Bryan Nothling Will Be Right Back
The Toronto actor has found success on TikTok. Now, he's ready for the big screen.
VANCOUVER – I tell Leah it’s my turn to watch TikTok. We’re scrunched together on the sectional in our living room, two pairs of eyes fixated on one phone screen. We watch her Toks and then, eventually, switch to mine. I’ve been told this is somewhat unusual, to consume such algorithmically bespoke content as a couple. But it’s just how we’ve always done it. We watch TikTok the way we used to watch TV. Our feeds are just different enough that switching between phones feels like a bifurcation; a fork in an endless stream of content.
And yet some common characters can be found across our For You Pages. Multi-hyphenate Vlogbrothers John and Hank Green. The feral Arizona cat colony Poet’s Square Cats. Non sequitur starlet Brittany Broski. And Canadian actor and comedian Bryan Nothling.
Armed with little more than his signature sunglasses, his keyboard, and a cup of coffee, Nothling has what agents might call range. One minute he’s hamming it up over buying too much Hoisin sauce or shrinking your new shirt in the laundry, the next he’s reflecting on the national housing crisis. It’s an absurd and sometimes messy blend of comedy and commentary that has resulted in the 38-year-old, originally from North Vancouver, amassing 16M likes across his videos.
Still, the numbers don’t tell the whole story. In August the comedian took a short break from the app, saying he noticed his motivations had changed. Two days later I sent him a message asking if he might like to do an interview. Our conversation, which took place Sunday, and which has been edited and condensed for clarity, touched on his brief hiatus from the app, the pros and cons of posting, the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, his early days on the North Shore, sobriety, our shared love of Vanderpump Rules and more.
ES: Welcome to the newsletter… Is this where the magic happens?
BN: That’s right. Well, sort of. I’m sitting at a weird angle right now. I bought a new webcam for my computer so I’m pointed in that direction. But if I move the camera, the kitchen is back there. It’s under construction.
ES: It reminds me of the time I visited Lisa Vanderpump’s SUR. It’s weird to see these places that you’re intimately familiar with from a new angle.
BN: Was anybody working there? I’m also a big fan of Vanderpump.
ES: Peter was working there. We met him
BN: Of course, Peter was working there.
ES: He was there and he was very sweaty.
BN: He just came to Toronto for a fan convention. And I was like, who’s coming out to see Peter? But I guess I’d like to see Peter. He’s more my speed.
ES: Ladies love Peter. Our friend Kate thinks he’s dreamy, so I actually got him to come up to the table and say “Hi.” It was funny. She was shell-shocked.
BN: I’m sure he loved that though.
ES: Definitely. He loves the attention. Being the big man on campus, I guess.
BN: And without controversy.
ES: I think he goes to the beach a lot and has a comfortable standing in the restaurant. He gets to weave in and out of the show.
BN: He did a short movie - have you seen his short movie?
ES: No, I haven't.
BN: For a moment he was trying to make short sci-fi movies. But yeah, huge Vanderpump fan over here. We’re very excited for the next season.
ES: It’s been fascinating to see Tom Sandoval completely squander his goodwill in the course of a couple of months. To see some of these D-list reality shows he’s signing up for post #Scandoval.
BN: Yeah. And he’ll be back. I think Raquel Leviss won’t come back because of her own mental health but I was amazed to hear some of the cast talk about not wanting her there. Why? Why don’t you want that glorious TV?
ES: I mean think about the advertising dollars alone. You definitely want to chase the tail of scandal for as long as possible.
BN: And they’re even talking about Jax Taylor coming back, which would be wild. Maybe we'll finally get Memaw’s Beer Cheese.
ES: Laughs. I can’t think of a Bravo universe product better suited for you, Bryan, than Meemaw’s Beer Cheese.
BN: I want. Everyone wants it. I think it was a little too generic of a product and too simple to make to market as one person's thing.
ES: How much would you be willing to pay for Meemaw’s Beer Cheese?
BN: That feels like a $9.99. It wasn’t just a little thing. Certainly not more than 10 dollars. It’s just dip, right?
ES: I think so. I’ve never understood what a beer cheese is.
BN: I think it’s just queso but with beer? I don’t know. In any case, I’m only having it once. You can’t have that much queso. I just turned 38. If I start eating queso all the time it’s over.
ES: One thing I really love about your content is your ability to weave between the most absurd situations while also being reflective on things like grocery pricing or other social issues. What drives that for you?
