-Welcome to the show. Thanks for coming on.
-Thank you for having me. -Jesse, you --
I know you're married to a good friend of ours.
I love her so much -- Kirsten Dunst,
a very talented actress. [ Cheers and applause ]
-Yes, yes.
-And you have two little, little babies.
How old are the kids?
-Our oldest is almost 5.
Our youngest just turned 2 a few days ago.
-So cute.
-And actually, the main reason for me coming and doing the show
is I have something that I want to talk to you about.
-Sure. -I want to thank you.
-You want to thank me? -I want to thank you.
And I also have a bone to pick with you.
-Oh. -Are you guys familiar with --
with Jimmy's children's book work?
[ Cheers ] -Of course.
-Writing. Anyways...
[ Laughter ]
He's a very well-renowned children's book author.
-I'm like Dr. Seuss. Yeah, of course.
-In his free time. [ Laughter ]
-But, no, Kirsten was on the show a while ago.
This was, I think, before our oldest was born.
And you sent a couple of your books --
"Your Baby's First Word Will be Mama"...
-Yes. -...and the Dada book.
-Yes, that's right.
-And they provided some, you know, great times for us.
We really enjoyed them.
And they're for young kids, right?
Wouldn't you say? -Yeah. They're -- Yeah.
-And our kid is -- our kid is 5 now.
And all he wants to read is Mama and Dada book.
[ Laughter ] -Yeah.
I think that's fantastic.
[ Laughter ] -No, it is.
-But he's 5. -He's 5.
-Yeah, he's probably -- -And now I'm worried about,
you know... [ Laughter ]
-Yeah. Yeah. He needs to take another...
-Yeah. -Another level.
Take it to another level.
No, the Dada books were great.
[ Laughter ]
But lookit, lookit. You get through them real quick.
You get through the books real quick.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
And as a way to just kind of entertain ourselves,
there's a little bit in the back where there's a --
all the parents picking up the kids from school.
And so we, like, started improvising...
-You really did read the book.
-Like thousands of times, yes. [ Laughter ]
-All right. Wait. I kind of know the bone you're about to pick.
Yeah. You -- You're tired of the book.
-I'm tired of the book. -Yeah, I understand.
Yeah, yeah, I understand. That's why I wrote this book.
Because I was reading the same books
you always read to the kids,
and you go, "I can't read it again.
I'm gonna go crazy."
-It's the equivalent of "Baby Shark," this book.
It's like, you -- [ Laughter ]
-No, no, no, no! -No, in a good way.
-Oh, okay. -In a good way.
It's like he cracked some child's mind code.
-That was -- I got very lucky with that,
with that book. And a lot of kids --
-Please write another book. Please.
-I actually -- I actually did.
And I want to give it to you. This is...
Do you have this? I know...
-"Nana"? -"Nana."
"Nana Loves You More."
[ Cheers and applause ]
This one...
This one -- This is the one.
-I'm excited, and I'm a little scared.
-No, no, I know -- I know Kirsten's mom,
and so I think you're gonna love this.
And she's gonna love this. This is a good one.
There's more words. -That's great.
[ Laughter ] -It's more -- It's more words.
Yeah. I'm taking babies -- We're getting bigger and bigger.
I'm writing more and more. -All right.
-Yeah. I want you to come on every year and see my progress.
-Yeah, okay, great. [ Laughter ]
-Thank you, Jesse. I appreciate that.
I want to talk about you because I'm a giant fan of yours.
So, I've been wanting to have you on the show for a long time.
Last year, you and Kirsten got Oscar nominated,
by the way, for the same movie. Congratulations on that.
[ Cheers and applause ]
"Power of the Dog."
"Power of the Dog." -Is that fun
when you go with your wife to the Oscars.
You're like, "Hey, we're both nominated.
This is kind of cool." -It's very surreal.
But -- but, yeah, I mean, it's something --
It was so unexpected.
I knew the odds for Kirsten and Benedict and Kodi
were pretty high for them to get nominated
and some of the other cast and crew.
But the last thing I expected
was to be a part of that list, as well.
And we had our family there.
It was just -- Yeah, it was unbelievably special.
-Who from the family went?
-Pretty much the whole crew.
But, yeah, my dad,
I've realized, mainly through that award season,
is that he has a real knack, probably better than I am,
at, like, cruising parties and...
-Schmooze? -His name is Jim Bob.
He's a retired fireman, cowboy...
-His name is Jim Bob? [ Laughter ]
-I'm surprised. I wish he was here.
-Jim Bob, yeah!
That's awesome. [ Cheers and applause ]
And so he went and cruised the party?
-I mean, yeah, he -- he -- There's no one that he meets
that isn't his best friend in a few minutes.
He's, like, introducing me to everyone.
-Yeah. It sounds like -- He's from Texas, as well?
-Yeah. A little town in Central Texas.
-Yeah. Come on. Jim Bob from Texas.
That's charming. Come on. Exactly right.
Well, he's got to be proud of you, bud.
Let's talk about this new limited series,
"Love & Death."
It's you and Elizabeth Olsen, and it's just crusher.
Is it David E. Kelley.
-David E. Kelley. Directed by Lesli Linka Glatter.
-Just crushes, man.
This is a bizarre story. It's a true story.
And do you want to explain
to everyone what the love and death part maybe?
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
Well, we sort of let you know right out of the gate
what you're getting into. There's a --
It -- As Jimmy said, it takes place --
It's a true story. It takes place in the late '70s
in a suburb of Dallas.
These, you know, very family-oriented,
churchgoing folks that are kind of all
chasing the American dream, and on the surface,
things seem to be working out well.
And my character, Allan Gore,
is friends with this -- with Lizzie's character.
And they play -- they play in this church volleyball league.
And at a certain point, they're both going for the same ball.
And Lizzie's character catches my character's scent
and in that moment thinks, "You know what?
I would like to have an affair with that guy."
And, um... [ Laughter ]
And then that's how the show...
-That's the -- that's the love part.
-That's the love part.
And then, yeah.
You have to watch to find out the other part.
[ Laughter ] -Yeah.
You have to watch to find out the other part.
You can google it, too. -Yes.
It's a very well-known story. -It's a well-known story.
It's an insane story, but well -- well-acted.
And a different take on --
You get to see the -- from all different angles
of the different characters.
You go, "Oh, that's interesting."
-Well, yeah, it's something that even just shooting it,
when you first read the story, your immediate reaction --
my immediate reaction -- was was one thing.
And as it goes along, you know, you realize
that there's not really any one particular character
you can point the finger at or blame
or that's the antagonist. So it's just an interesting
character study of these very, you know --
I don't know -- small-town, relatable,
real people going through unimaginable sort of things.
You know? -Before we show a clip,
I just want to say, I think I want to say
that you were in maybe 6 or 7 movies
that were nominated for Oscars.
And I think there's a reason for that.
You're fantastic, buddy.
[ Cheers and applause ]
I want to show a clip.
Here's Jesse Plemmons and Elizabeth Olsen
in "Love & Death." Take a look at this.
-I would never be able to forgive myself
if Betty ever found out.
That would just be devastating to her.
-I feel the same. We would have to be so careful
that no one would ever know except us.
-That's right.
-I've been thinking a lot about what you said about...
just wanting to go to bed,
not getting too emotionally involved and so forth.
That would be very important to me.
-Me too, Allan.
♪♪
God, I just want to enjoy myself.
Without hurting myself or anyone else.
-Whoa! [ Cheers and applause ]
Jesse Plemmons, everybody!
"Love & Death" debuts April 27th on HBO Max!
More "Tonight Show" after the break.
Stick around, everybody.