When comedian, writer, and actor Vinny Thomas logged on to our Zoom call, 1 thing immediately jumped out: his background. Instantly recognizable
, it depicts an ornate, palatial property with a seemingly endless hallway, massive windows, and glass chandeliers. The background, it turns out, is not a digital effect — it’s a real backdrop behind him, and 1 of multiple he has in rotation.
“I appreciate the old ways,” Thomas explains. “Artisanal Zoom backgrounds are a lost art.”
It’s that attention to item and affinity for offbeat humor that have helped propel Thomas to viral video success, a guest writing gig with NPR’s comedy podcast Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, and roles on Ahsoka, Platonic, and the fresh Will Ferrell-Reese Witherspoon romanticist comedy You’re Cordially Invited, which is now streaming on Prime Video. Thomas will besides be 1 of the guest presenters on the second period of Dropout’s hilarious PowerPoint organization show Smartypants, which is expected to launch in the first 4th of 2025.
Polygon spoke with Thomas about viral fame, how the full amusement manufacture runs on birds, and embarrassing himself in front of his childhood hero Dave Filoni.
Polygon: How did this all start for you?
Vinny Thomas: I grew up in Denver, Colorado. I didn’t want to be a performer necessarily for most of my childhood. I wanted to be the curator of birds at the Bronx Zoo. That was my main goal. I just wanted to work at a zoo and I wanted to take care of birds. But then I joined a small improv group that they were having auditions for at my school, called Spontaneous Combustion, and I loved it. I truly loved it. We would execute at the 2 improv theaters in Denver at the time, and I just loved it. I was like, I kind of want to keep doing this. The ceiling feels higher than taking care of birds, and what if it doesn’t work out? I could always figure out a way to take care of birds later. I could always have a bird-related future.
It’s different to fall back on comedy as a more unchangeable possible career path.
Isn’t that crazy? I think about that all the time. At the time it felt more reasonable, but even comedy itself didn’t feel super reasonable. So I was like, Maybe I’ll just be an anchor. I’ll be a news anchor. So I went to college and I majored in broadcast journalism.
The breaking news on campus would be like, individual fell down the stairs and you’re interviewing people about this very tiny thing that is this immense deal in this small community.
But after I finished, I just thought to myself, I kind of gotta effort [comedy]. I gotta at least effort to do this, and if I burn out, whatever, I’m just going to try. So I moved to Chicago and I started doing the Second City iO thing.
I was doing sketch and stand-up while I was out there, and then the pandemic happened, and I started posting videos online, which is not something I always thought I would do. The net is scary. It’s a terrifying prospect. Everything you make is there forever. Everyone’s looking at it. It’s very exhibitionist in a way that feels kind of icky, and I hatred to be a Puritan or whatever, but something’s very perverted about filming yourself and putting it online at all to begin with. But all my friends [in Chicago] were making videos online too. So it was kind of just us making clips for each another the same way we’d be doing stand-up or sketch or improv in those small spaces in Chicago.
But another people started to see it. And from those videos, I got attention from Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me! on NPR. And then Billy Eichner messaged me and he was like, ‘Do you want to audition for Bros?’ And I was Gay Twitter Witch No. 3 on Bros. yet I was cut out of Bros. I have an email from Billy Eichner that is very sweet, but Nick [Stoller, manager of Bros] directed Platonic. So he just kind pulled me in for that. And then yet You’re Cordially Invited. Somewhere in between there, I was on Star Wars for 12 seconds, which was bananas.
I do want to ask you about that later.
Oh, please. I have a communicative about that that’s so embarrassing, and I have a feeling that you specifically are going to love it.
Back to before you moved to Chicago, was there a minute where you felt like, Wait, I could actually do this for a living?
It’s comic looking back on it. I’d be in these kind of tiny improv theaters and I’d be doing sketch or improv, and I would kind of just know I killed it. Even if there’s only 5 people in the audience, I’m like, That might as well be the breadth of humanity. I’m kind of completely advanced on my own good performance, even if it’s just a twelve people kind of coughing all now and then and chuckling at whatever I’m doing. I was like, I should do this. I truly like this and I’m good at it. And as much as I like birds, there are quite a few people who are good at birds. In fact, you can kind of learn to be good at birds. Anyone can. I don’t know if I can learn to be good at this.
