As those of you who are fans of House M.D. know already, Kal Penn will be joining the series as a regular next season. This is positive news all around – more screen time for the Penn brother from another mother, which is great because even though he can headline and sell a movie, young actors need all the exposure and steady acting gigs they can get. And this should be good for audiences, because his character seems like a real pataka, and Mr. Modi has no problems keeping viewers amused when you give him material like this:
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Bend over and laugh |
… [Penn’s character] caught House’s attention in the episode by resuscitating a patient and suggesting that they get her drunk to better diagnose her rare neurological condition. “… [The character] is a fan of trying random methods of exploration and life saving, and isn’t afraid to break the rules a little bit,” [Link]
Lastly, this should be good for brownz all around because we’re finally getting another desi doctor on TV to match the high number of desi doctors in the real world:
By mid-1997 it is estimated perhaps 4% (22,000) of the entire nation’s medical doctors are South Asian immigrants from India or of South Asian descent. It has been claimed that many inner city public hospitals simply could not function if South Asian medical personnel were unavailable as they can constitute as high as 40% of the staff physicians and 50% of the nurses. In Ohio, one out of six physicians is South Asian and several other states approach that ratio. [Link]
Except that I don’t think his character is desi. I haven’t seen the show, so I don’t know for sure, but his character’s name is Lawrence Kutner which doesn’t sound desi to me. In fact, there were two desi actors in the “try out for House’s team” episode — Kal Penn and Meera Simhan — and their characters were named “Lawrence” and “Jody.” Neither one had a clearly desi name, both were probably cast for a character of unspecified race.
I’ve got nothing against race blind casting – Kal Penn has had a lot of roles where he wasn’t identifiably desi, and I think that’s good. There simply aren’t enough roles written for brown characters today, and there’s no reason for brown actors to restrict themselves unnecessarily.
I’m simply bemused at the fact that producers and advertisers believe (and probably rightly so) that white audiences want to see shows that are whiter than America actually is. This is why Friends depicted a Manhattan whiter than Boise, because suburban viewers in their racially homogenous cocoons aren’t ready to wake up and smell the chai and realize that the ER in ER is probably at least 20% brown, if not more.
Maybe he’s bi?
Yeah, if you’re that gorgeous, why restrict yourself to one gender?
I had no idea who Mohinder was…had to look him up.
Zen, my mom thinks both Zach and Kal look like John Ritter. 🙂
Yes, I can totally see shades of Jack Tripper in both of them.
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Greek is a very underrated show, which I too am slightly embarrassed to admite I watch but Asha’s mom loves anything on ABC family or the network formerly known as the WB. Basically anything revolving around teen-angst or college-angst ridden characters in the spirit of Dawson’s Creek, Felicity, Gilmore Girls, Everwood, etc.
I wonder if Rebecca Logan was Rebecca Patel would she be type cast as the brainy smart Desi girl instead of the superhot sex bomb Senator’s daughter role that she currently occupies. By the way her big sis on the show is Kelsey Grammer’s daughter.
Is Kal Penn the desi Keanu Reeves?
Thanks for sharing. I’ll bet that’s why my brother watches Greek. Although, I thought he didn’t find Indian women attractive. LOL
Why can’t desi people be blinder when they date?
Dilshad Vadsaria, very pretty.
no one is blind when they date. desi or otherwise. Asking desis to be blinder when they date is asking them to be superhuman. everyone likes having an attractive partner.
except clayton bigsby.
On the subject of desi playing a non-desi character, the most recent episode of PBS Mystery Inspector Lynley series this week just had Indira Varma as a (surprise) adulterous wife, named Melissa Booth.
aren’t you glad you did?
hee.
I find Arj Barker’s casting in Flight of the Conchords interesting. They make a reference to his Indian background without hitting you over the head with it.
