You probably know Tory Belleci from MythBusters - but the popular show isn't the only feather
in his cap.
He was cooking up awesome stuff long before he became a familiar face, and he's kept super-busy
ever since leaving the myth-busting 'biz.
This is the untold story of Tory Belleci.
It's a career path that certainly befits a man who's famous for blowing things up: Tory
Belleci worked in special effects for quite a long time before becoming a TV star.
In fact, he contributed to the god-king of all geek franchises: Star Wars.
Belleci's online portfolio is chock full of photos featuring him painstakingly building
models of the massive Federation battleship and one of the podracers for Star Wars: Episode
I: The Phantom Menace.
And he worked closely with one of his future MythBusters cohorts at Industrial Light & Magic,
the special effects company founded by George Lucas in 1975.
In the past, Belleci's former colleague Adam Savage has talked about their work together
on a particularly difficult set piece: Tipoca City from Star Wars Episode II: Attack of
the Clones.
That's where Obi-Wan Kenobi and Jango Fett fought each other, in case you haven't checked
out the film recently.
Savage even posted a photograph to his website Tested, which features them both dutifully
building a Tipoca City model — although he reveals the image isn't quite what it appears
to be, writing that
"The photo of Tory and me is actually one we call a 'model shop reach.'
These models are completely done, yet it looks like Tory and I are still doing model-making
with tools.
In reality, we were asked by the ILM photographer to come back over to the set and make it look
briefly like we were working on the models."
That's show business for you.
It's hard to imagine a show with a more absurd premise than MythBusters, which revolved around
quite literally exploding myths and urban legends.
Well, leave it to Tory Belleci to find a way to top it.
"Boo-ya."
"Ho-hoooo."
"’MythBusters' Tory Belleci hosts the ultimate heavy metal showdown."
According to Wired, the myth-busting rascal found himself hosting a show called Flying
Anvils in 2011.
The entire premise involved contestants shooting anvils flying into the sky using controlled
black powder explosions.
Believe it or not, this wasn't a concept hatched by some "caffeinated" TV executive.
Belleci was a celebrity host for the National Anvil Shooting Championship, an actual sport
that Belleci says dates back 200 years.
"There's a lot of rules but there's only one that matters — make sure you're not in the
wrong place when the anvil lands."
If you think blasting 100-pound anvils 200 feet into the air sounds dangerous, Belleci
would certainly agree with you.
But in his interview with Wired, he says of the contestants:
"These people are the salt of the earth.
They're very normal people.
At first, I thought they might be super weird, but they're just so down to earth, just typical
Americans.
A lot of them were blacksmiths to begin with and that's how they got into it.
They take it so seriously."
Gumball 3000
In 2014, Tory Belleci indulged in one of the oddest wrinkles in his professional career.
According to The Verge, he took part in the famed Gumball 3000, a highly exclusive and
elaborate 3,000-mile street rally.
And he did it with Canadian DJ Deadmau5, of all people.
Belleci and Deadmau5 drove a "Purrari", a custom Ferrari 458 Italia with a paint job
themed after the Nyan Cat meme… and it came complete with speakers that blared its maddening
theme song.
In fact, Belleci and Deadmau5 say they spent the race listening to that song on repeat.
"Of all the memes on the internet, why this one?"
"It's a bit dated… but a friend of mine kinda 'invented' it."
All of this might seem like a strange celebrity stunt to you.
After all, this was the same year Deadmau5 had a new album out, and Belleci and the rest
of the Build Team lost their MythBusters jobs.
But Deadmau5 and Belleci clearly enjoyed their time on the road.
They did suffer the occasional setback, however: At one point, the French police banned Deadmau5
from driving in the country, so Belleci had to take the wheel until they reached Spain.
Nevertheless, they did rather well on the week-long supercar race.
In fact, when they reached the goal in Ibiza, they were awarded the biggest award: the Spirit
of Gumball prize, which is given to the team that was most positive, had the best time,
and partied the hardest.
We've told you that Tory Belleci worked for years as a special effects guy… but we need
to emphasize just how sought-after he was in the field.
Judging by his bio and work portfolio, Belleci was one of the best in his 'biz — thanks
in no small part to his nearly decade-long stint at Industrial Light & Magic.
In fact, he's worked behind the scenes on some of the most beloved franchises out there.
Apart from his aforementioned work on Star Wars, he's built models for several movies
in the Matrix trilogy — specifically, The Matrix: Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions.
In fact, here he is working on a control tower in Zion; a.k.a., the last human city on Earth.
As a model builder, his resume also includes Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Starship
Troopers, and Galaxy Quest — as well work on Van Helsing and the 2003 version of Peter
Pan.
But he's worked in plenty of other corners of Hollywood as well.
For instance, he was a set designer for 2002's Scooby-Doo movie, and worked on props for
Bicentennial Man.
And all this work was before we got to know him through his MythBusters gig.
Quite the impressive work ethic.
These days, Belleci is best known as a TV personality, but he's also dabbled on the
other side of the camera, and we're not just talking about his special effects either.
It turns out Belleci also wrote and directed a short sci-fi movie while studying at San
Francisco State University's film school.
The film is called Sand Trooper, and it's a post-apocalyptic adventure that he made
as his senior thesis.
He's so proud of the film, it's even included in the biography on his website, which mentions
that
"[Sand Trooper] played at the Slamdance Film Festival and also aired on Syfy Channel."
The short - which credits him with his full name, Salvatore Belleci, takes place in a
post-apocalyptic desert where a lone soldier tries to infiltrate a mysterious facility.
We have to admit that the special effects, while rudimentary, are pretty darn neat.
