fiction.wikisort.org - Actor

Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak[2] (born July 31, 1979) is an American actor, comedian, director, producer, screenwriter and author. He has received five Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won two Screen Actors Guild Awards.

B. J. Novak
Novak at SF Sketch Fest 2008
Born	Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak (1979-07-31) July 31, 1979 (age 43)[1] Newton, Massachusetts, U.S.
Alma mater	Harvard University (AB)
Occupation	Actor comedian director producer screenwriter author
Years active	2001–present
Parent	William Novak (father)
Relatives	Jesse Novak (brother)

Novak became known for starring as Ryan Howard in the NBC sitcom The Office (2005–2013), for which he also served as a writer, executive producer, and director. He played roles in the films Inglourious Basterds (2009), Saving Mr. Banks (2013), and The Founder (2016). Novak made his directorial debut in 2022, starring in the dark comedy thriller Vengeance (2022).

Novak also appeared in The Mindy Project (2013–2016) and The Newsroom (2014), and was the creator and executive producer of Hulu anthology series The Premise (2021). He portrays Alistair Smythe in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014).

Beyond his film career, Novak authored the acclaimed books One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories (2014) and The Book with No Pictures (2014).

Early life

Novak was born on July 31, 1979, in Newton, Massachusetts. His parents are Linda (née Manaly) and author William Novak.[3][4][5] Novak's family is Jewish. His father co-edited The Big Book of Jewish Humor, and has ghostwritten memoirs for Nancy Reagan, Lee Iacocca, Magic Johnson, and others.[6][7] Novak has two younger brothers: Lev Novak and composer Jesse Novak.

He attended Solomon Schechter Day School of Greater Boston for elementary school and middle school.[8] He went to Camp Ramah in New England in Massachusetts for several summers when he was in 6th, 7th, and 9th grade.[9]

He attended Newton South High School with future The Office costar John Krasinski,[10] and they graduated in 1997.[10] Novak edited one of the school newspapers, The Lion's Roar, and cowrote a satirical play with Krasinski.[11]

Novak graduated from Harvard University in 2001, where he was a member of the Harvard Lampoon. He majored in English and Spanish literature, and wrote his honors thesis on the films of Shakespeare's Hamlet.[12] Aside from the Lampoon, he occasionally staged and performed in a variety show called The B.J. Show with fellow Harvard student B. J. Averell.[10]

Career

Following his graduation from Harvard, he moved to Los Angeles, California and began working in clubs as a comedian. His first live stand-up performance took place at the Hollywood Youth Hostel on October 10, 2001.[13] He was named one of Variety's "Ten Comedians To Watch" in 2003.[14]

Novak was a writer for the short-lived The WB sitcom Raising Dad.[10] He performed on Comedy Central's Premium Blend and on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.[12][14]

Novak's television acting career began on MTV's Punk'd.[10] He was the lead accomplice to Ashton Kutcher on the show's second season in 2003, playing pranks on Hilary Duff, Rachael Leigh Cook, Usher, and Mýa.^{[citation needed]}

An image of Novak entered the public domain as a stock photo and has been used on various international products, reportedly including a particular type of Calvin Klein cologne in Sweden.[15]

The Office

After hearing Novak's opening joke at a comedy club, executive producer Greg Daniels decided he "wanted to do something with him."[10] Novak was subsequently cast as Ryan Howard, who is first introduced on the show as a temporary employee at Dunder Mifflin in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Novak's character goes through ups and downs throughout his work career and has an on and off relationship with Kelly Kapoor (Mindy Kaling).

Novak was a cast member on the show and also a producer and writer. He, along with Kaling, Greg Daniels, Michael Schur, and Paul Lieberstein, were the original writers for the show. Novak is credited with writing 15 episodes of the show, including the Writers Guild of America nominated episodes "Diversity Day" and "Local Ad".

On July 21, 2010, news reports indicated Novak had signed a contract to remain with the show for its seventh and eighth seasons. Under the new terms, he would be made an executive producer midway through Season 7 and direct two episodes of the show. Novak left The Office after the ninth-season premiere "New Guys", however, he returned to guest-star in the final episode of the series. In a podcast interview Novak did in 2021 on Dax Shepard's show, he confirmed that he had been offered the Season 9 showrunner position but declined it because he decided that his fire for the job had burned out, and it was simply time for him to move on to new projects.

Novak and his fellow writers and producers of The Office were nominated five consecutive times for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series from 2007 to 2011.

In a June 2009 interview with The Philadelphia Inquirer, Novak spoke about sharing the success of The Office with his Newton South High School classmate John Krasinski:[16]

"Sometimes when this feels too good to be true, I think that if this were all a dream, that would be what should have tipped me off. I'd wake up saying, "I was in this incredible TV show and it was a big hit and the star was John [Krasinski] from high school. Isn't that weird?"

