Chris Diamantopoulos On His Office Infamy, Voicing Mickey, And Why He Couldn't Stay On Broadway

Welcome to Random Roles, wherein we talk to actors about the characters who defined their careers. The catch: They don’t know beforehand what roles we’ll ask them to talk about.

The actor: Chris Diamantopoulos is probably best known for playing Silicon Valley blowhard Russ Hanneman, but throughout his career, the Canadian actor has been just as likely to embody nice guys and working stiffs as he is to take on larger-than-life personalities like Frank Sinatra. Even now, as he co-leads Amazon's crime caper The Sticky, Diamantopoulos is also lending his voice to one of the sweetest characters in all of pop culture: Mickey Mouse. And that's all without dipping into his time on Broadway.

Still, you can see the swagger bordering on lunacy that Diamantopoulos brought to the Tres Comas founder in many of his other roles, like A Christmas Story Live!'s Old Man Parker (why else call a lamp an award?) and Mrs. Davis' JQ, whose workwear consists of a Speedo. That trait seems born of Diamantopoulos' own hard-won confidence, which withstood some serious setbacks early on: mentors and agents who doubted he was telegenic enough for the big (or small) screen, missed opportunities, and a stalled career. But with multiple Emmy nominations and a hundred-plus credits over the last 20 years alone, including teaming up this month with beloved character actress Margo Martindale, Diamantopoulos is poised to have the last laugh (if not a car with doors that go like this). 

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Law & Order (2002)—"Chris Wilson"

The A.V. Club: One of your earliest roles was on Law & Order, where you joined this long tradition of Broadway actors who have appeared in the franchise. What do you remember about that experience?

Chris Diamantopoulos: I remember vividly what a prince Jerry Orbach was. He could tell that it was my first job, that I was nervous, and he literally and figuratively put his arm around me and said, "You're doing great. Isn't this fun? Look at what we get to do for a living." I'll never forget it. He was peaceful and helpful and just a lovely, present guy. Reminds me a lot actually of my dear friend Bryan Cranston—that same sort of great actor who loves actors, is happy to be there. You get the sense on some of these shows, these procedurals that have been on for a very long time, that the series regulars are kind of punching in and punching out and sort of want to get out quickly because they might be able to make their lunch date and they're not going to be there for the guest stars' coverage. Not the case with Jerry Orbach—he was a consummate professional, and he set the tone for what I hoped one day to ever be even remotely on a set for a young actor.

AVC: Just a few years later, you found yourself on The Sopranos in a part that set the tone for many of your later roles, where it might be for only one or two episodes, but you shake things up. 

CD: It's interesting. My wife [Becki Newton] and I used to say, when we started auditioning for these things, "What's the audition for? Is it a good one or is it a rent-a-jerk?" "Rent-a-jerk" usually means you're a meat puppet—you do the work, and it's fine. There are those roles, and not that they're inconsequential, but they're not necessarily the thing that you get out of bed for in the morning, and I don't mean that to be disparaging. There are all sorts of different roles and all sorts of different reasons that we do the roles, but when you're a young actor…when I was a young actor, I wanted to be Daniel Day-Lewis. I wanted to be Philip Seymour Hoffman. You don't get those opportunities ever really, or especially when you're starting out. So, to get an opportunity to do something on a show as prolific as The Sopranos with performers as lauded as those performers, and to have a role, as you said, that wasn't inconsequential—[Jason] was definitely sort of there to push things in another direction and add to the intrigue—that was super cool. 

I remember there being many holdups, and so this job that was supposed to be one episode that I was excited to get because I hadn't worked in a year and a half and was supposed to take five days ended up taking seven weeks, which was marvelous for me on many levels. I remember in the sequence where [Tony] was in the hospital bed while they were setting up the lights, [James Gandolfini] was outside kicking around some gravel and looking for a sharp stone, and I asked what he was doing. He goes, "I'll show you something," and he picked up this stone. He would push this jagged stone into his stomach when he had to feel the sharp pain or whatever it was, and I thought that was fascinating. 

Another little tidbit was Tony Sirico, whom I love, was given two lead pipes—a real lead pipe for when the camera was on him, and he was hitting a bag next to my leg, and a fake lead pipe for when the camera was on me and he was going to hit my leg. He didn't get it right the first time. [Laughs] So, I got whacked by Paulie Walnuts and I survived. How about that? 

