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- [00:00]
Terry Gross
Okay. So does this sound like you you love NPR's podcasts. You wish you could get more of all your favorite shows, and you want to support NPR's mission to create a more informed public. If all that sounds appealing, then it is time to sign up for the NPR Bundle. Learn more at plus.npr.org this is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. My guest Jesse Eisenberg wrote, directed and stars in the film A Real PA. Oscar predictors expect the film to be nominated for multiple Academy Awards. Eisenberg had his first major film role in 2002's Roger Dodger when he was still in high school. Three years later, when he was 21, he was a star of the film the Squid and the Whale. He played Mark Zuckerberg in the Social Network about the early days of Facebook. He played the journalist interviewing writer David Foster Wallace in the end of the tour. He starred in the 2022 miniseries Fleischman is in Trouble, in a Real Pain. He plays a husband and father who goes on a Jewish heritage tour in Poland with his cousin, played by Kieran Culkin, who was like a brother when they were growing up. The trip is funded by their beloved, recently deceased grandmother, who left money in her will for the trip so that they could see the home she fled when the Nazis were in power. Each cousin is dealing with mental health issues, which are exacerbated by the trip. Eisenberg's character is introverted and takes meds for his ocd. He's constantly hurt and embarrassed by his cousin's inappropriate behavior. Culkin's character is dealing with depression, but when around other people he becomes extroverted, manic in ways that can be seen as charismatic or incredibly annoying and intrusive. Both extremes are intensified by the disconnect Culkin's character experiences between the first class train car the tour travels on and the cattle cars that brought Jews to their death. He's also troubled by the disconnect between the nice restaurants the tour takes them to, while at the same time the death camp Majdanek is on the tour. Our critic John Powers wrote, quote, with the lightest of touches, Eisenberg's stunning film got me thinking about the different ways we deal with suffering, both past and present. Should we simply get on with life, as David Eisenberg's character seems to, or should we take that pain into ourselves, as does Culkin's character, Benji, or is there a way to somehow do both, unquote? It's worth mentioning that the film also has Comic touches. Jesse Eisenberg, welcome to FRESH air. And congratulations on the film.
- [02:45]
Jesse Eisenberg
Thank you so much. What an honor to be on your show.
- [02:48]
Terry Gross
Oh, it's a pleasure to have you. So the movie is based in part in a movie you were making, a kind of road movie set in Mongolia and it wasn't working for you.
- [02:58]
Jesse Eisenberg
That's right.
- [02:59]
Terry Gross
And then you saw an ad advertising, like a Holocaust tour, a Jewish heritage tour, and it said lunch included. And you thought, okay, this is something. What intrigued you about that, especially the lunch included part?
- [03:14]
Jesse Eisenberg
Well, yeah, I mean, actually it was even more explicit than what you mentioned. It said Auschwitz tours with lunch. Right. So I was writing this movie that took place in Mongolia. It was about similar kind of characters, David and Benji, the character, you know, characters Kieran and I play in this movie. But it was set in Mongolia and it was just not going well until. And then an ad popped up online for Auschwitz tours with lunch. And I just thought, you know, well, first, like, I must be the target demographic for that advertisement. But also, like, it was just so profound in its simplicity, spoke to so many awkward modern things, which is just like, you know, we want to tour sites of horror and, you know, kind of wonder, like, why do we. Why do we want to do that? What are we doing when we're doing that? And then also we want to maintain the creature comforts that we have in our lives. So that's the with lunch part. And so, you know, I clicked on the ad and it took me to a site for, you know, what you would imagine, English speaking heritage tour of Poland that culminates at Auschwitz. And it was just so interesting, just like, posed all these interesting philosophical questions like, you know, why do we do tragedy tourism? And why don't we try to connect to this kind of history in a way that feels less, you know, comfortable?
- [04:30]
Terry Gross
Well, another question the movie raises is, like, what is real pain? Like, what is suffering? Like, if you're suffering from, you know, emotional or mental health issues, and I know you have issues of your own, the character has ocd. I don't know if that's an issue you have to contend with. But if you have your own internal suffering, and let's face it, people take their lives because of that internal suffering. Like, you don't even have to have somebody kill you, you end your own life because the suffering is so bad. But you haven't been in Auschwitz suffering there. But so is your suffering any less important? Does that count as pain?
