When Jeff Hiller was cast to play a friendly biker on Pluribus, he had no idea what he was getting himself into.
“I never read the script; I wasn’t given it,” the Emmy-winning actor tells Gold Derby exclusively. His character, Larry, interacts with romance author Carol (Rhea Seehorn) in the fourth episode as she’s actively investigating the mysterious hive mind virus that has infected humanity. Their conversation eventually turns to what Carol’s deceased wife, Helen (Miriam Shor), really thought of her books.
“I read the internal scene, but they’d made all sorts of changes to it,” Hiller adds. “They told me I was [Carol’s] father, and that I was talking to her about her dead mother, rather than her dead wife. When I showed up on set for my fitting, I still didn’t know anything. They put me in this weird bicycle uniform,” he laughs. “I was like, ‘What is this show? What is happening on this show?'”
He calls Seehorn “one of the nicest people in Hollywood” after she invited him over to her house in Albuquerque, N.M., so they could rehearse. “That was when she and the director, Zetna Fuentes, and one of the writers and a co-EP, Alison Tatlock, really sat with me and explained the concept of the show. It was complicated!”
The actor praises showrunner Vince Gilligan for knowing “his way around a laptop,” and praises the show’s dedicated fanbase. “You can’t watch while you’re on your phone,” he declares. “You have to be paying attention. It’s quiet. It’s not necessarily constantly action-packed. But it’s so worth the effort that you put in when you’re watching it — the effort of not looking at your phone simultaneously.”
Since almost all of humanity now shares the same thoughts, Hiller initially found it challenging to make Larry his own distinct character. “I was trying not to put too much of my own personal spin on it,” he reveals. “They were saying, ‘They all have the same mind, but it’s still your voice, your tone, and your facial expressions, so your face might be more expressive than Karolina Wydra‘s [who plays Zosia].'” He concedes, “There was a little bit of room to be physically different, but there were times when they would say, ‘Not so much emotion.'”
He explains about the infected people, “Even though they can’t lie, that doesn’t mean they want to necessarily reveal everything that might hurt Carol’s feelings. One of the main sticking points of the rehearsal was really understanding that and trying to strike that right dynamic with hearing her, not lying to her, but also protecting her — because they love her so much.”
Larry’s tight black-and-white tracksuit made him feel slightly uncomfortable at first. Gilligan even told him, “The hive mind doesn’t have any sort of vanity,” to which Hiller recalls responding, “Well, this actor does!”
The costume actually helped him create a backstory for his character: “I was thinking, Larry must not have had any vanity either. In my mind, he kind of let himself go, and was trying to get back into biking again. This apocalypse happened while he was out on a 20-mile ride, and now he’s just part of the hive.”
Addressing fans who want Carol and Zosia to get together romantically, Hiller claims he’s not a member of the “Stursia Army.” “I don’t like the idea of them being together, simply because it’s a bit of a lie,” he admits. “The fact that Zosia has to move to this ‘I’ pronoun and change herself, that’s not a good sign for a healthy relationship. It feels like Carol’s telling herself a lie, too, that they’re the real thing. Plus, you know, she stole her eggs! I feel like that’s kind of a boundary crossed.”
He would come back to Pluribus “in a heartbeat” if asked, suggesting he’d be crazy not to. “It’s an incredibly nuanced, intelligent show that’s a huge hit. Yeah, I would totally, but I don’t really see that happening.” He adds, “I really like Albuquerque. It’s a fun place to shoot. The crew is like family, but they’re also very welcoming.”
Last September, Hiller won his first career Emmy Award for Best Comedy Supporting Actor for Somebody Somewhere. He keeps his trophy on a “ridiculously high shelf” so that his cat, Beverly, won’t accidentally “jump on it.” Receiving a Best Drama Guest Actor nomination for Pluribus this year “would be crazy, but awesome,” he says.
“I’m having a hard time conveying the shock of being a person associated with the Emmys at all. I was 49 when I won the Emmy, so a lot of water had gone under the bridge,” he chuckles. “I’m not the type of actor that gets singled out. I’m sort of like a chorus member. I’m the guy who plays the waiter and the mean maitre d’, and the guy who enhances it when the detective says ‘enhance.'”
Hiller concludes, “I can’t believe people know my name and think I’m a talented actor.”
Season 1 of Pluribus is streaming now on Apple TV.
