Current mood:

giddy

John Krasinski Visits Brown!
Sorry for the confusion with my last post. I found out Friday night that he was speaking Saturday (they didn’t publicize it a lot, which was probably a good thing for me, because I got there an hour early and still had to sit on the floor), and I went to post here, and forgot about the whole screening-thing. So my post wasn’t up until AFTER he’d come. Sorry! But anyway.

So: John Krasinski.

He’s, like, a real person. He’s not imaginary. It blew my mind.

He’s also just awesome. Smart, funny, really nice, sweetly self-deprecating, and adorable. Awesome. And he mentioned several times that he hates when people do things just to do them, and that he’s not a very actor-y actor, which really just made me love him.


First, they showed us “Business School,” which was awesome for a number of reasons. At first I was wondering why they chose that episode, and then Michael talked about being a “visiting professor” at Ryan’s class, and Ryan said, no, just guest lecturer, and everyone cracked up and it made sense. Plus, we got to see Vampire!Jim.

Then he talked a bit about the episode, nothing new, just some cute things about “this new technology called ‘CGI’ that we used to have the bat flying around the office – I like to think of it as ‘Toy Story’.”

Then it was opened up to questions. There were quite a few about his experience at Brown, of course – in case anyone’s wondering (I was), he lived in Wayland. We had Spring Weekend last weekend, with The Roots and The Flaming Lips, and he was really upset to have missed that (as well as Dave Binder, who comes every year on Sunday and has for a long time). I’ll spare you the rest, because it’s only relevant if you go to Brown.

Someone asked about “Brief Interviews with Hideous Men”, which apparently came from a staged reading he did of it at Brown. One of his friends was doing a staged reading, and asked him to participate, and he just had this funny little part, and afterwards he sat down and watched the rest and was completely blown away. So later he was trying to get the rights to do the movie, and they basically laughed at him (they filmed last summer, which means he must’ve been trying to get the rights even before The Office). Finally he got to talk to someone, and she asked why he wanted to do it, and he talked about this really emotional connection he got from doing that staged reading. She said she’d get back to him, he asked for her honesty in response to his, and she said, “Well, my answer’s not ‘No’ anymore.” And so this summer he’s editing it!

Ok, about the show: Creed is his favorite character on and off the set. His favorite line ever on the show was, “Which one’s Pam?” and he loves the oddity of the character. But Creed Bratton was also the guitarist for The Grassroots (which was actually mentioned last episode!), and so he just has all these random stories about going on stage with Janis Joplin and hanging out with all sorts of people, and it’s just awesome to hear. He’s also, apparently, a HUGE star in China. Rainn Wilson is the most like his character; Rainn isn’t quite as weird as Dwight, but he has no issues with being weird every so often, and he loves playing Dwight as weird as possible. Jim and Pam are going to get married, have a huge family, and turn into this whole soap-opera thing, where Jim is going to be wearing an eye patch next season. Seriously. :D

His favorite episode is “Diversity Day,” because they did the pilot, which was pretty much exactly the pilot of the British version, and everyone was really nervous about it. Then they got the script for “Diversity Day”, and after the read-through, they all realized they were a part of something really amazing (and also that they might not have jobs next week!). So he loves that episode.

He talked about acting, a bit, and being a “professional waiter” in New York while going on auditions. He got fired from one job as a lunchtime bartender because he got someone to cover his shift while he went on an audition, and the boss didn’t think “his heart was in it.” John was just like, “Mmm, you’re right!” And left. Hee. He told some audition stories that I’d heard before, like the one where he told the executive producer that the show was going to suck, and that at auditions, everyone thought everyone else was going to get the part. Like, John was convinced Jenna and Rainn would get it, and Jenna and Rainn were convinced he would. And they were all right! He also talked about how surreal it was to see B. J. Novak, his high school classmate (director, and fellow Little League player), at the auditions, and that it was really weird until they realized they weren’t auditioning for the same role.

He talked about his upcoming movies, and how he’s idolized Robin Williams since he was 12 and how awesome it was to work with him. Also Leatherheads, and working with George Clooney (“Oh, hold on just one second, let me pick up that name” – he bends over, picks up an imaginary name, puts it in his pocket, as the audience laughs – “maybe you know him, he’s on a little show called ‘Er’”), who is ALSO awesome, and admits when he’s terrified about something.

Also, he DOES have hair (re: wig rumors). Or else he’s got a kickass wig that he wears everywhere except on the show, where he wears a crappy one. Because I was pretty close to him, and the hair was convincingly growing from his scalp. It was pretty short, though, which might be why it’s been weird lately – he says basically he rolls out of bed, showers, and when he gets to the set they hairspray his hair exactly as it is, and that’s Jim. He’s also really skinny and not as tall as he seems on the show (though maybe this is because I’m 5’11”). Also, he took the train from New York (“Yeah, I take the train. They offered me a helicopter, but I was like, no thanks”).

My question was initially whether he, as an Honors Playwright, was thinking about writing any upcoming episodes. Then he mentioned Doctor Who in another response (the exchanged went something like this: “What’s your favorite episode?” “Of The Office? Well, of course, I don’t know why I always ask that – it’s like, oh, my favorite episode of Doctor Who?”), I had to ask this: What TV shows does he watch? A lot of Cartoon Network (Aqua Teen Hunger Force, for one); he thinks Family Guy is the funniest show ever written; he’s starting to get into The Wire on DVD. Still not sure if he watches Doctor Who. :P

I think that’s everything important/interesting/relevant. If there’s anything else you think of that he might’ve talked about but I didn’t mention, ask – I’ll answer if I can!

So pictures. I don’t have any from when he was speaking (well, I have 3, but they’re AWFUL), because even though I was really close to the stage, he was on the other side of the room and my zoom isn’t that great. Plus the lighting was awkward. He didn’t do anything really interesting like dancing, anyway – his talking was enough.

BUT: Here’s him with me (yay! A not-crappy (though really not good) picture of me!)


And here’s my signed copy of the Lancelot photo from Entertainment Weekly (in case you can’t read it, it says: “Breda – How ridiculous is THIS!”), which I ran out and bought last night when I found out he was speaking.


Also, I’d really like to write to him, thank him for coming, tell him how awesome he is, all that. So if anyone knows how to contact him, I’d be eternally grateful.


Outside the cut because I only just remembered: the pictures posted by thepoodleskirt reminded me. The yearbook picture in Email Surveillance? Is him in high school. He had braces junior and senior year, got them off the week before prom. And, the flashback picture of Jim and Dwight in Traveling Salesmen (I think) was pasted-on heads from college photos over a photo of them in costume now. More of that new-fangled CGI stuff. :D