Casino Night
"Casino Night" is the second season finale of the American comedy television series The Office and the twenty-eighth episode overall.
Written by Steve Carell, who also acts in the show as Michael Scott, and directed by Ken Kwapis, the episode originally aired in the United States on May 11, 2006, on NBC.
The series depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company.
The episode received wide acclaim from television critics and earned a Nielsen rating of 3.9 in the 18–49 demographic, being seen by 7.7 million viewers.
In the cold open, Jim Halpert attempts to convince Dwight Schrute that he can move inanimate objects through telekinesis.
As he prepares for a charity casino night in the office building, Michael Scott invites his boss, Jan Levinson, to attend.
Jim, upset about Pam's impending marriage to Roy Anderson, tells the documentary crew that he met with Jan about transferring to Dunder Mifflin's Stamford, Connecticut branch, because he has "no future" in Scranton.
During Casino Night, Dwight wins a game of craps and kisses Angela Martin on the cheek, disregarding their attempts to keep their intimate relationship a secret.
[3] Toby Flenderson, who is portrayed by writer Paul Lieberstein, stated during the episode "I'm gonna chase that feeling" after winning at a game of poker.
The writing staff, on the other hand, wanted Pam and Jim's moment to be private and only heard via the mics; Daniels explained, "The writing staff was itching to do something kind of weird [with the scene] and have it be a private moment that the doc crew didn't know was going to happen and so only heard on their mics and came running around the corner to film.
"[11] The Season Two DVD contains the following deleted scenes from this episode: the staff playing Dunder Mifflin Mad Libs, Dwight and Jim choosing their charities, Dwight considering Jim's telekinetic powers, an extension of Michael's scene with Darryl, Pam finding planning a wedding stressful, and Meredith being recognized by the casino dealer.
[12] On the phone with Jan, Michael compares the performance of the Scranton branch of Dunder Mifflin to the biblical story of David and Goliath.
[13] When Michael mentions donating money to "Afghanistanis with AIDS", the conversation gets confused, and the various office workers begin talking about Afghanis, Afghans, and the nonsensical "Afghanistanannis".
[13] In a talking head, Michael notes that AIDS is not a humorous disease, and is one of the many things that is off-topic in comedy, including the assassination of John F. Kennedy and The Holocaust.
[17] Brian Zoromski of IGN said that "'Casino Night,' was full of great character development, awkward situations and laugh-out-loud moments.
[13] Gillian Flynn of Entertainment Weekly noted that, unlike other shows that featured resolved sexual tension, The Office was in no worry of being cancelled.
[19] In a 2011 poll conducted by fansite OfficeTally, fans voted "Casino Night" as their favorite of all Office episodes that had been aired at that time.
