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This is a This is a real [ __ ] Hey, what's going on everybody?
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For First We Feast, I'm Sean Evans and you're watching Hot Ones.
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It's the show with hot questions and even hotter wings.
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Today, I'm joined by Thomas Middleditch.
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You know him as Richard Hendricks in the hit award-winning HBO series Silicon Valley, now in its fourth season.
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And speaking of, you can catch new episodes on Sundays 10:00 p. m. Eastern on HBO.
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Thomas, welcome to the show.
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Hi, thank you so much for having me.
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How are you with hot food?
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I'm medium with hot food.
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Sometimes I like a bit of spice.
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Most times I don't mind a little bit, in fact, seek it.
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But, I've never been one to call myself the master of spice.
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Well, today you might be the master of spice, the king of spice even.
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Are you ready to get it going? Yeah, I'm ready.
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Is it a bad sign when the guest is like, "Mhm, that's great."
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and they eat the whole thing?
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You're off to a great start. You like it? Yeah, but that's minor.
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Sriracha, who hasn't had that?
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Probably a couple of people. Losers.
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[ __ ] [ __ ] So, I guess it's that your more casual fans probably think that your comedy career started in Silicon Valley.
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But, the day-one people know that it's been a 15-year long grind. My god.
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You could even add a couple more years in there if we count my stints in regional theater.
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I know that a lot of the people on Second City, they earned their stripes on the cruise ship circuit.
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Did you do the cruise ship? I certainly did.
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It was a four-month stint.
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Two months, roughly, we ported out in New York and we went like Bahamas, Bermuda, summer vacation stuff.
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A lot of like working-class Bronx, Jersey, Queens.
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I met my first guidos with a haircut.
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They'd be like, "Oh, Second City, let me buy A SHOT. OH MY GOD.
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WHAT AM I GOING TO SEE YOU ON SNL, you [ __ ] piece of [ __ ] You know, like that kind of stuff.
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Like and then like debauchery like key like teens getting caught like fingering each other on the Very much a right of passage Yeah, it's just like oh my goodness.
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And then we stopped for the fall tour to watch the leaves change.
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We went to like Boston, Bar Harbor, Maine, Newfoundland, Quebec City. No one under 50.
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They played Andrew Sisters on the PA.
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Everybody was in bed by like 9:00 p. m.
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and then the crew would just have like the ship to themselves. I love that second half. My God, the scenery.
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You know, some people they poopoo Tabasco. Mhm.
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Because it's got a bit of like a vinegar taste to it and I like that.
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I like the I like the That's what turns some people off.
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Yeah, that's what I like.
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I think that by virtue of your role that you probably had some contact with the tech world.
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Do you find that it's more or less insufferable than the version that you guys portray on the show?
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I mean, look it I don't want to be I don't want to throw, you know, the people who like the show under the bus.
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I'll say this, most of the time where I've met like actual developers and programmers it's been usually a pleasant experience.
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I have met some VCs venture capitalists who have been less pleasant.
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It's like your time with them is something that they own and it's like god damn right you'll you'll spend 20 minutes while I tell you how much the show I've lived.
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You know, that kind of stuff.
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What if I surprise myself?
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Is it around this time where people get, you know, like confidence and they're like I think I can do this and then then I there's a sobering realization around here where they want to bring a gun and shoot their brains out on on internet.
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I have seen that happen countless times.
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You know, I've used this analogy before.
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It's kind of like a professional wrestler when a wrestler gets his cockiest, you know, that's sort of like language. his downfall.
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Like that's when he gets a chair smashed over his back.
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It's when he I shouldn't fall into that trap.
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So I want to talk to you about geekery for a second because in addition Don't know anything about it.
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to naming your dog after Harry Potter, Correct.
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you also are no stranger to the Renaissance Fair. Yes. How into it do you get? Do you go in character?
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Do you talk with an accent? go in character.
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That would be [ __ ] annoying and I can't stand meeting those people. Um I I have garb though.
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I have a I have some costume? Yeah.
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It's like going out to Halloween and not dressing up, you know?
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It's like that you're not really doing it right.
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And then what's the scene like there?
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Because, you know, there's always these stories about how there's kind of uh like a psychedelic or like shroom sort of subculture.
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That's what I wanted to believe.
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I was like, "Okay, I'll go. I'll stay late.
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Next thing you know, I'll be invited to an orgy by the firelight."
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But like frumpy weird sort of like S&M fan women.
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What about as a single scene?
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Like if you were single, do you think that that would be a good place to meet people or not a good place to meet people?
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It'll be a good place to meet a certain type of people.