- [05:09]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, exactly. One of the kind of ironies with Ciaran's character in the movie, as you said, he kind of plays this incredibly charming and manic guy, but he also just is privately suffering from severe depression. I mean, severe, like, you know, wondering if he wants to go on with his life. And one of the dramatic ironies in the movie is that our grandmother survived, as I say in the movie, by a thousand miracles. You know. You know, the way my family survived the war. They were, you know, hidden in basements with their teachers. You know, crazy stories, as, you know, from, you know, anybody who survived the Holocaust, there's usually a story that's, you know, incredibly shocking and more shocking than the last one you heard. So, like, there's this irony where we are the products of a thousand miracles, and yet Kieran's character doesn't even know if he wants to live. And what is that? Why do we walk around with all this modern pain when our lives are materially comfortable after being the products of incredible stories of survival? And it's something I think about all the time because I'm like, you know, a depressed person or whatever. And I walk around, and I have a materially nice life, and I walk around kind of feeling bad for myself, being miserable over minor things. And yet I'm also incredibly fascinated by my family's history in Poland and learning about the suffering. And I don't know how to reconcile those two things of feeling bad about my very fortunate life and also understanding the horrors of my family's past or the horrors of people around the world today. And because I can't reconcile those two things, I was trying to sort out that in the movie, which is why the title A Real Pain, it's like, what is asking the audience that question? What is real pain? Is my character's manageable, medicated OCD pain valid? Is Kieran's pain valid? Even though, you know, he's experiencing, you know, the worst of what a kind of psyche can experience, but at the same time, he is in a comfortable life. No one is trying to kill him or is. The only pain that's valid and should be kind of acknowledged is the pain of war and of kind of mass genocide and mass trauma.
- [07:16]
Terry Gross
Okay, so you are a writer and director and actor, and you were not only in Majdanek, the death camp in Poland, you were filming there, because you do have a scene there, and it's a very emotionally moving scene. So I'd like to hear what it was like for you to not only have lunch and dinner while visiting Majdanek, you were filming there. You were, you were taking this kind of, like, holy place and setting up your lights and your cameras and your actors. How did you go about it in the most respectful way that you could think of while also making a movie?
- [07:58]
Jesse Eisenberg
So, like, you know, when I was writing the movie, I had set a scene at Majdanek. That's the camp that was like, you know, it's really five minutes away from where I had family. And as soon as I finished the script, I just assumed that we'd be able to, you know, film there, because it was in the script until we got Polish producers on board who told me that they read the script and they think everything is doable, but that it's going to cost a million dollars to build Majdanek. I was like, what do you mean, a million dollars? It's already there. She said, well, no, you can't film, you know, a narrative movie, you know, at a concentration camp. These are hallowed grounds. And, you know, they get asked every day to be turned into, you know, essentially, you know, war sets, you know, that they take place in 1942 and have extras running around in Nazi uniforms. And, like, they just don't. Of course, they're not going to allow that at this kind of site, which is a cemetery, which is a site of, you know, mass horror. And so over the course of, like, the next eight months before we made the movie, I just tried to reach out in any way possible to this concentration camp, Majdanek, to explain what I wanted to do, which is I wanted to film a scene of a modern tour group going through this place, you know, in an attempt to have it be part of the movie, but also to show audiences what this place is. And my kind of plea to them was that I want to do the same thing you're doing. You exist as a museum to show people today what happened on this site. And I'm trying to do the same thing through my movie. And so once we kind of were able to, you know, speak to the people who work there, who are these unbelievably brilliant young academics. These are not like state apparatchiks who are running this place. These are like young academics who could be doing anything with their lives and are spending it every day at a concentration camp to preserve the memory of Jewish history. And so once we were able to be in touch with them, they understood what my motivation was and how respectful we were going to be, how the scenes would be shot. We went over every word in the script. We went over every angle that we wanted to film, and it Took a long time, but they agreed to it. And we had two cameras, and we basically set up the shots in the most, like, you know, un kind of fettered way we would. You know, it was written in the script even that these scenes will be shot very simply. There will be no music. The actors will walk in and out of the rooms. That's how I wrote it in the script. And that's what we filmed. We set up the shot. The actors walked in. I asked them to not block each other so we can see everybody's, you know, face or whatever. And they experienced what they experienced looking at the shoes or looking at a gas chamber, et cetera, these places of horror. And then they exited the room. And so it was done with, like, the absolute utmost simplicity and care and reverence.
- [10:39]
Terry Gross
And also, you were shooting it as a museum. You weren't shooting it trying to pretend that it was still a death camp.
- [10:45]
Jesse Eisenberg
That's exactly it. So, you know, this place, Majdanek, is in Lublin. So it's in the southeast of the country. Lublin is this really bustling, gorgeous, vibrant college town. And so. And five minutes away from this, again, gorgeous, bustling, you know, cosmopolitan college town is this death camp. And when I say five minutes, that's not hyperbole. Like, you drive five minutes down the road and you are in this death camp. And so it's not a real known one. But what makes Majdanek really interesting, as opposed to, like, Auschwitz, is that it's so far east that the Russians liberated the camp before the Nazis could really destroy it. So the other camps, as you go further west in Europe, were destroyed by the Nazis as the Soviets or the Americans liberated the camps. But this one, as we say in the movie, is kind of well preserved, for lack of a better phrase. It looks like it was liberated that morning.
- [11:40]
Terry Gross
You became a Polish citizen. So what moved you to do that?