Post-The Office career

Novak has had supporting roles in Quentin Tarantino's acclaimed 2009 war film Inglourious Basterds, John Lee Hancock's 2013 period drama Saving Mr. Banks about the development of the 1964 film Mary Poppins, and Hancock's 2016 biographical drama The Founder about the founder of McDonald's.

Novak has also appeared in the films Unaccompanied Minors in 2006, Knocked Up in 2007, Reign Over Me in 2007, The Internship in 2013, and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 in 2014.

Novak voiced Baker Smurf in The Smurfs in 2011 and The Smurfs 2 in 2013.

He has starred in a few episodes each of The Mindy Project and The Newsroom, and made cameo appearances in the shows Community and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. He also served as a consulting producer for the first season of The Mindy Project.[12]

Novak wrote, directed and executive produced a half-hour anthological series called The Premise, released on FX in 2021.[17] Novak starred in the 2022 thriller Vengeance, of which he was also the writer and director. Filming began in March 2020 but was put on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic until January 2021. In May 2020, it was announced that Novak would be writing and executive producing an upcoming show entitled Young People on HBO Max.[18]

Book deal

On April 11, 2013, publishing house Alfred A. Knopf announced it had signed a seven-figure, two-book deal with Novak, with the first book slated to be a collection of Woody Allen-like fiction stories.[19] On February 4, 2014, a book of 64 stories, One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories, was published and spent 6 weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers Hardcover Fiction List.[20]

Novak also signed a deal with Penguin's children's books label and wrote The Book With No Pictures, which was released on September 30, 2014.[21] As of January 2021, The Book With No Pictures has spent a total of 174 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller Picture Books List since its release, with 34 weeks charting as #1. Its most recent listing was at #10 in September 2020.[22] A self-proclaimed lifelong lover of books, Novak has said he wrote the children's book partially because "to me, there is no more meaningful, important or exciting rule to introduce to children than the power of the written word."[23]

On November 19, 2019, My Book with No Pictures was published as a fill-in-the-blanks companion book to The Book with No Pictures to allow children to write their own story.

The List App

On October 14, 2015, Novak released an Apple iOS app along with co-founder Dev Flaherty called The List App.[24] The app was nominated for a Webby Award (losing in its category to Beme and Pocket) in 2016.[25] In May 2016, the app was rebranded as 'li.st' and became available on the Android platform.[26] In September 2017, the app was shut down due to lack of users.[27]

Personal life

Novak has a close friendship with Mindy Kaling, whom he met through writing for The Office, and called her "the most important person in my life" (on Fresh Air with Terry Gross). The two dated on and off while writing and acting on the show, sometimes mirroring the on-again, off-again nature of the relationship between their respective characters Ryan Howard and Kelly Kapoor.[28] Novak is the godfather of Kaling's two children.[29][30] He lives in Los Angeles.[31]

Bibliography

Books

• Novak, B. J. (February 4, 2014). One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. ISBN 9780385351836.
• Novak, B. J. (September 30, 2014). The Book with No Pictures. Dial Books. ISBN 9780803741713.
• Novak, B. J. (November 19, 2019). My Book with No Pictures. Dial Books. ISBN 9780593111017.

Essays, reporting and other contributions

Publications

• Novak, B. J. (1998). "My Unhappy Rendezvous with Magical Realism". The Harvard Lampoon.
• Novak, B. J. (November 4, 2013). "The man who invented the calendar". Shouts & Murmurs. The New Yorker. Vol. 89, no. 35. pp. 64–65.
• Novak, B. J. (November 28, 2013). "Kellogg's". Nautilus (7).
• Novak, B. J. (December 30, 2013). "A Good Problem to Have". One Story (187).
• Novak, B. J. (January 16, 2014). "Kellogg's". Nautilus (9).
• Novak, B. J. (March 2014). "Julie And The Warlord". Playboy.
• Novak, B. J. (November 2020). "My Unhappy Rendezvous with Magical Realism". The Harvard Lampoon.
• Novak, B. J. (November 2020). "Gag Gifts". The Harvard Lampoon.

Novak also has a chapter giving advice in Tim Ferriss' book Tools of Titans.

Instagram Live

• Current Mood with John Mayer (February 17, 2019). "Pants".
• Special Report on Current Mood with John Mayer (April 19, 2020). "Coronavirus".