You can make comedy about birds too. It’s not just 1 or the other.
And thank you for saying that. Not adequate people say that, and I want more people did.
That should be the genesis of your Pigeon at Pride video, right?
Oh, it absolutely is. It absolutely is. That is, I think, the eventual meshing of my 2 interests. Whenever I think of a large human event, I think about the small animals that are just existing around, that have their own hyperfixations.
If it’s a pride parade, evidently it’s a ton of gay people and they’re fixated on gay stuff, but that doesn’t mean that there’s not a rat somewhere who doesn’t inactive want a small bit of garbage, and he’s inactive going to be pursuing that goal to the ends of the Earth. It truly doesn’t substance what’s happening around him. So yeah, I was just reasoning of what a pigeon would say in that situation, and that’s the 1 I think I get the most attention for on the street more than anything else. I get yelled, “Throw any bread!” in the street.
Literally I was going to ask that. I’d written down “When people admit you in public, what do they say?” So it’s “throw any bread.”
It’s “throw any bread.” It’s absolutely “throw any bread.”
I was worried it would just be “TikTok.”
Could you imagine if people yelled “TikTok”? The way my body would respond to that is as if it was a racial slur, I truly cannot begin to describe to you. I would gag a small bit. Thank god it’s “throw any bread.”
So you moved to Chicago, then you started making videos on the internet. Do you remember which was the first that felt like a hit?
I’ve deleted most of these due to the fact that they felt dated, but I did an impression of the coronavirus in different situations. I did 1 impression of the coronavirus encouraging people to go to church, and I impersonated her as kind of a confederate female who’s very friendly and kind of has a wide, creepy small smile, and it’s just kind of encouraging everybody to contact and love on each other. I did that first and then I did a fewer more of those. I did the coronavirus at a brunch and coronavirus in a fewer another situations. I think that was the first one. And then after that Galactic Federation, that was the first 1 to truly kick off like crazy. I had Al Jazeera asking if they could post it. I was like, Al Jazeera wants my small video where I’ve popped my collar in this inexpensive JCPenney’s blazer?! You can have it, folks. Truly just take it.
The coronavirus bit reminds me of 1 of my favorites of yours, which is your impression of the pope after he got caught red-handed. I’m curious if you’ve seen Conclave, due to the fact that there’s a lot going on in that movie that’s akin to your sketch.
Oh my God, people keep bringing up Conclave and that I gotta see Conclave.
You should, you truly should.
People keep mentioning that in relation to that sketch, and now I’m like, I kind of gotta watch that. I think I’m going to revisit the pope stuff. It’s honestly any of my favorites. He’s specified a weird small guy. Just the thought that he’s saying that in the background erstwhile he’s kiki-ing with his friends, it’s funny. It’s just them hanging out, so there’s no reason to say it. It’s not like they’re calling anybody that, they’re just saying it with each other, which is, I dunno. It’s great.
I do want to make certain I hear your Star Wars story, though, if we could jump there.
So I get on the [Ahsoka] set and it’s Dave Filoni directing it, and I love Dave Filoni. always since I was a kid, I was watching Clone Wars and just a ton of his work. immense fan of Dave Filoni. Oh, and Clancy Brown was there, too, who voices Mr. Krabs. So I’m there with titans, icons of the genre. And I had improvised a small in my audition. At 1 point, Dave’s like, “Hey, how about you improvise a small line here?” He was like, ”You improvise, right?” And I was like, “Deadass. Of course I improvise. Don’t always ask me that. Of course I improvise.” I was so nervous, and the line I improvised was: “How on Earth?”