- [11:44]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, so, like, I imagine you're probably familiar with, like, the reputation that Poland has amongst, like, kind of American Jews, which is that, you know, I grew up hearing, oh, they're anti Semitic, and, you know, they're, you know, all the death camps were there, you know. But my experience there was so different. My experience there was really kind of revelatory in the following way. We were going to all these sites of Jewish history, of Jewish, you know, horror. And all the people that I met who were working there were, like, you know, 90% non Jews, people who had spent their lives doing far more to memorialize my family's history than I or anybody in my family. Is doing. And I just had this great feeling of indebtedness to the Poles, who have done a really good job of preserving a lot of this history. I know they're criticized in various ways and the government's criticized in various ways, but like, the Germans built these camps in Poland, and the Poles are still left with these things, you know, and they're really well done to preserve Jewish history there. And I just felt this kind of like, just open hearted indebtedness to that.
- [12:55]
Terry Gross
So the grandmother in the movie is based in part on your aunt. And tell us something about her. Like, when did she flee Poland? How did she survive the Holocaust?
- [13:07]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, so the movie's based on kind of like two people. So what we speak of in the movie is our Grandma Dory. She's my Aunt Doris, and she left Poland in 1918. The person who survived the war is my cousin Maria. And Maria actually stayed in Poland after the war. Both of them actually passed away in. Well, actually in 2019 and 2021, respectively. And my Aunt Doris, she was like my mentor. I don't know exactly how to describe her. She was tough, really strict with me. And I started seeing her when I was like, 17 every Thursday. I would see her every Thursday for three hours up until she died. She died at 106 years old in 2019. I even lived with her in my early 30s in her cramped apartment. I was very interested in her life because she had a very interesting life. And she was not impressed with me being a movie actor, which I started when I was 17 as well. And I think I needed that kind of real world humbling mechanism. And being with her every week made me feel like connected to the bigger world. The person that survived the war, Maria, you know, it's as we kind of describe in the movie, Through a Thousand Miracles. And I stayed with her for several weeks in Poland as well. And she was just this lovely but very tragic figure who I think was like, expected disappointment from the world in a way that I found so sad. She, you know, expected to be disappointed. She had. On top of surviving the Holocaust and losing all of her family, she also lost a son, you know, when he was 18. And so she just, I think, had this expectation from the world that it was going to be disappointing. And so it was almost like a nihilism rather than a kind of misery. And that was more sad. You know, I think when you're miserable, there's like a little, you know, maybe little, you know, streak inside you that's still, like, hopeful and the misery is because you're not experiencing the thing that you were hoping for. But a nihilism is something altogether worse, you know, which is that, you know, you don't expect anything positive to happen. And that's what she displayed.
- [15:25]
Terry Gross
Did your aunt and your cousin's experiences in Nazi Poland, did those experiences make them any more Jewish or any more secular?
- [15:39]
Jesse Eisenberg
Hmm. Wow. That's a great question. You know, my family's, like, become increasingly secular just because, you know, it was, you know, assimilate into American culture. You become probably a little more secular. That's probably not uncommon. But, yeah, I think my family in general does not think in a kind of tribal way. And so I think, like, the takeaway from the Holocaust would probably be something more along the lines of, you know, goodness, look what people can do to each other, rather than look what people do to Jews. That's certainly my take on the world and certainly my parents take on the world. In some ways, I suppose it's made us more kind of, like, open in a humanistic way to, like, the pains of others. The pains of others who are, you know, not Jews, you know, One of the characters in this movie, a Real Pain, is a survivor of the Rwandan genocide. He is. His character is based on my friend. They both have the same name, Eloge and Aloge. The real Eloge is the same as the character in the movie. And the stories that they tell are true, which is that, you know, my friend Delosh survived the Rwandan genocide, moved to Winnipeg, and the only people he felt kind of like, can understand him were Holocaust survivors because they'd been through a genocide, and he converted to Judaism, and he felt such a deep connection to Jewish culture. And I love that story so much, which is why I based a character on him in the movie, because that story speaks to the way that we can take kind of, you know, horrific experiences that have happened to us because of our religion or race or ethnicity or whatever you want to qualify Jews as and have it connect to other people's horrific experiences. And we can take this kind of, let's say, you know, historical trauma and have it be able to kind of transcend our own community's pain and allow it to connect us to other pain.
- [17:35]
Terry Gross
While we're on the subject of Judaism. Were you bar mitzvahed?
- [17:40]
Jesse Eisenberg
So I. I dropped out of Hebrew school when I was, like, 12, right before. I was having just my own problems. And also I, like, hated, in a real way, like, these parties that people had. Like, I grew up in the suburbs of Jersey and like. Or the bar mitzvah parties, they turned my stomach in a way that I couldn't probably even articulate. You know, just like the deification and celebration of a 13 year old kid, you know, doing what, I don't know. And then like the karaoke, celebrating a kid, it seemed so gross to me. And like, the kids in school would talk about the checks they got from the. It just. It nauseated me. I don't know why I'm sure. Cause I was probably like a depressed little 12 year old. So like, that stuff just seemed so gross. You know, in retrospect, I still feel a little put off by it. Like, why aren't we celebrating this kid and giving them the, you know, kind of false illusion that they've done some great deed for the world by learning seven seconds of Hebrew and finishing school, whatever. To me, it kind of like still turns my stomach culturally, but I dropped out of Hebrew school. And then, goodness, what would it have been? Like? Probably 10 years later, I was acting in a movie, playing a Hasidic Jew in a movie called Holy Rollers. And so I was doing all this research on Hasidism and I actually got a bar mitzvah because I was kind of like going to this Hasidic school and I was kind of pretending like I was just a kind of curious secular Jew, which they of course loved to have because they. They thought they can kind of convert me into their world. And so they gave me a bar mitzvah. So it was at the. It's called the 770. It's on Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights. It's like the big Hasidic school in New York. And so they gave me a bar mitzvah. So not only did I not have like, kind of secular Jersey bar mitzvah, but I ended up having like a Hasidic bar mitzvah with like 100 Hasidic young men standing around me chanting and wrapping the tefillin on me. So I had like, probably the most religious bar mitzvah a person could have. But it was just because I was like, trying to infiltrate this school to learn about it for an acting job.
