The ‘BlackBerry’ Director Had Never Touched a BlackBerry Before

For those familiar with his work—largely in high-concept comedy—Matt Johnson isn’t the obvious choice to direct a film about the BlackBerry, the proto-smartphone you probably remember fiddling with in the mid-2000s. Far from it: Johnson, by his own admission, had never even touched a BlackBerry before working on the new biographical drama.

Instead, what excited him about the story of BlackBerry (now in theaters) was, well, the story: that of the best friends-turned-co-founders of Research In Motion (RIM), who turned the tech industry on its head with their internet-connected cell phone. Once these nerdy Canadians shacked up with the cutthroat businessman Jim Balsillie (Glenn Howerton), however, their low-key quest for success grew into an unwieldy, multi-million-dollar triumph—and then disaster.

Johnson himself plays one of those nerdy Canadians: Doug Fregin, who resisted Balsillie’s promises of exploding BlackBerry’s market share in the name of keeping things low-key. But his bestie—and the real brains of the operation—Mike Lazaridis (Jay Baruchel) couldn’t quite resist the financial temptations.

Read more at The Daily Beast.