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Vol. 7 Edition 8
‘Soup Nazi’ entertains in Chatham
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Actor Larry Thomas speaks at two events at Ten-Seven Cafe
By Bruce Corcoran bruce@chathamvoice.com
“No soup for you!” Four words that draw the average person’s mind to the character of the Soup Nazi on the sitcom Seinfeld. For the man who played the Soup Nazi – Larry Thomas – those words still draw a smile. It doesn’t matter how many times over the years people have asked him to say those four words – heck, his own mother does – he doesn’t mind. Thomas will make appearances at events and in cameos in character. Where some entertainers seek to distance themselves from a potential typecasting character, or a song that made them famous, Thomas embraces it. He recently did two nights at the Ten-Seven Cafe in Chatham discussing his acting career that includes appearances on Seinfeld, Scrubs, Arrested Development and in Austin Powers.
At the centre of it all was the Soup Nazi, an abrasive, strict seller of very tasty soup that was in great demand, but not necessarily always available to the four key characters of Seinfeld – Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer. Thomas said in his mind, the character was put on the planet to make their lives miserable. “I knew they’d have a terrible relationship with him,” he said. George asked for bread with his soup? “No soup for you!” Elaine bored Thomas’ character with meandering conversation? “No soup for you!” It was behave as the Soup Nazi wanted or...”No soup for you!” Landing the role was by chance. Thomas said he asked fellow actor Jeffrey Tambor to introduce him to the casting director at the time for the Larry Sanders Show, Marc Hirshfeld, who also happened to handle the casting duties for Sein-
Bruce Corcoran/The Chatham Voice
Larry Thomas, left and Chef Dimitar share a laugh over a bowl of soup. Thomas, who played the iconic Soup Nazi on the sitcom Seinfeld, discussed his acting career during two intimate and interactive events at the Ten-Seven Cafe in Chatham Feb. 13 and 14.
feld. The two hit it off, and Thomas earned the chance to audition for the Soup Nazi. Winning the role was in some ways difficult, but easy in others. “They had a couple of very obvious heavy hitters in mind and they probably didn’t think they needed to look too far. But they wanted to bring me in just to see what I could do,” Thomas said. “I ended up touching on something the other two guys missed.”
That “something” was the rough, angry, abrasiveness that Seinfeld viewers readily identify with in the Soup Nazi. “I knew what the food service industry was like. I totally got a feel for this guy. It was really simple. I knew Seinfeld from the first seven seasons; very familiar with the characters. I just thought a guy with a nickname like that must be really, really strict. And definitely the only purpose of him being in that show would be
to run afoul of them (the four main characters),” Thomas said. “Even though there was no script for me to look at the night before, my mind was just filling with images of what kind of trouble would I get into with them?” He tried to emulate Omar Sharif’s delivery and accent from Lawrence of Arabia and continued to conjure up his Soup Nazi. “And then the nickname struck me as someone
who was just volatile,” he explained. “Jerry was a little surprised by how angry my interpretation came off. He did ask me to do it again, not so angry. But in the end he came up to me and said, ‘You know what? Do it the way you did it. The angrier, the funnier.’ And somehow it came out that way.” Thomas said he really enjoyed his time on Seinfeld. Continued on page 3
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