John Krasinski Secretly Wore a Wig During Season 3 of 'The Office'

Turns out a lot of work went into maintaining Jim's iconic bedhead

BY Alex HudsonPublished Jul 3, 2020

Jim's floppy mop from The Office is arguably one of the most iconic looks from '00s TV. Well, it turns out that John Krasinski's tussled bedhead actually took a lot of work to maintain, since he was actually secretly wearing a wig during the show's third season.

That's right — the moments when his relationship with Karen fizzles and he finally asks out Pam (sorry, spoilers!) were filmed when he was wearing a wig.

This revelation comes from Office hairstylist Kim Ferry, who spoke with Mashable about her experiences on the show. She revealed that, towards the end of the third season, Krasinski wanted to take a role in the 2008 film Leatherheads. That role would require a haircut, meaning that Krasinski would need to wear a wig for the final six episodes of the season.

Showrunner Greg Daniels denied Krasinski's request to wear a wig, so the actor pulled off a Jim-level stunt of his own: he got a wig custom made from human hair and wore it without telling anyone (except for Ferry, of course). Here's how Ferry remembers Krasinski's big reveal:

Greg kept saying, "No! I would know if you're wearing a wig." So John leaned over the desk and said, "No I don't think you would." That's when he ripped it off and shut it down, and we got to do the wig.

It's an undeniably impressive stunt in service of a largely forgettable film: Leatherheads went on to lose almost $17 million at the box office and currently holds a "rotten" rating of 51% on Rotten Tomatoes. Exclaim! called the film a "slowly sinking ship."

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