John Krasinski, most famous for his role as nice-guy Jim Halpert on “The Office,” never dreamed of being a professional actor. That is, until he performed a staged reading of David Foster Wallace’s “Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.”
“When I was in college, I read this book and then did a staged reading of it,” Kransinski said. “It was the moment I decided I wanted to be an actor. The staged reading had such an impact on me, and it hit me on a core level.”
This experience was so powerful for Krasinski that he decided to enlighten the public to Wallace’s work through a film adaptation of “Brief Interviews with Hideous Men.”
“The reason I wanted to direct it was to get more people to have the same experience I had the first time I was introduced to David Foster Wallace’s work,” Krasinski said. “I wanted to get his work on a different medium that would reach more people.”
In the book, the interviewer and their questions are absent, and they are merely characterized by the subject’s responses. For the movie, Krasinski created a character for the interviewer — Sara Quinn, a grad student, to follow. After suffering through a recent breakup, Sara is inspired to write her dissertation on the male psyche. For her research, Sara interviews a series of men who possess one repulsive quality. Similar to the book, Sara’s questions are removed from the interviews to maintain the focus on the subjects.
“When I first read the book, I saw the interviewer as a woman because of the way the guys interact and respond [to the questions],” Krasinski said. “Not only was she asking them clinical questions, but she was asking more probing questions. In their responses to the questions in the book, the guys seem slightly uncomfortable. That gave me a hint that this woman was on some hidden agenda.”
Early on in the scripting process, Krasinski spoke with Wallace on the phone to gain insight into the author’s thought process while writing the book.
“Speak[ing] to David Foster Wallace... was probably one of the best moments of my career,” Krasinski said. “He said he was trying to write a book about a character you never see or hear, but through all the guys around her, you get to understand what she’s all about.”
Wallace died before the film was completed. As a tribute to the writer, the movie ends with his quote, “The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you.”
“At the end of the movie, instead of just showing his name as the writer of the book, [I wanted to show that] he was responsible for much more than that in my life,” Krasinski said. “I believe that [the quote] is the essence of what the movie’s about and what I find is most true in his writing. To be a good person and to be honest is very difficult. If it was easy to be good and tell the truth, we’d all be doing it. I think that [in] the interviews the guys are being honest with themselves about their insecurities and [vulnerabilities], [which is what] makes them not hideous. I think that the title of the book is ironic because I don’t think any of these guys are truly hideous ... they’re just scared and they’re not really sure how to deal with women.”
Krasinski does not want the audience to merely like or dislike the movie. Rather, he intends for the movie to provoke the audience to think.
“It’s a movie you won’t have one opinion about,” Krasinski said. “You can’t just say you like it or you don’t. I hope that people leave the theater and can’t decide what they think of the movie for a few minutes until they talk about it.”
Krasinski will be at the premiere of “Brief Interviews” this Friday at the Alamo Drafthouse Downtown to introduce the movie and answer questions concerning his directorial debut.
WHAT: “Brief Interviews” screening
WHEN: Friday, various times
WHERE: Alamo Drafthouse Downtown, 320 East Sixth St.
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