With new film “IF”, John Krasinski uses daughters' imaginary friends to find the inner kid in us all

Plus, he teases, it features "'The Office' reunion we've all been waiting for."

In a roundabout way, we have John Krasinski's A Quiet Place films to thank for his magical next directorial effort, IF.

"I figured I needed to make a movie for my kids. Seeing as though Quiet Place is like PG-40 in our house — they won't see Quiet Place till they're 40 — I figured I should make one for them," he tells EW, laughing, on a break while deep in post-production on the new film, which he wrote, directed, produced, and stars in.

Indeed, IF couldn't be more different from the hit horror franchise. Starring Ryan Reynolds, who also produced with Krasinski, and Cailey Fleming (The Walking Dead, Loki, Star Wars: Episode VII), the family comedy follows Bea, a young girl who, after going through a hard time, begins to see everyone's imaginary friends — or IFs — who have been left behind after their real-life friends grew up. Reynolds' character, known as the Man Upstairs, is the only other person who can see all the IFs, so the two team up to try to help the IFs by attempting to pair them with new kids... which may or may not be possible.

Krasinski, who has two young daughters with wife Emily Blunt, says the idea for the film started with him being a spectator to the wonderful cosmos of their childhood imagination. "I was so enamored by the world that my kids were going to by themselves. They were off on their own and clearly deep in imagination, whether it was a game, whether it was painting, whether it was doing art, all this stuff. They went into this locked-in place that I wish I could have visited," he explains.

This was around the time he filmed season 1 of Amazon Prime Video's Jack Ryan series, which was fitting, he says, given that "Jack Ryan is basically like an imaginary friend." He recalls taking the idea to his producing partner, Allyson Seeger, around that time. "I just told her, 'I have this weird idea that we should do something where imaginary friends are not just adorable creatures. They're these time capsules for everyone's hopes, dreams, ambitions, and this place that we can always go back to that we all think that as adults we leave behind, but we didn't. They're right there. We just have to turn around and look at them again,'" he says.

The "silver lining" of the pandemic for Krasinski was that it finally gave him time to write the script, and by the time he wrapped up seasons 3 and 4 of Jack Ryan, he was ready to shoot it. A Quiet Place and its sequel, A Quiet Place Part II, were also in the can by this point, and not surprisingly, IF became a perfect palate cleanser.

"I remember Emily saying to me, 'I'm really glad that you're doing this,'" he recalls. "And I said, 'Why?' And she's like, 'Because living in that dark, dark place is really tough for too long.' And coming from [Blunt's character] Mary Poppins, I thought, she must know what she's talking about." Fair enough.

Stepping into the light world of IF also meant entering the "incredible world of child psychology," says Krasinski, who spent a lot of time reading up on research around imaginary friends and incorporated his favorite tidbits into the film. For instance, as seen in these first look images and the first teaser trailer (below), each IF looks completely different; as Krasinski learned, children who have imaginary friends often create them to fill some need in their life. If a kid is being bullied, they might create a huge IF for protection or to give them a hug. Or if a child's parents have divorced, and that kid is missing one of their parents, they would perhaps design their imaginary friend using articles of clothing from one of them.

"It led me into this much bigger conversation of how every single person on the earth is individual, so IFs have to be individual," he explains. "So that depends on what timeframe they were invented, where in history were they invented, where in the country were they invented geographically, and most importantly, what the kids were going through when they created their imaginary friend. Because most of the time it's to help them out in some way, shape, or form."

As is evident in the trailer, one of the biggest IFs literally and figuratively is Blue, voiced by Krasinski's costar on The Office, Steve Carell. "Oh my God, The Office reunion we've all been waiting for is in it," Krasinski jokes, adding more seriously, "The truth is, Steve's one of the most talented people on the planet. So whether I had ever worked with him before or not, I would've been gunning for him because I just had his voice in my head when I was writing Blue."

The character is ginormous, and very obviously, well, not blue. Blue is, in fact, purple, because the kid who created him is colorblind, and he's rather large because the kid needed a friend to protect him, explains Krasinski: "[Blue] is not going to defend anyone — he's just going to give you giant hugs and be adorable. And what better person to give giant hugs and be adorable than Steve Carell."

Matt Damon, Jon Stewart, Blunt, Maya Rudolph, Sam Rockwell, Sebastian Maniscalco, Christopher Meloni, Richard Jenkins, Awkwafina, Louis Gossett Jr., and Phoebe Waller-Bridge are the other starry names voicing the other IFs, at least a few of which were directly inspired by Krasinski's daughters.

"It's the first time my kids have been a part of the process," the director says. "So I got to talk to them very openly about, 'I'm doing this because I see you guys having tea parties with no one, and it seems like you're having a blast — who's at that tea party and where is my invite?' And they loved it. It was a really beautiful experience to get to do this alongside them. Both their imaginary friends are in the movie, which is really fun." (Krasinski admits that, though he did have an imaginary friend named Sam who he would build forts in the woods with, Sam was too busy directing the film with Krasinski to make an appearance.)

He continues, "I will say, the most emotional thing that I've ever had happen in my career is watching my kids watch this trailer. I've never been more scared to show anyone a movie than these two little people. The one criticism I'm looking for my whole life is: What do they think?"

When asked what he hopes all the other kids and grown-up kids will think when watching IF, he likens it to his time making the feel-good pandemic web series, Some Good News, which he calls "one of the most transformative experiences" and "the honor of a lifetime" for allowing him to bring a smile to people's faces during a horrific time.

"I remember saying to Emily, when I first started thinking of writing the script for IF, 'I want this to be Some Good News in movie form,'" he says. "I want people to feel like there's someone there for them, even on days that they feel like they aren't going to make it or it's not a great day. That in any day, whether it's a good day or a bad day, there's always someone there for you, and that believing in something bigger and beautiful will get you to the next day."

This is a lesson he took away from the film as well. Says Krasinski: "I've got to say, it sounds insane, but I created the movie as this fun thing for everybody to go through and make people think again about what it was like being a kid, and realize that it didn't go anywhere. You just changed, and you feel like you've got to do all these spreadsheets and work all these long hours, but the truth is, any time you want to go back, you can. And in making that movie, I think I believe it more and more every single day. I genuinely am looking for my imaginary friend more often than I thought I would."

IF — which also stars Fiona Shaw, Bobby Moynihan, and Liza Colón-Zayas — is slated to hit theaters on May 17, 2024.

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