"It's the Catalina wine mixer" is perhaps one of Adam Scott's most iconic film quotes to date. The Step Brothers co-star has appeared in countless other supporting roles over the years. Some worthy of note include The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, The Aviator, and even Knocked Up as that nurse with the clipboard. But more recently, Scott became a Hollywood staple with the release of Severance, his best role to date.
"If you're an actor, your business is literally you and your body and your face and your emotions," Scott recently told NPR, regarding the satirization of work-life balance in Severance. "How do you separate work from life? The work you're doing is replicating life and drawing upon your life in order to bring that experience to the role you're playing." Earlier this year, he teased a revival of the cult classic show Party Down, which fans eagerly await. Below are some of Scott's other finest on-screen efforts. Take a look!
5 Big Little Lies (2017-19)
The women certainly stole the show in Big Little Lies, but Scott also held his own as the second husband, Ed, of Witherspoon's Madeline. Plus, he rocks a killer beard here, which was shaved off for the inferior second season. Ed's discovery of Madeline's's infidelity made the second season that much more impactful for Scott as an actor, however. It was decidedly time for Hollywood to start taking Scott more seriously as a performer beyond comedies.
For those not familiar, the series focuses on a group of women (Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman, Laura Dern, Zoë Kravitz and Shailene Woodley) whose lives are changed after the hunt for a murderer ensues, and several mysteries are uncovered. The second series featured the scene-stealing addition of Meryl Streep as Alexander Skarsgård's mom. It’s a gripping HBO drama series and will have any fan of a mystery series hooked.
4 The Overnight (2015)
The Overnight is Duplass brothers cringe-comedy at its finest. Anyone who's seen Cyrus knows exactly what that means. Jason Schwartzman has said in the past that he always follows the writing to find his next project, and The Overnight is a great example of a well-thought-out script. In the story, Alex and Emily (Scott and Taylor Schilling) are new to Los Angeles, and a chance meeting at the park introduces them to the mysterious Kurt and Charlotte (Schwartzman and Judith Godrèche). A family "playdate" becomes increasingly interesting as the night goes on.
Avoiding too much spoilers, one particular highlight is when Alex and Emily first arrive at their new friends' house with a cheap bottle of wine. Alex quickly tries to rip off the label to bury the cheap-wine evidence, pitching to Emily on a whim that they can say the label is torn off because it's a cool, recycled bottle. It's all relatable content in The Overnight — even when things get weird...
3 Friends with Kids (2011)
Scott's Jason Fryman delivers a pretty epic speech to Jon Hamm's Ben in the third act of Friends with Kids, a terrific little project highlighted by superb acting. What starts out as a biting comedy pivots into heavy drama with the kind of rich dialogue actors just love sinking their teeth into. Director and star Jennifer Westfeldt and Adam Scott star as best friends who decide to have a baby to skip all the romantic entanglements. They have a Seinfeld-esque view of parenting and marriage that only exists in the fantasy world of celluloid. The terrific ensemble cast also includes Maya Rudolph, Chris O'Dowd, Kristen Wiig, and even Edward Burns. But it's the chemistry between Scott and Westfeldt that makes this a can't-miss.
2 Parks and Recreation (2010-15)
For a quick example of Scott's brilliant comedic timing as an actor, check out the seventh episode of Parks and Recreation's fourth season, titled "The Treaty." In a cutaway interview, his character tries to convince us that "it's fun" between him and Amy Poehler's character, even though they're broken up. In general, Scott owns his character, who actually didn't enter the picture until season 2. Parks and Recreation was originally brainstormed as a potential spinoff from The Office, but eventually took on its own identity as one of the most beloved workplace comedies of the 21st century.
1 Severance (2022-)
The final episode of Severance's first season is one of the coolest, most unique finales in recent years. In general, Apple TV+ struck gold this year with Ben Stiller's hit show, which follows Mark (Scott), an employee for a company called Lumon that requires its employees to undergo a brain surgery that literally removes memories of work from their personal life. It is social commentary at its finest here. The series' second season was recently greenlit, and fans are certainly eager to watch.
"I just couldn't believe my luck just because it's exactly the kind of thing that I like watching. It's a dream role!" Scott recently told W Magazine. "It's like the role that I feel like I've been earning my whole career. I felt really lucky and fired up that Ben [Stiller] thought of me, but also just didn't want to blow it. I just had to be a part of it."