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Aaron Sorkin says “it never occurred” to him that Jesse Eisenberg would not be joining him on The Social Reckoning.
The Oscar-winning screenwriter has previously said that he spent three days trying to convince Eisenberg to reprise his role as Mark Zuckerberg from the 2010 hit The Social Network for its sequel, but that the actor was not persuaded by anything — especially not money.
“I knew what the studio was offering him to do it, but money does not motivate Jesse. It’s infuriating,” Sorkin told Entertainment Weekly in an interview published Saturday. “If anything, money is a disincentive for him. It’s admirable. He’s very concerned about raising his kids with too much money.”
Sorkin, who is stepping in to direct The Social Reckoning after David Fincher helmed the 2010 film, said that he was close to finishing the script for the new movie when he ran into Eisenberg at a party and told him that he planned to send it to him.
Eisenberg “smiled and nodded, and I sent it to him,” Sorkin said. “It never occurred to me that he wouldn’t want to do it.”
Over the next three days, Sorkin said that he planned his arguments to convince the Oscar-nominated actor to change his mind. “This is the only time I’ve written myself an outline. I don’t do it for the movies, but I did it for my conversations with Jesse,” he said.
“It was arguments for why he should do it. They included, ‘We already know you’re going to be great because you were already once.’ You know, ‘Here are the great moments that you’re gonna get to play in the movie.’ And I laid it out for him,” Sorkin recalled.
In the end, Eisenberg still ended up turning down the role. However, Sorkin said that he told him that their conversations made him “come closer to changing my mind than I thought you were going to,” which the screenwriter said was enough for him.
Jeremy Strong will be taking over for Eisenberg in the role of Zuckerberg for Sorkin’s new movie, which comes out October 9. The movie also stars Mikey Madison and Jeremy Allen White.
When asked about declining the role, the A Real Pain actor also reflected on his conversations with Sorkin, but concluded that he no longer wants “to be associated with that character.”
“It’s an honor to speak to Aaron in any capacity, because he’s so articulate and charming and so bright,” Eisenberg told Variety in June.
“We talked about doing the movie for several days,” he said. “The way Aaron speaks, he speaks so wonderfully, as he writes, that, in a way, if you’re not going to do something with him, it feels almost like you’re letting down America.”
He continued: “I just told him I’m moving in different directions in my life, and you know, what he said sums it up nicely: I don’t want to be associated with that character. But all of my reasons for not wanting to do the movie have nothing to do with how wonderful the movie is, and will be, and I’m sure is already.”