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If you're a little bit um shelled up in real life, a place like that is is an opportunity to kind of be weird. Be who you are.
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The Ren Fair is is just mainly to be like, "I want to go and be a fairy or a barmaid or something and just be weird."
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So, this one is the Queen Majesty.
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Oh, a nod to my British roots.
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So, I wouldn't be doing my job at First We Feast if we didn't unpackage this rap that you made making fun of McDonald's that somehow some way became an actual commercial for Chicken McNuggets. Mhm.
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McDonald's was just starting its like urban campaign of like ba da da da da.
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Like it was it's all like ha ha hey.
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Like two guys playing basketball.
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Like let's go to McDonald's. Like whatever. Boo boo doo doo doo.
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And I just thought it was so um transparently pandery. I don't know.
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It rubbed me the wrong way.
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So, after like two years of it being online, it got bought. Did that surprise you?
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It had to have been kind of did.
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Well, we were coming coming from a satirical place.
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So, to have them actually acknowledge it and then validate it is interesting. Yeah.
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What What was weirder is before it before McDonald's bought it, uh people advertisers who were writing a book on viral marketing used it as an example. So, it's in a book.
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It's referenced also in literature as well. Mhm.
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There's sweetness in there. Mhm. All right.
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So, the next part of the show is called Explain That Graham.
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And what we do is we do a deep dive on our guest's Instagram full interesting pictures that need more context.
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So, I'll show you the picture and then you just tell me the bigger story. Does that sound good? Radical. Yeah. All right. Let's do it.
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Let's do You're on This is from my Graham. Yep. I'm out of Twitter. I deleted it. It's gone. I know. [ __ ] it. It's too negative.
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Why did you delete your Twitter? It's mean.
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Everything is mean on there. It's just noisy.
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Internet's noisy and that's like the amplification of the internet's noise.
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So, I always have like kind of that thought.
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Like maybe I should just get rid of everything and maybe I'd live a happier life because there is so much messaging from like so many different angles and maybe that's kind of like, you know, affecting my life and affecting my happiness.
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Have you found since you deleted Twitter, does it feel a little little bit liberating?
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Well, Do you miss it at all?
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Well, I I I first deleted Facebook. Don't miss it all.
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I still sort of have that impulse to be like, "Ah, I could say that."
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But I Everything's so mean Yeah, there. It is. It's vicious.
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directed at you, some you know, just the ether. Why?
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Why subject yourself to it?
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Just get off and then you it suddenly goes away. It's great. All right.
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So, this first one You got the Falkland Arms with Patrick Stewart.
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Yeah, peace to Patrick Stewart has um strangely become a very good friend.
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I do this show called the Improvised Shakespeare Company, also born out of From Chicago. Yes.
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He has played with us from time to time.
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And just through that, we've become buddies.
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And we have recent I recent we recently had a trip to uh old the old England.
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And um that's how I have to say it.
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And then we we made a made a side TRIP TO THE COTSWOLDS, EVEN though that's not that at all.
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And uh he's got a place out there.
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And then I was kind of split between this Patrick Stewart picture, but there was like another one where it looked like you were playing Monopoly and Reggie Watts was there.
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It was like a whole thing.
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That was uh yeah, that was like a uh uh wonderful motley crew dinner type of thing.
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Yes, and we did play Monopoly.
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And guess who won that game? Thomas? [ __ ] right. I beat everybody.
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I beat all those Hollywood [ __ ] Rude boys on the lot? Yeah.
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It's all exquisitely like on-brand dorkiness.
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Couple of the guys thought we should get jackets cuz we're a gang.
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We're called ourselves the rude boys.
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Yeah, rude boys on the lot, Sony Pictures lot. Okay, cool.
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And we found a website that you could order custom jackets.
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And they even have like dice on the back. Wow.
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Yeah, and then so we thought, okay, we're the rude boys.
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We don't we don't give a care knowing like knowing who we are.
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We're like, yeah, we're rude.
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And uh we took our scooters and we were wanted to like scooter around the lot with our jackets.
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We did this ride and like 2 minutes into it, a security officer was like, "Hey, you can only ride bicycles here. You can't use those."
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We're like, "Oh, we're sorry."
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We like turned our turned around and just put them away.
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Blood in, blood out when it comes to rude boys on the lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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And we killed that guy afterwards.
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We hunted him down and we shot him in the face.
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So, you've said that on YOUR OFF DAYS IS THAT YOU SPEND HOURS PLAYING VIDEO GAMES. Not hours. Check with the wife.
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It was literally all day.
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It was all day yesterday for hours. Yeah.
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Is the League of Champs still a thing?
