There’s a particular kind of anxiety that comes with stepping into the orbit of a TV show like The Office. For Sabrina Impacciatore—the Italian force of nature now starring in Peacock’s new spin-off The Paper—it was more like a recurring panic attack. “You should have seen me during the table reads,” she says. “Every week, I was shaking under the table. I didn’t understand half of what was going on because of the language. It was terrifying. I can’t believe I made it.”
And yet, she didn’t just make it—she became one of the breakout stars of a show that could’ve easily collapsed under its own lineage. The Paper picks up years after the Scranton documentary, with the same camera crew descending on a struggling Midwestern newspaper and its chaotic staff. Impacciatore’s Esmeralda isn’t just chaotic; she’s a full-body caffeine jolt. “She just wants to survive, no matter the cost,” Sabrina laughs. “She’s bossy, manipulative, maybe horrible—but she’s doing it all to survive.”
Her definition of “commitment” extends well beyond method acting. She tells me, almost proudly, about her doomed attempt to perform “the worm.” “I had this line, ‘I’m going to do the worm while you girls look at me,’” she explains. “But because I’m stupid, I told Greg [Daniels] and Michael [Koman], ‘Let’s actually shoot the worm!’ I didn’t know what it was. I thought it was… I don’t know, an actual worm?” They, of course, said yes.
“So they bring in a choreographer. I spent all night on YouTube, doing the worm in my bed. I didn’t sleep. The next day, I did the best worm in the history of worms,” she says, laughing. “And then the director said, ‘That was a great rehearsal. Now let’s shoot it.’ I had blood on my knees. So what’s in the show is actually after—the injured worm.”
It’s a fitting metaphor for The Paper itself: bruised, battered, but endearingly alive. Sabrina says she’s been waiting her whole career for this balance of freedom and madness. “Greg and Michael trusted me so much,” she says. “I couldn’t believe it. They just said, ‘Go wild.’ So I did. And somehow, it worked.”
She’s not exaggerating about her comedy chops, either. While many Americans first noticed her as the exasperated Valentina in The White Lotus, Impacciatore built her career in Italy as a comedian, writer, and sketch performer. “I was very young. I didn’t even know I could be funny. Directors told me, ‘You have a gift for comedy,’ and I said, ‘What are you talking about?’” she says. “But I think comedy is born from tragedy. I’m a very dramatic person in real life. That’s where it comes from.”
That duality—funny and tragic, cruel and innocent—is exactly what she brings to Esmeralda. “I told them, let’s put an element of innocence in her,” Sabrina says. “Kids can be nasty and manipulative, but they’re still innocent. That makes her human. You can’t hate her.” It’s not hard to imagine Michael Scott beaming with recognition from the background.
When asked whether The Office itself was ever a reference point on set, she shakes her head. “Never. Never ever,” she says. “The only connections were Greg, Oscar [Nuñez], and the directors. But you could feel the spirit of The Office there. You’d walk on set and it was like—boom—the office is alive. You could feel the soul.”
Still, she admits the “soul” came with a side of heavy expectation. “It was like doing squats,” she jokes. “You have this big weight on your shoulders. But if you use the pressure right, that fear can make you better.”
Her approach—equal parts instinct and chaos—feels like the perfect match for a mockumentary that thrives on awkward sincerity. When she first auditioned, producers sent her eleven pages of monologues. “Eleven!” she exclaims. “I had 24 hours to learn them, and I was flying on a plane. I didn’t remember one line. But when I’m inspired, I wake up at night with ideas. It’s like a tornado. And that’s how Esmeralda was born—in the middle of the tornado.”
She recalls her first day of shooting, when she thought she was just coming in for a makeup test. “Greg sat on my right, Michael on my left, and they started asking Esmeralda a hundred questions,” she says. “I had no idea what to do, so I just survived—exactly like Esmeralda. And they laughed so much. That’s when I knew, okay, this works.”
Now that the show is out and being praised by even the most skeptical Office diehards, Sabrina can finally breathe. “It’s like being in a Luna Park,” she grins. “Everything is crazy and fun, but I’m ready for it. Acting keeps me sane. Otherwise, I think I’d need drugs.” She bursts into laughter. “So choose acting, not drugs. Choose The Paper.”
It’s impossible not to root for her—bloodied knees, wild energy, broken English and all. Like The Paper itself, she’s figuring it out as she goes, surviving every awkward silence and bad idea until it becomes something extraordinary.
Watch the full interview above and then check out the trailer below.
