New Hodgman interview plus moustache update

John Hodgman has done an interview with The Onion's A.V. Club for its "Random Roles" column. He answers questions about his roles as an actor (in Coraline, The Invention Of Lying, the 2011 remake of Arthur, and the television shows Battlestar Galactica and Bored to Death) and the making of his new movie The Best and the Brightest.

More importantly, he sheds new light on what the deal is with his 'stache in his answer to questions about working with the Bored to Death crew:

They give me everything I need to work with comedically, and from a writerly point of view, it's fun to connect the dots and say, "Who is the person behind all of these wild emotional swings?" And it kind of wasn't until I grew a mustache that I figured it out. I think that's true for a lot of men who grow mustaches, about a lot of things. The mustache is an affectation that I grew as a joke, and then just sort of enjoyed, and it allows me to really embrace wholeheartedly the idea of affectedness, and affectations in one's personality. [...] I really think it fits with the kind of derangement that you have to go through when you are confronting your mortality at the age of 40. So I will keep it as long as America will allow me to keep it. [...] So far, people have been very tolerant of it. But I'm not going to get tied down. Maybe I'll shave it off tomorrow, I don't know.

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Further reading:

• The original post on Hodgman's moustache
• All Hodgman interview posts

Hodgman appears on The Daily Show in "You're Welcome - Hacker Threat"

I always know when John Hodgman appears on The Daily Show because this blog gets a huge spike in traffic. Nearly all of it is people searching for information about Hodgman's moustache. I thought that this month's "You're Welcome" segment (in which Hodgman shows how to handle hackers) was a particularly good one, so I have embedded it below. Enjoy!

The Daily Show - You're Welcome - Hacker Threat
Daily Show Full Episodes

Hodgman's moustache

Documentation of John Hodgman's moustache:

His 2011 moustache:
From his Twitter page.

His 1999 moustache: From here.

On Twitter, Hodgman says of his new look:

No, I am not playing Higgins in the Magnum PI reboot. However, I AM playing young Wilford Brimley in the upcoming prequel to Cocoon. - 14 Jan 2011

I speculate that Hodgman's fame has developed to the point that he has grown a moustache as a kind of disguise.

At the beginning of this Daily Show segement, his moustache has its coming-out party:

The Daily Show - You're Welcome - NASCAR

UPDATE: Hodgman's latest moustache Twitter:

Now I pass friends on the street without saying hello.

Them: "Hey! It's me!"

Me: "Sorry. I didn't recognize you with my new mustache."

March 20th Update:
It might have been hiding there before (and I just missed it), but now Hodgman has developed a serious "soul patch".


April 23rd:

Late lunch. I have manipulated my mustache into "SOUP EATING POSITION."
- @hodgman

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Further mustache information: In an interview with the A.V. Club, Hodgman answers questions about his moustache.