Aziz Ansari signs to US 'Office' spinoff

Comedian Aziz Ansari has been hired to the spinoff of The Office in production in the US.

Producers have made the casting despite not yet having written the show or even decided what it will be about.

Michael Schur, who is executive producing the series for NBC, said: "We're trying to come up with the best concept and hire the funniest writers. In the next couple of weeks, we'll be making the final move to one specific idea."

Neither the producers or NBC have yet confirmed whether characters from The Office will transfer to the new series, which will air on the network in the winter.

However Greg Daniels, Schur's partner on the project, said they were delighted to have hired Aziz, who starred in MTV sketch show Human Giant.

"We met him pretty early on and thought he was very funny," he told Variety. "We loved his work in Human Giant, which I'm a huge fan of, as is Mike, and we have a good character for him."