via Tori Time, with permission
What does it take to make it in Hollywood in 2025?
Start with a camera. Add a few famous friends. Stir in a surreal sense of humor. And don’t forget the yogurt.
Or maybe a little raw milk?
Because in an industry obsessed with innovation but terrified of risk, sometimes the smartest move is to go rogue and make dessert.
The Perfect Parfait is the newest—and maybe most delightfully absurd—offering in the yawning sea of talk-driven content on YouTube. Created by actor and writer Hunter Cope and directed by longtime collaborators Danny Simmons and Joe Angelo Menconi, it’s a half-hour comedy interview series filmed poolside at The Parfait Palace (read: Danny’s parents’ backyard in Encino), where guests like Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, Nick Braun (Cousin Greg on HBO’s Succession) and Paul Walter Hauser show up not to promote a film, but to vibe.
The show just wrapped up its first season on YouTube. The Perfect Parfait season finale features alt-comedy legend Tim Heidecker.
Why Parfaits?
“I’ve always loved parfaits,” Cope tells me. “They’re the underdogs of the breakfast world—always at the bottom of the menu, buried in some rarely ordered-from ‘light eats’ section. I’ve always seen myself as an underdog too, so I guess there’s a bit of a kinship there.”
That blend of sincerity and absurdity runs through everything. “Parfaits are both rigid and freeform,” he continues. “They’re structured—you’ve got your creamy, your crunchy, your fruity—but you can kind of go off and do whatever you want within the format. We know this show has the bones of a traditional interview, but with each new guest, we change up the ingredients.”
And like the dessert itself, the tone is delightfully contradictory. “Parfaits are a little class and a little trash” Cope says. “It’s Enya at a Monster Truck rally. Vin Diesel in a Jane Campion film.”
There’s a looseness to The Perfect Parfait, a kind of offbeat harmony, like jazz with a yogurt spoon. And that’s not accidental. As director Danny Simmons puts it, “There’s magic in the musicality of this series,” a feeling born from his decades-long creative bond with Hunter Cope.
“Hunter and I have known each other since high school,” Simmons said. “We used to jam back in 9th grade at Dory’s house—he played drums, I played sax. I think jamming like that in the past helped us make this show special today.” It’s fitting, then, that Dory—now the show’s deadpan bandleader—became part of the crew. The whole project feels like a throwback to their roots, polished with adult budgets and iPhone DM receipts, like this one:
Building the Parfait Palace
The idea sparked during the pandemic, when Cope slid into Simmons’ DMs with “a down and dirty idea of reviewing parfaits.” Simmons admits he may have “big leagued” him at first, which only made Cope more determined to bring him on board. “Hunter, Joe, and I developed the show for over a year,” Simmons added, “and after some convincing, we added Dory and Chef David Codney, who I’ve worked with a bunch through my culinary work. This collaboration has been really fulfilling.”
It’s a rare kind of project—equal parts inside jokes, artistic experiments, and genuine creative homecoming. “There’s a conversation to be had about the rhythm of the show,” Simmons added. “But maybe that’s a conversation we should have over another beer,” he tells me in an email, referring to our recent Friday night hangout over many beers at Tiny’s Hi-Dive in Santa Monica.
At the center of it all: a parfait. A literal, lovingly constructed, custom-crafted parfait designed by Chef David Codney, formerly of The Peninsula Beverly Hills, tailored to each guest’s creative persona. The premise is unhinged. The execution? Shockingly crisp. High production value. Tight edits. Stylish chaos. The obvious comparison is Hot Ones, featuring A-list household names like Bill Murray and Pedro Pascal if it took a Xanax or Between Two Ferns while floating in a pool noodle.
It’s not a podcast. It’s not late night. It’s indie TV born from internet DNA, grown in the soil of frustration. Because Hunter Cope’s been at this for a while—fifteen years in the game, pitching, writing, producing—and in this current landscape, getting new projects off the ground often feels like auditioning for a ghost.
via Tori Time, with permission
Cope comes from the Funny Or Die sketch comedy system, back when it was a reliable farm league for comedian talent with aspirations for comedy blockbuster gold and big-screen success, just like its founder, the great Will Ferrell. Cope got to witness what went into the sausage for some bonafide Internet classics, including the iconic Between Two Ferns with Zac Galifianakis. Somewhat of a man about town in the LA comedy circuit, Cope has floated through writers’ rooms at the Disney Channel, acted in cult projects, and punched up scripts for others—always circling the spotlight, never quite center stage.
Until now.
The New Rules of Making It In Hollywood
The old model in Hollywood is coughing up blood. Studios are hoarding IP like gold bars in a doomsday bunker. Streamers are chasing global, billion-dollar bangers. Everything’s about the thumbnail. If you’re not Chris Pratt in space or a piece of legacy content with a fan wiki, you better bring your own lunch. And your own crew.
Christian A. Pierce, the star of Real Bros Of Simi Valley, one of The Perfect Parfait’s early guests and a longtime friend of Cope’s, put it plainly: “Me, Hunter and the rest of the Parfait crew go way, way back, like we literally went to the same high school.” But even with all the familiarity, he showed up unprepared for what he was about to eat. “It was my first parfait, so I didn’t really have a grading scale,” he said. “Chef Dave took my Parfait V-card, and ever since then my sweet treat taste buds have belonged to the streets.”
