Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Remember in sixth grade when a boy showed up to school with a haircut that looked amazing on him and everything in your world changed? You found yourself asking, “Whoa, am I totally attracted to him right now?” Well, a similar thing has happened recently with actor Jemaine Clement. Not so much a haircut, but more in the form of a vibe, that has totally changed the perception of the Flight of the Conchords funnyman.
Clement has been involved with some interesting and surprising projects in the past few years that have indeed projected him straight to Total Babe status. Most Americans were first introduced to him as one half of the New Zealand folk-rock band, Flight of the Conchords. The silly half-hour series lasted two seasons on HBO, and Clement followed it up with roles in the comedies Dinner for Schmucks, Men in Black 3, and lending his voice to characters in Despicable Me and Rio.
2014’s What We Do in the Shadows, co-written and co-directed by Clement and Taika Waititi (his college bestie and director of the upcoming Thor: Ragnarok), found Jemaine as a vampire with a questionable, triangle goatee and broken heart. The movie is incredibly funny, but Jemaine remained the silly guy we know and love.
Until 2015’s People Places Things, aka his “haircut” moment, so to speak. Clement stars as a graphic novelist who just can’t seem to get over his ex, while having to balance his teaching schedule, taking care of his twin daughters, and a potential romance with Diane (Regina Hall!), the mother of one of his students. Throughout the course of the movie, his character goes from dunce to total DILF as he moves on with his life, and seeing this softer, sentimental side to Clement’s acting turned out to be quite enlightening.
Paired with this turn as Julian on HBO’s Divorce opposite Sarah Jessica Parker, it became time to let your Clement crush bloom freely. Maybe the power of suggestion is to blame, but it made total sense that he’d play the kind of guy to seduce a married woman into an affair (and 30+ rounds of hookups). Even though he played a bit of a pretentious art history professor, seeing him in this show is like running into a guy that you know at the bar and being pleasantly surprised and excited he’s there. While SJP’s Frances had to shut down her relationship with him on the show, he still managed to make his mark on the series and remind viewers that it is always a good time for a Flight of the Conchords re-watch. After all, that’s when your crush started, whether you realized it or not.
