As good-guy salesman Jim Halpert, he’s navigating the tricky waters of a workplace relationship with Pam Beesley (Jenna Fischer) on NBC’s The Office. Off screen, John Krasinski is reaping the benefits of being on a popular, critically acclaimed, award-winning show: a higher Hollywood profile and the roles that come with it.
Not only has he landed both leading and choice supporting parts in recent and upcoming films, he was able to secure backing for his directorial debut, Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, from a screenplay he based on stories by David Foster Wallace starring Julianne Nicholson, Will Forte, Christopher Meloni and Office castmate Rashida Jones.
Krasinski, in fact, is no stranger to scripts. He graduated from Brown University in 2002 with honors in playwriting and a degree in English Literature and subsequently studied at the National Theater Institute. Then the native of Newton, Mass.,–who grew up playing Little League with Office mate B.J. Novak, who in high school wrote the first play Krasinski acted in–worked as a writing intern on Late Night With Conan O’Brien.
The actor most recently in the summer comedy License to Wed with Robin Williams and Mandy Moore, and blockbuster Shrek the Third as the voice of Lancelot. Both will be out this fall on DVD, following The Office’s third season set, just released. In November, Krasinski also plays as a football star whose fiancée (Renee Zellweger) falls for his coach (George Clooney, who also directs) in the 1920s-set Leatherheads, and will appear alongside Adam Brody and Anna Faris in director Gregg Araki’s comedy Smiley Face, an independent film awaiting release.
Meanwhile, the 27-year-old actor is gearing up for The Office’s fourth season–and he brought us up to date on his return to the Dunder-Miflin cubicle.
Hollywood.com: What’s the scoop on Jim and Pam this season?
John Krasinski: I don’t know. The writers are committed to doing a real relationship and so what I keep saying is that as long as it’s something that people can go, “Yeah, I’ve been down that road ” or “I know someone who’s been down that road,” that’s our goal. As soon as it starts getting out of control and we start dressing up in weird clothes or going to Disneyland on dates it won’t make sense.
HW: Are you concerned about jumping the shark?
JK: I don’t actually think that there’ll be an opportunity to jump the shark this season because–I always bring this up–but in the “Booze Cruise” episode it was so dramatic and so weighted about what Jim was going to say and then he said nothing. I honestly didn’t know that was coming and so I don’t know how anyone else can know. When you have writers who are coming up with ideas like that, that’s very real, because I’ve been there and I don’t always know what to say either.
HW: You’ve been doing a lot of movies lately. How are you balancing The Office and your film career?
JK: To be honest, I attribute it all to the show. The only reason someone like Robin Williams or George Clooney even know who I am is because of the show. So it’s really fun to bring that energy and they liked the show and they wanted to add that element to the movies.
HW: You’ve got Leatherheads coming up and Brief Interviews With Hideous Men. Can you talk about those?
JK: I directed and wrote Brief Interviews With Hideous Men and I play a small part in that, and Leatherheads is George Clooney‘s movie that’s coming out is about the beginning of football, how the NFL got started. It comes out Dec. 7.
HW: You play a jock in that?
JK: I am the jock. I’m the best player in the country. So, thank you, George Clooney.
HW: Are you athletic off screen?
JK: I run a little bit and I do a push up here and there, but as you can tell I’m not necessarily the pillar of exercise.
HW: How good a football player are you?
JK: I played all my life, but never organized football. It was just playing everyday after school and things like that. But the fact that you’re doing it on film means that you can’t screw up and do another play. You’ve got to do that play over and over. So when the play was that I had to run a hundred yards down the whole field, I think that George started doing a few extra takes to get a little amusement.
HW: How is Clooney as a director?
JK: Fantastic. He’s totally different from anyone that I’ve worked with. He knows exactly what he wants every time and yet still somehow maintains a feeling of freedom and enjoyment. I was taking notes on everything that he did from directing to eating lunch to talking to the crew. Pretty much everything he does is the right way to do it. I had a great time.
HW: NBC is promoting a green-living initiative in its programming coming up in November. What do you personally do that’s eco-friendly?
JK: I drive a hybrid, the Lexus hybrid. On the set we are coming up with ideas all the time like collecting all the old scripts and stuff like that, which is really cool because no one is asking us to do it.
HW: The Office is a TiVo show for a lot of people. What’s on your TiVo?
JK: A lot of documentaries, Frontline. I was out of town for a while and it was nice to come back and learn about the world again.