- [19:38]
Terry Gross
Did you feel like a fraud?
- [19:41]
Jesse Eisenberg
No, because I really thought. I don't know. I take my work really seriously. So, like, I was thinking, like, no, I want to make sure this part is accurate and authentic. I mean, you know, not really. Yeah, no, because I'm like, what is the downside? Like, I'm not, you know, hurting them in any way. I am a secular Jew and I am curious about it. I wasn't, you know, wasn't trying to, you know, steal their Styrofoam cups of coffee. I was just, I was just trying to, like, learn about their thing so I can present it accurately in a movie. And I wanted to play my character with as much respect as I possibly could.
- [20:12]
Terry Gross
Oh, that's such a great story. Okay, let me reintroduce you and then we'll talk some more. If you're just joining us, my guest is Jesse Eisenberg. He wrote, directed and stars with Kieran Culkin in the film A Real Pain, which is now streaming on multiple platforms. We'll be right back. I am Terry Gross. This is FRESH AIR.
- [20:32]
Molly Sievi Nesper
This message comes from CookUnity. Choose from hundreds of restaurant quality meals prepared by award winning chefs, delivered straight to your door. Just heat and eat Flexible commitment free subscriptions. Skip deliveries. Pause or cancel anytime subscriptions start as low as $11 per meal. Reset your routine with convenient, mouthwatering meals crafted with local ingredients by award winning chefs. Go to cookunity.com fresh or enter code fresh before checkout for 50% off your first week. This message comes from NPR's sponsor, IKEA. IKEA is hitting the snooze button on everything but rest and sleep. Why not turn your bedroom into the space to decompress? Shop the IKEA range of comfy beds, pillows, mood lighting and so much more. Every time you step in there, it's nothing but me time. Sounds like a dream, right? IKEA has what you need to design a bedroom you'll never want to leave. Create your comfy, blissful bedroom today with the IKEA 6 Sleep Essentials shop in store or go to ikea-usa.com sleep this.
- [21:35]
Jesse Eisenberg
Message comes from Grammarly. At an enterprise level, nothing is more important than communication. Grammarly for enterprise enables your team to work smarter and faster. Other AI tools can quantify business impact, but Grammarly gives you actionable insights and measurable results with features like their effective Communication Score, which tracks key metrics so you can make data driven decisions to improve outcomes. Learn more@Grammarly.com Enterprise hi, this is Molly Sievi Nesper, digital producer at FRESH air.
- [22:10]
Terry Gross
And this is Terry Gross, host of the show.
- [22:12]
Jesse Eisenberg
One of the things I do is.
- [22:13]
Terry Gross
Write the weekly newsletter and I'm a newsletter fan. I read it every Saturday after breakfast. The newsletter includes all the week shows, staff recommendations and Molly picks, timely highlights from the archive. It's a fun read.
- [22:25]
Jesse Eisenberg
It's also the only place where we tell you what coming up next week.
- [22:28]
Terry Gross
An exclusive, so subscribe@whyy.org fresh air and look for an email from Molly every Saturday morning. So I want to play a clip from a real pain. And this is a scene that not only shows the kind of emotional turbulence that the Kieran Culkin character is going through. He plays your cousin, and he's the one who is very prone to severe depression, but he also gets kind of manic when he's around people. And I don't know if you would describe him as bipolar, but those are the two extremes of character that he goes through. So in this scene, everyone on this small tour is at a restaurant, and your character is talking about the grandmother and how she survived the Nazis through a thousand miracles. So before we hear the scene, I just want to say you're going to hear a couple of very loud burps during this scene. And that is the Karen Culkin character who will be doing the burping. Here's the scene.
- [23:39]
Jesse Eisenberg
You know, Grandma never pitied herself. In fact, she always told me she was grateful for her struggle. Well, that's just it.
- [23:45]
Terry Gross
What she endured, that gave her hope, right? Yes.
- [23:49]
Jesse Eisenberg
In fact, she used to tell me that, like, you know, first generation immigrants work some, like, menial job. You know, they drive cabs, they deliver food. Second generation, they go to good schools and they become like, you know, a doctor or a lawyer or whatever. And the third generation lives in their mother's basement and smokes pot all day. I mean, she said that. I think she was, like, just speaking generally about, like, the immigrant experience. I lived in my mom's basement. She was just talking about immigrants. Okay. That's all. Yeah. I got some pee. I'm gonna go to the bathroom.
