Simone Carter
·4 min read
No soup for Larry Thomas.
Thomas, the actor famous for his “Soup Nazi” character on “Seinfeld,” was supposed to schmooze fans on Saturday afternoon at Tacoma’s Infinite Soups. The appearance was aimed at raising funds for the new Yelm-based cat sanctuary All for Meow — that is, until things curdled.
“Heads up folks, we just learned that the soup nazi thing has been moved to Gilman House due to rain,” Infinite Soups wrote Friday evening on Facebook. “Please direct any questions to @catmantotherescue as we don’t know anything more than this.”
For $60, fans had expected to take a selfie and get an autographed photo at Infinite Soups, 445 Tacoma Ave. S., from noon to 5 p.m.
Thomas’ Soup Nazi performance forever burned the line, “No soup for you!” in “Seinfeld”-lovers’ consciousness. His collaboration with Infinite Soups had initially seemed to be a perfect pairing.
In a follow-up post Saturday morning, Infinite Soups claims to have gotten “duped.” The restaurant wrote that they had proof but decided against posting it to avoid further online drama.
“So! When we agreed to do this thing we planned on 3 things, make soup, have some fun, and raise some money for a good cause,” Infinite Soups continued. “And that’s what we’re going to do. We made the soup, and we’re going to have some fun today.”
The soup-maestros wrote that money raised from Saturday’s event will benefit the no-kill Oakbrook Cat Rescue group and Burger Seoul.
“The only thing we don’t have is ‘the soup nazi,’” Infinite Soups added. “But Todd will be happy to yell at anyone upon request [winking emoji].”
Infinite Soups’ Wendy Clapp told The News Tribune that Joe Parrington with All for Meow had become increasingly “demanding” leading up to the event. After learning that certain requests could not be honored, she said, he became combative in a series of messages. Then he suddenly pulled out.
But no one told Clapp, she said. Infinite Soups learned that the event venue had been changed from a Facebook post Friday afternoon: “That was the first we were hearing of it.”
Parrington has disputed Clapp’s framing in a video and screengrabs posted to Facebook.
Tensions boil over
At times leading up to Saturday’s event, Clapp said, she had messaged Thomas directly, including to verify the legitimacy of All for Meow. But then Parrington told her she shouldn’t contact his “celebrity talent” again.
“I’m not impressed by this ‘celebrity’ thing that you keep throwing around,” Clapp recalled telling him. “Larry Thomas seems like a regular guy, and you don’t tell me what to do, essentially.”
She continued: “[Parrington] got more and more angry and was just bombarding me with posts, and I told him, ‘Look, we will do this thing on Saturday. We’ll do it with smiles on our face, but I don’t want to hear from you again. If you keep bothering me, I’m going to block you on Facebook.’”
He kept bothering her, Clapp said. So she followed through.
“I mean, it is what it is, you know. It’s a shame,” Clapp said. “It would have been a really cool event, but it worked out however he wanted it to work out, I guess.”
Parrington told The News Tribune his side of the story.
He said the ordeal was initially going to be held over two days — Friday and Saturday — before it was trimmed to one because Thomas wound up having a work conflict in Los Angeles. In Parrington’s view, it was Clapp who was being difficult by not agreeing to reasonable asks, such as letting the Soup Nazi set up in the doorway given the day’s chance of rain.
Parrington, who cited multiple show-business credentials, said things really went south after he asked Infinite Soups to rephrase messaging about the event to better make clear that meeting Thomas would not be free.
“I’ve done events all over Tacoma. I work in LA. Celebrity stuff is something that’s in my DNA,” he said. “And one of the important things as a publicist is you make sure the phrasing is exactly so, so that nobody is under a false impression of what they’re getting. ... The only way for anybody to meet him is to buy that $60 ticket, and then they get that experience.”
The way Parrington tells it, Clapp was the one who got hostile before blocking him on Facebook: “So how was I supposed to communicate with her anything beyond that point?”
It would have been ideal to have the event at Infinite Soups, he added.
“When she posts today and says, ‘We have receipts, and we could’ — show it. Show it,” Parrington said. “Don’t say you have something: Show it.”