Podcast appearances

• Weird Adults with Little Esther (December 17, 2012). "32. BJ Novak" (Podcast).
• Id10t with Chris Hardwick (February 3, 2014). "B.J. Novak" (Podcast).
• Ron Bennington Interviews (February 6, 2014). "Unmasked with B.J. Novak" (Podcast).
• The Hollywood Handbook (May 13, 2014). "32. B.J. Novak, Our Close Friend" (Podcast).
• The Tim Ferriss Show (November 25, 2015). "#121: BJ Novak of The Office on Creative Process, Handling Rejection, and Good Comedy" (Podcast).
• Decoder with Nilay Patel (November 25, 2015). "Recode Decode: B.J. Novak and Dev Flaherty, The List App Co-Founders" (Podcast).
• Exactly (January 6, 2017). "BJ Novak: Why Does Dark Comedy Work?" (Podcast).
• The Great Debates (December 20, 2018). "309 — Our Traditional Holiday Gathering With BJ & John" (Podcast).
• The Great Debates (December 25, 2019). "Holiday Special 2019 with Special Guests" (Podcast).
• You Made It Weird with Pete Holmes (January 29, 2020). "B.J. Novak" (Podcast).
• LA Podcast (April 24, 2020). "FREE SAMPLE: The Ten, Episode 1 - BJ Novak" (Podcast).
• Office Ladies (June 24, 2020). "Initiation w/ B.J. Novak and Rainn Wilson" (Podcast).
• The Great Debates (December 31, 2020). "511 - 2020 Holiday Special" (Podcast).

Filmography

Key

Denotes works that have not yet been released

Film

Acting credits

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2006	Unaccompanied Minors	Flight Attendant
2007	Knocked Up	Unnamed Doctor
2007	Reign Over Me	Mr. Fallon
2009	Inglourious Basterds	Pfc. Smithson Utivich
2011	The Smurfs	Baker Smurf	Voice role
2012	The Dictator		Uncredited
2013	The Internship	Male Interviewer
2013	The Smurfs 2	Baker Smurf	Voice role
2013	Saving Mr. Banks	Robert B. Sherman
2014	The Amazing Spider-Man 2	Alistair Smythe
2016	The Founder	Harry J. Sonneborn
2022	Vengeance	Ben Manalowitz

Writing/directing credits

Year	Title	Notes
2022	Vengeance	Writer and director

Television

Acting credits

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2003	Punk'd	Field Agent	5 episodes
2005–2013	The Office	Ryan Howard	166 episodes Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series (2006, 2007) Nominated—Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series (2007–2011) Nominated—Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series (2008–2012) Nominated—Prism Award for Best Performance in a Comedy Series (2009)
2013–2016	The Mindy Project	Jamie	5 episodes: Season 1, Episode 13 – "Harry and Sally" Season 1, Episode 14 – "Harry and Mindy" Season 1, Episode 24 – "Take Me With You" Season 3, Episode 21 – "Best Man" Season 5, Episode 7 – "Revenge of the Nurse"
2014	Community	Mr. Egypt	Season 5, Episode 13 – "Basic Sandwich" (cameo)
2014	The Newsroom	Lucas Pruit	4 episodes: Season 3, Episode 3 – "Main Justice" Season 3, Episode 4 – "Contempt" Season 3, Episode 5 – "Oh Shenandoah" Season 3, Episode 6 – "What Kind of Day Has It Been"
2015	Arthur	MC	Season 19, Episode 10 – "The Last Day" (voice)
2016–2018	Crazy Ex-Girlfriend	Himself	2 episodes: Season 1, Episode 13 – "Josh and I Go to Los Angeles" (cameo) Season 3, Episode 10 – "Oh, Nathaniel, It's On!" (cameo)
2020	Home Movie: The Princess Bride	Count Rugen	Season 1, Episode 6 – "Chapter Six: The Fire Swamp"

