Producer Oliver Ridge On the Glorious Simplicity and Absurd Fun of ‘Corner Office’

Producer Oliver Ridge has two films being rapturously received at different festivals. Corner Office, starring Jon Hamm, has made quite the impression at the ongoing Tribeca Film Festival, and Saim Sadiq’s Joyland won the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard section at Cannes. Ridge brings a unique excitement to talking about both films, but I marvel at how Corner Office blooms from such a simple concept.

In Corner, Hamm plays Orson, an intellectual with an optimistic view of the system. He believes that he will be rewarded for his good work, and those who don’t should be shown the door. “I could choose to see the light,” he says early in the film. Things take a curious turn when Orson discovers a beautifully decorated room that no one else seems to notice. It quickly becomes Orson’s paradise when he needs an escape. That’s the entire basic plot of the film, and I was impressed at how director Joachim Back can play with so much of the simplicity.

“You’re kind of asking the same question to me twice, and I’m thinking of how to answer it with two different parts of my brain. The producer part of me thinks about shooting it in one central location during COVID. That was very appealing. On the creative side, it’s nerve-wracking, because the film is very internal. Art is the most complicated, simple thing in the world. Corner Office looks at what it’s like to be human, and I think there is a delicacy and simplicity that I really like.”

Since the pandemic changed how we approach our daily routine, our work ethic also adjusted. We no longer accept the reality of a 9 to 5 position when we can find comfort in our own space, and projects like Corner and Apple TV+’s Severance explore that.

“It’s impossible to not see how the world has changed in that sense. Tesla, for example, is trying to get people back into this office. Seeing a shift in that conventional way of working–of how I saw my father working–is really surprising. I remember a job that I hated as a telemarketer with people all around me. It was a sea of people. What appealed to me about Corner Office is when Orson finds his oasis.”

I truly believe that Jon Hamm can do anything. We came to know him as Don Draper, but, over the years, he has shown an impressive range in a variety of projects. As Orson, Hamm doesn’t even look like himself, but it’s one of my favorite performances of his. Ridge was eager to reveal a portion of Hamm’s appearance in the film.

“Everyone knows Don Draper. Mad Men is this iconic show, and it was, in a way, the perfect storm for us to get someone of his caliber on board. I’ll let you in on a little secret: that’s a real mustache. He was attached when I came on, so when I read the script, I imagined him in the role. I was taken aback by how funny he was, because we are so used to seeing him in something like the bank robber in Baby Driver or the cop in The Town. I’ve never seen him in anything like this. We were so eager to work with him in this role.”

“He’s an Adonis of a man, so to give him that haircut and that mustache was so wonderful and fun,” Ridge added. My crush on Hamm from 2006 has be mightily reconfirmed.

Establishing Orson’s oasis was vital. If the space didn’t work, the film wouldn’t make sense. You can see how more relaxed Orson is in the space. His shoulders lose their tension, and he moves differently behind the desk. Wouldn’t we all love to find that one place that gives us total peace?

“The production design is phenomenal, and it really harkens to what Joachim [Back] and Pawel [Edelman] created. The film is very claustrophobic, but that office is so beautiful and expansive. That space isn’t that big, so the way they were able to shoot it was so key to the story. You put that vibrancy and the energy compared to the cubicles outside, it was so great to create. I love how he interacts with the desk and really feeling at home in that space.”

It’s shocking that Joyland was the first Pakistani film to compete at the Cannes Film Festival. The film centers on a young son of a Pakistani family who falls for a trans starlet, but the constraints of a deeply patriarchal society stand in their way. When I asked Ridge to describe his favorite moment of the film winning, his face lit up with such love.

“My favorite memory of it playing at Cannes and winning the Jury Prize–which still sounds crazy to me–is the filmmaker’s reaction after we showed it. He received an eight-minute standing ovation. This is a film about trans rights and gay rights in a country where those issues are complicated to say the least–those are the director’s words, and not mine. He bursts into tears and he and our trans actress were greeted with such love. It was so beautiful for me to watch that. It makes my heart so full, and I am so proud to be part of it.”

Since we spent so much time talking about potential paradise, I had to ask Ridge what his idea of ‘the room’ would look like.

“I’ll tell you a bit of a secret. My room would be the outdoors inside. There would be wood and all these trees, but in the middle there would be a little body of water. It would be still and silent. I would have my favorite books and comics. It would be warm, and I would be surrounded by nature.”

Corner Office has several more showings remaining at the Tribeca Film Festival.