Wally “Famous” Amos wasn’t just a great baker, he was also an excellent entertainer. The iconic founder of the Famous Amos cookie brand, who passed away Aug. 13 at age 88, made the most out of his entertainment business connections, making multiple television appearances to promote his company.
The first Famous Amos store opened in 1975 on Sunset Boulevard with the help of investments from the likes of Marvin Gaye and Helen Reddy, whom Wally had met through his career as a talent representative at the William Morris Agency (he is credited for booking Simon & Garfunkel and would use cookies to sweet-talk clients).
In the years that followed, as the business grew, Amos showed up in the massively popular sitcoms The Jeffersons and Taxi, and soon Famous Amos cookies became a household name. More recently, the enterpreneur made a cameo appearance in The Office in a perfectly on-brand chaotic scene featuring some of the show’s most recognizable faces.
What episode of The Office was Famous Amos in?
A 76-year-old Amos was featured on episode 15 of The Office‘s eighth season as a guest speaker at a business retreat at the Sabre headquarters in Tallahassee (the baker and former talent agent’s hometown) to teach the gang about proper business building. Dwight, Jim, Stanley, Erin, and others had traveled to Florida as a selected team to participate in a special project that was being developed by the new owners of Dunder Mifflin.
Although the cookie king first draws celebrity-worthy reactions from the crowd upon being introduced by Catherine Tate’s Nellie Bertram, no one really pays attention to what he has to say once they find out he’s brought cookies. What makes the scene especially funny is the fact that Amos famously lost his business (and with it his name and likeness), due to bad business decisions. Much like this capsule scene in The Office, his legacy was never tied to savvy business moves, but to his delicious, handmade gourmet cookies that became the first of their kind to be widely distributed in grocery stores.
As Famous Amos was passed around from one owner to the next, the man who first decided to sell his Aunt Della’s famous pecan chocolate-chip cookies in a small shop in L.A. distanced himself from the business. Amos was uninterested in the direction it was going in after the new bosses began adding preservatives to the recipe for a longer shelf life, essentially making them a copy of every other product in the market.
A highlight of Famous Amos’ appearance in The Office is when Ellie Kemper’s Erin Hannon calls him “Famous,” thinking that’s his actual first name, and then apologizes for wasting his time when he figures out she was about to pitch him an oatmeal with no raisins cookie recipe. The episode is available to watch with a Peacock subscription.
Wallace “Wally” Amos died peacefully in his Honolulu home in Hawaii after battling dementia for years. He is survived by his wife Carol Williams, children Shawn, Sarah, Michael, and Gregory, as well as seven grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.