Eisenberg's film, A Real Pain, follows two cousins on a Jewish heritage tour of Poland, which includes a stop at the Majdanek death camp. Eisenberg spoke with Terry Gross about tragedy tourism, and his own relationship to Judaism. The "Hebrew school dropout" says the suburban bar mitzvah scene made his 12-year-old stomach turn.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
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This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. My guest Jesse Eisenberg wrote, directed, and stars in the film A Real Pain. Oscar predictors expect the film to be nominated for multiple Academy Awards. Eisenberg had his first major film role in 2002's Roger Dodger when he was still in high school. Three years later, when he was 21, he was a star of the film The Squid and the Whale.
He played Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network about the early days of Facebook. He played the journalist interviewing writer David Foster Wallace in The End of the Tour. He starred in the 2022 miniseries Fleischman is in Trouble.
In a real pain, he plays a husband and father who goes on a Jewish heritage tour in Poland with his cousin, played by Kieran Culkin, who was like a brother when they were growing up. The trip is funded by their beloved, recently deceased grandmother, who left money in her will for the trip so that they could see the home she fled when the Nazis were in power.
Each cousin is dealing with mental health issues, which are exacerbated by the trip. Eisenberg's character is introverted and takes meds for his OCD. He's constantly hurt and embarrassed by his cousin's inappropriate behavior.
Culkin's character is dealing with depression, but when around other people, he becomes extroverted, manic in ways that can be seen as charismatic or incredibly annoying and intrusive. Both extremes are intensified by the disconnect Culkin's character experiences between the first-class train car the tour travels on and the cattle cars that brought Jews to their death.
He's also troubled by the disconnect between the nice restaurants the tour takes them to while at the same time the death camp Majdanek is on the tour. Our critic John Powers wrote, quote, unquote. It's worth mentioning that the film also has comic touches. Jesse Eisenberg, welcome to Fresh Air and congratulations on the film.
Thank you so much. What an honor to be on your show.
Oh, it's a pleasure to have you. So the movie is based in part in a movie you were making, a kind of road movie set in Mongolia. And it wasn't working for you. That's right. And then you saw an ad advertising like a Holocaust tour, a Jewish heritage tour, and it said lunch included. And you thought, okay, this is something. What intrigued you about that, especially the lunch included part?
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