# Thanks for Sharing
**Thanks for Sharing** is a 2012 American comedy-drama about three New Yorkers in a 12-step program for recovery from sex addiction, directed by Stuart Blumberg in his directorial debut and written by Blumberg with Matt Winston.[1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) • [2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing) It stars [Mark Ruffalo](https://www.edgepedia.org/mark-ruffalo), Tim Robbins, Gwyneth Paltrow, Josh Gad, and the singer [Pink](https://www.edgepedia.org/pink-singer) (credited as Alecia Moore).[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1932718/fullcredits/) The film premiered at the [Toronto International Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/toronto-international-film-festival) in September 2012 and received a limited United States theatrical release on September 20, 2013 through Roadside Attractions.[4](https://theplaylist.net/tiff-review-thanks-for-sharing-the-uneven-dramedy-version-of-shame-20120909/) • [1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director and writers | Stuart Blumberg (directorial debut), co-written with Matt Winston[1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) |
| Principal cast | Mark Ruffalo (Adam), Tim Robbins (Mike), Gwyneth Paltrow (Phoebe), Josh Gad (Neil), Joely Richardson (Katie), Patrick Fugit (Danny), Pink (Dede)[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1932718/fullcredits/) |
| Release | Premiered at TIFF September 2012; US limited release September 20, 2013 (Roadside Attractions)[4](https://theplaylist.net/tiff-review-thanks-for-sharing-the-uneven-dramedy-version-of-shame-20120909/) • [1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) |
| Box office | $1,065,881 domestic (30.5%); $3,499,442 worldwide[1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) |
| Runtime and rating | 1 hr 52 min; MPAA R[1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) |
| Critical scores | Metascore 54 (38 reviews); Tomatometer 50% (116 reviews)[5](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/thanks-for-sharing/critic-reviews/) • [2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing) |
| Production companies | Olympus Pictures, Class 5 Films[2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing) |
## Spoilers
### Plot and characters
The film follows three men in a New York City sex-addiction support group whose lives intertwine as they work toward recovery.[6](https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/movie-review-thanks-for-sharing/) Adam (Mark Ruffalo) is a recovering sex addict who describes himself as having "a lack of impulse control"; he is addicted to brief encounters with numerous partners in contexts devoid of emotional intimacy, and after five years of sobriety he begins a relationship with Phoebe ([Gwyneth Paltrow](https://www.edgepedia.org/gwyneth-paltrow)), a breast-cancer survivor.[7](https://www.thewrap.com/thanks-for-sharing-review-12-step-dramedy-addicted-to-formula-and-cliche/) • [8](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/cinej/article/view/320) Mike ([Tim Robbins](https://www.edgepedia.org/tim-robbins)) is the group's senior member, with fifteen years of sobriety, who serves as Adam's sponsor; in the film's terms his sobriety means no compulsive masturbation or sex outside a committed relationship.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/thanks-for-sharing-movie-review/2013/09/18/99b514f6-1bd7-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html) • [6](https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/movie-review-thanks-for-sharing/) Neil ([Josh Gad](https://www.edgepedia.org/josh-gad)) is an emergency-room doctor who has been fired from his hospital for trying to videotape up his female supervisor's skirt and who attends the 12-step program only as a condition of a legal settlement; he struggles with a compulsion to touch strangers in public spaces.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/thanks-for-sharing-movie-review/2013/09/18/99b514f6-1bd7-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html) • [8](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/cinej/article/view/320)
