Danny McBride: 15 Now-You-Know Facts

15 He used to be a substitute teacher.

As a substitute, it seems like the worse you are, the better you are.

After a fruitless attempt at scoring writing gigs in LA, McBride moved back to Virginia, and became a substitute teacher.

About substituting, he said, “It wasn’t making me feel good about myself, so I was putting it out there that I was destined to do more. But those kids didn’t give a sh*t. All they cared about was if I smoked weed and what kind of car I drove. I had a Hyundai Elantra, so they didn’t care about me.”

He told Rolling Stone magazine that he once told a class, "If you don't f*ck with me, I won't f*ck with you," then let them watch Cops while he read a book in the back of the room.

14 His mullet was fake.

I don’t know why I care, but this kinda hurts for some reason.

He told Jimmy Kimmel, “The curls at the top are all mine, but it is a piece that I put in.”

In the first season, he wore extensions, but he and his wife agreed that having to wear them morning, noon and night was too much, so he opted for a more temporary thing to, “leave his work at work.”

13 He had a bong-related injury.

We always thought stoners were a bit more chill, but according to Seth Rogen’s behind-the-scenes tweets, Rogen broke his finger and James Franco cracked Danny McBride’s head open during that fight scene in Red’s house.

12 The movie Your Highness started as a joke.

Quick, gimme a fake movie name, and I’ll come up with the plot.

It sounds crazy, but the medieval stoner comedy Your Highness was just part of a game he played with his film school buddy David Gordon Green.

Green threw out the name of a fake movie, like Face of Danger, and McBride would improvise the plot, “Plastic surgeon Steve Danger solves mysteries.” Years later, after they found some success in Hollywood, they decided to produce one of their favorite fake movies…Your Highness.

11 He proved how much he wanted Bill Murray in Vice Principals.

McBride worked with Billy Murray on Rock the Kasbah and Aloha, and when was casting his HBO show Vice Principals, he really wanted Bill Murray to cameo as Principal Welles in the first episode.

McBride said, “So I sent him an email. Didn’t know really if he’d respond to it or not, asking him if he’d be interested in checking out the script. He kind of responded, ’Please deliver me a hard copy at the RiverDogs baseball game tonight.’”

"I got one of those metal briefcases that people make cocaine deals with, and I put the script in there." Murray cracked it open, read the script, and signed on.

After drinking absinthe all day in New Orleans with actor and friend Craig Robinson, they ran into Samuel L. Jackson at half time of a Hornets game.

McBride had never met the Pulp Fiction star, and drunkenly (while covered in buffalo wing sauce) told the actor he really admired his work. Jackson said that he like Eastbound & Down but asked, "You got any brothers in your show?"

McBride panicked and quickly pointed at Craig, saying, "Craig's in it! Craig's in the show!”

9 He played the roadie of all roadies in a Tenacious D music video.

In 2012, at the height of his Eastbound and Down fame, McBride played Sebastian the roadie in Tenacious D's "Roadie" music video.

Sebastian’s done it all. Pyro, lasers, and he roadied for Van Halen, Metallica, and AC/DC. Tenacious D rocks this song for him and his dedication to rock.

8 He made movies as a kid.

One of those since-day-one types. That’s nice.

In a Rolling Stone interview, McBride says that even as a kid he was a filmmaker. He would recruit kids from the school bus to help him make movies in his backyard, and once convinced the quarterback and a drum major to come over and help him make an amateur war movie. 

7 His early work.

His film debut was as the character, “Bust-Ass” in 2003's All the Real Girls with Zooey Deschanel and Paul Schneider, but his first lead role that would put him on the comedy map was as taekwondo instructor Fred Simmons in 2006’s The Foot Fist Way.

The Foot Fist Way introduced us to McBride’s cringeworthy “loser thinks he’s the ultimate bad-ass” comedic style.

6 He was offered a professional baseball contract.

In March 2009, based on his work in Eastbound and Down, he was offered a contract to play baseball in the minor leagues with the Pensacola Pelicans.

The independent pro ball club said that he would be an "unusual influence in the clubhouse and a lot of fun on bus rides."

Because he probably wanted to continue acting (and making more money than a minor leaguer) McBride declined the offer.

5 Vice Principals was originally intended to be a movie.

McBride and co-creator Jody Hill first came up with the premise about an increasingly dirty power struggle for a principal’s job over ten years before filming, and they initially planned to shoot it as a movie.

McBride told the The New York Observer “It didn’t work as a movie because there was just so much about these characters that we wanted to tell. When we extended it, that’s when it really came alive.”

4 He has a couple Tropic Thunder Easter eggs.

In Tropic Thunder, Danny McBride plays explosives expert, Cody Underwood. The movie makes it obvious that he lost his finger in an explosion, but a few fans spotted his severely burnt, almost non-existent right ear, implying he lost it in an explosion.

At the end of the movie, Cody seems to be holding an Oscar (we’re guessing for Best Visual Effects).

3 He’s too funny to die.

It pays to be funny.

In another Seth Rogen behind-the-scenes of Pineapple Express tweet, he says, “Red was originally supposed to die the first time he was shot when he was tied up in his apartment, but we thought Danny McBride was so funny that we just kept bringing him back to life.”

2 He’s in Grand Theft Auto V.

The next time you complete a mission, and hop back in your car in Grand Theft Auto V, keep an ear out for conservative radio host Duane Earl.

You’ll hear Danny McBride voicing a parody of Rush Limbaugh. 

1 He’s nothing like Kenny Powers or himself in This Is The End.

Makes sense. He did want to keep that Kenny Powers mullet at work.

Rolling Stone writer Gavin Edwards notes that McBride is nothing like the gun-toting, foul-mouthed misogynist character he's so often cast as.

When Seth Rogen met him in person, he was shocked to find McBride wearing glasses and acting shy. 

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Top Image: Gary Sanchez Productions & Rough House Pictures