‘The Office’ Star Rainn Wilson: From Dwight Schrute to ‘Code 3’

Obsessed: The Podcast

The Daily Beast

Tv & Film

4.5 • 686 Ratings

🗓️ 10 September 2025

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

When they were shooting the pilot episode of ‘The Office,’ Steve Carell told Rainn Wilson that playing Dwight Schrute could change his life forever. And he could not have been more right. In this episode, Wilson breaks down his unique career journey from working character actor to sitcom star all the way through his latest film ‘Code 3’ (in theaters Friday Sept. 12) in which he plays a burnt out paramedic alongside fellow comedian Lil Rel Howery. His role in the new movie, as well as much of what he has done since ‘The Office’ ended in 2013, feels very different from Dwight, and purposefully so. Wilson opens up about the massive blessing and occasional curse of being so closely associated with such a hugely popular character. Addressing the perennial question about whether ‘The Office’ could be made today, he admits that the “clueless, insensitive, racist, sexist” jokes hit differently now. Wilson also reveals the “relief” he felt when NBC killed off a Dwight-centered spinoff and shares whether that character could ever pop up on the new Peacock spinoff ‘The Paper’—or perhaps even a movie version of ‘The Office.’ Follow Rainn Wilson on Instagram @rainnwilson Follow Matt Wilstein on Bluesky @mattwilstein Follow The Last Laugh on Instagram @lastlaughpod Highlights from this episode and others at The Daily Beast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:26.7	Pay within 48 hours online, full teas and seas at Williamhill.com.
0:29.4	Play responsibly.
0:37.3	This is the Last Laugh.
0:39.1	I'm Matt Wilstein from The Daily Beast, and today on the show, you almost certainly know him as Dwight Shrewd from the office.
0:46.3	He hosts the podcast Soul Boom and plays a burnt-out paramedic with a secret heart of gold in the new movie Code 3.
0:54.0	Rain Wilson, welcome to the Last Laugh.
0:57.2	Happy to have a last laugh with you, Matt.
1:01.7	That's great.
1:02.9	Yeah, I'm thrilled to have you here, and I want to start by talking about this new movie Code
1:07.4	3, which I just got to see and really enjoyed it a lot.
1:11.5	So can we kind of start with how this story, this film came to you, why you wanted to do it,
1:18.0	what the story behind that is?
1:21.4	Sure.
1:22.4	Yeah, I went in to this wonderful producer's office.
1:25.9	His name is Matt Smith.
1:27.7	And I was meeting about a movie that I was interested in.
1:32.1	And he met with me and he was like,
1:34.0	you're not right for this movie.
	...

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