Miles Teller says an Esquire magazine profile that opened with the framing “if he’s a dick” felt like a “violation,” leaving him wary of future sit-down press interviews after he worried about misquotes and accounts being reshaped.
Miles Teller didn’t need a Cannes crowd to relive the moment.
He’s in Cannes promoting his competition title Paper Tiger. directed by James Gray. but the conversation keeps drifting back to a September 2015 Esquire magazine profile. The feature carried a sharp premise from its first line: “You’re sitting across from Miles Teller at the Luminary restaurant in Atlanta and trying to figure out if he’s a dick.”.
Teller still describes it as something that crossed a line.
“That was so mishandled,” Teller tells IndieWire about the fallout from the cover story. “The reason why I have not done profiles is because I said. ‘Wow. if I’m not doing this interview on camera. this person can misquote things or put things out of order or say things that didn’t happen.’ It felt like such a violation of what actually transpired. ” he recounts.
The grudge isn’t just about the opening framing. Teller points to the writer continuing the “dick” theme through the piece. ending with a final line: “He gives you a hug and goes off to contribute to the cache or catalog or canon or whatever the fuck you call it and charm the world with his dickishness.”.
Since then, Teller says he’s pulled back from press formats that don’t involve him being recorded.
He recalls telling his handlers he wasn’t up to doing more sit-down press interviews. “Guys. I don’t think I’m doing this again. because I’m reading this and this doesn’t sound like me to me. This is not life. so why would I ever want to be a part of something where they can just put that in?” he added.
Teller’s argument goes beyond personal irritation. He says the profile reflects a media incentive he no longer wants to feed.
“So it’s unfortunate that being a good person, that doesn’t sell. People want to click on the negativity. If you go to bed and put your head on your pillow and how you treat people truly, that’s what matters,” Teller argues.
His current film. Paper Tiger. is a different kind of story—one built around family pressure. temptation. and the consequences of getting pulled into someone else’s plan. The film follows Hester and Irwin, played by Scarlett Johansson and Teller, respectively, raising a family in 1980s Queens. Irwin’s flashy brother. played by Adam Driver. sells him on a moneymaking endeavor that leaves the couple in the crosshairs of the Russian mob.
Gray, Teller says through the film’s setup, helmed a semi-fictionalized return to his family life in mid-1980s Queens. The project is also a companion piece to Gray’s 2022 film Armageddon Time.
For Teller, though, the piece that still stings isn’t the plot of a crime thriller. It’s the feeling that a real-life profile could be turned into something else—word by word—before he ever had the chance to stop it.
Miles Teller Esquire IndieWire Cannes Paper Tiger James Gray Scarlett Johansson Adam Driver Luminary restaurant in Atlanta 2015 Esquire profile press interviews