John Krasinski has revealed that he refused to shoot a scene in The Office that would have depicted his character Jim cheating on his wife Pam (Jenna Fisher) during the show's eighth season.
As spotted by the New York Post, Krasinski wrote about the scene during an entry for a new book about the show called Welcome to Dunder Mifflin: The Ultimate Oral History of The Office.
Showrunners at the time had apparently planned on writing a scene into the episode 'After Hours', where Krasinski's character would "make out" with his wife's maternity leave replacement Cathy when the pair found themselves alone together in a Florida hotel room.
“That’s the only time I remember putting my foot down…" says Krasinski in the book. "I remember saying things that I never thought I’d say before, like, ‘I’m not going to shoot it," he writes before explaining that he took the issue to executive producer and director Greg Daniels.
“My feeling is there is a threshold with which you can push our audience. They are so dedicated. We have shown such great respect to them. But there’s a moment where if you push them too far, they’ll never come back. And I think that if you show Jim cheating, they’ll never come back.”
While the couple had their fair share of ups and downs across the sitcom's nine seasons, the show's community will likely be glad to hear that Daniels ultimately decided not to shoot the scene. Though, perhaps unsurprisingly the director does note that a number of the factors affecting the couple were introduced in part to keep fans engaged with the show.
“I feel like that kind of worry was good in terms of the fans’ engagement. I think they knew what was coming,” Daniels says when discussing plot points such as the show's decision to bring in Brian the sound technician to comfort Pam following a fallout between the pair.
“They were very comfortable with the show they were getting, and I needed to worry them that maybe I was going to give them a bad ending so they were happy when they got a good ending,” he finishes.
For more on The Office, make sure to check out this article detailing how James Gandolfini was paid $3 million to not become the new boss in the show.
Jared Moore is a freelance writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.