BN: As a comedian and entertainer I would prefer the absurd, silly kind of thing. A long time ago, I would shy away from the serious stuff and from saying what was on my mind. So I try to pepper that stuff in occasionally because it’s hard and I’m fearful of it. Also, I feel you can be shoe-horned into being the silly person. I have serious things to say sometimes, I would just like to say them in a funny way.
ES: Was there a specific moment where you decided it was important to share your personal opinions?
BN: Yeah. I’m sober and there were a couple of instances where it became evident that sharing my story might help some people. I got a little bit serious in that regard and then people were like, “Oh! You certainly have some value here.” It was enough to make me think I should do it more often, even though it feels terrible.
There have been some instances where I've really stepped in it from a topic standpoint. I did a song about guns after one of the mass shootings at a school in the U.S. and was not even remotely prepared for the backlash from the pro-gun right-wing Americans. It became quite a stress in my life.
ES: How long did the fallout from that last?
BN: The video was probably up for about three or four days. I ended up taking it down because I realized that I was spending way too much of my time focusing on the negative aspects of it. You start to obsess over it. I really admire the people who do that every day. I don’t think I could do it. How they deal with the stress is beyond me.
ES: Do you typically post and ghost or are you someone who reads the comments?
BN: I read the comments, unfortunately. I'll also really take the negative comments in and act like the positive ones aren’t there. It’s something I’m working tremendously hard on in therapy. A thousand people said they liked it and one person said it was terrible. Why do I only listen to that one person? I don’t know.
ES: How has TikTok influenced your mental health generally? Does it lean positive or negative?
BN: Good question. In two ways it’s positive, in that I am expressing myself creatively and I’m doing so publicly, which are the two things that I think are really necessary for anybody doing creative work. That, to me, is a win from a mental health perspective. But there are some days when I can’t handle the negativity that comes online. There are a lot of people who say “Just get a thicker skin” and most days I do. But it can be detrimental for sure.
You can also get a little carried away with the numbers. Obsessing over that. It can consume you. It feels a bit like gambling.
ES: I remember you mentioning that when you announced you were taking a break from the app. How was that for you?
BN: Good. I'm gonna be honest with you, it was pretty short-lived. I certainly felt the pull to post things right away. I still do. I probably could have done with a longer break, but, you know, I also really like doing it. It’s a joy to have people react to me positively.
At the same time, the way that I have been posting for years has worked up until now, but I'm seeing kind of a plateau effect. I think I need to change how I do things.
ES: It was a bit of a Bryan corporate retreat then?
BN: Sort of, yeah. There are a lot of people that I admire on the app who seem to be finding success because they are taking a little bit more care with what they post, it’s a little bit more professional. My stuff is a little bit sort of messier and off the cuff.
ES: Is there anyone who comes to mind in terms of that professionalism?
BN: There's a comedian from Toronto by the name of Austin Alexander. I find that he consistently produces well-made, well-edited, funny stuff. You can look at the product and go “That was made with care.” He didn't just turn the camera on and make something… I would like to try and do that a little bit more.
ES: That’s interesting. I think the TikToker Strawberry Milk Mob has talked about how her approach is rolling out of bed and sharing the first thing that crosses her mind.
BN: Yeah. And I tend to do that too. Like, I make my video in the morning sort of right before anything else happens. Sometimes they go well, but sometimes I’m searching for something to say. And that’s what I was falling into the trap of. It would be a Wednesday morning and I have nothing to say, but I'm just gonna do something. And, it’s not always good.
ES: But sometimes it is really good. That’s enough to keep you going, I imagine.
BN: Yeah. Unfortunately, the pull of it is that sometimes you’ll do something that is not good and did not take a lot of time and it’s the best thing you’ve done all year. And that is frustrating and intoxicating.
ES: Not to draw parallels where they maybe don’t exist, but that pull is interesting considering you live with addiction.
BN: Oh yeah. It’s a good addiction to have, I suppose. But in the back of your mind, you have to be thinking “Are you addicted to being creative? Or are you addicted to receiving positive feedback from doing anything?” There’s a line there that is like a tightrope walk.
ES: Yeah, like are you addicted to the numbers? Because what number is ever large enough to feel like you accomplished something?
BN: That’s true. And also trying to separate the numbers from a positive emotion. People are so obsessed with views, but how do you know that that was a positive view? You don’t. You don’t anything about that. They could hate it. They could hate it and then share it with a hundred of their friends and say “Look at this terrible thing.” For some reason we have equated every view is a positive thing. I watch things I hate all the time.
ES: I mean, hate-watching is such a part of the culture. We have micro-influencers in Vancouver and some of them share the most ridiculous, out-of-touch content, but my friends and I still watch it but we don’t engage with it in any meaningful way.