Behind The Camera: The Unauthorized Story Of Mork & Mindy (2005)— "Robin Williams"

The Kennedys (2011)—

AVC: Frank Sinatra and Robin Williams were these larger-than-life personalities. How did you find the balance between an homage and steering clear of an impression?

CD: It boils down to what the specifics of the task are. The Unauthorized Story Of Mork & Mindy was a low-budget TV movie that was supposed to be part of a series. But for me, it was my first chance to really show myself that I can do this: I can inhabit a human being; I can become someone else on screen. There was no pre-production time. The whole thing, all of it, was less than three-and-a-half weeks, but it still gave me a chance to think about it and do a little studying and watch the old videotape and [impersonates Robin Williams] oh, boy, let's see what happens. I realized that not looking like someone, not sounding like someone, that's not a hindrance. The hindrance is, are you willing to try and go there and take it past caricature and actually get into the skin? There were a lot of people that are like, "Robin's going to hate this. It's unauthorized." It was an homage. This was a veneration of my idol, and frankly, as a young actor, it was a chance, and I took it with aplomb. 

The Kennedys was a lot different because those guys—Joel Surnow and his team—they had a very specific idea about a non-public, deferential part of Frank Sinatra that most people didn't know about. For lack of a better term, his servitude toward the Kennedys because they were basically American royalty. Sinatra, from my understanding, desperately wanted to be accepted into that echelon of society. [The producers] were vehement about [me] not playing the Sinatra that we all know; they wanted him to be different than we've seen. It was challenging for me because all of the archetypal material that I had sort of looked at and the way that I wanted to go for it was different than what they wanted, but I have to do what the filmmakers want. So, that was an exercise in restraint, and it was an exercise in finding humanity and sort of just finding little elements that might be able to simply imbue an essence of Sinatra. I think it was more akin to some of the smaller characters in, say, Once Upon A Time…In Hollywood, where you get a taste of Steve McQueen, not necessarily a Steve McQueen impression. 

But I got to work with the late, great Tom Wilkinson, and he was cut from the same cloth as Mr. Orbach and Mr. Cranston—just a prince of a man. I probably didn't shut up asking him about his experiences about some of my favorite films and performances, but he was more than happy to discuss them with me, and that stayed with me as well. 

AVC: Did you talk about The Full Monty? 

CD: [Laughs] We did. My wife came to set and he said, "Oh, she's so lovely. How did you guys meet?" And I said, "Well, this is a funny story. I was waiting to tell you this," and he got such a kick out of it. He loved that I met her on the subway and invited her to see me [in The Full Monty on Broadway] naked before our first date. His response was, "And she's with you anyway."

AVC: You mentioned not seeing eye to eye on a production. Was there any one experience that felt more contentious than the others, or something you took a big lesson from?

CD: I haven't directed television, but I've done my fair amount of television—guest spots and arcs and series. Working directors have a very challenging position on a TV set because unlike film sets—and even that's changing—directors don't have the last word. They don't even have the second-to-last or fifth-to-last word. There are so many cooks in the kitchen in television that for a director to be able to impart a vision for something, they're dealing with producers and showrunners and network executives and studio executives, and maybe number one on the call sheet that's also an executive. By the time they get to say, if I'm number three on the call sheet, or if I'm just a guest star in a few episodes, they've already been torn down in so many ways in terms of what they had set out to do that it can be challenging.

The good directors understand this. Frederick E.O. Toye, who just won the Emmy for Shōgun, we've done a few things together: Mrs. Davis and Taylor Kitsch's Dark Wolf, which is coming out soon on Amazon. But Fred is fucking brilliant. He's super creative, he's super collaborative, but he also understands that there is a hierarchy, and he doesn't try to supersede that hierarchy. No, he's the judo master of directors. He takes what the network is giving him, and he's able to sort of let it go and then move into the thing that he wants to do; and he has such a fluid way of making everyone around him—the actors and producers—feel like they're getting what they want, and ultimately he ends up getting exactly what he wanted.