Which, of course, cannot work. And I didn’t even realize it at first, but “How on Earth?” came out of my mouth, and a second afterwards my eyes went immense and I stopped and Dave was like, “Can we cut for a second?” He comes up and he is like, “Maybe don’t say Earth. You know, galaxy far, far away.” And Clancy’s cracking up. He’s, like, beside himself. I’m humiliated due to the fact that I’ve never done anything like this. It’s like 40-foot-tall blue screens. You gotta wear cloaks erstwhile you walk out of your trailer due to the fact that nerds are flying drones over the set to effort to see who’s there. Everyone had a codename. I was named Senator Kingfisher. Everyone was a different bird, which, circling back to birds…
Oh wow. Yeah, it’s all coming together.
Actually, the manufacture is all run by birds.
No one’s talking about this.
And then there were extras in all these masks and makeup and it’s a 100 degrees and they’re clearly on the verge of heatstroke, and I’m wasting time saying “How on Earth?” It was my embarrassing Star Wars moment.
How was the remainder of that experience for you? I know you had 1 appearance, but you got to play not only a Star Wars character — you played a senator in Star Wars.
I love that I got to play a senator due to the fact that I love wearing an interesting tailored small suit, first of all. And they altered this, I think it was an Armani suit, so that it was alien, but inactive kind of gave the impression of a suit. The experience was totally different than anything I’d always done, just due to the scale of it. It was massive. It was like football fields of sets just completely outside, and everything just felt expensive. I was kind of frightened to contact anything or frightened to interact with anyone besides much. But it was nice. Everyone’s super friendly, and I think luckily I haven’t bumped into anyone in the manufacture who’s, like, a massive asshole yet. I’m certain it’s coming. Something crazy is going to happen soon, but so far it’s all been — everyone’s truly great.
Can we anticipate more of Jai Kell in the Star Wars universe?
I have no idea. I’m so removed from all decision they made. And it’s so tiny to the scope of whatever’s happening with that show.
Another 1 of my favourite videos of yours is in the tavern with the individual talking about the wizard mixing the nasty soup with his finger. To me, that seemed very influenced by Skyrim.
Yes, the tavern video is definitely Skyrim-influenced.
What’s your background with gaming? Do you play games still?
I do play games, yeah. My brother’s a much bigger gamer than I am, so quite a few what I play is kind of backwash from what he truly likes. The Elder Scrolls [5: Skyrim] was 1 of the first immersive games that I’ve played, and I loved it. I’m actually replaying it right now due to the fact that I love that game so much. But I besides love the stupid NPCs that kind of just walk up to you and they’re like, “You look rough. Can I aid you with something?” And I would love a game where the NPCs weren’t dumb and they were always trying to spill. They’re trying to say something crazy. I want unhinged NPCs that are kind of on the cusp of a intellectual breakdown. I think that’s very fun. And no 1 has that yet, but we’ll see. I think they’re making a fresh one. So…
I play Planet Zoo. The control classics. Your Smash Bros., your Mario Kart. My brother’s trying to get me to play Red Dead Redemption, but I don’t have anything capable of moving that. I request a machine. I request a water cooler system. I request a wheel to crank and coal and shit. I don’t have the supplies to run Red Dead Redemption. And I love any classical fighting games, too. Tekken, Mortal Kombat. My go-to in Tekken was always Nina and I just kind of spam the kicks. My brother studied all of the buttons, so he knew all combination. But what I knew was slap, slap, kick, and it works all time.
I have 1 last question for you, Vinny. Do you have a dream task that you’d like to put out there in the world? Something you have an thought for or something going on now that you’d like to be active with? What’s your pastry in the sky?
Oh my gosh. I have quite a few pies in the sky. There’s a show coming out on CBS about the DMV and I love the monotony. I love a monotonous workplace, so I would love to be in a show about the DMV, but besides I would love to play a villain in something. I think it’s time for a Joker who’s kind of a short king. I think it’s time for that. Or I don’t know, just kind of a classical Bill Nye-style discipline education show. I want to age gracefully into individual who teaches people about the dodo.
What I love is that your interests are all over the place, so it seems like any of these could happen.
I kind of request to choice a direction, don’t I, Pete?
I think you’re paving the way for the remainder of us.
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