Thomas Middleditch

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Thomas Middleditch
File:Thomas Middleditch at SXSW 2016 (cropped).jpg
Middleditch at SXSW 2016
Born (1982-03-10) March 10, 1982 (age 42)
Nelson, British Columbia, Canada
Nationality Canadian
Occupation Actor, comedian, screenwriter
Known for Silicon Valley,
Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero
Spouse(s) Mollie Gates (m. 2015)[1]

Thomas Middleditch (born March 10, 1982) is a Canadian actor, comedian, and television writer, known for his lead roles as Justin Frost in the 2009 romantic comedy Splinterheads[2] and as Richard Hendricks in the HBO series Silicon Valley.[3]

Early life

Middleditch was born and raised in Nelson, British Columbia.[4] His parents are British.[5] He was put into a play in grade eight that he said "changed everything" for him. He went from an indoorsy kid who was bullied, to becoming the funny, popular kid in high school, even being voted Valedictorian.[4][dubious – discuss] He discovered improv in grade school from performing with Theatresports.[4]

He briefly attended the University of Victoria before dropping out and moving to Toronto where he auditioned for and enrolled in George Brown College, but never attended classes.[4] He instead opted to make sketches on his own, and worked at a New Balance selling shoes for an income.[4]

He relocated to Chicago where he took classes at The Second City and iO Theater, while also performing regularly.[4] Due to immigration issues, he worked various cash jobs until Charna Halpern sponsored him to get his work visa.[4]

While performing on a Second City cruise, he got an audition for Saturday Night Live.[4] Though he did not get cast, the routine he used in his audition landed him a network holding deal and he moved to New York City.[4]

Career

Early work

While living in NYC, Middleditch began acting in commercials. In 2007 a sketch video for Chicken McNuggets he made with Fernando Sosa in Chicago was purchased by McDonalds and used as a commercial.[4][6]

He appeared in the 2009 romantic comedy Splinterheads as lead role of Justin Frost.[2]

On March 25, 2010, he joined a CBS pilot Hitched, written by Josh Schwartz and directed by Rob Greenberg.[7]

On May 5, 2011 Middleditch made his first appearance in Jake and Amir, in the episode "Jake and Amir: Doobs".[8] He has made several returns to the web series including on November 17, 2011 for "Jake and Amir: Doobs Part 2",[9] on November 20, 2012 for "Jake and Amir: Doobs Part 3",[10] on March 5, 2013 for "Jake and Amir: Movie Date",[11] and on March 12, 2013 for "Jake and Amir: Movie Date Part 2".[12][12]

On May 31, 2011, Middleditch joined the cast of the Paramount Pictures' comedy film Fun Size, directed by Josh Schwartz.[13] On August 8, 2011, he joined Road to Nardo,[14] a film that would have been Scot Armstrong's directorial debut. On December 12, 2011, he joined Jay Roach's The Campaign, starring Will Ferrell and Zach Galifianakis.[15] In autumn of the same year, he pitched a cartoon called Worst Friends Forever to MTV, but it never made it to air.[16][17]

On July 23, 2012, Middleditch joined the cast of the comedy film Someone Marry Barry, directed and written by Rob Pearlstein and produced by Barry Josephson.[18] On August 23, 2012, he had a role on The Office's final season episode "The Farm".[19]

He had a role in the 2013 comedy fantasy film The Brass Teapot, directed by Ramaa Mosley,[20] and played a police officer in the 2013 CBS Films coming-of-age comedy Toy's House, later re-titled The Kings of Summer.[21]

Silicon Valley

On January 30, 2013, Middleditch joined HBO's comedy pilot Silicon Valley playing Richard Hendricks.[22] The show has received wide critical acclaim since its premiere.

He has said that the pilot was written with him specifically in mind as the lead (the character was originally named Thomas Pickering; the latter being his mother's maiden name).[4] This was a result of a "random" audio sketch he once made for a stand-up routine which he would later animate himself and pitched to several people, including Mike Judge's production partners John Altschuler & Dave Krinsky, who would later create the show.[4]

For his work on the show, Middleditch has garnered a Satellite Awards nomination and two Critics' Choice Television Award nominations. The show won Best Comedy Series at the 5th Critics' Choice Television Awards.[23] Both Season 1 and Season 2 have been nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series, and the show also received its first Golden Globe Award nomination for Best Comedy Series, which it lost to Transparent. Despite the show's critical acclaim, it is yet to garner an acting nomination, including for Middleditch, at either awards show.

