Philadelphia Weekly

John Krasinski’s stock among those who don’t moon over his good looks rose precipitously when a strange credit appeared on his IMDb page. Turns out he had used his clout from The Office and elsewhere to write, direct and act (among a vast ensemble) in an adaptation of David Foster Wallace’s Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, a short story collection with no apparent storyline. Krasinski had nearly completed his directorial debut by the time Wallace committed suicide last fall, a tragedy that lends the caustic, monologue-heavy film a bittersweet tinge, particularly given how reverently it treats its source. PW spoke with Krasinski before the film’s Philadelphia debut, somehow never finding the time to ask him about Office spoilers, his Grizzly Adams beard in Away We Go or his dalliances with various Hollywood hotties.

There’s that cliché that what all actors secretly want to do is direct. But I read that you were not one of those people.

No, not at all. In fact, I may not direct again. Who knows? It’s true I never had any deep desire to be a director or even a writer. This book was really the thing that did it for me. I had done a stage reading of it in college, and I wanted people to have the experience that I had of hearing the words out loud and seeing the actors do it. Its the epitome of a passionate project.

What attracted you to the book so much that you’d want to carry it around as a project for so long?

The big thing was that David Foster Wallace had the power to write with this unique perspective of the world. And what he does is he’s able to give you people - especially guys - who you are asked not to judge right away. You’re asked to hold your opinions until you know all the information. And if you come back to the same opinion, that’s fine, but you’ve got to do the work.

A lot of the characters hold these truly abhorrent points of view, but they’ve thought them through so thoroughly.

Exactly. The actor Dominic Cooper plays a character who’s trying to defend the idea that women whov’e been raped or abused, that what happened to them could be a good thing because they’ve lived through it and gained an internal strength that most people don’t have. That’s such an incredibly offensive statement and theory, but [Wallace] delves into it in such a well-written manner and he plays both side of the the fence. He puts it out there as an idea, not some drastic defense of the theory. He holds a discussion about it. By the end you realize he’s been abused himself, so this is his own way with dealing with his past. Human coping mechanisms are so strong they’re about to come up with these wild theories to protect us.

How did you pitch the film to actors or producers, especially considering it’s based on a collection of short stories and not a continuous story?

What I was trying to pitch to the cast, and to the producers too, was my experience in college - basically that I had been part of this project that was inciting and provocative, and that so many people had so much to say about it, which I think is a rarity in movies today. A lot of times things are laid out pretty cut and dry, and this movie is more like an experience, almost. It’s about getting to see the world in a different way, and to have conversations about how you felt. And the fun part is when you disagree with the person who sat right next to you. That’s what really got people excited about the movie.

Were people worried about the content or the fact that it’s more like a cine-essay than a narrative?

I think less than the content people were worried it wouldn’t be linear, that it wouldn’t look like any other movie, and that it was definitely literary. I wanted to keep it literary thing. The idea was I wanted to do it as close the book as I could, and I wanted David Foster Wallace’s language to push through. I didn’t want it to be dumbed-down so everybody could understand it, or take it the place where everyone speaks. I was excited to have people speak in a slightly cerebral, stilted way.

In the book not only is the identity of the interviewer never revealed, he or she never has any lines. Why make her female?

I don’t know why, but right from the first time I read the book I was convinced she was a female. I was convinced she had some hidden agenda to asking guys all these questions. It wouldn’t make sense to be asking question after question if she didn’t have some purpose. And then I actually got to speak to David Foster Wallace. He said, “My idea was to write this book where you know nothing about the lead character, but through all the characters you realize who she is.” And I asked, “Is it a girl?” And he said, “Yeah. I figured she was a girl doing her dissertation at some Ivy League school.” And I said “That’s exactly the screenplay we wrote.” So that was fun to know we were on the same path.

Did you have a tight script you were following, or is this a film found in the editing room?

It was lot in the editing room. Originally I thought a more linear structure would be much easier as a doorway into the material. And as it turned out the linear structure got in the way and ruined how spontaneous and cool his book is. So in the editing room we started breaking it down more, and that’s where it got its prismatic feel.

You talked to David Foster Wallace though never met him in person.

No, we spoke on the phone. We tried to meet twice, but scheduling got in the way. But I did talk to him on the phone and got his blessing, which was very kind of him but also necessary. I don’t think I would have been able to do the movie the way we’ve done it if I had known he was somewhere out there maybe possibly not happy about it.