BJ Novak Wants 'The Office' Cast on 'The Premise': Why He Hasn't Worked With Mindy Kaling Yet (Exclusive)

Novak serves as creator, host, executive producer, writer and sometimes director on the new FX series.

BJ Novak's star-studded new show The Premise is about to premiere on FX, but he's already thinking about who'd he'd like to pull in for season 2. As he told ET's Matt Cohen, he's thinking about "everybody" from The Office. 

"I'm always thinking of Rainn Wilson, who played Dwight, and what an amazing talent he is. He's so well known for Dwight, but he was a dramatic actor and he was a clown. I mean, he's done everything, so that's a guy I'd really love to write a role for," he said. "Of course, I'd always love to reunite with Steve Carrell and of course Mindy Kaling. I'd love to someday do something with her, but we're worried that we would fight too much making it." 

As fans know, Novak and Kaling have been best friends since their days on The Office. The show aired for nine seasons on NBC, from 2005 to 2013, and Novak thinks it's a little early for a reunion of any official capacity. 

"I feel like it's a little soon," he said. "Maybe when there's another generation of actors and writers that will do their own Office... I'd love to see that. But you never know." 

In the meantime, fans have Novak's new anthology series to look forward to. Each episode of The Premise, which is created, hosted, executive produced and written by Novak, tells a single character driven story about a current world issue. Stars like Ben Platt, Jon Bernthal, Tracee Ellis Ross, Daniel Dae Kim and more appear throughout the series. 

"They get to really play with truth," Novak explained of how he got the cast to sign on. "Like Jon Bernthal playing someone who lost his daughter and has a revenge plot, and Ben Platt playing a guy who finds a police incident in the back of a sex tape." 

"I wanted to sort of take things we are all talking about and living through and obsessing over and worrying about, but tell them with some comedy and with some drama," he added. 

The late Ed Asner even stars in an episode -- and was a total force, Novak recalled. 

"I mean here he was 90, he was taking naps between shots, sometimes he would nod off in his chair and someone would gently wake him up. But once you woke him up, you couldn’t stop him. He would be improving forever and ever," he remembered. "And I think that to be able to succeed in this business especially -- or any business -- for that long, you have to love it. There's no other way." 

The Premise premieres Thursday on FX on Hulu. 

RELATED CONTENT: