TJ Miller
SFX|September 2017

The American star puts on his best smiley face for The Emoji Movie

James Mottram
TJ Miller

He does stand-up. He hosts a podcast. He released a comedy rap record (The Extended Play EP). And they’re just the things you probably haven’t heard about. TJ Miller is everywhere right now, thanks in part to playing Weasel, the wise-ass bartender in Deadpool and tech entrepreneur Erlich on HBO’s Silicon Valley. This month, he can be heard voicing Gene in The Emoji Movie (yes, they have made a cartoon based on texting icons – at least he’s not voicing the poo emoji, like Patrick Stewart). Gene is a multi-expressional emoji who must seek out normality. As for Miller’s own journey, it’s about to get real – with the upcoming sequel to Deadpool, thriller Underwater with Kristen Stewart and, most excitingly, the role of I-R0k in Steven Spielberg’s virtual reality yarn, Ready Player One. There really is no stopping him from total world domination…

Do you see any similarities between you and Gene?

When they first came to me and said, “You will play the ‘meh’ emoji,” I said, “I don’t know if that exactly matches my comedy.” But once I realised he was manic in his expressiveness, I thought, “That’s perfect.” There seemed to be a lot of comedy inherent in that.

You co-star with James Corden. Were you a fan?

This story is from the September 2017 edition of SFX.

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This story is from the September 2017 edition of SFX.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.