A Long Overdue Ode To David Wallace From ‘The Office’

Well, this all kind of sucks, doesn’t it? The thing is, “this” in that first sentence could mean a few different things and what’s remarkable is I don’t even have to explain what I mean. We just all know. In response to all this, like a lot of people, I’ve been rewatching a lot of The Office lately. Now, I haven’t been specifically seeking it out – it’s not like I’m firing it up on streaming and picking out specific episodes – but, instead, I’ve just been drawn to it when it’s on cable, like comfort food. And I’m here to tell you that The Office is on cable a whole heck of a lot.

(This is a topic for another day, but I am kind of stunned with some of the jokes The Office got away with, and there’s no possible way The Office could withstand today’s social media interrogation of every line of dialogue. Also, I think this is why The Office has become so popular with Gen Z because there’s nothing quite like it on television right now. It didn’t seem groundbreaking at the time – it was literally a remake of another show – but now it seems like something weird and wonderful that couldn’t exist as something new right now.)

Now, what’s weird is – and maybe this is because I’ve seen the episodes before and my brain is looking for something new – the character I’ve become the most infatuated with is Andy Buckley’s David Wallace. I don’t think anyone has ever played a realistic mid-level company, corporate boss better. He’s perfect. He’s so perfect it’s uncanny and I’m just drawn to every scene he’s in. (It’s worth noting here that at one point in his life Buckley worked as a stockbroker, so he’s actually been in the corporate environment – which makes a lot of sense.)

Before what you’re reading right now became my career, my first jobs after college were at a bank and at an insurance company. (Strangely, my college major was actually consumer economics. This is something I bring up in conversation from time to time when I want to pretend I know what I’m talking about, even though I have no idea what I’m talking about.) And I remember when the David Wallace-types of those companies would visit the office I worked in – it was always this huge deal. These corporate leaders would always be treated like they were legitimate famous people. It was like Billy Idol was visiting. I remember one women got her corporate branded t-shirt autographed by a visiting corporate boss.

This is all encapsulated in the “Cocktails” episode of The Office when David and Rachel Wallace host a corporate party at their home. While Michael and Jan are busy making out, and Dwight is checking the house for imperfections, this is the episode when, at the party, Jim gets an invite from David Wallace to meet in the backyard to shoot the basketball around. Then Jim kind of smugly looks at the camera with a big smile and says he is going to shoot some hoops with THE David Wallace. This is a great scene because it’s so very true. It’s weird how we create celebrities in our own microcosms, and when a person works at a corporation, people like David Wallace become celebrities. (It’s always weird when a new person starts and they don’t know who the David Wallace of the company is and everyone has to explain to the new employee just how important David Wallace is. Then, a couple of weeks later, when the new employee finally meets David Wallace, he or she always has that look on his or her face like a famous person just entered the room. I’ve seen this happen many, many times.)

Now, the other aspect that makes David Wallace perfect is David Wallace’s own personal temperament. Usually, the actor hired to play a character like this plays it either stuffy or cold and boisterous. Buckley plays David Wallace as fairly unflappable, while remaining calm and collected. Other than the episode in which Michael visits an unemployed Wallace (really the only episode Buckley gets to go a little nuts), most of the time the most negative emotion Buckley will offer is give a look of bewilderment here and there. This is the perfect portrayal of someone in Wallace’s position. When Wallace is unpleased, he still remains pleasant, but there’s some passive-aggressive bite that has to later be interpreted. This is also a trait of the people who hold these positions.

I think we take it for granted, or don’t even notice it, because it’s just so well done. Because in reality, when companies hire for management, those companies look for level-headed, reasonable people who won’t get the company sued. Buckley plays Wallace in that frame of reference. A lot of this comes out in the episode when David Wallace is interviewing prospects to take over Jan Levinson’s position. Those scenes still make me anxious because no matter what strange answers he hears, he just keeps going along unfazed, just like anyone in his position would actually do while conducting an interview. It’s like being in an actual interview.

I know plenty of people who have never worked a job with a traditional corporate structure. When they find out I have and they ask what that’s like, I now just point to David Wallace. It’s like that. If you work at some sort of mid-level corporate job in the Midwest (or Scranton), that’s the person who will most likely be running the show. And when he shows up at your office, expect people to freak out.

So, all these years later, I finally appreciate David Wallace. I finally can see that Buckley was so good at playing David Wallace, I didn’t even realize it was happening. And, just maybe, David Wallace’s calm and stable hand can get us through all of this together.

You can contact Mike Ryan directly on Twitter.