When I spoke to Jesse Eisenberg in early 2020, we were in his hotel room, sat opposite an open suitcase across his bed. Acknowledging the unusual interview setup, Eisenberg described the stress involved with his job, which prompted a catchy headline: “Jesse Eisenberg: Films Are a Source of My Misery”.
Four years later and two weeks before Christmas in 2024, it appears that films are now a source of Eisenberg’s joy. I’m chatting to the 41-year-old filmmaker in another London hotel room, except this time it’s a spacious suite rented out for an awards push. Moreover, Eisenberg continually uses the word “love” to discuss the production of A Real Pain, a comedy-drama about generational trauma in which he writes, directs, and is the lead actor. “I love that it’s personal stuff,” Eisenberg enthuses. “I love playing in the mud with it. I’m sitting there writing about myself and laughing. It’s a world that I love.”
That Eisenberg spends a disproportionate amount of his life in hotels is reflected in A Real Pain, a travelogue starring Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin as, respectively, David and Benji, two American cousins embarking on a Holocaust tour in Poland before visiting their late grandmother’s house. In their hotel at night, the pair smoke weed, reflect on their childhood (Benji claims David used to cry all the time, and now feels nothing), and bicker viciously. By day, they visit landmarks that range from a Warsaw war memorial statue to a concentration camp just outside Lublin. With fellow tourists, they debate the purpose of observing these historical sites, and the viewer undergoes a similar existential dilemma alongside them.
Eisenberg, whose family originate from Poland, previously visited the same locations as a tourist. David and Benji’s grandmother’s house is also the house where Eisenberg’s grandmother lived. “A lot of these Holocaust tours aren’t all doom and gloom,” says Eisenberg. “There’s wonderful history that’s not so tragic that took place before the war.” When a tour guide played by Will Sharpe delivers facts to the group, he delivers them to the audience as well. Does that make A Real Pain a tour guide for cinemagoers? “It’s exactly that. You’re seeing the country through these two American people’s eyes. Will Sharpe has a line right to camera: ‘This is going to be a tour about pain but it’s also about resiliency.’ That’s meta-commentary. It’s a movie about pain, and also these two guys trying to move on with their life in various ways.”
Eisenberg is known primarily as a loquacious actor in movies such as The Social Network, Adventureland, and the Now You See Me franchise. Behind the camera, Eisenberg’s debut feature as a writer-director, When You Finish Saving the World, didn’t get a UK release despite its A-list cast, and he acknowledges that his many plays and short stories have gone unnoticed by the general public. Where A Real Pain differs from When You Finish Saving the World is the inherent likeability of its characters – Culkin plays Benji with a similar comic energy to Roman in Succession – and the directness of its literal A-to-B-then-back-to-A storyline. There’s openness, too, in how David represses his emotions until he publicly collapses in tears, or how Benji speaks without fear, mischievously greeting a fellow tourist as “a real fucking loser” to provoke a laugh.
The depth of A Real Pain also stems from its earlier incarnations. In his twenties, Eisenberg wrote and starred in a play, The Revisionist, about an American writer visiting his cousin in Poland. In his thirties, he wrote a short story, “Mongolia”, about two quarrelling Americans who fly to Mongolia for the purpose of self-discovery. One line – “there was no oppression to give his life meaning” – could be an elevator pitch for A Real Pain. “You’re the only person I’ve met during this whole thing [since Sundance in January 2024] who’s read ‘Mongolia’,” says Eisenberg. “I’m kind of in shock.”
“I’ve had so few interesting experiences in my life. They’re all being completely extracted for whatever value they have dramatically” – Jesse Eisenberg
Eisenberg does all his writing in a public library in New York City. “I have a routine where I sit next to my friend, Jim Beggarly, and we keep each other accountable. It’s really hard to write outside of this single chair at the library. If I have six weeks off, I’ll go there every day, like office hours.” Eisenberg attempted to adapt “Mongolia” into a movie script but discovered it didn’t work beyond the first act. For A Real Pain, he not only shifted the story to Poland, he reworked the characters: David is someone who “strives for stability because the world is so confusing to them”, while Benji is “self-destructive in an attempt to find meaning in life”.
Originally, Eisenberg planned to play Benji, not David. “Benji’s the better role on the page,” he says. “He’s unhinged, spontaneous, and high-energy. But our producer, Emma Stone, convinced me not to play that role if I was directing, because it’d be too taxing. I’m so lucky she suggested that because Kieran is brilliant.” Taking on David makes it easier to concentrate on the directing? “Yeah. I’m playing more of an introvert. I’m reacting in the moment to Kieran. The truth is, I’m not thinking of it as my script anymore.” He lists how everything from rain to Culkin’s constant improvisations affected his plans. “A movie is 17,000 aspects every day that change what my initial thought was.”
I tell Eisenberg that I noticed the attention to detail. For example, David, the uptight and organised one, walks around with a backpack and both straps over his shoulders, while Benji, an unemployed stoner, doesn’t carry a bag and has to buy bottled water. However, Eisenberg tells me, “No, it was the exact opposite. I wanted to wear my red baseball cap, which is my real hat. We were told by somebody representing the investors on the movie that I can’t wear my hat for dramatic scenes because you can’t see my eyes as well, and it’s going to be harder to sell the movie. Every day was an argument like, ‘Can I please wear my hat today?’”
In early 2025, Eisenberg will direct his third feature, a musical he’s written for Paul Giamatti and Julianne Moore. “It’ll be pushed and styled,” says Eisenberg. “The emotions and humour are real, but it won’t feel like it takes place in the real world.” He describes it as a fever dream with hints of The Double, the comedy he did with Richard Ayoade. “It’s a reaction to the naturalism of A Real Pain.” Like his last play, it’ll be about a woman doing community theatre. “I’ve had so few interesting experiences in my life. They’re all being completely extracted for whatever value they have dramatically.”
Eisenberg, though, still has an awards push for A Real Pain, which is guaranteed a number of Oscar nominations and almost certainly an Oscar win for Culkin as Best Supporting Actor. Eisenberg reveals his other hopes for A Real Pain. “I didn’t want to tell this story of a bleak, Soviet-style country with red lines. I wanted to make Poland look as beautiful as I think it is, which is a vibrant, warm, welcoming place.”
In fact, Eisenberg has applied for Polish citizenship. “When I was there – I’ll tell you the truth. I just had the most…” He laughs. “Well, obviously I’ll tell you the truth. For this one, I’ll tell you the truth! When I was there, I was just really, really overwhelmed with the warm reception I got there.” He continues, “I was just thinking how sad it was that my family has no relationship with Poland. Most American Jews whose families are from Poland have no relationship to Poland now. That’s so tragic. We were Polish for way longer than we were American. Shouldn’t we try to reconnect to this history in some way?”
A Real Pain opens in UK cinemas on January 8
