Danny McBride was asked to do Ye-face — by Ye himself!
During a Hollywood Reporter comedy actor roundtable, McBride revealed that the eccentric rapper traveled all the way to his house in South Carolina to ask if he would play him in a biopic:
“One time, I did get a phone call from Kanye West, and, this is real, he came to my house in South Carolina and wanted me to play him in a movie . . . [Ye] flew to South Carolina. I took him out on a boat for the day, and he said that he wanted to do a movie of his life, and he wanted me to play him.”
Stunned, the rest of the actors searched for a proper response. Laughs, exclamations, and questions rang out, with Bowen Yang posing, “In like an I’m Not There Bob Dylan way? Like, Cate Blanchett?” I’m Not There is a 2007 film starring Blanchett and several other actors as the legendary singer-songwriter.
“Who knows? Maybe,” McBride replied. “It was one of the most incredible days ever. It was pretty awesome.”
“What are the follow up questions that you then lob?” the host, Lacey Rose, asked.
“There’s one follow up question,” Jerrod Carmichael interjected. “On the scale of one to Tropic Thunder, how much am I playing? ” he joked, referencing the transracial implication of such a performance. “It actually makes sense, though. You’re probably the only person that could embody that confidence,” he told McBride.
“I’m like very excited about that,” Michael Che added. “Please follow up.”
You can see McBride — unfortunately not as Ye — in The Righteous Gemstones on HBO.