‘Social’ dis-ease

Despite earning a Best Actor Oscar nomination for last year’s “The Social Network,” Jesse Eisenberg is pretty sure he’ll never work again. It’s a somewhat irrational fear — isn’t Joey Buttafuoco still getting work, for God’s sake? — but one that afflicts many creative people.

“I always thought that, ‘If I’m in this movie, I’ll be satisfied.’ Then I get there and I’m not satisfied,” Eisenberg tells The Post. “Then I think, ‘If I get that kind of recognition, I’ll be fine.’ Then I get that kind of recognition, and I have that same feeling of instability. Then I think, ‘If I just had that person’s career, I’d be fine.’ Then you meet that person and they’re miserable.”

Eisenberg has a winning sense of humor. But he’s not really joking here. He has a genuine fear that his acting parts will dry up. That’s why he’s branching out, looking like a contender to the hyphenate crown of James Franco, only with 17 fewer post-doctoral degrees.

His current hyphenate is actor-playwright. After all, one way to ensure you’ve got work is to write a role for yourself. (Heartbreaking if you don’t get it though.) Two years ago, Eisenberg penned a comic play called “Asuncion,” about a pair of educated liberals whose views are challenged by their new Filipino roommate. The show, which stars Eisenberg and Justin Bartha from “The Hangover,” begins previews Wednesday at the Cherry Lane Theatre.

“One of the reasons I wanted to write this was because I wanted to explore part of myself that’s underdeveloped,” he says. “The character in the play knows a lot about politics and history and he’s read a lot, but he has no life experience. The play explores that disconnect.”

The actor, 28, says he’s also more book-smart than street-smart. “I know a lot about politics and international news and the GDP of countries that a lot people don’t know exist, and yet I have very little life experience,” he says. “I grew up in an isolated town, I do theater and movies for a job.”

He also claims not to go out, watch TV or movies and says he has no hobbies of any kind. Most of his free time is spent laying around the house, hanging out with a girlfriend he politely declines to discuss, or working on his various creative pursuits.

And he has many pursuits.

Eisenberg has also written a yet-to-be-produced musical, a passion of his since the days when he was a child stage actor living with his family in East Brunswick, New Jersey. “I grew up on musical theater, so more than anything, that’s in my blood,” he says. “Any time I sit down to write songs, even if it’s grunge rock, it comes out as ‘Follies.'”

Eisenberg began acting in stage productions when he was 6. As a senior in high school, he landed a part in 2002’s “Roger Dodger,” a black comedy about a shy teen tutored by his womanizing uncle (Campbell Scott). Parts in “The Village,” “The Squid and the Whale” and “Adventureland” followed over the next decade.

But even with fairly steady movie work, Eisenberg says he never quite felt fulfilled. As another creative outlet, he tried his hand at screenwriting, selling a few that were ultimately never made. One rom-com screenplay involved a vigilante who cracks down on petty crimes, like speeding. Another was about two kids on a cross-country bowling tour.

“So then I thought I’d put more effort into writing a play. It’s more interesting to me to write, because you can write about themes and characters that are just more unique, more substantive than you can afford to do in film, which is driven more by economics,” he says. “My experience was totally different when I’d hand my scripts into theater companies. All their notes would be about making sure the script is true to itself rather than having a mass appeal.”

Writing of any kind has been curtailed for Eisenberg these days. Since his Oscar nomination — or as he calls it, “getting more attention” — he’s too busy to spend seven months writing a play. He hasn’t given up altogether though, especially considering that, while the number of movie scripts he’s now being sent has increased, the quality hasn’t necessarily.

“That’s the nature of what’s made. Most of them are not really original,” he says. “Something like ‘The Social Network’ is so good for so many reasons, it almost has nothing to do with the Hollywood system. It almost got made despite the Hollywood system.”

Eisenberg is also trying to focus on school. (Somewhere, Franco is nodding in approval.) He majored in something called Democracy and Cultural Pluralism at the New School, but he remains three credits short of graduating. He plans to take one class per semester, perhaps online, starting in the winter and finally complete his degree.

Good thing, too. Doesn’t he know it’s impossible to get a job without a college degree these days?