Still, it stuck with him. “In a world where there are a thousand outlets people use to do press and promo for their upcoming projects, I’d much rather do a show like The Perfect Parfait than go with one of the more cookie-cutter options.”
via Tori Time, with permission
The headwinds in Hollywood right now are practically hurricane-force for getting a project off the ground. According to a 2024 report from Variety, scripted TV orders from streamers dropped more than 24% year-over-year, and film production is down nearly 30% compared to pre-pandemic levels. The dual labor strikes of 2023 sent development pipelines into a tailspin, and many haven’t recovered. Streamers have shifted from swinging big to playing it safe—less discovery, more sequels. Meanwhile, mid-level actors, the lifeblood of any functioning entertainment ecosystem, are booking fewer roles as productions shrink casts and prioritize global IP.
Faced with stalled careers and shrinking paydays, many performers have taken a different route: building their own audiences. According to SAG-AFTRA’s own research, a growing percentage of its members are now investing in personal content brands—launching podcasts, YouTube channels, TikToks—not as a hobby, but as a survival tactic. When your agent can’t get you in a room, sometimes the algorithm can.
In 2025, talent isn’t just waiting for the phone to ring—they’re picking up a mic, hitting record, and becoming their own distribution channel. No agents. No gatekeepers. No sinking into the pool at your hillside mid-century modern, wondering where it all went wrong, like BoJack Horseman.
Which is exactly what Cope, Simmons, and Menconi did.
They corralled friends, editors, producers—favors upon favors. They built Perfect Parfait with their hands. It’s executive produced by Cope, Simmons, and Joe Angelo Menconi (who also co-wrote the upcoming Blackout), with production support from Bastard Hound Films and Broken Dove. This isn’t a polished product of the system. It’s a lovingly chaotic rebellion against it.
That spirit of joyful absurdity is shared by producer and co-creator Joe Menconi, who joined the project after lunch with Cope and Simmons during the WGA strike. “Hunter pitched us the show and we just laughed the whole time,” Menconi said. “It didn’t leave my head after that. I just thought Hunter was such a huge talent and I liked the idea of making something purely silly, with no other agenda.”
via Tori Time, with permission
Menconi, who also co-wrote the upcoming film Blackout, describes the creative process with equal parts reverence and chaos. “It’s three big dummies making a weird show,” he said. “I think it’s been very freeing for all three of us because we really only have one goal—which is trying to make the show as funny as we can. Hunter is truly a comedy machine and has such a rad comedic voice. It’s exciting for Danny and I to try to constantly support that and show up to capture the absurdness.”
As for what’s next? Menconi’s not dreaming of an empire. He’s just hoping for another round. “100 episodes? 1/100th of the Hot Ones money?” he said. “Nah, we’re just stoked to make more. We feel like we just figured out the show, so we’re itching to keep going.”
via Tori Time, with permission
And getting by with the help from your friends just might be the blueprint.
Christopher Mintz-Plasse—the actor forever enshrined in comedy history as McLovin from Superbad and a longtime friend of Cope’s—brings his signature deadpan to the show’s first season, telling Cope about how he got a Santana-inspired tattoo after tripping on mushrooms in the desert near Joshua Tree. “I read the script and was completely moved,” he jokes. “It was unlike anything I had seen before. I just knew I needed to be a part of this. Big or small.”
He and Cope were roommates for five years in their 20s and still look for excuses to collaborate. His review of the parfait, which contained raw milk? “Dogshit. It made me sick. Sorry, Chef Dave.”
And yet, he’s pulling for a second season—for reasons both sincere and shameless. “Work has been slow, so I’d love for Hunter to do another season so I can get back on and get free craft service again.”
And more importantly, it’s proof that if you can’t find a seat at the table in Hollywood right now, you might as well set up your own by the pool and start serving dessert.
For the show’s six-episode first season, new episodes are released on YouTube every Thursday, chasing the same sweet spot that Hot Ones cracked—funny, sincere, a little chaotic, and infinitely clippable. Not engineered to game the algorithm, but specific enough to deserve one. It’s the kind of project that feels inevitable once you see it. Like, of course someone should be making parfaits for Tim Heidecker while talking about the collapse of traditional masculinity or whatever.
It’s funny. It’s weird. It’s honest. It has a palate cleanser.
Paul Walter Hauser—who won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for his chilling role in Black Bird, and stole scenes in films like I, Tonya and Richard Jewell—also showed up to vibe. “I did The Perfect Parfait because Hunter Cope is one of my favorite humans alive,” he said. “He’s so effortlessly funny, and we both have such great affection for movies and silly stuff.” The show’s relaxed, food-fueled tone clicked immediately. “There’s nothing I want to do more than eat with a friend and have a fun, chill conversation. That’s the height of enjoyment for me.”
“Like any good conversation, parfaits are layered,” Cope says. “Which, of course, presents a solid metaphor for the show. A good chat veers from ‘What do you think happens when we die?’ to ‘Check out my Dr. Evil impression’ to ‘Should we order a round of shots?’ That’s the vibe I want the show to embody. A parfait is a casual eat. It doesn’t weigh you down — and I’d like to think our show feels the same way.”