But yeah, there have been situations where I've been uncomfortable on-set, where I felt like the person in charge was a fucking idiot and didn't have a clue what they were doing. They didn't have a shot list. They hadn't gone to film school. When I was younger, I probably let that show on my face a lot more than I do now. What I realized is—and Kurt Russell said this to me a long time ago on a film—everybody's doing their best. Even the fucking assholes, even the ones that are trying to fucking bring this thing down, even the ones that are stomping their feet: They're doing their best. They don't realize that they're being a fucking insecure 12-year-old and that they're at the school dance and no one is calling on them. So, yes, I've had contentious moments, but you gotta judo your way through that shit. 

 The Three Stooges (2012)—"Moe Howard"

AVC: This was the definition of a passion project for you. You talked with Michael Rosenbaum about everything you went through to play your hero, Moe Howard: low pay, having to fire your agent. Looking back, knowing it would play out the exact same way, would you do it again?

CD: In a heartbeat. In my room, I had [a] Kelly LeBrock [poster] on one side, Paulina Porizkova on the other side, and Larry and Curly dressed in golf gear on the biggest wall. I was a Stooge fanatic. When I was a kid, let alone teen or in my twenties, if you had said to me, “You're going to play Moe Howard in a feature film one day,” I would've told you to go fuck yourself. Because I would've thought there's no way that's going to happen. And yet I did that. I took something that was…I'm getting emotional talking about it. The Stooges were as much a part of my life as breathing and eating feta cheese. I got to take something that had been cellularly imprinted on me from so much watching and so much imitating, and I got to do it for a mass audience. 

I will say, I didn't say that I got paid so little; I said I got paid Schedule F, which is to say the least. I think Michael got some flak after that. I love him, by the way. He's a terrific interviewer. But people were like, "He got $65,000 for that job. Do you know what I would give for $65,000?" I agree, $65,000 is a huge sum if you get it right then and there. But that $65,000 had to last me I think it was 21 months. Again, not bad, but I had to keep a house in L.A. and then rent a house in Atlanta, and I had a family. It wasn't enough money, especially after taking 10 percent for an agent, 10 percent for a manager, and five percent for a lawyer, and then a publicist. There was nothing left. Anyway, would I do it again? Absolutely. In a heartbeat.

The Office (2013)—"Brian"

Arrested Development (2013)—

Community (2013)—

AVC: In 2013, you hit a hit-comedy trifecta with roles in The Office, Arrested Development, and Community. Did that feel like a turning point in your career?

CD: It's funny. As a young man, I would've been certain that I could tell you when I would feel the turning points or the benchmarks, but I couldn't tell you. I was so busy trying to get the work and trying to utilize my energy, desire, passion, and talent that I didn't necessarily realize that the shows that I was working on were shows that people loved. I mean, I knew that they were shows that people liked, but I wasn't focused on that. I really was focused on trying to create three completely different characters. 

And talk about three completely diametrically opposed experiences. The Office, that was a tricky situation. That was a quasi-contentious situation from the standpoint that, here we are at the tail end of a beloved journey, not only for the global audience but for these people that had been a part of it from the beginning, particularly John Krasinski and Jenna [Fischer] and Greg [Daniels], and all three of them had different ideas of how they wanted to wrap it up. I found myself square in the middle of those ideas. They were all producers, and they all had valid points. It was a little awkward for me at times, because typically there's a collaboration on-set. Even if you're a guest star, when you're working a scene or you're figuring out the staging of something or realizing that something on the page doesn't work and you want to find another phrase or a different way around it, everybody's ideas are, to a degree, heard. In this instance, it was pretty clear that I better just be quiet, and that was awkward. I also shot some stuff, a bunch of stuff, that didn't end up making the cut, and I didn't realize I was going to be the most reviled character in The Office history with people yelling at me, "You suck. You tried to break up Jim and Pam." [Laughs] Such is life.

Hannibal (2014)— "Clark Ingram"

Silicon Valley (2015-2019)—

AVC: You were also a kind of disruptive presence on Hannibal, albeit for one episode. But as Russ Hanneman, you messed with the Pied Piper boys on Silicon Valley for years. What stands out most about that experience?