BN: It’s certainly like a playbook and a lifestyle that I don’t really wanna take part in, you know? You see a lot of people where they’re not very entertaining people I guess, but they’re trying to follow this set of instructions in order to attain a certain amount of followers. And then something will happen? But I’m not sure what will happen.
ES: Maybe a good influencer deal?
BN: I guess. I mean, there certainly is money to be made, but there’s a trade-off. I have done the occasional ad and it’s certainly a polarizing event for your audience. A lot of people see somebody doing that and they think you've made half a million dollars or something. The general public, I would say has no concept of how much a commercial pays. It’s not a lot. Low thousands at best.
ES: Like, I think I saw you in a cheese commercial?
BN: Right. Most commercial actors in Canada are non-union right now due to a labor dispute with ACTRA. And I would say the average pay for a non-union commercial is under $5,000. A lot of the time it’s less. You get paid a flat rate to be at work and then you get paid something called a buyout when the commercial airs. It’s not enough to pay your rent sometimes, whereas if you were in the union, a commercial like that cheese commercial would make your year.
ES: Cause you’d be making residuals on it?
BN: Yes. We're talking $30,000. So it’s certainly not a living. It’s extra money on the side. I have a day job.
ES: How has the actor’s strike in the U.S. affected you, if at all? My friends who are actors here say it’s never been a worse time for them.
BN: I don’t audition for anything to do with the union, but I will tell you that the only way into the union as a non-union performer is to get cast on union sets. You get credits, build up that resume, and then you can eventually join the union. And that opportunity does not exist as much as it used to for people that I know. The path to becoming a unionized actor in Canada seems much longer now than it used to.
ES: Especially because it seems like they’re not anywhere close to reaching a resolution?
BN: Yeah. And in Canada with ACTRA it’s not really even a strike, per se. It’s a lockout with the Institute of Canadian Agencies. So I’m not sure what a solution ends up being there…
But yeah, it would be nice to be in the union and audition less for better things.
ES: Isn’t it incredible to be living in such a period of unfettered corporate greed?
BN: Laughs. Yeah, that is also an odd thing to be a part of. Like, okay, I have to participate in this system. There’s no actor that doesn’t make commercials. None. Unless you’re Timothy Chalamet or someone like that. And even he makes commercials! So you have to participate in that while also being beaten down the way we’re all being beaten down by capitalism.
The only reason I’m able to afford to live in Toronto is because I moved into this place at the height of the pandemic. It’s not glamorous but I can’t go anywhere.
ES: Yeah there isn’t much social mobility anymore. Or at least it seems like a lot of Canadians and other people feel that way.
BN: Right. Like, at least you’re not alone… but there’s nothing that you can really do? I make alright money. Enough that I should be able to survive. And I can but I’m just getting by like everybody else. It certainly feels like something is about to crack and things are about to get not-so-great. I’m not sure how we're gonna make our way out of this one without some sort of widespread civil unrest. Not to get too gloomy about it.
ES: I think there’s a precedent for that, given some of the protests we saw in 2020 after the killing of George Floyd.
BN: Yeah and I think there are a lot of jobs that won’t give you paid leave to protest. But they also aren’t paying enough to dig yourself out of whatever circumstances you’re in. At some point people are just gonna say, I’m not gonna work anymore. I work in tech. I don’t have a great job in tech, but many of the people at my company do. They’re not complaining too much at the moment. But, you know, as soon as those people start to join, I think we're in a bit of trouble.
ES: How does it feel looking at Vancouver compared to Toronto? It feels like people have been talking about the bubble bursting for decades, but it hasn’t.
BN: I moved in the early 2010s when the housing crisis was really starting. There’s just less space. Like in Toronto, you can still find the occasional apartment here and there. It’s getting worse, but there’s just more space. In Vancouver it’s not even space, there’s nowhere to go.
I wish I knew what the solution was. I talk about this in my videos sometimes, but when I was graduating high school in the late 90s, I wanted to be an actor. And I was told to get a plan B. But that plan B was never to make sure you could afford a $2-million dollar house in Burnaby. That wasn’t even on anyone’s radar. No one thought this would happen. Plan B would be like, make $ 65 grand and you’ll be fine. But that just doesn’t exist anymore.
ES: Did you always know you wanted to move to Toronto?
BN: There are two places you can go, really. Vancouver or Toronto. Halifax has some stuff going on as well. But a lot of my friends moved to Toronto. They were also actors.
But you know, growing up in Vancouver. Like, the peak of my addiction was in Vancouver. I just didn’t want to be there anymore. If I ever have cause to go back there I consider it very carefully. Whether or not it’s worth it.
