Jeff Hiller Pluribus Emmy nomination came from a seven-minute role
Jeff Hiller said viewers likened his brief Pluribus turn to ChatGPT after he aimed to play “extreme love” for Rhea Seehorn’s Carol.
By Bianca Rossi · Entertainment Editor
3 min read
Jeff Hiller’s Pluribus Emmy nomination is built on a screen appearance that runs just seven minutes, according to Deadline, but the tiny role has turned into one of the season’s oddest talking points.
Hiller appears as Larry, a member of the hive mind in Apple TV’s Vince Gilligan sci-fi series Pluribus. On The Daily Show, the actor said viewers have told him Larry reminded them of ChatGPT, even though that was not the performance target he had in mind.
“I’ve heard this. A lot of people have said, ‘You’re just like ChatGPT,’” Hiller said on the show. He added that the comparison was not part of the conversation when the episode was filmed, saying the shoot happened “kind of a long time ago” and before ChatGPT had become ubiquitous.
Why is Jeff Hiller’s Pluribus role being compared to ChatGPT?
Hiller told The Daily Show that his goal as Larry was to show devotion toward Carol Sturka, the character played by Rhea Seehorn. “I was trying to convey extreme love for her,” he said. “And instead, I did ChatGPT.”
The comparison appears to come from Larry’s place inside the show’s collective consciousness. Deadline reports that Larry is one of the “Others,” a blissfully content hive mind created after a mysterious extraterrestrial virus changes the world.
In the Season 1 episode “Please, Carol,” Seehorn’s Carol is among the few people immune to the virus. She is trying to understand what the hive mind wants and how to stop it from making her join, and she questions Larry as part of that effort.
Hiller took the audience reaction in stride. “Anyway, I got an Emmy nomination for it,” he said on The Daily Show. “Sometimes you aim for one target, you hit another.”
The actor also joked about his odds, saying, “I’m not gonna win,” before offering what he said his acceptance speech would have been. “This one makes more sense. Suck it!” he said, laughing.
What is Pluribus about?
Pluribus is a sci-fi series from Vince Gilligan about a world transformed by an extraterrestrial virus into a cheerful hive mind. Carol Sturka, played by Rhea Seehorn, remains immune and tries to work out what the collective wants from her.
Hiller’s Emmy recognition follows a win last year, when he received the award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for playing Joel in the third and final season of HBO’s Somebody Somewhere, according to Deadline.
The new nomination gives Hiller another awards-season moment, this time for a performance that barely takes up a coffee break. The strange twist, by his own account, is that the part was meant to read as overpowering love and ended up reminding viewers of artificial intelligence.
This story draws on original reporting from Deadline.