James Spader Actually is an Annoying, Unfunny Douche

He's not a comedic actor. I don't know what they were thinking. But, his character is an asshole and that seemed to work.

Spader has always seemed like a complete asshole. He's always had an air of "I'm much better than you and don't you forget it".

I don't think his "I only did The Office for the money" attitude probably helped.

I'm glad I was late for the whole The Office thing. I thought that Spader was really good at being a thorough dick, that's what he's always done, and I think that too many times Steve Carell was trying too hard to be funny. Atleast was a different take on a boss, which was what they chose to roll with to keep the show going. I'd also guess that this cast, like many others had 'gelled ' by the time Spader came in, and no one would have been good enough, hell Andy wasn't funny until he got back (for the second time) from absconding from The Office.

By the last two seasons all involved were just in it for the money, and good for Spader for not dressing it up any other way.

Spader plays the same role in everything.

I LOATHE Ed Helms, that Frankensteinian motherfucker.

Wow, what an asshole he was for acting like a professional and collecting his paycheck. /s Some people don't want to hang around with their coworkers on their free time, they just want to get the job done and go home.

On Reddit a while back someone from the show said that in actuality the people who played Jim and Pam were jerks who created an "in group" and everyone else was treated like a second class. Spader probably picked up on that vibe right away and decided to keep his head down and time on set as short as possible.

Agree with R5, they need stop trying to make Ed Helms happen.

Is Pajiba a new Gawker? I took a quick look around and the bitching and personal attacks seem quite familiar.

My God. They all sound like crybabies. Where are the stories of him being mean to people? Abusing people? Crickets. Go trash Roseanne or others who were mean to writers or cast members.

James Spader has had a longer career than anyone in the Office.

His Entitled Rich Douche from Pretty in Pink is the standard by which all such performances should be measured.

It's their own greed for carrying on the show after Carell left. It should have ended there.

Spader sucked, as did Ed Helms.

He was so hawt back in his prime.

Yes, r11, every time I've seen a picture of Spader post-2000 or so, I cannot believe how thoroughly he lost his looks. He was SO pretty -- almost too pretty -- as a young man, and it's like he just fell off a cliff.

Brendan Fraser is another case like this.

And then of course there are those few actors that are quite the opposite, like Pierce Brosnan and George Clooney, looking good or even, in some ways, better as they aged into their 50s. Life can be so harsh, even to beautiful people!

Have a friend who works on that Blacklist show. He’s never had anything bad to say about Spader (and he’d be the kind to share).

James Spader doesn't seem annoying or a douche at all in this story. He didn't want to be in the Office fraternity with annoying Mindy Kaling and fug wannabe Captain America John Krasinski, so he did his work and went home.

Sounds fine to me.

[quote]so he did his work and went home.

His "work" was to be funny.

So, no, he didn't do his work.

Spader can be funny. He was great on Boston Legal.

The writer was acting scandalized because Spader admitted he took the gig for money. That's a totally valid reason to get a job. I mean we're not talking about a Kubrick movie here but a silly little comedy show. Was Spader supposed to behave like he was blessed to get this close to acting luminaries like Steve Carell and John Krasinski?

I will never forget that one night his table was next to mine at Mr Chow's in NYC. He was wearing this ridiculous billowy caftan top (I know, Mary!) and you could tell he was pretentious just by the way he carried himself. What was most egregious, however, were his table manners. I have seen two year olds with better table manners than him. He talked while chewing his food. He would pick up, say, a chicken wing and point it at the person while he was talking to them. I can usually ignore bad manners, but his were just worse than anything I have ever seen. Perhaps he was high or drunk, or eating that way on a dare, but I can't see him without remembering his table manners.

R15 He actually was funny and the pervert backstory was really actually funny. Just his air of pompous 'why are you wasting my oxygen' presence was funny. That and his open penchant for coke and booze.

What was unbelievable was that he 'talked Jo out of being CEO'. That with Steve leaving was impossible for the shows dynamic to change.

I don’t even remember him on The Office. He was great in sex, lies, and videotape though.

The article doesn't make him out to be a dick, it just says he struggled with the role because he's not a comic actor and didn't know how to do comedy, which led to tension in that he was likely blowing lines and having to reshoot scenes that everyone else was nailing, mostly because they'd been on the show forever.

"The Office" is one of those shows DLers hate because it was about characters who were younger than they were and didn't have that camp vibe like Golden Girls and other 70s and 80s sitcoms.

This scene hooked me into The Blacklist.

Spader played Our Brooke’s brother in “Endless Love.” And that is enough.

