The Soup Nazi Interview Goes Viral
The story behind one of the most memorable roles in comedy history
This month marks the third anniversary of Wells $treet, and also the 26th anniversary of the “Seinfeld” finale, in which I had a small role.
One of the best things about being part of the finale in 1998 was seeing so many famous faces whenever I stepped out of my tiny trailer on the Warner Brothers lot. I was especially starstruck by “The Soup Nazi.”
There he was, grabbing lunch at the commissary, though I don’t believe he had soup. (Maybe they wouldn’t serve him. “No soup for you!”) I didn’t dare approach him, though. I was afraid he’d be as mean as his character.
He’s not. Larry Thomas is a really nice guy.
While I was too intimidated to approach him then, that changed in 2021.
Wells $treet began on Meta’s Bulletin platform, and part of my contract required me to do a monthly “Facebook Live.” CEO Mark Zuckerberg wanted Bulletin authors like me to help increase engagement across Meta’s platforms.
I wanted to find someone really interesting for my first event, a fun and funny celebrity who had an offbeat story involving money. Wells $treet is, after all, financial-ish.
Around that same time, I received one of my regular residual checks from “Seinfeld.” These usually total 53 cents (though they’ve gone up since Netflix took over the show). I suddenly wondered, “How big are the Soup Nazi’s checks? How much money does a guest star earn on a hit show?”
I tracked down Larry Thomas and asked him if he’d be willing to talk. He said yes.
I struck gold. Not only was he an interesting and engaging interview, he told a helluva tale.
Larry’s journey to becoming the title character in arguably the most famous episode of one of television’s most popular comedies is worthy of its own “Seinfeld” script. Imagine if Kramer took a job as a bail bondsman during the day while attending acting classes at night. He never goes to auditions, so his acting teacher threatens to kick him out of class unless he starts trying out for parts. After a series of wacky events, Kramer ends up landing a role on a major TV show and becomes famous for saying one line.
That’s pretty much Larry’s story.
My attempt to stream our interview live on Facebook suffered some technical difficulties, so I ended up taping it and dividing it into two parts to post on Youtube.
One of the videos focused on the money angle. Larry revealed that he was paid about $2,600 for the Soup Nazi episode. He later got paid again for being in the series finale, and then he started earning residuals as “Seinfeld” went into reruns and syndication, though he didn’t make enough money to quit his day job as a bail bondsman.
He eventually did quit that job when he began earning a decent living through autograph signings, personal appearances, and Cameo. “In the year 2020, when all my friends were hurting bad,” Larry told me, “I made more money than I’ve ever made in my life.”
For reasons that aren’t clear to me, the video about residuals recently went viral, even though it’s a few years old. It’s been viewed over two million times on YouTube. Here it is, and please ignore the awkward angle of my camera — I ended up having to hold my cellphone.
The second video that I posted from our interview has far fewer views, but I think it’s far more interesting. In that video, Larry takes us behind the scenes from audition to final filming. We’re told that his inattentive agent, “Mike,” couldn’t believe it when Larry got a call from a casting director. We learn that he prepped for his audition by watching Omar Sharif in “Lawrence of Arabia.” And here’s a shocker: Jerry Seinfeld was initially concerned that the Soup Nazi was too mean.
I could go on and on — Larry describes his reaction when Julia Louis-Dreyfus unexpectedly pounds the counter in their final scene. He says that Larry David came up with the line, “Adios, muchacho!,” as an afterthought. And Larry explains how the writers realized in the middle of rehearsal that the Soup Nazi needed a co-worker — someone who would take money from customers and hand over soup (or snatch it back). They chose a woman who’d worked as an extra on the show for a long time, someone who made money melting into the background. Now she was in the limelight. “It ruined her career on ‘Seinfeld,’” Larry told me.
If you have 28 minutes, watch and laugh:
I reached out to Larry a few weeks ago via email to see how he’s doing. “So interesting you re-connect at this moment,” he emailed back. “I'm sitting here waiting to book a flight to NY to do yet another thing involving Seinfeld.”
He was in New York to film a Pop-Tarts commercial promoting Jerry Seinfeld’s new Netflix film, “Unfrosted.” The movie was co-written by Spike Feresten, who also wrote the script for “The Soup Nazi” more than a quarter century ago.
Who would’ve imagined in 1998 that Larry Thomas would still be in demand 26 years later, making new money playing his old character — an angry soup genius? Talk about a recipe for success.
Nice story. The decades keep on coming!
Congrats on the 3 year anniversary! Love your work! Keep it going/growing.