Paul Walter Hauser can make awkward men funny, unsettling or unexpectedly warm through a posture or a lingering look. We rate his skill with a small part, but too many films still give him too little to do.
Fi1m perspective
In Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere (2025), Mike Batlan has a cassette recorder to wire up. Paul Walter Hauser makes the guitar technician an agreeable presence in a biopic otherwise so careful with its subject. We warmed to him because he made that practical help feel companionable. He can establish a character through posture, a laugh or a stare held while a thought sinks in. His is a small part, and the film could have used more of him.
Supporting turns as Shawn Eckhardt in I, Tonya (2017) and Ivanhoe in Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman (2018) brought him to notice. Clint Eastwood's Richard Jewell (2019) gave him the title role and his first major lead. Larry Hall, the serial killer he played in Black Bird (2022), provided a more unnerving use for that close attention to behaviour. Yet the brief eccentric parts have kept coming. The risk is that films hire him for an immediately recognisable oddness and never ask him to do anything beyond it.
The Fantastic 4: First Steps (2025) is a case in point. Matt Shakman's film gives Mole Man only a handful of minutes, and Hauser is funnier than the plot has time for. We like the warmth of the four leads, but the repeated speeches about family suggest there might have been time to spare elsewhere. We would happily have lost one of those speeches for another scene with him.
The Naked Gun (2025) finds a better job for his economy. As Ed Hocken Jr., alongside Liam Neeson's Frank Drebin Jr., he lets Neeson keep the punchlines. Akiva Schaffer's rule is that nobody should seem aware they are in a comedy, and Hauser's restraint suits it. That willingness to help another actor get the laugh is a considerable virtue, particularly when a supporting player could so easily demand attention. For a comic evening, choose this one, accepting that the gags thin out late.
Biography
Paul Walter Hauser is an American actor and professional wrestler. Born on 15 October 1986 in Grand Rapids, Michigan, he was raised in Saginaw and attended Concordia University Chicago before pursuing acting.
Hauser’s breakout role came as the title character in Clint Eastwood’s Richard Jewell (2019). He is also known for playing Shawn Eckhardt in I, Tonya (2017), Ivanhoe in BlacKkKlansman (2018), Stingray in the series Cobra Kai (2018–), Larry Hall in the miniseries Black Bird (2022), for which he won a Golden Globe and a Primetime Emmy, and the voice of Embarrassment in Inside Out 2 (2024).
In 2025 he appeared as Mike Batlan in Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowhere, Ed Hocken Jr. in The Naked Gun and Harvey Elder / Mole Man in The Fantastic Four: First Steps. Hauser is signed to Major League Wrestling.
