-Our first guest tonight is an Oscar-nominated actor
you know from movies such as "Zombieland,"
"Now You See Me," and "The Social Network."
He stars in FX's "Fleishman is in Trouble."
New episodes stream Thursdays on Hulu.
Let's take a look.
-Can I get Instagram? Everyone has it.
-No. We've answered this before.
No social media until you're 13.
-Everyone.
-Hanna, you don't even have a phone.
It's not good for kids and anxiety.
Your brain is still developing,
alright? -Dad and I'll talk about it.
-Excuse me. We've already talked about it, okay?
-How about my anxiety that everybody is always on it
and leaving me out?
-She has a point. -Yeah?
[ Laughter ]
[ Water runs ]
-You're an animal.
-Please welcome back to the show
our friend Jesse Eisenberg, everybody.
[ Cheering and applause ]
[ Upbeat funk plays ]
♪♪
How are you? -I'm great.
Thank you so much. How are you?
-I'm wonderful.
I am enjoying the show a great deal.
-Thank you so much. I had not -- I'm ashamed to say
I had not read the novel it's based on,
which was a book that everybody spoke very highly of.
-Yeah. -Had you read the book
before you took on?
-I bought the book, you know, I bought the book.
[ Laughter ] I had it on like -- I had it on on the app.
I bought a digital copy of the book, you know,
as an environmental gesture. -Sure, that's [indistinct].
[ Laughter ] And greatly appreciated.
Thank you. -Yeah, you're welcome.
[ Laughter ] -And --
Yeah, but then I had -- Before I read it,
I heard an interview with the writer,
who's now a friend, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, a genius,
and I heard an interview with her
and she was talking about her work as a journalist
for The New York Times Magazine,
as a culture reporter, writing about celebrities.
And, once I heard that, I decided not to read the book
because I thought maybe it's about a celebrity and I,
you know, avoid anything having to do with celebrity culture
or the arts, you know, based on just shame and ambivalence
[ Laughter ] about my own place in it, you know.
And so, I didn't read it and I felt good
about that decision, you know, because I thought,
you know, there's a nobility in my, you know,
my aversion to anything having to do with myself.
[ Laughter ] And then --
And then they had sent me the script
and I saw that it wasn't about anybody famous
and I immediately dove into the book and I loved it.
-Yeah. And, for those who don't know,
it's about a divorced father
who's sort of going back into the dating scene,
but then his ex-wife disappears
and he's left with the children. -Right.
-One of the elements of this is he is introduced by his --
you know, his younger colleagues introduce him
to the dating apps, which he has missed. -That's right. Yeah.
-You also, in real life, missed the dating apps, right?
-Yes, thank God. -You met your wife a while back.
-Met my wife a long time ago.
I, you know, pursued her for like a year and a half
before she agreed to date me, so then --
-Really?! -Yes.
-So, that's a lot harder than an app.
-Yes. -Yeah.
[ Laughter ] -Yes, yes, exactly.
I mean, I -- you know,
I went through like, you know,
the 12 stages of Hercules
[ Laughter ] or whatever it's called, you know, to get her to date me.
You know, it was in New York City, though,
so that just means, you know, sending her my jokes
and my scripts and stuff like that.
[ Laughter ] I didn't have to fight a lion or anything like that.
But then, you know, to see the ease
with which people can date,
you know, of course, my first thought, you know,
was like, "I made a huge mistake," you know, obviously.
[ Laughter ]
And then you go through the thing
and you see everybody on the yacht or wherever they are
and then you realize, "No, thank God.
Thank God for that year and a half of misery."
[ Laughter ]
-I missed it as well, I think, very mercifully.
But, again, if you see, you know, younger friends
who are on it, you're like, "Oh, my God, it's so easy,"
but then you realize there's just a deep, empty sadness
in their eyes, you know, and that makes me happy. -Yes, yes, yes.
[ Laughter ] I like stability over happiness any day of the week.
[ Laughter ] You know what I mean? Yeah.
-That was your wedding vow, right?
[ Laughter ] -That's what I said to her.
That's -- Which was it?
That's why I asked her to marry me.
I said, "Would you be stable... [ Laughter ]
...and with a ceiling on stability, and nothing else?"
And she said no.
[ Awws ] And then I waited for another period of time and then we --
-That's great. Yeah. -Yeah. We were engaged.
-People always come around to stability.
There is a flashback.
We see sort of your courtship with your ex-wife,
played wonderfully by Claire Danes.
And this is -- That's a wig?
-That's a wig. It's great. -Yeah, it's a really good,
believable wig, yeah. -Yeah.
[ Laughter ] But, you know, it was like scripted and decided
by like a team of people and FX,
you know, network people, people, you know,
professional people, that I should look, you know,
younger and awkward, you know, and --
[ Laughter ]
Yeah.
[ Applause ] You know. [ Chuckles ]
[ Laughter ]
And then they made like a $10,000 wig
that looked exactly like how I normally look.
[ Laughter ]
And, you know, you get the sense that like,
"Oh, corporate realizes
that I, Jesse Eisenberg, in my natural state,
am awkward and, you know, [ Laughter ]
young-looking, just generally speaking,
and that I'm not presentable on television, unless it's like,
you know, qualified that this is the awkward years."
[ Laughter ]
-I have a lot more to ask you. We'll be right back
[ Cheering and applause ] with more from Jesse Eisenberg, everybody.