Other work

On April 23, 2013, he was added to the cast of the comedy film Search Party, a directorial debut of Scot Armstrong.[24]

Middleditch made a small cameo appearance in the 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street as a bow tie wearing broker who is fired for cleaning his fish bowl during office hours.[25]

He has played as a hipster thief in the episode "Sunday Funday" on the show You're The Worst.

On The Pete Holmes Show, he has played Nightcrawler and Gambit from the X-Men and Vega and Ken from Street Fighter II.

On October 16, 2013 it was announced that the Disney XD-produced animated series Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero would star Middleditch as the titular multiverse-hopping hero. The series premiered in late 2014.[26] In 2015, he co-starred in the films The Final Girls and The Bronze.[27][28] Also in 2015, he began streaming himself playing video games on the website Twitch.[29]

On January 21, 2014, Middleditch was added to the cast of DreamWorks Animation's animated feature Captain Underpants, based on Dav Pilkey's book Captain Underpants.[30]

Personal life

Middleditch and his wife, costume designer Mollie Gates have been together since 2012, and became engaged in June 2015.[1] They were married on August 22, 2015 in Middleditch's hometown.

Middleditch has described his own upbringing as agnostic. He believed in a "classic Christian religion" at a young age, but is now an atheist.[31]

Filmography

Film

Year Title Role Notes
2009 The Rebound Maverick
2009 Splinterheads Justin Frost
2010 The Other Guys Art Exhibition Curator
2010 Night Home James Short film
2011 Certainty Game Guy
2011 Michel Jean-Michel: Overexposed Michel Jean-Michel Short film
2012 Being Flynn Richard
2012 The Campaign Travis
2012 The Brass Teapot Gilad
2012 Fun Size Manuel Fuzzy
2013 The Kings of Summer Rookie Cop
2013 The Wolf of Wall Street Stratton Broker in a Bowtie
2014 Someone Marry Barry Kurt
2014 Search Party Daniel "Nardo" Narducci
2015 SMILF Dan Short film
2015 The Bronze Ben Lawfort
2015 The Final Girls Duncan
2016 Henchmen Lester (voice) Filming
2016 Going Under In post-production
2016 Joshy Josh

Television

Year Title Role Notes
2010 Robotomy Additional voices Episode: "Bling Thing"
2011 Ugly Americans Episode: "Wet Hot Demonic Summer"
2011 Beavis and Butt-Head 7 episodes
2011 The League Julian Episode: "The Light of Genesis"
2011 Fact Checkers Unit Kerry Episode: "Fly Like a Buttress"
2013 Newsreaders Micah Berkley Episode: "Auto Erotic"
2013 The Office Jeb Schrute Episode: "The Farm"
2013 Key and Peele Monsieur Thénardier Episode: "Les Mis"
2013 Trophy Wife Nurse Terry Episode: "Lice and Beary White"
2013 The Pete Holmes Show Gambit/Nightcrawler/Vega 2 Episodes: "Ike Barinholtz" & "Conan O'Brien"
2014 TripTank Warlock / Caller Voice; episode: "TripTank 2025"
2014 You're the Worst Hipster Ringleader Episode: "Sunday Funday"
2014–present Silicon Valley Richard Hendricks Nominated – Critics' Choice Television Award for Best Actor in a Comedy Series (2014, 2015)
Nominated – Satellite Award for Best Actor – Television Series Musical or Comedy (2014)
2014–present Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero Penn Zero Voice;
Writer (episode: "Ultrahyperball")
2015 Scheer-RL Jeff Timons Episode: "98 Degrees"
2015 Comedy Bang! Bang! Various 2 episodes
2015 Drunk History Sam Zemurray Episode: "New Orleans"

Web

Year Title Role Notes
2009 Memoirs of a Manchild Danny Nanners 3 episodes; also writer and producer
2010 UCB Comedy Originals Unknown Episode: "Macbook Pro Unboxing"
2010 The Back Room Die Antwoord Episode: "Steve Agee"
2010–13 CollegeHumor Originals Various characters 20 episodes
2011 Funny or Die Woodshed Guy Episode: "2.8"
2011 Matumbo Goldberg Lenny 5 episodes
2011–15 Jake and Amir Penis "Doobs" Dubligné 6 episodes
2012 Bravest Warriors Professor Fartsparkles Voice; episode: "Time Slime"
2013 The Funtime Gang Randy the Racoon Episode: "Pilot"
2013 The Morning After Dave Unknown episodes

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ 4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. ↑ Theapiary.org
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Making It #61: Thomas Middleditch, 58:25 to 59:09: "not in my hands anymore"
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  25. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  26. ↑ Deadline.com
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  29. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  30. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  31. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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