-Do I call you "James" or do I call you "Jimmy"?
-Ah, "Jimmy." -I do?
-Yeah. -You go by Jimmy?
-I go by Jimmy. -Yeah.
But you -- professionally "James"?
-Yeah, it's, it's -- yeah I'm professionally James,
but everyone calls me Jimmy. All my friends call me Jimmy.
-Oh, good. -I made this crazy decision
when I was like, 22, the first big show I did as an actor,
the producer came up to me and she was like,
"You know what?" I was like "What?"
she was like, "I think you should go by "James"
And I was like, "I don't know, everyone calls me Jimmy,
that might be weird and confusing,"
and she goes, "Yeah, but James Stewart
is what Jimmy Stewart was billed as."
And I said, "Alright, well if it's good enough for
Jimmy Stewart, it's good enough for me."
And so then became the most confusing 10 years of my life.
Because what happens is, I'll go onto a set
and they'll go, "So what should we call you?"
And I'll say, "Well, call me 'Jimmy.'"
But I don't get to everyone at the same time.
So I'm telling certain people Jimmy, certain people James.
-Oh, then people think you don't like them.
-People think I'm not a nice person.
-Yeah, they go "Hey, what's this?
I'm not in the 'Jimmy' club." -Yeah.
Why does he get to call him Jimmy
and I have to call him James? -Yeah.
You actually have to start saying your middle name as well.
-Yeah, so you were smart. -That's really rude, yeah.
I got to assume you get recognized a lot,
because I know you from a lot of big things.
"Mad Men" you were great in. "Watchmen," "Billions."
-Thank you. -Do you get recognized a lot?
-Yeah. I mean, it's like. I'm not -- Not like you.
It's not -- you know, there's no --
-"Yo, James!" -Yeah, right.
[ Light laughter ] I kind of get like the look,
like, "Is that my cousin? Why do I know that guy?"
[ Laughter ] Or like, "Was he at
Thanksgiving? Was he at my aunt's Thanksgiving?"
[ Laughter ] -Was he at Thanksgiving?
-"Why is he smiling back at me? What's wrong with that guy?"
But what happens is like we -- so we have these neighbors
who are -- they're great. There's like 13, 14 --
there's like 20 of them. And they're really nice.
And they walk our dog.
And during the pandemic they were great.
They'd come and walk the dog -- we have two small kids at home.
And we didn't want the dog to be neglected. So we had them come.
And I always noticed they'd kind of look at me.
And they'd kind of smile, and I go,
"Oh, they definitely know my work."
I talk -- they must have seen whatever show it was.
And then one day, one of the guys comes up and he goes,
"We thought you were John Krasinski."
[ Laughter ] I was like, "okay."
-At least he's honest. I'll take that.
-"We thought you were famous.
We thought you were John Krasinski."
-I would take that. Why not man?
-John Krasinski -- yeah. -He's a stud.
-Yeah, never walked the dog again. That was it.
He wasn't welcome back. -You're not John Krasinski,
yeah. I want to -- can we talk about the show?
-Yeah. -"Ordinary Joe."
I like the idea of this, because --
the idea is kind of like, to me,
like the movie "Sliding Doors." Like, what if?
What if I made this decision instead of this decision
in my life? Would my life change?
Yes, of course it would, but also the lives
around you would change as well. -Yeah.
-Is that kind of the idea? -Yeah, so the show is,
basically, you meet the character who I play,
his name is Joe Kimbrough.
You meet him the day he's about to graduate from college.
And you see that he has three very different choices
in front of him.
And then the show cuts to black, and it picks up 10 years later,
and you follow the three different
iterations of his life.
So basically it plays with this idea of choice,
and how the choices we make
drastically change who we become.
And in each world -- like, in one world
he's married with a kid.
In another world, he remains single,
and he became a nurse at a hospital.
In another world he became like a famous musician
because he followed his dreams of music,
and he has -- him and his wife are trying to conceive,
and they're having trouble doing it.
-So it was like -- this is great for an actor.
You must -- that's a meaty role. -It's a challenge.
-You can do three -- you have to do three different --
-Yes. -- -Characters in one episode.
-Yes, we will -- sometimes we do three characters in a day.
Like, you're literally, in the morning, you know,
we'll do one character and then two hours of, like,
a hand-laid beard. If you saw the show tonight,
he wears -- like, I have a long hair and a beard
in one of the roles, so we'll do that at lunch.
-How fun.
-Come back as a different character. It's awesome.
-And then you can take it anywhere.
Who knows where the show can -- cause you go like,
"Which one is real?" -Right.
-Could be the real -- I'm not writing for the show.
[ Light laughter ] -Yeah, yeah.
-Just saying, you go like, "Hey, the rock star one is real."
Then you go, "No, it's not. Just kidding."
-Well, do you have that -- do you have, like,
a moment like that where you look back and you go like,
"That was the -- that was the crossroads where, like,
that drastically changed --"? -Yeah, I think I did
reach that part.
I think everyone has that thing where you're like,
"I think I'm going to do this," or,
"I'm going to date this person, or not this person."
-Totally. -You make that move,
and it all can change. I love it.
-Yeah. -I'm so excited about this.
-Thanks, man. -I want to show everyone a clip.
Here's James Wolk in "Ordinary Joe."
Take a look at this.
-Wow, you look fancy. -Just a tie, bud.
-Fancier than your scrubs. -Yeah, a bit.
-You trying to impress people?
-Not really.
-Is mom going to be there? -Yeah. It's her reunion too.
That's where we met, in college. -I hope you impress her.
-James Wolk, everybody. [ Cheers and applause ]
Check out new episodes of "Ordinary Joe" Monday nights
at 10:00 P.M. here on NBC.