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Wow, how do you know about the old LOC? Who told you?
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I created a little league and a playoffs tournament and it kind of started growing and eventually trophies were at the end.
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People got trophies and stuff. Um it was super fun.
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Well, I am curious who who spilled the beans.
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You'll Twitch stream and you get all into it with the headset and stuff.
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Do you have any strange interactions with strangers over that headset?
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Cuz it can be kind of a volatile place.
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It What I'm coming to to experience, not only with Twitch but like social media, is like I'm not sure if all this access is a good thing.
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Or at least me reading the access.
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Cuz it's like for every nine very positive people, there's one person who's just a prick.
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And he's probably 14 years old.
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And but in the world of anonymousness, that 14-year-old like, "You're gay." And or whatever he says.
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It like cuts through and it's like, "Oh, I was having such a fun time."
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I remember the last comment is I was playing Twitch.
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I look over this feed and it goes, "So this is what being a celebrity has been reduced to, streaming video games online for teenagers."
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I was like, "You're right." Exit. Sorry, guys. I got to go. Quit. Shut it down.
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I was like, "He's right." What am I doing?
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I'm sure I'm trying to be an actor and I'm doing this.
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And it's so weird that like a little some troll really make you reevaluate your life.
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It's just smoking a store. Mhm.
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Now, I don't dislike smoking. But I do like the tang.
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What do you think of the zombie apocalypse? I mean, I like it. It's [ __ ] hot though. Mhm. It's a creeper as well.
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So for a lot of actors, working with Martin Scorsese is kind of the holy grail.
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I know that it was a relatively small role in Wolf of Wall Street.
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Yeah, I had to audition quite heavily for that.
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Scorsese was interesting only in the sense that like his AD, I'm assuming it was his assistant director, was uh he's everything that you think he is. He's petite, he's weak.
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He's happy and he talks like this. He's like, "Great. Okay." Yeah.
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What you did there, great. Try something new. Okay.
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And you're like, Like, "He likes it. Try something. Do whatever." And you're like, "Okay." That was it.
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It was very short and sweet. Mm.
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No, I'm very much supporting in that scene for Jonah.
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In that bowtie scene, he flicks the [ __ ] Everyone's like, "New shoe day?
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You [ __ ] clean your thing on new shoe day?
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Get the [ __ ] out of here." And I WAS LIKE, "GO. BOO. YOU SUCK."
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AND I knew a couple people like Brian Sacca and some other people that were And they they got they took it upon themselves to get personal.
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Like, "You big-nosed freak."
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And then extras were like, "Yeah, you freak. You [ __ ] bird troll."
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And I'm like, "This is terrible."
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And that went on for like an hour and a half, 2 hours.
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You know, you have to at the end of the day you have to be like, "It's just the movie.
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They don't really think that."
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This looks like dudes who love pot made this label.
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And it looks like people are like, "Oh, man.
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You dude you take some like [ __ ] purple kush, bro. [ __ ] Hawaiian dank.
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Take some bomb beyond insanity.
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All right, see you later."
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I think they're going to have the last laugh on that. Mhm.
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See, it becomes like a different type of spice. Mhm. Oh, yeah.
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I might not eat the whole thing of that. It's probably smart.
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So, now that you're a native of British Columbia and here at First We Feast we care way too much about what people eat.
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So, I wanted to talk to you about your love for Ruffles All Dressed, It's number one flavor in Canada. Sure.
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What do you love about Ruffles all dressed?
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Well, if you're a fan If you're a fan of zest If you like zest over heavy flavors.
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Now there's people who like chips Who like heavy flavors, you know, like barbecue, sour cream cheddar Mhm.
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You find a lot of heavy flavors in American stores. I got to be honest.
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It's very few very few zesty ones.
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God help God help you if you try to take an American away from a sour cream and cheddar. Mhm. But I like the zest. I like salt and vinegar. I like all dressed.
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You think that all dressed is like Was that every flavor on one chip?
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No, that would be disgusting.
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All dressed is like a vinegary zesty kind of thing.
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And the fact that it's just now making it down here is both great and awful.
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I mean there was for a second for a brief second Canada had something that you guys didn't.
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We could hold on to it and say you may have a big army and a big navy and a big air force but we have all dressed chips and poutine.
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All right, so this is Mad Dog 357.
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Dude, Mad Dog 357 like caliber magnum that guy has underneath my pillow just in case an intruder comes up. I'm doing a little guy. You're doing a halfers. What's good about that? I like the taste better. Mhm.
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You know how the bomb has very few if any redeeming qualities?
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Yeah, that's [ __ ] I feel like Mad Dog at least they're trying to make something happen.