ES: Really.
BN: Yeah. It’s just a lot of like, “Oh, there’s that bar there and that alley there.”
ES: It’s a lot of baggage.
BN: A lot of baggage. And you don’t wanna go visit the past too much, you know?
ES: If you had to pick one thing from Vancouver to export to Toronto, what would it be?
BN: Oh, without a doubt the ocean and the mountains. I grew up in North Van. At the base of Seymour Mountain, like, on the ocean. I miss that. A lot of people will tell you you can go to High Park in Toronto if you want nature. It’s just not the same. You definitely feel like you’re in nature more in Vancouver. As much as I am a city person, I like to get away.
ES: Toronto has a lot of ravines I find.
BN: When I first moved here, I found myself lost in a ravine. I didn't love that.
ES: Laughs. How did you get out?
BN: Well you just go up. But I was like, where am I? And you would occasionally pass other people. Like, what’s going on in this ravine? I haven’t returned.
ES: Ravines have a bit of a sinister energy. It’s always where kids would go to fight or smoke cigarettes.
BN: Yeah. There aren’t a lot of positive ravine stories.
ES: What made you want to be an actor growing up?
BN: Oh goodness. I guess I just showed an aptitude for it very early. It might be because I was a male in the performing arts. They were like “Of course!” In elementary school, I did a couple of little plays and got a great response. I was like, “Oh, I’m somewhat good at this, I guess.” Over the years the positive response made me think it’s something that I should do. And I’m also very stubborn. I’m not going to stop. I don’t see the point of settling down.
ES: What were the plays that, you know, you found that early success with?
BN: There were two. The first play that I ever did was a parody of Star Wars called Food Wars. I was in Grade 5 or 6 and I played the character of SPLIT-PEA3O.
ES: Wow.
BN: Then in Grade 7 we did a production of Captain Underpants. I was like an evil teacher, and everyone got a big kick out of that.
ES: You’ve mentioned that there are benefits to being a TikToker. Can you expand on that? Are you getting noticed in the street?
BN: I mean, occasionally I’ll get noticed by people, which is an interesting thing. I’m not very comfortable when it does happen, unfortunately. I wish I was better at it. What are some other positives? Just being told this is good. You don’t really think that that's what you wanna hear, but then when you do, you’re like, “Oh, I’m satisfied.”
Certainly no money, unfortunately. It would be nice to be paid, but they don’t pay Canadians.
ES: I was going to ask you about that. It’s unfortunate that TikTok is obviously the biggest app right now, but the pay structure compared to something like YouTube is so different.
BN: You can go live, that’s a way to do things, but you don’t make a lot of money. There are a lot of countries where they'll pay you per view if you want to join the creator fund, but we don’t have that in Canada yet. And I also don’t get millions of views so I wouldn’t get paid much anyway.
ES: I wondered if you ever get noticed at the grocery store.
BN: I do. It’s funny because at the time I did those videos about groceries people were like “Oh why are you at this Loblaws? I’ve seen you make fun of this place.” And it’s because there’s nowhere else to go. That’s kind of the whole point. I’m in a food desert and there’s one grocery store.
ES: I’m picturing you being mobbed by screaming fans as you reach for a bottle of Hoisin sauce.
BN: Yeah, that was one of those ones where I had no expectation that it would do even remotely well. It’s incredible what that did. I don’t understand it. I’m glad it was 5 minutes of actual labor on my time. But a cop rolled his window down when that video went viral and pointed at me and shouted “Hoisin sauce!!” Like, OK. Wow. No one else on this street knows what you mean.
ES: Anything to get in the good books of the Toronto PD hey?
BN: Laughs. I guess. Like, I’m glad we’re not in Chinatown right now. You screaming that out of the window at me. That would be an odd thing to do right? I don’t know. You have no control over it. If you’re gonna be putting something on TikTok, you have to understand that you have no control over it after it’s published. It just becomes what it becomes.
My advice: if there’s a bit you really love, don’t put it on the internet. Save it for a live show. Save it for a well-produced video or something. Don’t just walk down the street and do it with your phone in your hand, because anyone can take it and do something with it.
ES: I feel like you’re at an interesting crossroads right now, re-evaluating stuff. In a year from now, where do you want to be?
BN: I would like to be acting on a regular basis, really. Scripted acting work is what I want to be doing. Even if it’s my own thing. I got an agent from TikTok, I’ve started auditioning because of this. It is a way to put yourself out there and say “I’m available and ready to do things.” But the ultimate goal is to be acting in film and television.
Bryan Nothling is an actor and comedian. He lives in Toronto.