“I like playing emotionally conflicted characters.” Jesse Eisenberg discussed more than just films at KVIFF Talk

Jesse Eisenberg, fresh from receiving the President’s Award, spoke at the first KVIFF Talk at the new Festival Lounge at the Thermal. The conversation opened with The Double, which the acclaimed actor introduced at the festival. “I’d never seen it on a big screen before because I don’t enjoy watching myself. But since I started directing, I’ve realised the whole film doesn’t depend on my face anymore,” Eisenberg admitted. He also looked back fondly on making the 2013 film. “Early in my career, I always felt I was ruining the movies I was in. Richard Ayoade is so funny that I knew there was no way I could mess this one up,” said Eisenberg, praising the director of The Double, whom he described as his favourite person he’s ever worked with.

Presenter Pavel Sladký also asked the Zombieland and Now You See Me star about some of his other collaborators, including Woody Allen, Kelly Reichardt and Kieran Culkin, who won an Oscar for his performance in A Real Pain, which Eisenberg also wrote and directed. “He wouldn’t answer my calls for six months. Then he finally agreed to do the film, but said he didn’t want to talk about it. After that he changed his mind again. Fortunately, Emma Stone was also one of the producers, and she’d dated him years earlier. She told him he could leave the film if he wanted, but that he would be putting 300 people out of work,” Eisenberg recalled. “Kieran was a real pain on set. He never did what I asked him to do. But he was so good! He’s this magical creature whose psychology I simply don’t understand,” said the filmmaker, who enjoys exploring American ignorance in his screenplays and plays.

Eisenberg also explained why he has no interest in returning as Mark Zuckerberg in the sequel to The Social Network, why he stays away from social media, and why he donated a kidney last year. “My life is so easy and so good. I hate it. It’s not healthy to have such an easy life, so I wanted to make it a little harder. But donating a kidney turned out to be easy too. I was fine after two weeks. Terrible.”

Eisenberg is known for portraying anxious characters with a certain inner conflict. At KVIFF Talk, he also spoke about mental health. “As a child, I struggled with anxiety and depression. When I was fifteen, I realised at an audition that I could turn it into comedy. Suddenly, the thing that had been holding me back became something I could use. That’s why I like playing emotionally conflicted characters. It helps me come to terms with who I am,” said the anthropology graduate.

Although he doesn’t watch many films himself, he admires cinema’s ability to foster empathy for people whose lives are very different from our own. He extends that empathy even to villains. “I feel compassion for them because I know they’re suffering. They all believe they’re doing the right thing. They all have their own psychology, and that’s what interests me,” said the actor, who chooses projects based not on the director but on the role. “What matters to me is having a good experience making the film, not whether the film itself is good. I probably won’t watch it anyway.”

When writing, Eisenberg starts with a premise grounded in genuine emotion and then tries to make it as funny as possible. “But because the emotional core is real, it doesn’t become a dumb comedy.” His third feature as director, The Debut, is expected to premiere later this year.