The Office? The Office??

Who the fuck watches The Office?

He’s a hot spanker in Secretary

[quote] it just says he struggled with the role because he's not a comic actor and didn't know how to do comedy, which led to tension in that he was likely blowing lines and having to reshoot scenes that everyone else was nailing

It doesn't even imply that he was blowing his lines. He delivered his lines in the same lazy way he always does.

The PTB didn't think he was sitcommy enough and the rest of the cast wanted him to be their dad like Steve Carrel.

I liked the character Robert California. I hated Steve Carrel's Michael.

The funniest performers were all the supporting cast members.

"... too many times Steve Carell was trying too hard to be funny."

Because the material wasn't funny. It makes actors go overboard trying to emote. Shouting doesn't make it funnier.

And he got fat and ugly

He's a total douchebag asshole

Who bottomed?

It's kind of sad that he's been in the business his whole life and he's struggling for money.

My close friend worked with him on some discovery channel thing years ago, and said that he was incorrigible. Apparently, he was easy to anger, and would scream at people. They were happy to be done with him, and the project. He was also witnessed screaming at his wife. Maybe he was at a bad point in his life, but people hated him.

He does seem like an asshole, thought I'm probably basing that on a lot of his asshole characters, because I've never seen him in interviews or on talk shows much, and I've never followed gossip about him. I have enjoyed many of his performances. Then, again, I've enjoyed many of Spacey's performances.

I hear he's brutal with The Blacklist cast + crew due to his drinking, but otherwise a pro when he isn't drunk/hungover.

[quote] Spader played Our Brooke’s brother in “Endless Love”

Watching that film, it's easy to see why Spader went on to a successful acting career and Martin Hewitt didn't.

James Spader, Steve Carell, and John Krasinski are all from Boston so they may not have gotten along because in Boston you argue about who had it better growing up, or who had it worse.

He could have easily taken the popular box office route back in the late 80s/early 90s but he made a conscious decision to choose more off-beat, far less commercial projects, and then graduated into more “character actor” roles. And proved himself to be a great actor in the process, really.

I think he’s more than earned the right to cash in on the last couple of seasons of a hit TV show.

He seems to play the same character over and over. Just a grown up version of Steff from Pretty in Pink.

R39, to be fair he did star in bigger films like Stargate and Supernova so it's not like he was totally against being a leading man. I'd say it was more about him not being a hot star kind of material in the first place that put a stop on becoming a new Harrison Ford. He's done mainstream romantic comedies, drama, action films and scifi so it's not like he's some indie darling à la Parker Posey.

But since he was a semi-hottie in his own lowkey way when younger so it's possible he chose to not play the Hollywood game and only really worked when forced to.

[quote] He delivered his lines in the same lazy way he always does. The PTB didn't think he was sitcommy enough

In other words, he was blowing his lines....

It’s common knowledge that there was a lot of the lines were improvised and Spader doesn’t have the chops to come through with that.

R33, struggling on how much?

Someone not being able to maintain a comfortable lifestyle is more about not managing one's money well rather than genuine need.

He was not someone trying to get by on food stamps and a minimum wage job.

I still love his Julian from Less Than Zero.

Also, he was great alongside Cusack in True Colors - a role where he actually wasn't the douche.

And, White Palace - where he started as sort of a douche but was kind of reformed by the end.

There seems to a difference of opinion:

HIS FANS HERE ON DL: "He is no problem to work with!!!!"

PEOPLE WHO HAVE WORKED WITH HIM: "He's a pain in the ass."

I guess we'll never know . . .

There seems to a difference of opinion:

HIS FANS HERE ON DL: "He is no problem to work with!!!!"

PEOPLE WHO HAVE WORKED WITH HIM: "He's a pain in the ass."

I guess we'll never know . . .

R11 OMG. So true.

To say that James Spader "doesn't know how to do comedy" is just dumb.

His character on The Practice/Boston Legal was essentially comic. Boston Legal was as much a comedy as a drama.

He won three Best Actor Emmys for the two shows.

If The Office hired Spader expecting him to mug and derp around like Steve Carell, then they were doubly dumb. It's just not his style.

Maybe James Spader is the father of Mindy Kalinga baby.

Isn't the fact that he's turned into a bloated, estrogenic alopecia case ought to provide at least a slight measure of gratification for the people abused by his crappiness.

a guy who was potentially thought of as a hot man 30 or more years ago , by people other than me. Yeah, annoying and unfunny then and still.

Jeeze I knew him years ago socially.

