David Hoffman interview
I Live With Models sounds great, David. Can you introduce your character for us?
I play Tommy Bishop, who is a gorgeous hand model. Meaning his hands are gorgeous! (They put make-up on me so I'm not as attractive as I am in real life, ha ha.) But no, he represents the majority of the population, I think. There are plenty of great looking people in the world but the models and super models are rare. I represent the rest of us.
Models have this life of parties and excitement, the glamour. The show is sort of asking, what would it be like if one of us got to go and be part of that? So Tommy represents one of us; specifically he likes to have fun, he says what's on his mind and he's not too worried about appearances or social graces. Maybe I am biased towards him because I feel like I'm a lot like him, but I feel he's a really good guy you want to hang out with - and now he's getting to hang around with people he feels lucky to be around. But I think they're lucky to be around him!
He's dropped into the deep-end somewhat, isn't he?
He sure is! To extend the analogy, it's like he's been learning to swim his entire life, waiting for the moment to just get into the pool - and now he's there. Yes he's splashing around, and he needs a life preserver, but he's been waiting for this his whole life. He thought he'd go his whole life without getting this, and it's just that stroke of luck that brought him there.
What's been your favourite storyline for Tommy during the series?
Oh we've had so much fun. I think my very favourite one is Episode 6, The Editor. It had something to do with the casting - Kate Mulgrew plays Joanna Vermouth, a very powerful, older, fashion editor. I don't want to give too much away except to say that Tommy and Joanna get close, and it's a very funny episode.
Tommy was discovered whilst working as a barista. What do you think he would've done if it weren't for modelling? Would he have coasted along or...?
Oh no, no no. Tommy is a dreamer. We actually shot stuff that got cut from the first episode: whilst working at the coffee shop, Tommy's working on a comic book called 'Captain Americano' that he's drawing himself, and he also has an album - I forget what it's called, but you'll see in one episode he has a funk band. He has big dreams! So yeah, if this didn't happen, he wouldn't have just said "I'm cool working at the coffee shop for the rest of my life." He was going to make a name for himself at some point. Even if it happened when he was 80 years old, he'd never give up. He's just paying the bills by working at the coffee shop.
If hand modelling hadn't have come along, I'd say he might've become a reality TV star at some point maybe; a YouTube sensation; he would've come up with something. He would've made his mark. Celebrity was definitely a goal in his lifestyle.
What's it been like filming in the UK?
It's been ... different! First of all you're away from home, so it's just not normal. The first time I ever came to London was in July 2014 to shoot the pilot. I can speak English, so that's a start! But it's a lovely, lovely country with lots of history. I'm going back to LA tomorrow and things feel a bit, well, there's not much history in LA, there's not that depth and sense of culture. You feel old world here, in the best possible way. We've been shooting at Pinewood, which is just iconic for so many reasons - and yeah, it's just different here, very different. LA's very specific in the way things work. 'Hollywood', if you will. This is a little, I don't know quite how to describe it, more 'blue collar' I guess? But I enjoy it, I really enjoy it. Having a bunch of LA actors come do this here is kind of like having the models go to Vinny's [the dive-bar in the show].
I've loved every second of it though; our writers, producers, director - I'm such a fan of them as people, and as collaborators, that it's really hard to leave them. It's been really fun.
You've appeared in a few other sitcoms in the past: what's it been like working with the live studio audience, and have they differed noticeably from US audiences?
Oh, yeah. They are different. I don't know quite why - what I've been told here is that the audience is used to a specific, different type of show, different type of humour. And what we're shooting here is an essentially American sitcom. That's the point of it; it's an American-style sitcom. I know plenty of people have watched them on TV, but of course few have been in the audience for one. It took some adjusting. In the US there's music pumping, t-shirts being shot out of cannons; it's just like "Let's get these people into a FRENZY!!" and I don't think it even matters what you're watching. Here it's like you're really earning those laughs.