Supporting characters include Mike's wife Katie ([Joely Richardson](https://www.edgepedia.org/joely-richardson)), who has hepatitis C presumably contracted through his past infidelity; Danny ([Patrick Fugit](https://www.edgepedia.org/patrick-fugit)); Dede (Pink), a fellow group member who befriends Neil; and Becky ([Emily Meade](https://www.edgepedia.org/emily-meade)), a young woman with whom Adam relapses through a sexual role-playing encounter late in the film.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/thanks-for-sharing-movie-review/2013/09/18/99b514f6-1bd7-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html) • [3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1932718/fullcredits/) • [10](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/thanks-for-sharing-2013) The film depicts the practical rules of recovery in detail: members avoid the subway because of the close contact with strangers' bodies, and in Mike's program sex is permitted only after working through the addiction and only within a committed relationship.[7](https://www.thewrap.com/thanks-for-sharing-review-12-step-dramedy-addicted-to-formula-and-cliche/) • [10](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/thanks-for-sharing-2013)
## Production
Stuart Blumberg, who received an Academy Award nomination for co-writing *The Kids Are All Right*, wrote the screenplay with his friend Matt Winston, an actor; the two wrote together via Skype over the course of nine months.[11](https://s3.amazonaws.com/cdn.filmtrackonline.com/mongrelmedia/starcm_vault_root/images%2Ffiles%2Fbb%2Fbb734054-4b28-47f2-baae-a6efdabbde9e.pdf) The script won over Class 5, the production company in which Blumberg is partnered with [Edward Norton](https://www.edgepedia.org/edward-norton) and William Migliore; Norton served as executive producer.[11](https://s3.amazonaws.com/cdn.filmtrackonline.com/mongrelmedia/starcm_vault_root/images%2Ffiles%2Fbb%2Fbb734054-4b28-47f2-baae-a6efdabbde9e.pdf) • [3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1932718/fullcredits/) Blumberg said he had attended twelve-step meetings with friends and was struck by how such groups bring together people who would not otherwise socialize and forge tight relationships among them.[12](https://www.filmink.com.au/unsung-auteurs-stuart-blumberg/) The film was produced by Olympus Pictures and Class 5 Films.[2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing)
## Release and box office
After its Toronto premiere the film screened at festivals including the Sydney Film Festival in June 2013 before Roadside Attractions gave it a limited domestic release on September 20, 2013.[13](https://cms.sff.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/plpp_sff-comes-to-cremorne-orpheum-8-may-final.pdf) • [1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) It opened to $536,591 domestically and finished with $1,065,881 in the United States and $3,499,442 worldwide, with 69.5% of the gross coming from international territories.[1](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/) Streaming release followed on January 3, 2014.[2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing)
## Critical reception
Reviews were mixed. The film holds a Metascore of 54 based on 38 reviews, categorized as "mixed or average", with 14 positive, 21 mixed, and 3 negative reviews; its Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer stands at 50% from 116 reviews, with an audience score of 42%.[5](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/thanks-for-sharing/critic-reviews/) • [2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing) The Rotten Tomatoes critics consensus reads: "Thanks For Sharing showcases some fine performances but doesn't delve into its thorny premise as deeply as it should."[2](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing)
Reviewers praised the performances while faulting the structure. Alonso Duralde, film reviews editor at TheWrap and a member of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association, wrote that a game cast could not lift the story out of formula, but noted that the details of how people in recovery lead their day-to-day existence occasionally made the film feel like a novel approach to a familiar subject.[7](https://www.thewrap.com/thanks-for-sharing-review-12-step-dramedy-addicted-to-formula-and-cliche/) The Washington Post's review gave the film three and a half stars, crediting the dignity with which Blumberg treats his characters and an unpreachy handling of 12-step programs.[9](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/thanks-for-sharing-movie-review/2013/09/18/99b514f6-1bd7-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html) Roger Ebert's site criticized the film for pathologizing sex under the rubric of recovery, comparing it with [Steve McQueen](https://www.edgepedia.org/steve-mcqueen)'s *Shame* (2011) as part of an era in which casual sex is treated as pathology on screen.[10](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/thanks-for-sharing-2013) The Guardian called it bland next to *Shame*.[14](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/oct/03/thanks-for-sharing-review)
