The Office star Jenna Fischer revealed the “intense” reason why she decided to step away from acting.
The 52-year-old actress is known for her main role as Pam Beesly in the NBC adaptation of the British sitcom. The Office ran until 2013. Fischer left acting in 2019 after the ABC sitcom Splitting Up Together ended.
During a new appearance on Jesse Tyler Ferguson’s Dinner’s On Me podcast, Fischer explained her decision.
“After The Office, I did a few jobs,” she said. “It was during Splitting Up Together, which I really loved that cast so much, but the hours were so intense. It was like 65-70 hours a week. It was really, really hard and my kids were really small.”
“I just decided after that that being like the lead of a television show or even a regular on a television show was not going to be a fit for me anymore,” Fischer explained.
The actress shares Weston, 14, and Harper, 12, with husband Lee Kirk. Fischer said she can now be “at every school drop-off, every school pick-up, every teacher conference, every concert.”
“I didn’t have to beg someone to go to the Halloween parade,” she joked.
Her children were young when she stopped acting in major television and film roles, explained Fischer, leading them to think of her as a “podcaster.” Fischer has been running her podcast with The Office co-star Angela Kinsey since 2019.
“As a result, my kids... were so little when that change happened, they thought of me as a podcaster,” she revealed. “Like if anybody asked them, ‘What does your mom do?” They say, ‘Oh, she’s a podcaster. She has a podcast.’ They didn’t even understand what my podcast was about. ‘You know, it’s called Office Ladies. It’s with her best friend, Angela.’”
Fischer, who is estimated to have made $150,000 per episode by the end of the show’s run, stipulated that having the security of a job for nine seasons on The Office was “an amazing thing.”