Writing credits

Year	Title	Notes
2001–2002	Raising Dad	Episodes written: Season 1, Episode 5 – "Fight for Your Right to Party" (November 2, 2001) Season 1, Episode 13 – "Mentor Matt" (February 1, 2002)
2005–2012	The Office	Episodes written: Season 1, Episode 2 – "Diversity Day" (March 29, 2005) Season 2, Episode 2 – "Sexual Harassment" (September 27, 2005) Season 2, Episode 4 – "The Fire" (October 11, 2005) Season 2, Episode 15 – "Boys and Girls" (February 2, 2006) Season 3, Episode 5 – "Initiation" (October 19, 2006) Season 3, Episode 20 – "Safety Training" (April 12, 2007) Season 4, Episode 9 – "Local Ad" (October 25, 2007) Season 4, Episode 14 – "Chair Model" (April 17, 2008) Season 5, Episode 13 – "Prince Family Paper" (January 22, 2009) Season 5, Episode 22 – "Dream Team" (April 9, 2009) Season 6, Episode 21 – "Happy Hour" (March 25, 2010) Season 7, Episode 2 – "Counseling" (September 30, 2010) Season 7, Episode 17 – "Threat Level Midnight" (February 17, 2011) Season 8, Episode 1 – "The List" (September 22, 2011) Season 8, Episode 24 – "Free Family Portrait Studio" (May 10, 2012) Writers Guild of America Award for Comedy Series (2006) Nominated — Writers Guild of America Award for a Comedy Series (2005, 2007–2010) Nominated — Writers Guild of America Award for a New Series (2005) Nominated — Writers Guild of America Award for an Episodic Comedy (2005, 2007)
2013	The Mindy Project	Episodes written: Season 1, Episode 13 – "Harry & Sally" (January 29, 2013) Nominated: Writers Guild of America Award for a New Series (2012)
2021	The Premise	Episodes written: Season 1, Episode 1 – "Social Justice Sex Tape" (September 16, 2021) Season 1, Episode 2 – "Moment of Silence" (September 16, 2021) Season 1, Episode 3 – "The Ballad of Jesse Wheeler" (September 23, 2021) Season 1, Episode 4 – "The Commenter" (September 30, 2021) Season 1, Episode 5 – "Butt Plug" (October 7, 2021)

Directing credits

Year	Title	Season	Episode	Title	Airdate	Notes
2009	The Office: Blackmail		Episode 1	"Oscar"	May 7, 2009	Webisodes
			Episode 2	"Andy"
			Episode 3	"Kelly"
			Episode 4	"Pay Day"
	The Office	Season 6	Episode 12	"Scott's Tots"	December 3, 2009
2011		Season 7	Episode 14	"The Seminar"	January 27, 2011
		Season 8	Episode 1	"The List"	September 22, 2011
2012			Episode 11	"Trivia"	January 12, 2012
			Episode 24	"Free Family Portrait Studio"	May 10, 2012
2013	The Mindy Project	Season 1	Episode 15	"Mindy's Minute"	February 19, 2013
			Episode 21	"Santa Fe"	April 9, 2013
2021	The Premise	Season 1	Episode 2	"Moment of Silence"	September 16, 2021
			Episode 3	"The Ballad of Jesse Wheeler"	September 23, 2021

Awards and nominations

List of awards and nominations

Year	Group	Award	Work	Result
2005	Writers Guild of America Awards	New Series	The Office	Nominated
		Episodic Comedy – for episode "Diversity Day"		Nominated
		Comedy Series		Nominated
2006	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Won
	Writers Guild of America Awards	Comedy Series		Won
2007	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series[32]		Won
	Emmy Awards	Outstanding Comedy Series		Nominated
	Writers Guild of America Awards	Episodic Comedy – for episode "Local Ad"		Nominated
		Comedy Series		Nominated
2008	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Nominated
	Emmy Awards	Outstanding Comedy Series		Nominated
	Writers Guild of America Awards	Comedy Series		Nominated
2009	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Nominated
	Emmy Awards	Outstanding Comedy Series		Nominated
	Writers Guild of America Awards	Comedy Series		Nominated
	Prism Award	Performance in a Comedy Series		Nominated
2010	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Nominated
	Emmy Awards	Outstanding Comedy Series		Nominated
	Writers Guild of America Awards	Comedy Series		Nominated
2011	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Nominated
	Emmy Awards	Outstanding Comedy Series		Nominated
2012	Screen Actors Guild Awards	Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series		Nominated
2012	Writers Guild of America Awards	New Series	The Mindy Project	Nominated

References

Works cited

• Hoys, Matt; Brooks, Mel (2013). Comic Genius: Portraits of Funny People. Chronicle Books. ISBN 978-1452131955.
• Novak, William (2006). The Big Book of Jewish Humor. Collins. ISBN 978-0-06-113813-3.

External links

• B. J. Novak at IMDb
• B. J. Novak on Twitter
• "The Office's BJ Novak: Uncut", an NPR interview from May 2008

На других языках

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[de] B. J. Novak

Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak (* 31. Juli 1979 in Newton, Massachusetts) ist ein US-amerikanischer Schauspieler, Drehbuchautor, Stand-Up Comedian, Regisseur sowie Autor.

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- [en] B. J. Novak

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[es] B. J. Novak

Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak (Plantsville, Connecticut, 31 de julio de 1979), conocido como B. J. Novak, es un actor, cómico, guionista y director estadounidense. Como actor ha aparecido en películas como Knocked Up y Inglourious Basterds, e interpreta a Ryan Howard en la serie de la NBC The Office, de la que es también guionista y coproductor ejecutivo.

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[ru] Новак, Бенджамин Джозеф

Бе́нджамин Джо́зеф Ма́нали Но́вак (англ. Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak; род. 31 июля 1979) — американский актёр, сценарист и продюсер.

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