‘Silicon Valley’ star Thomas Middleditch on hyperlink to stardom

Cans of beer and excited high fives were passed around the Mission’s Alamo Drafthouse for the pre-season premiere screening Thursday night of “Silicon Valley,” the HBO comedy that satirizes the notorious tech industry to our south.

While the show’s cast and creators confidently joked through their post-premiere Q&A, “Silicon Valley’s” star Thomas Middleditch seems to live in permanent awe that he’s really on a hit HBO show playing a character that director and co-creator Mike Judge wrote specifically for him.

The cast is engaged in a constant comedic banter of inside jokes and insults, fart humor abounds, and there’s a palpable vibe that no matter how silly they get, it’s too late to fire anyone.

Soon entrenched in show business, it was a pitch for a cartoon show at MTV that introduced Middleditch to Judge, the Emmy-winning creator of shows like “Beavis and Butt-head,” and the cult classic film, “Office Space.”

In addition to the small screen of premium cable, fans can also catch Middleditch as Melissa Rauch’s stuttering love interest in “The Bronze,” a raunchy romantic comedy about a washed up gymnast.

Middleditch plays “Twitchy,” pairing the actor’s characteristic ‘aww shucks’ persona with a compulsive twitch.

[...] though he didn’t get the “SNL” gig, he can be seen sharing TV screen time these days with Tina Fey in American Express commercials.

In real life, Middleditch is a friendly newlywed and videogame enthusiast, far more hipster Napoleon Dynamite than terrified computer programmer.

Settling comfortably into season three of a well-regarded HBO series with a cast who have become close friends doesn’t hurt either.

Says Middleditch, “I have a feeling that I'll have a very sobering reality X amount of years later, on some other project and we'll be able to be like, ‘Oh yeah, what we had was pretty special and fun.’”