- [24:33]
Terry Gross
I'll get that. Don't worry.
- [24:36]
Jesse Eisenberg
Pee.
- [24:36]
Terry Gross
Pee time. So that's an example of how really inappropriate Kieran Culkin, who plays your cousin, can be. Tell us why you wanted to create that difference, because this is another really important dynamic in the film. Like, you've both had a very similar upbringing. You lived close to each other when you were children. You were like brothers. You were born three weeks apart or three months apart. I forget which. But now, like, you're living in separate cities in New York. You're in New York City, he's in Binghamton, and you've gone in different directions. He seems, like, totally rootless. And you have a good job. You're married, you have a child, you have a nice home. And he's lived in his mother's basement. We don't know if he's still there or where he is or if he has any home at all. So why did you want to create that wide range, that big dynamic of difference between the two cousins?
- [25:38]
Jesse Eisenberg
I didn't have a calculated reason, but I had just, like, had written these two characters kind of before, you know, just, like, kind of trying to figure out, you know, what's behind the most charismatic person in the room. You know, what happens to them when they go home, why are they acting that way. These are people that I feel very envious of. You know, the people who can light up a room. I am a performer, and I have my own amount of extroversion, but, like, you know, I kind of, like, just sit in awe and envy of people who can, like, walk into a room and immediately, you know, light it up. And so I was trying to kind of explore what's behind somebody like that, because I envy them. But I also know there's something maybe happening there that I wouldn't want. I wouldn't want to trade.
- [26:23]
Terry Gross
So your character in the film is dealing with ocd, and he's medicated for it. So we don't see a lot of ocd, but we do see you live a very structured life in the film and that Kieran Culkin's character is a rule breaker. So I'd like to talk with you, if you're willing, about, like, your own inner issues.
- [26:44]
Jesse Eisenberg
Sure, sure, sure.
- [26:45]
Terry Gross
So is OCD a thing for you, or is it something different?
- [26:50]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, I mean, it's probably, you know, God, I don't know what my actual official diagnosis is on my insurance forms, but, yeah, it's like, you know, I have ocd, depression, anxiety, that kind of stuff. And it changes and is emphasized based on what's happening in. But as I talk about in the movie, I feel my pain is unexceptional.
- [27:10]
Terry Gross
Do you feel like something like OCD ever works in your favor? Like, if you're producing a movie or directing a movie, there are so many details that you have to take care of and so much you have to pay attention to. And I was thinking that maybe. And I might be misdiagnosing the symptoms of ocd. That may be that your brain would be wired in such a way, you would have almost a need to obsess on details.
- [27:40]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, I guess so. But, you know, one of the other things about, like, being in the arts is learning to be flexible and learning to feel like Kieran Culkin in this movie didn't want to stand on any marks, which means, you know, when you're setting up a shot in a movie, the actor has to stand on their mark to deliver their lines. This is like kind of just standard practice. Kieran would never stand on a mark because he didn't know what he was gonna do or where he was gonna walk or what he was gonna be performing like. And so for me, if I had, you know, some kind of strict compulsion to wanting the actors to all do my thing, the movie wouldn't be good because it would be stifling our, you know, leading character, Kieran. And so learning to be flexible is helpful. And in the arts, that's. That's really kind of paramount, you know, because you want the most creative, interesting idea to win. So when I'm writing the script, I have, I guess you could call it some kind of compulsion to make sure everything is exactly what I want it to be. But I've learned this is my second movie as a director, but I've also written and performed in several plays, that being flexible or being open to being flexible at least, is probably the best way to get the best version of something.
- [28:40]
Terry Gross
When Karen Culkin refuses to stand on his mark, does part of you go into a panic?
- [28:47]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, like the first. The first few days, yeah. He told me, like, that's not what I want to do. I don't want to get notes from you. I don't want to rehearse or talk about the scenes. I was just panicked that he wasn't going to know his lines because he speaks so quickly in the movie and it has to go quick. Like, the movie wouldn't work if he's kind of stumbly with his dialogue. So I was just worried he wouldn't know his lines. But he's some kind of genius because he would come to set in the morning and he would say, what scene are we shooting today? Which is like, not the question you want to hear from your main actor. And I would say, it's the five page scene on the train. You have two monologues that have to be delivered at lightning speed. And he would go, oh, God, I remember that scene. It was so funny. Can I see the script? I'm like, oh, my goodness. So I show him the script. He looks at it. Terry. I'm totally. I'm being completely serious. He looks at the script for like a minute and he's word perfect. He just has some kind of weird memory bank where he's able to learn lines really, really quickly and then forget about them the next day. So he was always great. And you know, for me, you know, trying to direct him, it just felt like the movie's gonna be great if if I let him kind of run around, you know, I don't like dialogue improvisation, but if I can let him just be free and spontaneous, the movie will really soar and the movie benefits. The movie really is kind of like my perspective on my cousin, and it really works nicely when he is as hard to grasp for the audience as he is for me.