We won't spoil anything here, but if you ever find yourself in a Mad Max-inspired wasteland,
it's probably best to avoid petting mysterious mice.
Oh wait, we kind-of did spoil that, huh?
Since leaving the show, Tory Belleci has somewhat struggled to replicate the success of MythBusters.
His first post-MythBusters show was Thrill Factor, where he and Kari Byron took their
scientific approach to amusement park rides.
"Aaahhhhhh!"
Sadly, the show only received a single season in 2015, but at least it fared better than
their proposed science-themed prank show, Prankenstein.
Alas, Prankenstein was never picked up — although Byron is reportedly still holding out hope.
White Rabbit Project — The Build Team's most recent effort — wasn't too lucky, either.
In 2017, Belleci confirmed on Reddit that Netflix had chosen against renewing the show
for a second season, leading one fan to comment:
"Tell [Netflix] I hate them.
Please and thank you."
Another ill-fated show was Punkin Chunkin, a pumpkin destruction-themed Science Channel
Thanksgiving special that Belleci co-hosted for several years.
According to CNN, the show was incredibly popular, even topping ratings monsters like
The Apprentice.
But thanks to the obvious safety risks involved in shooting large pumpkins 4,000 feet into
the air, the production was plagued by several injuries.
Due to a lawsuit by a volunteer who got injured in an ATV accident, the event was cancelled
in both 2014 and 2015.
And just as they were gearing up to return in 2016, a producer almost died when an air
cannon exploded.
Clearly fans of the event were disappointed with this development:
"As far as I'm concerned, you know, they should be able to continue going on with it, you
know.
Just let people know, hey, accidents do happen."
According to Entertainment Weekly, Tory Belleci and Grant Imahara ended up in the middle of
Los Angeles' LAX airport when a gunman terrifyingly opened fire inside Terminal 3 in 2013.
Their trip to Science Channel's annual Punkin Chunkin competition in Delaware soon turned
into a full-on panic, as they ended up right in the thick of things.
Belleci told Entertainment Weekly:
"It was like my worst nightmare.
You hear about these situations on the news, but to actually see it — to see people running,
leaving stuff behind, crawling over each other, crying.
You always wonder how you’ll respond."
Belleci was reportedly at a gate that was dangerously close to the shooter, and everyone
was running his way when the first shot rang out.
What's more, there seemed to be nowhere to go.
As he told CNN,
"We were kind of trapped at the end of the terminal — and I never saw the shooter but
we heard the shots."
Eventually, someone opened the doors and let them out on the tarmac.
Belleci and Imahra's live tweets were some of the first reports of the incident to emerge
from the scene — with Belleci writing,
"Shooters in #LAX That was f-----g terrifying!"
Tory Belleci seems to be intensely private.
Even the most tenacious gossip sites can't seem to agree on anything conclusive about
his relationships and other personal matters.
Perhaps due to this lack of solid information, many sites address common rumors, including
reports that he dates — or used to date — fellow former MythBusters co-host Kari
Byron.
That's not true… they're simply good friends.
Evidently, Belleci is A-OK with keeping personal matters personal.
However, he has been known to indulge in the occasional social media post with an apparent
girlfriend.
The website Hollywood Mask seems to think a few 2013 tweets suggest he was romantically
involved with Francesca Garigue, a former senior production coordinator for MythBusters.
After all, they tell each other
"Love you!"
for all the world to see.
More recently — and more promisingly — a woman who goes by the name "Erin B." on Instagram
has posted some rather romantic images featuring Belleci.
One post even reveals that they might be tying the knot in the near future.
To be clear, Erin B. wrote in April 2019:
"Can’t believe I get to marry this stud."
You heard it here first.
Maybe.
Religion doesn't seem to go hand-in-hand with all the mad scientist antics on MythBusters
— but Tory Belleci is reportedly a man of faith.
According to The Monterey County Herald, he's a devout Christian … and that makes him
something of an outlier among his fellow former MythBusters.
According to Skeptical Inquirer, Adam Savage thinks of himself as an atheist, free thinker,
humanist, and, yes, a skeptic.
Meanwhile, in a 2014 Reddit Ask Me Anything, Jamie Hyneman plainly stated that he doesn't
think too highly of religion, writing that,
"Atheism or Agnosticism or whatever movement doesn't affect me at all.
I don't believe in anything.
There are only probabilities, and the probability of a deity or some s--t is pretty f------g
low IMHO."
Even Belleci's close pal Kari Byron has said,
"I am an atheist, but I don't begrudge anyone for whatever belief systems they hold."
Tory Belleci comes across as a pretty great guy on TV — and in real life, he seems to
dial that kindness up to 11.
The Monterey County Herald reports that Belleci decided to take a trip abroad when MythBusters
took a brief hiatus in 2010.
But instead of indulging in a luxurious holiday, he flew to Haiti to do some important volunteer
work.
Joining forces with the non-profit organization LifeGivingForce, Belleci visited orphanages
in the country in the aftermath of the catastrophic 7.0 earthquake on January 12th, 2010.
He helped local communities gain access to clean, safe water by building water cleaning
systems.
"Little guys like this are getting clean water so they're not getting sick anymore."
Belleci was impressed by how the orphanages aimed to educate the kids.
As he told The Monterey County Herald,
“One of the pastors said 'If we can educate 5,000-6,000 kids over the years, these kids
are going to grow up and you're going to have a whole generation of leaders.'
And that is what he was saying they need in order to change Haiti.”
He blows things up for kicks.
He helps people in need.
He's basically the perfect human — and that's no myth.
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