## Reception among clinicians and scholars
Addiction professionals took the film's accuracy seriously. Robert Weiss, LCSW, CSAT-S, then Senior Vice President of Clinical Development with Elements Behavioral Health, wrote in *Counselor Magazine* that *Thanks for Sharing* offers a much more accurate portrayal of the pathway to sexual recovery than *Don Jon* (2013), that it does not gloss over the realities of active sex addiction or recovery, and that a collective viewing could provide useful material for group therapy, with the caution that its explicit scenes could trigger clients with compulsive sexual disorders.[15](https://counselormagazine.com/two-new-sex-addiction-films-are-they-accurate/) A writer in the SAA fellowship's newsletter, while noting that the film's unnamed fellowship is probably not a completely accurate depiction of any of the S-fellowships, judged that the one portrayed comes closer to SAA than to other fellowships and called it a powerful movie that inspired discussion.[16](https://saa-recovery.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/NewsLetter2014-07.pdf)
In scholarship, Joel Gwynne's 2021 article in *CINEJ Cinema Journal* analyzed the film alongside *Don Jon* as a representation of sex addiction and neoliberal masculinity, arguing that the film prizes self-control as a form of constant self-management: Mike and Adam function as reformed-masculinity exemplars while Neil, an overweight doctor whose domestic environment resembles a teenage boy's room, is constructed as abject precisely because his life lacks the discipline his profession requires.[8](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/cinej/article/view/320) • [17](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/cinej/article/download/320/651) The same article notes that the film is set among the affluent suburbs of New York, in contrast with *Don Jon*'s blue-collar New Jersey.[8](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/cinej/article/view/320)
The film should not be confused with *Thank You for Sharing*, a 2026 American documentary about mental health institutions.[18](https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/thank-you-for-sharing)
## References
1. [Thanks for Sharing (2012), Box Office Mojo](https://www.boxofficemojo.com/title/tt1932718/credits/)
2. [Thanks for Sharing, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/thanks_for_sharing)
3. [Thanks for Sharing (2012) full cast and crew, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1932718/fullcredits/)
4. [TIFF Review: 'Thanks For Sharing', The Playlist](https://theplaylist.net/tiff-review-thanks-for-sharing-the-uneven-dramedy-version-of-shame-20120909/)
5. [Thanks for Sharing critic reviews, Metacritic](https://www.metacritic.com/movie/thanks-for-sharing/critic-reviews/)
6. [Movie Review: 'Thanks For Sharing', CBS Philadelphia](https://www.cbsnews.com/philadelphia/news/movie-review-thanks-for-sharing/)
7. ['Thanks for Sharing' Review: 12-Step Dramedy Addicted to Clichés, TheWrap](https://www.thewrap.com/thanks-for-sharing-review-12-step-dramedy-addicted-to-formula-and-cliche/)
8. [Joel Gwynne (2021). "'not conducive for sobriety': Sex Addiction and Neoliberal Masculinity in Don Jon and Thanks for Sharing", CINEJ Cinema Journal 9.1](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/cinej/article/view/320)
9. ['Thanks for Sharing' movie review, The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/goingoutguide/movies/thanks-for-sharing-movie-review/2013/09/18/99b514f6-1bd7-11e3-a628-7e6dde8f889d_story.html)
10. [Thanks for Sharing movie review, RogerEbert.com](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/thanks-for-sharing-2013)
11. [About The Production, Thanks for Sharing press notes](https://s3.amazonaws.com/cdn.filmtrackonline.com/mongrelmedia/starcm_vault_root/images%2Ffiles%2Fbb%2Fbb734054-4b28-47f2-baae-a6efdabbde9e.pdf)
12. [Unsung Auteurs: Stuart Blumberg, FilmInk](https://www.filmink.com.au/unsung-auteurs-stuart-blumberg/)
13. [Sydney Film Festival program PDF](https://cms.sff.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/plpp_sff-comes-to-cremorne-orpheum-8-may-final.pdf)
14. [Thanks for Sharing, review, The Guardian](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/oct/03/thanks-for-sharing-review)
15. [Two New Sex Addiction Films: Are They Accurate?, Counselor Magazine](https://counselormagazine.com/two-new-sex-addiction-films-are-they-accurate/)
16. [SAA newsletter, Volume 8, Issue 4 (2014)](https://saa-recovery.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/NewsLetter2014-07.pdf)
17. [Gwynne article full text PDF, CINEJ](https://cinej.pitt.edu/ojs/cinej/article/download/320/651)
18. [Thank You for Sharing streaming page, JustWatch](https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/thank-you-for-sharing)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Comedy and romantic films (individual works) › Comedies of 2011 to 2012 › Released in 2012*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license