CD: Talk about recognition of a turning point. And this isn't to denigrate any of the projects that came before, but it was a moment of cognizance that when you are given great writing with a solid director and showrunner that understand exactly what they want, you almost can't fuck up. And that's when I realized, all those years that I wanted to be Daniel Day-Lewis or Philip Seymour Hoffman—I mean, those guys were great, but they also had great material. They had great directors, great producers, production value, and great cinematographers and music. And that's why this is a collaborative medium, because when one of those things is lacking, it doesn't really go over as well. You could be fucking Laurence Olivier giving it your all, and if the production value isn't there, you kind of look like you're wearing fake eyebrows, y'know? Silicon Valley, that was the moment where I stopped and thought, "Holy shit, this is what it means to work with arguably some of the best comedy." I mean, Mike Judge and Alec Berg—Alec Berg from Seinfeld—not to mention the whole host of brilliant staff writers on that show…I felt like every day was Christmas.

When I auditioned for that role, my agent gave me old material, so when I went in to read for Jeanne McCarthy, she was like, "Oh shit, you don't have the right material." And it was 14 pages. I was like, "Well, can I just do it? I learned it." She's like, "No, no, no. The character's changed." I was like, "Let me just do it because this is what I learned." She said, "You can do it, but they want to see the new material." So, I did it and I left. A day later, I called my agent and I was like, "Is this happening?"—which I never do—and he told me they were going for Jon Bernthal. I was like, fuck. Jon Bernthal's a great actor, but we couldn't be more different. And he's not Russ Hanneman, sorry! So, I went back to Jeanne McCarthy's office, literally knocked on the door and was like, "Hi, I'd like to do the new material." And she said, "I think we're down a road," but she let me do it 10 different times, and then I don't know what happened. I'm sure Jon probably just passed on it or whatever it was, but I got the part.

When I showed up on set, I said to Mike, "I did it a bunch of different ways. How do you want me to do it?" He goes, "Just do the thing." So, I start doing my thing and I see all the other actors looking, 'cause they're very low key, and I was like crazy. All of them separately running back to video village, whispering and then running back, and then Alec comes up to me and pats me on the shoulder and goes, "Keep it up." Because the whole point was I was making them uncomfortable and that read on camera, and I had a ball. I absolutely fucking loved it. It was prescient, it was brilliant—and talk about taking a mundane subject matter and making it crackle.

Episodes (2014)— "Castor Sotto"

CD: That was another moment where I realized when you're given this kind of writing, you just go. This was David Crane and Jeffrey Klarik, who, when I watched the show as a fan, before I was on it, I thought that 90-percent of the show was improvised, particularly [Matt] LeBlanc's stuff. And I didn't realize until we did the table read that even his guttural utterances are scripted. Jeffrey and David have written the season as a sort of operetta, and from my understanding, when they're writing and they hear that [makes tapping sounds], and you can't add an "um" or an "ah" because it ruins the rhythm. This was one of the first times in television where it was, you don't change a comma, you don't change it from "there is" to "there's" because "there is" is part of the rhythm of the rest of the line. And that was a freedom I've never felt before. I knew that I could deliver that six-page monologue as-is, and I would be supported by the quality of the writing. I feel like if people haven't watched that show as a cringey peering into what the industry really is [shakes head]....  I loved doing that show, and I loved working with Kathleen Rose Perkins, who I think is a comedy genius.

Family Guy/American Dad! (2013-2024)—Multiple characters

Beavis & Butt-Head (2017-2023)—Multiple characters

Invincible (2021-2024)—Multiple characters

Mickey Mouse, The Wonderful World Of Mickey Mouse, more—

A Christmas Story Live! (2017)—

AVC: You kind of have a career within a career with all of your voice work. You did some early on, but since 2015, you've racked up 50-plus voice credits. How does that fit within the broader arc of your career?

CD: Everything begins and ends with the voice for me, whether it's on camera, on stage, or animated, because my childhood was spent making my friends and family laugh or entertaining them by becoming different people. And I have to say, coming off of Broadway, I had a little bit of a voice career, not doing animation, but doing broadcast stuff like radio and television commercials and stuff like that. But it wasn't until I met Linda Lamontagne, who was the casting director for Family Guy and American Dad! for many years. She brought me in and cast me in a tiny role on American Dad!, and that was a kindness, because, let's be honest, they probably could've had a sound editor do it. While it did take years and audition after audition, that one line on my resume—American Dad! voice number two, or whatever the hell it was—opened doors.

