hilarious to see him (Toby) let his hand more-than-linger on her knee and then abruptly flee the premises by jumping over the fence and running home." In a poll done by Office fansite OfficeTally.com, viewers ranked "Night Out" as the thirteenth most popular episode out of the fourteen episodes of season four.
External links
- "Night Out" at NBC.com