- [30:14]
Terry Gross
Let me reintroduce you again. If you're just joining us, my guest is Jesse Eisenberg. He wrote, directed and stars with Kieran Culkin in the film A Real Pain, which is streaming now on multiple platforms. We'll be right back. This is FRESH air. Donald Trump is starting his second term as president.
- [30:31]
Jesse Eisenberg
What will his administration do and what.
- [30:34]
Terry Gross
Policies will it promote?
- [30:35]
Jesse Eisenberg
On the NPR Politics podcast, we'll break.
- [30:37]
Terry Gross
Down what the new administration does and.
- [30:39]
Jesse Eisenberg
Explain why it matters.
- [30:41]
Terry Gross
Listen to the NPR Politics podcast every day.
- [30:44]
Jesse Eisenberg
Wait, wait, don't tell me. Fresh Air up first, NPR News. Now, Planet Money TED Radio Hour Throughline the NPR Politics Podcast Code Switch Embedded books we love Wildcard are just some of the podcasts you can enjoy. Sponsor free with NPR. Get all sorts of perks across more than 20 podcasts with the bundle option. Learn more at plus.NPR.org I want to.
- [31:09]
Terry Gross
Get back to your emotional state and how it may or may not have changed over the years. When you were young and were going to school, you've said that in first grade you cried every day on the bus. What was your reaction to crying in front of all the other kids on the bus?
- [31:29]
Jesse Eisenberg
You know, I I cried, like, everywhere. And I guess at some point I probably shed the embarrassment that most kids would have probably felt. I, you know, was kicked out of preschool before that because I locked my mom in the closet because I didn't want to be away from my mom. And so I think, Whoa, whoa, slow down.
- [31:46]
Terry Gross
You were kicked out of preschool because you locked your mom in the closet because you didn't want to be separated from her?
- [31:52]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah. And I so I probably at some point got over the probably expected humiliation a kid would have about kind of being very emotional in front of people. It's kind of weird to think that that's my job now. Like, I'm kind of like on sets with a lot of oftentimes very, you know, tough people, you know, like, crying in front of them, you know, in the movie or whatever. And, like, I didn't want, like, attention or pity. I think I was Just like, so miserable. I couldn't control myself. And I think I probably just. Whatever got over that. I don't know.
- [32:25]
Terry Gross
So I wasn't like you when I was growing up. But I could cry pretty easily. And then when my parents would say, stop crying, or an alternate was stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about, you know, And I thought, like, I didn't have the words to express it then, but, like, that was so not helpful.
- [32:44]
Jesse Eisenberg
No, of course not.
- [32:45]
Terry Gross
It just makes you cry even harder because all this, like, anger is coming at you, like, stop it. And you know, you can't. It's not like, I'm not trying to cry.
- [32:54]
Jesse Eisenberg
Right, Exactly.
- [32:55]
Terry Gross
It's not a willful thing. Did anybody ever tell you, stop crying?
- [33:00]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, my teacher. When I get to school, my teacher was, you know, I'm actually sorry. She was a nice, very. Such a nice person. But, you know, she even told me one day, jesse, I had a bad weekend. Do not cry today. And I remember just like, desperately trying to stifle it because she had a bad weekend. I mean, and sorry, it sounds like I'm presenting my teacher in a negative light. She was great. And goodness, I can't imagine what it's like to teach a kid who's weeping every day, but I remember that pretty distinctly. And, yeah, I mean, then, like, I had real more emotional problems in sixth grade. And my parents were trying to take like a. You know, because I missed a year of school because I couldn't be there and all that. And like, you know, my parents were trying to kind of do both things of trying to, like, be sensitive to me while at the same time, like, trying to make me not fall into something inescapable. So, like, I was institutionalized, and then I couldn't go back to school after that. I just couldn't be there. And I remember, like, my father, again, really nice parents, you know, sensitive people. But I remember my father was more of the school of, like, you should really just be going to school. And the more kind of like, we as a family, like, allow you to, like, escape all the things that scare you, like, the worse you'll get. And he was right. Cause, like, they pushed me back to school in seventh grade, and seventh grade was better for me. And I got better by just kind of like, let's say just like normalizing rather than kind of like indulging in escaping.
- [34:23]
Terry Gross
What was your experience like when you were in a mental health institution?