I love doing animation. I get to use my long-dormant singing voice. I built my singing voice from when I was 15 years old until I was about 30. All I did was focus on singing—classical music and opera and musical theater, stretching my voice and becoming a baritenor, then a tenor, and then a bass. And then I left Broadway and it was like, nope, I can't go back. Because when I was breaking into television, you didn't necessarily want to have a Broadway resume; they would say you were "too theater." So, I put it aside and didn't want to necessarily go back to it, but I missed singing. In animation, that's a place where I really can do it. I did get to do A Christmas Story Live! with Maya Rudolph and Matthew Broderick, which was a great chance for me to re-explore the singing. But for the most part, I get to sing a lot as this guy [points to Mickey Mouse drawing], which is super-duper fun. [In Mickey Mouse voice] "Lollipops and lemon drops, la-di-da-di." It's super fun that I get to use that stuff. Animation is my playground and being a father of four, it's a pretty neat playground to be able to share with the kids.

AVC: How do they feel about their dad being Mickey Mouse?

CD: The older ones are more "That's pretty cool, Dad." My two-year-old, when I do Mickey, she just looks at me like I'm weird. [Laughs] For the most part, when I do my Mickey, particularly for children, I don't like to do it on camera. So, if I'm talking to kids at a school or a hospital or whatever, I'll say, "Hang on a second, I think he's right here" and leave. Because Mickey shouldn't look like this. 

On Broadway: The Full Monty (2000)—"Ethan Girard"

Les Miserables (2003)—

Waitress (2017)—

AVC: To dig into your Broadway work more, you had fairly prominent roles in The Full Monty, Les Miserables, and Waitress. Did you think about staying in live theater, or did you always want to make that move to film and TV?

CD: When I was a kid, I wanted to be Danny Kaye. I wanted to sing and dance and be a movie star. Broadway and musical theater seemed like the root for me because I could sing. Even as a young man at 16, 17, I had a facility, I had an understanding of how my voice worked, and there weren't a lot of straight young guys that were open enough to do that at that young age. I would go into these auditions and maybe not be perfect, but they needed someone, and I was there, ready to do the work. 

I did eight shows a week for 12 years in touring companies and Broadway and regional theater. When I met my wife, I was doing The Full Monty, and she was a kid right out of college, and she was like, "Wow, this is so exciting." But I said I was off-track—I was supposed to go be a movie star. And she's like, "Well, you're in New York; you're in the wrong place." And I was like, "Well, listen, kid, you don't know." She's like, "Well, if you want to be a movie star, you gotta go to L.A." I said, “You don't just give up a Broadway show.” She said, “If you're not loving it anymore, you do.” The next day, I gave my two-weeks notice and moved to L.A.…and I didn't work for a year and a half. I couldn't get an agent. I drove her around to her auditions and they would say, "Your dad has to wait in the car," because she looked like she was 16 and I looked like I was 40. It was a real tough pill to swallow. My agent in New York would say to me, "I told you, you don't have a face for the screen. You're giving up what could be a really big career on Broadway, and I think you're making a huge mistake." And maybe he was right to a degree, but I had to prove him wrong, and I had to prove to myself that there was a possibility that I could do it. I'm still not necessarily doing exactly what I set out to do, but I ain't done yet.

Mrs. Davis (2023)— "JQ"

The Boys In The Boat (2023)—

Red Notice (2023)—

The Sticky (2024-)—

AVC: 2023 was another big year for you. Do you have a favorite role or experience?

CD: The Boys In The Boat was a dream come true. I mean, if we had another hour, I'd talk about how much I love George Clooney. It was, in every way, a great experience. I love playing in that genre, the 1930s, and using my vocal chops to play that character. I want to live in period pieces, so that was super fun. And then Mrs. Davis, for me, was the most underrated, most beautiful show.  And I have to say mainly because of the brilliant, fearless, fucking ridiculously talented Betty Gilpin. I could take two hours to talk to you about how incredible Betty Gilpin is. She was Bugs Bunny crossbred with Meryl Streep, and you're telling me she didn't even get nominated for an Emmy? What the fuck is wrong with us? She's also just a wonderful person and so sweet to the crew and great to all her fellow actors. 