He was a sweet heart. Not a drinker. A witty pothead. Very laid back.

But I would call him lazy.

[quote]On Reddit a while back someone from the show said that in actuality the people who played Jim and Pam were jerks who created an "in group" and everyone else was treated like a second class. Spader probably picked up on that vibe right away and decided to keep his head down and time on set as short as possible

I remember reading something like that on some gossip site years ago. The gossip was that Jenna Fischer and John Krasinksi weren't all that nice to crew members and that the fame/popularity of their characters had gone to their heads. Fischer stil pretty much clings onto The Office- if you look at her social media accounts, she posts a lot of Office related stuff and it's almost she hasn't totally moved on from it. She's also doing a rewatch podcast with Angela Kinsey.

[quote]On Reddit a while back someone from the show said that in actuality the people who played Jim and Pam were jerks who created an "in group" and everyone else was treated like a second class. Spader probably picked up on that vibe right away and decided to keep his head down and time on set as short as possible

I remember reading something like that on some gossip site years ago. The gossip was that Jenna Fischer and John Krasinksi weren't all that nice to crew members and that the fame/popularity of their characters had gone to their heads. Fischer stil pretty much clings onto The Office- if you look at her social media accounts, she posts a lot of Office related stuff and it's almost she hasn't totally moved on from it. She's also doing a rewatch podcast with Angela Kinsey.

[quote]To say that James Spader "doesn't know how to do comedy" is just dumb.

His ability to give comic line readings during tense, even gruesome scenes is what's made [italic]the Blacklist[/italic] so much fun. Elizabeth Keen being the stupidest FBI special agent in TV history is fucking up the show, but Spader is still fun.

This sounds more like a writer problem. Spader not a comic actor? That is pretty much all he has been since Sex Lies and Videotape rode on his dry humor. Boston Legal was an out-and-out comedy.

To claim he is not a comic actor is just bizarre. Perhaps the truth is that the writers had trouble writing humor that he could deliver. No shame there. His comic persona is very specific, and must be very hard to write--especially when the rest of the cast are funny in a different way.

I am not a Spader fan, but I thought he was a breath of fresh air on a program that had become rote and predictable.

The only thing I ever liked him on was seinfeld. His character not wanting to let George borrow a cashmere sweater because George would stretch out the neck hole with his rather bulbous head lol

R58 Yes. I thought the whole point of his character on "The Office" was that he was off-putting and did not jell with the group. There were good moments with his character.

The series shouldn't have ended with the departure of Michael Scott. Season 8 was horrible. They redeemed themselves a bit in Season 9. The original UK version was only 12 episodes(2 series)

[quote]The writer was acting scandalized because Spader admitted he took the gig for money. That's a totally valid reason to get a job. I mean we're not talking about a Kubrick movie here but a silly little comedy show. Was Spader supposed to behave like he was blessed to get this close to acting luminaries like Steve Carell and John Krasinski?

I agree, the writer scandlized him. I also get the vibe that the writer is one of those Office viewers who were very protective of the original cast members. Spader was never going to win with many of those of viewers. I noticed this quite a bit on the IMDB boards and other Office fan sites years ago. Those kinds of viewers were always bitchy whenever new cast members were added in. Ellie Kemper got a lot of hate on message boards when she was upgraded to a regular cast member and her character became the new receptionist. The fans were always posting things like "Pam is so much better than Erin" and I hate Erin/Ellie Kemper. I don't think Ellie is the most talented comedic actress in the world. But, I think she is better than bland montone Jenna Fischer.

I think he helps support family members and that's one reason he works these jobs.

Link to a funny story he tells about JFK Jr and Jackie.

Why would I, a viewer, give a shit whether an actor is an asshole in real life?

[quote]The funniest performers were all the supporting cast members.

I agree with this. Some of those Office webisodes that supporting cast members were in were quite funny and actually better than some of the episodes that aired on TV.

The Office is horrible and overrated. Steve Carrell is annoying. A show for basic bitches to quote.

I love him on Blacklist even though it jumped the shark long ago.

Somebody who's great at playing an asshole actually IS an asshole?

I wanted him so badly when he was younger.

R69 I had him.

Years ago, I sit next to him at the Blue Bayou in Disneyland. He was with another actor can't remember who he was. And they both had their young sons with them. I got so nervous because I just remember seeing him in Less than Zero, Pretty in Pink. But he seemed just like a really cranky person. He really made sure his son was on good behavior too. Seemed really strict. But I guess it's good because most Hollywood kids are spoiled brats. I didn't bother him at all, because I didn't dare.