Jesse Eisenberg has declined to reprise his role as Mark Zuckerberg in the sequel to The Social Network. The film is now called The Social Reckoning and stars Jeremy Strong in the lead.
Eisenberg spoke about the choice at the Los Angeles premiere of Minions & Monsters. He said he told writer and director Aaron Sorkin that he is moving in different directions in his life and does not want to be associated with the character.
Sorkin spent three days trying to change Eisenberg’s mind. According to Sorkin, Eisenberg no longer wanted to be conflated with Zuckerberg and cited unwanted encounters with fans who approach him with business cards that read “I’m CEO, bitch.”
The Social Reckoning follows Facebook engineer Frances Haugen and Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz as they scrutinize the company’s practices. Eisenberg stressed that his decision had nothing to do with the quality of the project itself.