But the main reason I love the show is the day after I got it, Damon Lindelof was like, "Hey, how do you feel about making this guy Australian?" I was like, "What do you mean? Why?" He's like, "I don't know; I just feel like it would be crazy. Do you do Australian?" I said, “No, but what if this guy's ranch was in between Russell Crowe's and the Hemsworth ranch?” [Lindelof] was like, "And those two families went off and did very well, but this guy was kind of a loser. What would he sound like?" And I remember when Russell Crowe was accepting his Screen Actors Guild Award for Gladiator. And he was like  [in Russell Crowe voice], "Actors, we're all storytellers. God bless storytelling. God bless narrative." [Laughs] I did that, and he was like, "Yeah, that's JQ!" Then when I went in for the costume fitting, it was that [voice], but in a thong. That's why I love that show. I mean, what the fuck was I thinking? And yet I had so much fun.

AVC: Mrs. Davis represents the kind of big swings that are becoming increasingly rare in an industry obsessed with IP, because they aren't usually rewarded. When going out for roles, are you seeing any kind of contraction, where projects are perhaps less daring?

CD: Here's what I'm going to tell you. It's easy to get caught up in this narrative as you see Deadline report on contraction and how much they're paying actors. But the easiest thing to do is to go along with something that's negative or pessimistic. Someone has already told you that there's no hope, so all you have to do is fall into that vacuum, right? And that's why, in many ways, we are where we are. I think, despite the evidence right now, we're going to enter into another golden age. There are going to be daring opportunities and terrific roles. I think that the delivery system of those is just changing. The way that those things will come about isn't going to be the way that they came about once.

We all have a hard time when the thing that we thought was a guarantee goes away. Well, here I am at 49 years old and we're talking right now because of The Sticky. And you want to talk about a big swing, weird fucking role that starts in one place and ends someplace else. That's the very definition of it. But have things waned in the past year and a half? Well, we had a fucking writers' strike and an actors' strike. We were just getting over COVID. Let's give things a chance to neutralize. I am a believer in humanity. I'm a believer in art. I'm a believer in storytelling. I'm a believer that all of these people, you and me and all these people that I work with and everyone that's making TV shows. They're not sitting around not wanting to create things. Even the people that are just watching shit on TikTok, they're not not wanting to be entertained. Everybody wants the same thing. We're just saying it in different ways. [The industry] is just like everything else—it's changing. And if we give it a chance, it will change into what could be a renaissance. I think we're going to get there. I really do.

AVC: The Sticky does seem like the natural next step for you after playing the villain in Red Notice and the heavy in shows like True Story. Does it feel like hard work paying off or more like another step in your evolution as an actor?

CD: I tend to sort of ebb and flow between character work and lead work. I've done other lead work, admittedly in shows that maybe didn't have as much fanfare or didn't get a fair shot. I did a great show that came out just too early: Good Girls Revolt for Amazon. That really could have been something; Dana Calvo is a brilliant writer. Had it come out eight months later, that show would have run for a while.

Every job that I've done is hard-won. I don't remember any job that just landed in my lap. That just doesn't happen. I had an interview with someone just before you, and they were like, "So did they say, 'Hey, you're the guy for this' or did you have to read for it?" And look, I'm not an A-list actor. I think I should be an A-list actor, and one day I will be an A-list actor. But for the time being, I'm happy to do the work to say, "Okay, you need me to show you that I'm the guy." If you just give me the chance to show you, I'll show you.

The Sticky is gratifying for a number of reasons. One, because I got to do things that I haven't had a chance to do on-screen before. I've gotten to blend some of the physical elements of my performance with some more emotional elements of performance. And I've gotten to weave like little embers of, “Oh, is this guy kind of like a mysterious leading man? No, he's a buffoon.” [Laughs] You know, a little bit of humor, a little bit of drama. That was really cool. What I think The Sticky represents for me is it reminds me that if I just keep my head down and do the good work, I will find scripts that are compelling and I will throw my hat in the ring and end up working with creatives and showrunners that recognize my value and I'll be able to carry on telling stories.