STARR IS BORN
‘Silicon Valley’ grump eyes next chapter
As Martin Starr looks forward to his next project after “Silicon Valley” — whose final season premieres Sunday — the comedian keeps finding himself looking back.
The 37-year-old actor made a name for himself as the painfully hopeless Bill Haverchuck on the short-lived “Freaks and Geeks” as the millennium turned over, then never stopped working. Some were big roles: “Party Down,” “NTSF:SD:SUV::,” and “Burning Love.” Some were just a few episodes. He popped up in “Game of Thrones” and “Adventureland,” “Knocked Up” and “Spider-Man.” He worked alongside Kristen Bell in “The Lifeguard,” then tried to kill her in the “Veronica Mars” movie.
But at his best, Starr has found his niche in comedy, in deadpan, sarcastic roles like the character he says goodbye to in “Silicon Valley,” the ever-grumpy coder Gilfoyle, who cares little about human niceties.
“Why care? It’s a waste of energy,” Starr told the Daily News. “He just doesn’t abide to the same put-upon moral code that society establishes. He’s created what’s valuable to him. I don’t think that negates trust or friendship or being loyal. He just defines them all a little differently.”
That, in a sense, is a generous summary of “Silicon Valley” and its motley crew of tech geniuses with no interest in consequences. As the sixth and final season kicks off, Pied Piper is back on top again, higher than ever and with farther to fall.
“It’s always two steps forward, one step back, but this season obviously has to be more conclusive than that,” Starr told The News, refusing to give away anything concrete. “We still play with the same structures that we built over the course of the show.”
“Silicon Valley’s” time is up at the right time for the series, which is rare for Starr; “Party Down” and “Freaks and Geeks,” particularly, were cruelly ripped away from us far too soon, two lines on a lengthy list of shows cancelled too early or not early enough.
That makes it easier on fans, maybe, to say goodbye, but not for Starr. Apologizing for being so sappy, he said the farewells never get easier.
“I’ve had great fortune on all of those shows to be around very supportive groups of people. We’ve really created deep bonds and very familiar bonds. And we fight and have issues but we always come back and have a great deal of love for each other,” he told The News. “The way we work is with an awareness and compassion of other people. We all look better when we’re doing our best.”
Starr isn’t sure what’s next for him, but he’s looking. He even teased a return to “Party Down,” but wouldn’t say anything more about how far discussions have gone. There have been rumors for years, and for the first time, most of the original cast (Starr, Adam Scott, Lizzy Caplan, Ryan Hansen, Ken Marino, Jane Lynch and Megan Mullally) is free.
“I so hope we have legs to stand on and make another season or two,” he said.