Exclusive: Nick Swardson's Ten Favorite Characters of His Career

Nick Swardson has had one of the most diverse careers in the comedy genre, playing everything from a confident video-game-playing stoner in Grandma’s Boy to the gay, rollerskating prostitute Terry Bernadino on Reno 911!, so while chatting with the 43-year-old stand-up comic for Netflix’s The Wrong Missy, we took a step back and looked back at his ten favorite roles of his career.

In The Wrong Missy, Tim Morris meets his dream girl and their relationship quickly escalates through texts, for which he throws caution to the wind and invites her to his company’s corporate retreat on an island resort. However, when a past blind date from hell shows up at the airport for the weekend getaway instead, he learns too late that he’s been texting “The Wrong Missy.”

The film stars David Spade (Tommy Boy, Grown-Ups), Lauren Lapkus (Orange is the New Black), Geoff Pierson (Dexter), Sarah Chalke (How I Met Your Mother), Molly Sims (The Benchwarmers), Nick Swardson (Blades of Glory, Just Go with It), Chris Witaske (Love), Roman Reigns (Hobbs & Shaw), and Rob Schneider (50 Fifty First Dates).

The film is directed by Tyler Spindel from a script written by Kevin Barnett and Chris Pappas. It is produced by Kevin Grady, Allen Covert and Judit Maull with Barry Bernardi, Edward H. Hamm Jr, Raymond Mansfield, Sean Mckittrick, Chris Pappas, and Kevin Barnett serving as executive producers, and is available for streaming on Netflix now!

Travis – 30 Minutes or Less

Swardson: I’m trying to think of something I haven’t played, at this point I haven’t really been like a villain villain. 30 Minutes or Less was one of my favorites with Danny McBride.

Tied: Howie Goodman – The Benchwarmers & Jeff – Grandma’s Boy

Swardson: I would say Jeff from Grandma’s Boy Howie from The Benchwarmers are definitely in my top ten.

Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star

Swardson: Bucky Larson I love, that’s one of my favorites for sure. That character maybe overall might be my favorite, because it’s such a part of me that midwestern nativete and that’s essentially the kind of guy I was when I got in the business. I was 19 and just right out of Minnesota and everything was like, ‘Whoa, that’s crazy.’

Hector – Blades of Glory

Swardson: Blades of Glory was great too, because that guy was just on another planet, that dude was so weird.

Nick – Grown Ups 2

Swardson: Grown Ups 2 was great, that was fun because I don’t even know what I was in that, that was just a straight up bizarrio person.

Nelly Patch – The Ridiculous 6

I love The Ridiculous 6, I got to play a character that was full cowboy outlaw and that was fun getting to ride a horse and Santa Fe was gorgeous and such a great town.

Bob – The Do-Over

Swardson: The Do-Over was great because I got to play an FBI agent and you don’t know I am, I kind of gave it a way a little but it’s fine, it’s been out for a while, so that was pretty cool. I did some of the stunts, but I got to get hit by a car like several times, that was pretty insane.

Gary Rodgers – Sandy Wexler

Swardson: After that I did Sandy Wexler, where I actually played a stuntman and that was pretty awesome. I did a lot of my own stunts and I got a lot of respect from the stunt community because I did as many of the stunts on my own as I could and they were fucking crazy. I had to go to trapeze classes and all this stuff and that was pretty wild.

Matthew – Art School Confidential

Swardson: Then I would say a smaller one that nobody really saw was Art School Confidential, that was an independent film from the guy who did Ghost World, Terrence Zwigoff and it was me and Ethan Suplee and Max Minghella and that was super fun too. It’s like a murder mystery, I don’t know it’s pretty fun.

Terry Bernadino – Reno 911!

Swardson: What would the world be without Terry? [laughs]

The world was treated to the long-awaited return of Reno 911! this year with the Quibi revival, although sadly without the return of Swardson as everybody’s favorite gay, rollerskating prostitute and though part of it came down to scheduling conflicts on the comic’s part from touring, part of it also came from his uncertainty on whether to come back as he is “not a big fan of revisiting characters.”

“I revisited Terry for the movie, but I don’t know, Terry is so sacred to me and once I’m done with something like that, it’s hard to go back,” Swardson described. “It’s one of the main reasons why I turned down Grandma’s Boy 2, they really wanted to do a sequel and I was like, ‘Nah I’m good.’ They were like, ‘Really?’ and I was like, ’Nah,’ because I never really saw it as continuing, you know? I don’t want to force something that’s not organic, that’s never been something that’s interested me. Terry would be something I would maybe entertain, but again, Terry ran its course, we had a whole conclusion to him, we had a whole ending. We had the jet in South Beach, we had it all, so I just never really planned on, ‘Oh he’s back again,’ so I don’t know. I don’t fault anybody for doing a sequel, that’s not what I’m saying, but it’s just not me. Sandler got offered Happy Gilmore 2 and he was like, ‘No,’ and they offered him everything and he was just like, ‘No, that’s not really how I saw it, it wasn’t supposed to be a fucking trilogy. It’s Happy Gilmore, his story’s over.’”