- [34:26]
Jesse Eisenberg
It was crazy. It was so crazy. I Was really going crazy. I mean, I tried to take the scissors out of the woman's desk and hurt her. I don't know. I was going crazy. So they kept bringing me to this, like, padded room or something. And, like, it was terrifying. And I couldn't go in my room, so I would sleep on the couch. I don't know why they let me sleep on the couch in, like, the TV room thing. It was terrify. And I would go to the soft room and they would, like, put their knee in my back and hold me back to restrain me. And it was just crazy. And it was like a swastika carved into my room. It was not directed to me at all, I'm sure. Carved in by a kid. I don't think it was probably even anti Semitically driven. I think it was just like a kid being bad in a place where they have a pen and a wall. And so once my family was able to come back for visiting day, I was telling them, I can't be here. I can't be here. I'll do better, I'll do better. I'll try it. Please, I'll do anything. I'll go to school. I'll do whatever. And they were not having it. And then I think I may have mentioned, like, there was a swastika on the wall. And that for my mom was like, ooh, that's not good. But it, for whatever reason, was the thing that tipped my parents into, like, taking me out of there. And I was going home and I was like, I think I should skydive. Like, I had this feeling on the way home, like, I just love life. I was kissing the car and I was kissing my sister's arm hair. I mean, I was only in there for like a week. And then, like, you know, after a week or two being out, then you're like, you go back to the same problems. But the problem for me was, like, if I didn't at least try to go to school, not to go to class, but to try to go to school and sit in the therapist's office at least for three hours a day, then the feeling was like, well, then I have to go back to the institution. So the institution became this kind of boogeyman of, like, that's where I have to go if I'm not going to at least try to sit in the school building for three hours a day.
- [36:05]
Terry Gross
Well, I'm thinking of a couple of things. One is like, I'm wondering if being inhibited is like the swing of the pendulum in the Opposite direction. That's really funny for acting out because you're acting out in such a stream way, an extreme way. And inhibition is about holding things in.
- [36:25]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah. That's interesting. You know, I'm also shy. Yeah. I don't know. But I think that more has to do with when I'm in groups of people that are very happy. I think probably, like a lot of people in the arts, you know, you go to these, like, parties because you're celebrated for your art thing. And you feel so out of place at these parties because you just see people happy and laughing and you just think, like, the world is so much more miserable than you're behaving right now. Like, you're behaving like the day before Rome fell or something. Like, don't you know what's happening? And so I think a lot of people in the arts are sensitive people who, like mine their own emotional lives to be in the arts. And then, of course, the great irony is that then when they are succeeding in the arts, they're brought into all these worlds that were the thing that made them so uncomfortable that they got into the arts in the first place. And that's certainly one of the experiences I'm having now because my movie's being celebrated and well received. And I find myself in these places and amongst groups of people that were my impetus for making a movie about people struggling with their, you know, own trauma versus the Holocaust. You know, there's some kind of irony there, and it certainly sums up probably a lot of my inner life.
- [37:29]
Terry Gross
If you're just joining us, my guest is Jesse Eisenberg. He wrote, directed and stars with Kieran Culkin in the new film A Real Pain. We'll be right back. This is FRESH air. Did becoming an actor really young change your thoughts about yourself or your ability to be around other people, your ability to be on your own and to think that, like, you had something to contribute?
- [37:58]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah. But even more than that, it was just being around adults. I started doing community theater in New Jersey and then theater in New York, where I would get to take the bus from New Jersey into New York. And I didn't really have a sense that I was, like, contributing anything great. I mean, I was just in, you know, community theater productions of Annie get yout Gun. But what I really. What was really great about it was I was with adults. And somehow I just felt so much more comfortable not only being with them adults, but being with adults who are all attracted to the arts. And especially when you're working on the community theater level. It's all people that feel outcast in every other part of the world. And that's why they're working after their job at, AT and T. During the day they come and, you know, they have their outlet at night. And just being around people like that was just so life changing and affirming and made me realize, you know what? I think I'm okay when I'm an adult because I could see all these people are more like me. They're not like the people I go to school with. These people are outcasts and weirdos and art. That just was like, it was life changing.
- [38:57]
Terry Gross
I love something you said about acting and why acting has been so helpful to you. You said you're given a prescribed way of behaving. And so instead of having to figure out what to do in a situation, you're playing a character who has a script and you know how the character's supposed to behave, you know what they're supposed to say. And that, I guess was relatively relaxing. Like, the pressure of acting was nothing compared to the pressure of being yourself.
- [39:28]
Jesse Eisenberg
Still. I mean, it's still amazing. Like, you know, when Kieran and I were working on a real pain together, like, we had this unbelievable, like on screen comfort with each other. Like, because we were playing these two characters that were kind of like well defined and we liked our roles. And so it felt like I was. It felt like I knew this person forever. And now Kieran and I are going to these award shows together and it's like, it's just not the same level of comfort with each other. Partly it's the venue, but also it's because when you're playing a character and like it's. He has license to hug me and push me and make fun of me and slap me and I have license to kind of like be scared of him, but also kind of lord my stability over him in the movie. Like, it's just such a more comfortable relationship because the set of circumstances and the scenes dictate what we have to do. And to me it's just like there's nothing more comforting in the world. World.
- [40:23]
Terry Gross
Your mother was a director and choreographer in a high school among other things that she's done. Was that helpful to you when you started acting?
