How did Christian Slater end up filming the training video for The Office? A simple call from John Krasinski was all it took — and it didn’t hurt that the “A Quiet Place” star was also directing. As part of the episode, Krasinski wanted to record a fake training video that included a celebrity appearance. Having been a long-time friend of Christian Slater’s, Krasinski reached out to Slater’s representative to check his availability. As fate would allow it, Slater’s schedule was open and the role was cast. 

In a 2010 interview with EW, Slater commented further on the general awkwardness of his fake training video. To solidify the cringe factor that already included the introduction: “So, you’ve just been bought by Sabre, and you probably have a lot of questions. Hi, I’m Christian Slater,” the actor tossed in the infamous “thumbs up” at the end of the video, stating: “The thumb’s up was a spontaneous moment. I just kind of thought what would be the cheesiest things to do? John wanted it to really look like Kathy Bates [who plays the new boss] paid for this actor to come in and directed him on what to do behind-the-scenes. So I just kept thinking, ‘What would Kathy Bates tell me to do?'”