Livin' the Dream

The episode guest stars Michael Imperioli as Sensei Billy, and was initially scheduled to air in its half-hour timeslot, before being expanded to a full hour.

The series—presented as if it were a real documentary—depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania, branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company.

In the episode, Andy Bernard (Ed Helms) decides to pursue a career as a professional actor, and quits his job at Dunder Mifflin.

Meanwhile, Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) finally receives his black belt in karate from his new sensei (Imperioli) and, on the recommendation of Jim Halpert (John Krasinski), is promoted to Regional Manager of the Scranton branch.

CEO David Wallace plans to fire Andy Bernard due to his missing work for acting gigs.

However, mere hours later Andy feels that he is sticking with his Dundler-Mifflin job only because it is safe and that he has to take a shot at achieving fame.

Andy bids farewell to his coworkers with an unexpectedly moving rendition of "I Will Remember You", prompting them to comment to the documentary crew that he may have star potential after all.

"Livin' the Dream" was written by story editor Niki Schwartz-Wright, marking her second writing credit for the series, after the earlier season episode "Lice".

[1] In its original American broadcast, "Livin' the Dream" was viewed by an estimated 3.51 million viewers and received a 1.8 rating/5% share among adults between the ages of 18 and 49.

Roth Cornet of IGN wrote that "it pleases me greatly that at the conclusion of this super-sized episode I was left, once again, truly looking forward to seeing what these next few weeks, and that final hour of The Office, will bring."

Cornet praised the full-use of the ensemble, particularly the "Phyllis and Stanley Lil' Romeo mini-debate" and Creed's confused mimicking of Dwight's declaration.

[10] Alan Sepinwall of HitFix gave the episode a slightly more mixed review writing that "the non-Andy parts of "Livin' the Dream" were fairly interesting".