Dunder Mifflin Scranton may be on the hunt for a new manager this time next year.
Steve Carell, who's played Michael Scott on "The Office" for the past six seasons, says that the 2010-11 season will "probably" be his last on the show. In a BBC radio interview with his "Date Night" co-star Tina Fey (which Office Tally picked up; it also has audio of the interview), he notes that his contract runs out next season. Here's the full exchange:
Interviewer: How long will you stay with 'The Office' for? How many more series? How long does your contract run?
Carell: Contract through next season.
Interviewer: And will you stay after that?
Carell: I don't think so. I think that will probably be my last year.
That's potentially huge news for the show, which is NBC's second-highest-rated series (after "Sunday Night Football") among adults 18-49; it's averaging a 4.6 rating in the demographic this season, which places it in the Top 20 among all shows, and just under 9 million viewers per week, the most by far of anything in NBC's Thursday lineup.
