Tom Segura Talks ‘Netflix Is a Joke,’ Kevin Hart, Brady, Burrow & More w/Rich

Tom Segura has built a career out of saying yes to things that did not sound like much at the time. The Netflix is a Joke festival ending this weekend is a good occasion to notice the pattern.

Start with Netflix itself. Segura recorded a special on spec in 2013, shopped it around, and got passed on by Comedy Central before a buyer turned up.

"They're like, somebody wants to buy the special," Segura told Rich. "And I was like, who? And they're like, Netflix. And I was like, the place you send DVDs to?"

He was not impressed.

"It was like a consolation prize," Segura said. "I was not stoked about it at all."

The same accidental quality runs through the Two Bears 5K, which Segura runs Saturday at the Rose Bowl. It began as an offhand bit on a podcast with Bert Kreischer.

"He was like, we should do a 5K," Segura said. "And I was like, yeah, sure."

When that episode aired, the response was immediate. The first year drew 2,000 people. The next, 7,000. This year Segura expects more than 10,000, a full spectrum from elite runners to people walking it in two and a half hours.

"So many people have started their fitness journey because of this," Segura said.

Rich asked what Segura would have thought, back at the start, if told the run would inspire people to get in shape.

"I would be like, I have diarrhea every day," Segura said. "I don't think health is going to be aligned with me."

Then there is Bad Thoughts, which returns for a second season May 24. Segura made it the same way he makes everything else, by trying something small. He wrote a batch of short films, shot them, and discovered in the edit that he had a 35-minute episode. His agents told him to shop it. Netflix bought it.

The creative freedom is the part that still surprises him.

"I've never had a relationship where we go, we want to do this and they're like, yeah, okay," Segura said. "They give us no notes. They're basically like, don't say the n-word. That's basically their note."

The bakery has the same origin DNA. Segura befriended a Los Angeles pastry maker, kept the relationship alive, and after the Palisades fires asked the man to come to Austin and build something with him. The result is Chicho Bomba, now three locations, the name an Italian term for a chubby kid.

"Being fat and loving food is kind of like how it started," Segura said. He has lost roughly 70 pounds over the years, but he framed his food obsession as permanent. "Even if I had 5% body fat, I'd be like, yeah, but I'm still fat in my soul."

Segura also served as a guest judge on Funny AF with Kevin Hart, where the audience voted a comedy store doorman named Ron the winner and an hour special. Segura was so taken with the four finalists that he walked into the comedy store afterward and did a set.

"Good art makes you want to do it," he said.

That, more than any single project, is the through line. Segura keeps stumbling into the next thing because he keeps saying yes when something sounds fun, and then doing the work after.