- [40:32]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yeah, so before I was born, she was like a choreographer in a Christian boys school in Philly while my dad was at temple getting his degree. When I was growing up though, she was a birthday party clown. So she did like birthday parties in the tri State area. And so she would, you know, basically wake up every morning and, you know, tiptoe downstairs and tune her guitar. And she would be, you know, put on her makeup and her ridiculous outfit and her shoes and, you know, her pinwheel hat. And so she was doing some like, very like real absurdist performance. And so that was just normalized to me. So when I was like, you know, acting or got into the arts, to me, like the awkward leap that a lot of people have to make to like be on stage and do something, something, I'm using quotes, silly on stage. Like, a lot of people find that to be like an awkward hump to get over. But for me, it was just totally natural because I grew up seeing that normalized, seeing silly behavior. Not only normalized, but like professionalized. And so it was kind of a seamless transition for me to be in the arts. Like right now, I go on set and I'm just totally unselfconscious. I know I seem like a self conscious kind of person as we're speaking, but when I'm on a movie set, for some reason, I just give over to the story and I let my emotions and imagination take me and I'm happy doing anything. I've played villains in movies and, you know, I played a bodybuilder who joins a cult last year in a movie. And to me, I just. This stuff to me is so much more comforting than just trying to navigate normal stuff.
- [41:57]
Terry Gross
Here's something I'm curious about. So in the film the Social Network, you played Mark Zuckerberg. When you hosted Saturday Night Live, he did a bit with you. When Zuckerberg does something that really makes news, especially, especially when he does something that a lot of people really don't like, like ending, fact checking on Meta. Do you feel personally connected to that? Like, what's it like for you having played him?
- [42:25]
Jesse Eisenberg
You know, as an actor, your job is to kind of like really understand your character. Even if the character is like a villain in a movie, you know, your job is to defend your character. Right. And so I spent a lot of time thinking about this guy and thinking about, you know, how he felt outcast in the world and created this thing in connect with other people because he felt he felt uncomfortable connecting with other people through more traditional social norms. And at the time when I was acting in it, I thought, oh, this is wonderful and totally defensible. This is a guy who is ambitious because he has this great thing that he's going to unleash on the world. And when I see the News now, of course, is that they ended fact checking, whatever. I'm like, oh, I wonder if that's really an extension of that same person. A person whose kind of ambition really, let's say, supersedes their caution in a way that can be pretty dangerous. And now that the platform is so powerful and owns all these other things, you know, I guess I feel a little bit sad. Why is this the path you're taking? And so I mostly just think of it that way of like, oh, this is that same person that I spent a long time, you know, humanizing and thinking about, you know, and trying to justify and defend his behavior.
- [43:44]
Terry Gross
So I want to close with some music from the soundtrack of the film. There's some beautiful Chopin music throughout the film. And were you familiar with that music before making the movie?
- [43:58]
Jesse Eisenberg
Yes. I became, like, obsessed with chopin's music in 2008 when I visited Poland. My wife and I went to Chopin's house, which is outside Warsaw. It's a museum now. And I just became obsessed with the music because right after I did. Right after I did that trip, I wrote my first play, which took place in Poland. And I put Chopin's music as the interstitial music in the play. And so I just. I went down a rabbit hole of so much of his work. And so when I was writing this movie, a real pain. I was listening to his music, and I started putting his music in the scenes. In the script, I would say, like, over this scene this track is playing, which turned out to be just wonderfully beneficial because on set, I would play the music that would be underscoring the scene so that the actors and that the cameramen had a feel for what the tone is going to be. So I would give it to the dolly grip, which is the guy who pushes the camera and who sets the pace for the scene. And I would say this is the song that's playing underneath. So can we try to, you know, use this as, you know, as a guide for the pacing? So it was really, really wonderful and helpful. And I just, you know, I'm not a classical music buff, but I'm a Chopin hand buff.
- [45:01]
Terry Gross
Is there a piece you'd like to close with?
- [45:03]
Jesse Eisenberg
Oh, my God, of course. I'm allowed to dictate that kind of thing.
- [45:06]
Terry Gross
You mean what we close with? Yeah, of course.
- [45:09]
Jesse Eisenberg
That's amazing, right? So my favorite piece of his is opus 25, number one. It's the scene that plays over the ending of the movie. It's also colloquially known as Aurelian Harp.
- [45:20]
Terry Gross
Beautiful it has been such a pleasure to talk with you. Thank you so much.
- [45:24]
Jesse Eisenberg
Thanks. What a privilege to speak to you finally. Thank. Thank you.
- [45:27]
Terry Gross
I'm so glad we did. Jesse Eisenberg wrote, directed and stars in the film A Real Pain. It's streaming on several platforms. Tomorrow on FRESH air, our guest will be Pamela Anderson. She became a pop culture phenomenon in the late 80s in part because of her role on the series Baywatch, but there's much more to her than that. She's received award nominations from the Golden Globes and the Screen Actors Guild for her role in the new film the Last Showgirl. A Netflix documentary about her was nominated for an Emmy. I hope you'll join us. FRESH air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our managing producer is Sam Brigger. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Phyllis Myers, Anne Marie Bodonado, Lauren Krenzel, Teresa Madden, Monique Nazareth, Thea Chaloner, Susan Yakundi and Anna Bauman. Our digital media producer is Molly CV Nesper. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. Our co host is Tanya Mosley. I'm Terry Gross.