Justin Theroux Explains His Video Game Obsession and Fakesgiving

Justin Theroux (Courtesy of PMK*BNC)

Justin Theroux is a lot of things: actor, writer, and yes, Mr. Jennifer Aniston. But he also proudly rocks another title that fewer fans know about: gamer. The 44-year-old thesp has been playing video games long enough that he can’t remember exactly when he started, but told Yahoo Celebrity it was “back in the day when you had to put quarters in the machine.” (So, like, decades ago.) It turns out, gaming has proven helpful in his career as well — for staving off boredom on set, that is.

“I was doing a movie in Miami and I was looking for something to do to kill some time in my trailer and I found Call of Duty,” he explained. “That was before I was playing online. I was just playing against the CD Rom, the machine itself — jeez,” he added with a laugh. These days, the Leftovers star, 44, plays with a group of friends. (Before you get too excited, the group does not include his wife… sigh).

“The people I play with are real people in the real world who I actually have dinners with and do things with,” he noted, adding that they also get together for “little poker nights” that frequently include sessions of the latest installment of Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. Though they occasionally play against strangers, Theroux tends to avoid that because he finds it “depressing” that faceless teenagers kill him “so quickly.”

While Theroux considers his hobby of choice a social activity, he realizes many others don’t. “Most other people consider it anti-social,” he laughed. “It takes a while for [non-gamers, like, ahem, his wife] to understand that you’re actually with a bunch of your friends and not just on the couch with your headset on talking to yourself.” For this reason — and this reason alone — Theroux would never mix a gaming marathon with say, a dinner party.

Justin and Jennifer Aniston (Getty Images)

But we all know that he and Jen like to throw a party here and there — like their secret Wednesday afternoon wedding that they advertised as a birthday bash to a portion of their guests (though in hindsight, Theroux admitted that wasn’t the best idea). While it will be hard to ever top that soiree, another blowout is coming up soon. Spoiler alert: It involves turkey.

“We usually have two Thanksgivings,” he revealed. “We have one that we call Fakesgiving, which is just us and all of the friends that we love where we sort of have a Thanksgiving right before Thanksgiving. Then the real Thanksgiving is obviously the one where everybody goes to their families.”

So if you want to try to kill Jennifer Aniston’s better half online, Thanksgiving’s probably not the day to find him.