John Krasinski cannot thank wife Emily Blunt enough for helping him have a successful career.
The actor-director, who has received numerous plaudits for making one of the best films of this year, A Quiet Place, told the Independent that he wouldn’t have directed the science-fiction horror tale had it not been for Blunt. The duo starred in Krasinski’s first ever foray into a studio movie, which earned universal acclaim and raked in more than $330 million upon its release. Krasinski said that Blunt helped him understand the nitty-gritty of the movie business in a way that no one else had.
“I was originally just going to star and Emily told me I had to direct it. She knew it was a huge opportunity for me, and in the madness she just let me be myself. I honestly feel I wouldn’t have this career if I hadn’t met her, because she’s taught me so much about how to go about the business. She’s been my secret ingredient.”
The Office star said that he wanted Blunt to star alongside him, but was “too scared” to ask her. But when Blunt read the script of A Quiet Place on a flight, she basically ordered him to cast her. At the time, a well-known star had already been cast for her role, but Krasinski had to let her go to be able to cast Blunt.
“I can’t say who,” Krasinski said, “but essentially, yes – Emily had someone fired.”
John Krasinski interview: ‘Emily Blunt is the secret ingredient to my career’ https://t.co/53Muop3rry pic.twitter.com/bChJ7xGGJK
— The Independent (@Independent) August 25, 2018
Krasinski even credited A Quiet Place with having made his marriage with Blunt stronger. Joking that some of his friends had warned him about probable divorce if both him and Blunt worked on the movie together, he prided himself in the fact that it was the pair who had the last laugh.
“It without a doubt made our marriage stronger,” Krasinski said.
“I think we were both surprised by that. Not that I thought it would get worse but we were much more in love after the movie. We leaned on each other in a way we never had.”
And now the 38-year-old is set to play the titular character in Jack Ryan, Amazon’s new show based on Tom Clancy’s series of books. Krasinski said it is a huge honor to play a character which has previously been played by stalwarts such as Harrison Ford and Alec Baldwin, but it was something entirely else that convinced him to play the everyday superhero.
“I think that there’s an everyman quality to Jack that certainly my character in The Office [Jim Halpert] had, and I think that’s what I connected to,” he said. “There was a nerdy part of me as a kid that went, ‘Oh, I could be Jack Ryan’ whereas I couldn’t be Superman. There is such an appeal to playing a guy who is a real person, that you might see in a bar – he’s an actual superhero that could exist.”
