--- title: Watch Jason Segel Play David Foster Wallace in 'The End of the Tour' description: "I treasure my regular guy-ness" canonical: https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/ author: Esther Zuckerman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-05-27T16:12:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T07:39:52.966Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: Watch Jason Segel Play David Foster Wallace in 'The End of the Tour' og:description: "I treasure my regular guy-ness" og:url: https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4df501011a93a933/698851cde20a877bdea8b8a6/screen-shot-2015-05-27-at-11-55-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Screen Shot 2015-05-27 at 11.55.37 AM og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Watch Jason Segel Play David Foster Wallace in 'The End of the Tour' twitter:description: "I treasure my regular guy-ness" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4df501011a93a933/698851cde20a877bdea8b8a6/screen-shot-2015-05-27-at-11-55-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Watch Jason Segel as David Foster Wallace in the Trailer for _The End of the Tour_ by [Esther Zuckerman](/author/esther-zuckerman/) ## Esther Zuckerman Zuckerman is a contributor for TIME. May 27, 2015 4:12 PM CUT  by [Esther Zuckerman](/author/esther-zuckerman/) ## Esther Zuckerman Zuckerman is a contributor for TIME. May 27, 2015 4:12 PM CUT In the new trailer for James Ponsoldt’s film _The End of the Tour_, Jason Segel plays David Foster Wallace discussing topics ranging from _Die Hard_ to sadness to why he wears that bandana: “I know that it’s a security blanket for me whenever I’m kind of afraid my head is going to explode.” There’s already talk of awards for Segel’s portrayal of Wallace. After the film premiered at Sundance, The Huffington Post [wrote](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/25/jason-segel-the-end-of-the-tour%5Fn%5F6539436.html "undefined"), “it’s early, but let’s prep Jason Segel’s Oscar campaign just to be safe.” The film, which was written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Donald Margulies, follows Wallace on a road trip as he’s promoting _Infinite Jest_. He’s traveling with David Lipsky, played here by Jesse Eisenberg, who was reporting for _Rolling Stone_ and would go on to publish his and Wallace’s conversations [in the book _Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself_](http://content.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1985702,00.html "undefined"). Speaking to TIME about why the book was framed as a “straight transcript,” Lipsky said in [2010](http://content.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1985702,00.html "undefined"): “It seemed like the best thing was to say, Here’s what he was like to be with. Here’s what he was like to be with in a car and on an airplane. It seemed like the only way to write about him.” The movie is due out July 31. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/"},"headline":"Watch Jason Segel as David Foster Wallace in the Trailer for The End of the Tour","datePublished":"2015-05-27T16:12:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T07:39:52.966Z","description":"\"I treasure my regular guy-ness\"","url":"https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/","keywords":["movies"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4df501011a93a933/698851cde20a877bdea8b8a6/screen-shot-2015-05-27-at-11-55-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Esther Zuckerman","jobTitle":"Zuckerman is a contributor for TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/esther-zuckerman/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt4df501011a93a933/698851cde20a877bdea8b8a6/screen-shot-2015-05-27-at-11-55-37-am.png?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Screen Shot 2015-05-27 at 11.55.37 AM","caption":"","creditText":"","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/movies/","name":"movies"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3897949/jason-segel-david-foster-wallace-end-of-the-tour/","name":"Watch Jason Segel as David Foster Wallace in the Trailer for The End of the Tour"}}]}] ```