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Yeah, Mad Dog is at least giving it a god damn shot. It's nothing though. Mhm. How you feeling so far? I'm pretty good.
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I feel confident I can make it to the end.
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So before I get to my question, first I want to say congratulations on getting your pilot's license. Thanks, man.
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Was that kind of a hobby?
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Was it something that you had your eyes set on for a long time or It's been It's been a ha It's been a dream for a while. For a while.
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Had I any Had I any common sense [ __ ] What's the reaction going on in here?
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That's like some backflips in there. That's like, "Hey." Evacuate. Go. Do you have to throw up? No, no.
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But why do I burp all the time?
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But I've burped some pretty nasty ones.
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Okay, let's get through it.
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What do you remember about your first time flying?
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That it was scary, but I enjoyed it. Wow, that creeps. Mhm. Here's the deal.
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Flight Flight has been a a passion of mine for about 15 years.
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I got on my flight simulators.
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Been into those for a long time.
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A flight came by way of a mil A passion for military history.
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Start talking about military history, you start talking about fighter pilots.
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I almost exclusively read fighter pilot memoirs.
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Are you in the mile high club?
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Not yet because someone's very prudish. All right, Thomas.
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Are you putting extra on? It hurt.
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This is Blair's Mega Death Sauce with Liquid Rage.
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It's tradition around here to put a little dab on the last wing.
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But it's already it there. It's already on there.
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And you don't have to if you don't want to, Thomas Middleditch.
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You don't have to if you don't want to.
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You don't have to if you don't want to. Dumb.
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Dumb comes through with the refill.
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When does the pain usually end though? Mhm.
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Like how long is this going to happen?
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Yeah, if I put a dab on it am I [ __ ] Listen, for the next 15 or 20 minutes if you put a dab on it or you don't put a dab on it, you're [ __ ] I want to. Pride says yes. Brain says no. Let's do it. Damn it.
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[ __ ] My dab might be small. It's okay. It's okay.
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This is not a dick measuring contest. Oh, that's interesting.
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I've never seen this move before. Huh. Can I help? No. All right. Do we cheers? Cheers.
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Too big of a I would love to. Oh.
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What's the big deal with this guy?
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I probably could eat the hottest men and ingredients on the planet Earth.
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Please use this with extreme caution.
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So now that I have Deck in the house with an improv experience, I'm sure that many people think that Thomas Middleditch is much like his character Richard, but most of the characters that you've done over the years like Doobs and Joey Tortellini, these are big personality characters.
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So if you'll humor me, I'm hoping that while the Blair's Mega Death Sauce with Liquid Rage is channeling through you, that you can summon one of those classic characters to give the people out there a Yelp review on Blair's Mega Death Sauce with Liquid Rage. Oh.
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I got my publicist over there like, "We should stop." It's fine, Rachel. Ah. Okay.
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This is a This is a real [ __ ] Was Joey torturing me like this, right? Let me tell you.
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The only thing hotter than this so than this sauce are the babes that I DJ to every every night in Vegas.
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I can't remember all the details.
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It was a tough episode for not only you, but for me as well.
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Over here, major face sweat. Tommy doing backflips. Tommy doing backflips.
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Tommy backflips over here. You made it through. I did. You cleared the board.
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You're a better man for it if I look in your eyes. God damn right.
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This camera, this camera, or this camera, let the people know what you have going on in your life.
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Well, I'll be later on [ __ ] bloody hell out of my butt hole later on.
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But other than that, you can check Silicon Valley season 4 out.
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And also Captain Underpants July.
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And at some point I'm going to film with Keanu Reeves. It's called Replicas.
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THAT SHOULD BE INTERESTING.
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YOU'RE TEARY A LITTLE BIT. I'M NO SUPERHERO, TOMMY. I'm no superhero.
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Wait, that's not the lyrics.
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You were trying to do some Foo Fighters there? I'm your What is it?
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Which one were you trying to do? I don't know. Superhero babe.
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Were you trying to do My Hero by Foo Fighters? Maybe.
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I could be your superhero babe.
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And then maybe I was also get getting like There goes my hero.
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That's how we do the Foo Fighters one.
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And there's also Why yeah, Superman's dead, bro.
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Those guys Our Lady Peace. You remember that? Maybe they're Canadian.
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It's hard to tell nowadays.
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Hey, what's going on, Ones fans?
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If you liked the video, maybe meet us halfway. Throw us a subscribe.
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If you didn't like the video, don't subscribe. I don't want you.
21:15
I don't want you in the tent.
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But, if you liked the video, subscribe. Thank you very much. I appreciate you. I love you. More than a friend.