We started off with smaller audiences and they've got progressively bigger and more into it. I love working with live audiences, I've done a lot with live audiences - not on TV, but like in theatre in LA, and there's just a relationship that you start to develop. They become a co-star with you and you're playing with them and for them. As they get to know you and the characters, they feel more comfortable. It's been exciting, every week has been better with the audience. It's really fun.
My hope is that we'll be back and we'll have audiences full of people that know the characters and love the characters and the shoot nights will just be this really great experience for everybody.
Tommy's somewhat the dysfunctional flatmate - in the eyes of the others, at least! Have you had any horror stories yourself of living with other people?
Years ago, because of bad experiences, I decided that I don't care how poverty-stricken, how disgusting a place I live in, I was going to live alone because I'd had bad experiences! I could go on for a while, but I'll give you bullet-points:
In my freshman year of college - oh, or rather, 'uni'! - I went to school in Boston, and my uncle lived there too. We decided to play a trick on my new room-mate. We'd spoken on the phone but he hadn't seen a picture of me, so we decided to pretend my uncle was me. It was very funny and the kid got it right away, but was not amused. So I just wrote the guy off and said 'I'm never speaking to him'. But one day I was outside the door and I heard him crying inside, on the phone. He was very home-sick in the first week, and he said "I'm not the parrot man anymore! I don't do parrot man things!" After that I just started seeing all these odd clues: he always slept with his socks on, so I felt like maybe he had talons or claws? And he always fell asleep on a newspaper like he was in a bird cage! He was just a very bizarre guy.
Then when I moved to New York after college I shared an apartment with a stranger. And the way the apartment was set up, when he came in the front door, in order to get to his bedroom he had to walk through my bedroom. And that was, as you can imagine, an absolute nightmare! And we just didn't click either - it was just so awkward and awful, and in the middle of this horrible heatwave, and we didn't have air conditioning... it was just a terrible time!
In the eyes of the others in the flat, Tommy has some pretty disgusting habits. But what about your co-stars? Have they any quirks of their own...?
Hahaha! Let's see ... Eric, first off, Eric IS Enrique. I don't think there is a difference between them. And I mean that in the best possible way because Enrique is SUCH a sweet, innocent guy. But he - well, let me tell you a quick story, he really is the greatest. We went to the British Museum and we were just breezing through quickly on a lunch break. Anyway, it said on the little plaque next to an Egyptian mummy, 'from the 25th dynasty ... blah blah'. Eric starts reading it and he says "From the 25th Century? Wow! So long ago!" I said, "Eric - that's in the future!" So he has this really endearing habit of selective reading or selective hearing sometimes. And he's honest, just SO honest. He asked me if I had Tourette's when we first met! I don't want to say that's a bad habit because honesty is great, but he's just a very, very honest guy.
I'm trying to think what Brianne and Rebecca do without getting in trouble... Ha ha. Well, I have breakfast every morning with Brianne in our hotel and she has a habit of attracting every single man in every single room. And you might say, "Oh yeah, she's a beautiful girl." But no - to the point where they're trying to figure out what MY deal is! "What's this guy doing here?" And then they quickly realise I'm not a threat - then they're just very forward with her. The entire hotel staff is very forward with her. Not in a wholly uncomfortable way, but they're asking her stuff and they're not all speaking English that well, so she's just saying "Oh great, great..." and the next day they show up with flowers!
And you've got a part in the upcoming Top Cat movie, David?
Yes! It's a cartoon, so I'm the voice of a granny in it, and a couple of other characters. I recorded that a while ago: my voiceover agent, when I first started with her she'd send me audition details for this and that. One time I saw it was a grandmother character, and I sent in an audition because I felt like I had a funny grandmother voice. But then she's like "That was an accident! I meant to send that to my female clients!" but I said, "Well, keep sending me grandmas!" And then she calls me one day, SO excited when I got that role, going "You're going to be a grandma! You're going to be a grandma!"