David Chang Plays Himself on ‘Billions’

The new episode of Billions, Showtime’s thriller about a U.S. Attorney (played by Paul Giamatti) trying to take down a hedge fund heavy hitter (played by Damian Lewis), has a bunch of cameos from high-profile New York City restaurants.

Lewis’s character, the ultra-rich Bobby Axelrod, takes one of his cronies to dinner at Momofuku Ko, where David Chang himself delivers a few of the courses. As he’s setting down the plates, the Momofuku emperor says: “I’m going to carpet-bomb you guys with so much fucking food you’ll be reeling.” After Axelrod thanks Chang, the chef replies: “Don’t thank me, just be there for us when Fuku goes public.” This is, of course, a reference to Chang’s highly-scalable fried chicken sandwich chain, which launched two years ago at South by Southwest.

Later in the episode, Paul Giammati’s character, Chuck Rhoades, arranges to have an informant go to dinner with one of Axelrod’s associates at Michael White’s Ai Fiori. Rhoades fixes his gaze on a steak sandwich that the surveillance technician is eating:

And later, his team watches the dinner unfold on a closed circuit TV:

After busting another one of Axelrod’s associates, Rhoades celebrates his victory by finally eating a sandwich (with a side of poutine) at Mile End Delicatessen:

David Chang is no stranger to hour-long TV dramas: The chef appeared as himself in an episode of HBO’s treme six years ago. On Instagram, the Changster shares a photo from the Billions shoot with a note about how he is a longtime acquaintance of the show’s co-creator/producer Brian Koppelman.

The chef writes: “Brian has been one of the earliest and biggest supporters of momofuku since 2004. He is one of the patron saints of NYC dining!! If you watch billions you know the writers are true gourmands.”

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