B. J. Novak

Benjamin Joseph Manaly Novak (born July 31, 1979) is an American actor, comedian, and writer.

He has received five Primetime Emmy Award nominations and won two Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Novak was born on July 31, 1979, at Newton-Wellesley Hospital in Newton, Massachusetts.

His parents are Linda (née ) and author William Novak.

He 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.

Novak has two brothers: Lev Novak and composer Jesse Novak.

He attended Solomon Schechter Day School of Greater Boston and Brown Middle School.

He went to Camp Ramah in New England in Massachusetts in the summers of his 6th, 7th and 9th grades.

He attended Newton South High School with future The Office costar John Krasinski; they graduated in 1997.

Novak edited one of the school newspapers, The Lion's Roar, and cowrote a satirical play with Krasinski.

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.

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.

After Harvard, Novak moved to Los Angeles, California and began working in clubs as a comedian.

His first live stand-up performance was at the Hollywood Youth Hostel on October 10, 2001.

He was named one of Variety's "Ten Comedians To Watch" in 2003.

He was a writer for the short-lived The WB sitcom Raising Dad.

He performed on Comedy Central's Premium Blend and on Late Night with Conan O'Brien.

Novak's television acting career began on MTV's Punk'd.

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.

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.

After hearing Novak's opening joke at a comedy club, executive producer Greg Daniels decided he "wanted to do something with him."

Novak was subsequently cast as Ryan Howard, who is 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 also a producer and writer on the show; he and Kaling, Greg Daniels, Michael Schur and Paul Lieberstein were its original writers.

Novak is credited with writing 15 episodes, including the Writers Guild of America nominated episodes "Diversity Day" and "Local Ad".

Novak is known for starring as Ryan Howard in the NBC sitcom The Office (2005–2013), for which he was also a writer and executive producer.

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

He appeared in the films Inglourious Basterds (2009), Saving Mr. Banks (2013) and The Founder (2016).

He made his directorial debut in 2022 with the dark comedy thriller Vengeance, which he also wrote and starred in.

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: "'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?'"

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.

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 would direct two episodes.

He left The Office after the ninth-season premiere, "New Guys", but returned to guest-star in the series' final episode.

In a 2021 podcast interview 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 time for him to move on to other projects.

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).

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