Celebrities who want to avoid being harassed in public have found refuge over the past three years because they can wear masks to conceal their identities while protecting themselves from airborne diseases.
On April 13, actor Rainn Wilson, best known as Dwight Schrute on “The Office,” sat next to a fan in a plane and went unnoticed for over 5 hours because his mask concealed his identity. He had fun with the situation in an Instagram post where he secretly filmed the guy sitting next to him as he binge-watched “The Office” during the flight.
In the post, Wilson videos himself, wearing a mask, and slowly pans to the guy sitting next to him who is intently chowing down on a meal while watching “The Office.”
“When the person sitting next to you has no idea who you are …,” Wilson captioned the video to his more than 3.3 million followers on Instagram.
After the video went viral, countless people asked Wilson whether the guy beside him realized who he was. So he did a follow-up post on the video’s second slide where he explained the big reveal. “Everyone keeps asking me did the guy ever recognize you? And, yes, so after five hours of watching ‘The Office,’ I finally nudged him,” he said.
“I was like, ‘Oh, it seems like you like that show.’ And I was slowly taking my mask off,” Wilson continued. “And he’s like, ‘Yeah, I really liked it a lot.’”
Wilson’s anonymity allowed him to get an honest opinion of the show he starred in for 9 seasons. “I was like, ‘Oh, I heard it was not so good,’ Wilson recalled. “He’s like, ‘Well, it starts really slow and the first season is kind of questionable.’”
“And I was slowly taking my mask off, and I was like, ‘Oh, not so good, huh, the first season?’ he said.
“He’s like, ‘Yeah, but once you get into it and get to know the characters.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, but that first season kind of sucks. Is it really bad? That’s too bad that the first season sucks,’” Wilson continued before completely removing his mask and exposing his true identity.
When the guy realized who it was, Wilson says his “head exploded,” and the two “had a nice laugh.”
“So, happy ending,” Wilson concluded the post.
A testament to Wilson’s sense of humor was his patience in the funny situation. He could have revealed who he was when his seatmate first started watching “The Office.” But he waited over 5 hours before the big reveal, making the situation even more surreal.
Funny enough, the thing about the video that received the most comments was that the guy on the plane wasn’t a huge fan of season one of “The Office.”
The most popular comment on the post, which received nearly 5500 likes, was by its_bnv, who took real issue with the guy’s opinion. “First season sucks? Did he not watch diversity day?! One of the best episodes of the entire series.”