Thomas Middleditch Convinced His Wife to Let Him Bang Other Women
Thomas Middleditch, star of Silicon Valley, told Playboy that after he married his wife, Mollie Gates, 4 years ago, he found out that he still really wanted to — wait for it — have sex with other people. Instead of having an affair, getting caught, releasing a statement on IG and then splitting like a normal person, he decided to talk to his wife first to see if she’d be up for an open marriage. To everyone’s surprise, she agreed.
I don’t know how much I can say, because I don’t want my wife to be mad at me. Only after I got married was I like, “Mollie, I’m sorry, but we have to get nontraditional here.” To her credit, instead of saying “F**k you, I’m out,” she was like, “Let’s figure this out.” To be honest, swinging has saved our marriage. We have different speeds, and we argue over it constantly, but it’s better than feeling unheard and alone and that you have to scurry in the shadows. By the way, it’s now called being “part of the lifestyle.” The term swinging is old.
Before any other guy reads this and tries to start a conversation with their significant other that begins with, “I’m sorry, but we have to get nontraditional here,” realize that the success rate with other women will be really low and you’ll probably be punched in the face. Unless you’re super rich or famous, in which case, you’ll at least get a good 5 second pause. Playboy then asked if this was something he’d always been interested in.
Absolutely not. I self-deprecatingly call myself a pervert, but that’s not what it is. I just like it. I’m sexual. I’d always thought I was a romantic and that when I fall in love, that stuff fades away. It does for some years—enough to be like, “I should get married, and I’ll be different.” But it’s part of me. If that’s part of your being and it feels important to you, find a way to explore it, because repression sucks.
This dude just likes to f**k and now that he’s semi-famous with groupies, it’s a lot easier for him. Sadly, Middleditch says his wife doesn’t get the same attention because she’s not famous so she has to constantly hear stuff like, “Can I bang this chick?” and answer with, “What about me?”
Personally, that’s one of the trickier elements of it all, because Mollie doesn’t get that and yet she has to witness it. I’m like, “Come on, what about this chick who’s obviously really into me?” And Mollie will say, “Yeah, she’s into you. Where do I fit in?” That question comes up. There’s a lot of negotiation, and adding fame sometimes makes it easier and sometimes complicates things.
Good for them. Sounds like they’ve set up some rules and boundaries and on the surface, everything seems to be working out well. I’d try this too but, oddly enough, the thought of some guy plowing my girlfriend in front of me while I desperately try to slide into the DMs of hundreds of women in hopes one of them will respond doesn’t really interest me.
