Thank God Emma Stone Talked Kieran Culkin Into Making 'A Real Pain'

Every November into December I look at all the “award movies” that will be released or have been released and quickly realize there’s no way I’ll get to all of them. I try! I love going to the movies and more often than not will have a good time watching whatever movies are going for the gold. The risk of seeing something I don’t like is lessened. It still happens (I’m looking at you, Dream Scenario) but it’s rare. It’s more common to see something I think I’ll like and love it. That was the case with A Real Pain.

I knew I would enjoy the new film written, starring, and directed by Jesse Eisenberg. He has always impressed me as an actor, both in his performances and what he chooses to make. The premise of the film, two Jewish cousins taking a Holocaust tour across Europe, certainly interested me. Regardless, A Real Pain ended up being one of my favorite movie-going experiences of the year. It’s a deeply somber and deeply hilarious film, and that is thanks in no small part to Eisenberg’s co-star, Kieran Culkin.

Most of my experience with Culkin comes from seeing him in three things. I’ve watched him almost my whole life as Fuller in Home Alone. I saw him in a production of This Is Our Youth on Broadway about a decade ago. Then, like most Americans, I mainlined Succession during lockdown. That’s it! I haven’t seen him in anything else. That’s on me because he is terrific. I marveled at his work in A Real Pain, so it’s wild to hear that he joined the film late in the process and almost didn’t do it at all.

If you asked I would have told you Eisenberg likely wrote the role in the new film specifically for Culkin. It plays to all his strengths, yet doesn’t feel typecast in any way. That’s just the energy he brings as an actor. I would be incorrect in my assumption. Eisenberg revealed in a new joint interview with the LA Times that Culkin came in after the film had already been storyboarded, costumes were being purchased, and locations were being chosen. Still, Culkin had reservations.

“Yeah, I wasn’t really aware of how far along you were,” Culkin explained. “I didn’t know you were actually out there until I had that conversation with Emma.” He’s referring to Emma Stone who is a producer on the film and managed to give the actor the final nudge toward accepting the role. It also helped that Culkin loved the script. He didn’t want to leave his wife and child to go to Poland and shoot a movie, but the work was too good to pass up.

You can read the whole interview here and I recommend you do. Eisenberg and Culkin’s chemistry sparkles via the written word just as brightly as it does on screen. I’d watch them together in anything. Let’s remake The In-Laws again! Who cares?! Just put them together! There’s something special here and we have Emma Stone and a great script to thank for it.