Sarita Choudhury seems to play hispanic characters as much as Indian. Considering how Indian moviemakers import half Indian half white actresses for their Bollywood movies, why not just get a saucy Hispanic actress to do the same? A younger version of Salma Hayek, maybe? And the Hispanic guy with glasses in Miami Vice. He would fit right into a Bollywood movie as a great villain.
No stereotypical exotification please.
I am glad he’s getting a regular role… I would like for his brownness to be acknowledged actually (even though I don’t watch the show… House is such an asshole), so House can make racial digs at him like he did at Omar Epps’ character. Honestly, it would be out of character for House not to.
But seriously, am I the only one who’s thinking he looks a LOT like Sanjay Gupta in this picture?? He looks ashy… boy needs some shea butter moisturizer.
He looks much better in the Spring issue of Istyle magazine…..cavorting in bed in a tux shirt and undone bowtie with an underwear-clad model, and the first pull quote from the story is “I don’t go around actively being Indian every day.”
Ahem.
any bids on exotifying me? i’d love to be an object..
Probably because we like to see people who look like us represented in a positive manner. Growing up and seeing no one like me on television, I believed I was weird, different and felt adrift in the suburban world. If we’re truly working toward your admirable level of colorblindness, then isn’t it a good thing to have a diversity of characters and viewpoints represented on television to facillitate understanding between people and move us in that direction?
Two of my favorites! Awesome awesome shows.
Haha — exactly. That movie was depressing as hell — I saw it with my bro and parents and we left saying, “Wait. I understand that families go through hard times, but don’t we laugh and joke and enjoy one another’s company once in awhile?” There wasn’t any element of that to temper the extreme sadness and feeling that in the end, we’re all alone and waiting for a train after our hot French-speaking wife cheats on us. Metaphorically speaking.
You mean the episode where the Indian guy is acting like a racist towards them because he thinks they’re Australian, and then when they explain that they’re from New Zealand, they all go and mock the guards at the Australian Embassy together? That was hilarious.
Being blind when dating…I meant being color (or biodata) blind. Does North Indian have to date North Indian? Does it matter what his parents do if you really, truly connect with the guy? Of course you have to be attracted to the person! Duh! 🙂
Mohinder…not my type. LOL
I would argue no (mostly). but, if the parents are a REAL basket case, you can end up in the position where you need to support an entire family. best to avoid such extreme cases.
“He does seem to currently be embroiled in a gay relationship with Parkman,”
Mindy Kaling in the office – love her character; Her character being Indian is incidental, that is her character primarily being defined as ditzy and obsessively in love and just desparate. She’s so funny!
Rob H,
“Just a comment on how statistics are misused.
To observe that 40-50% percent of the medical personel in Urban and inner city hospitals are South Asian and to then conclude or hypothesize that the hospitals could not function without the infusion of South Asian personel is a logical fallacy, as it assumes the positions would go unfilled.”
It’s not a logical fallacy because the statement “Inner city hospitals could not function if South Asian personnel were unavailable” uses a tense contemporary with the conditional, “could not (verb) .. if”. What you speak of, the eventual evolution of the situation whereby the hospital may regain operation, would only invalidate a statement of the form “Inner city hospitals could never again function if South Asian personnel were unavailable”. The use of “never” generalizes the statement across time instead of maintaining temporal locality. No such temporal generalization was made, except in your imagination.
Of course there’s also Detective Chester Lake on “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,” a native American character, albeit played (as invariably — cf Jay Silverheels on the “Lone Ranger”; Graham Green in “Dances With Wolves”; Dan George in “Little Big Man” — why is this so?) by an aboriginal Canadian actor, in this case Adam Beach, a Salteaux from Manitoba. Are there any native American actors on US television?
Sarah, I was referring to the first episode where there is a party in his place. The Indian guy who looks like Grover from Sesame Street is not Arj Barker. He has some show on MTV. I forget his name. That guy was great too.
(Come to think of it, the vast majority of ethnically South Asian actors on US telly are actually Brits and even Canadians — well, there’s Sugith Varughese, anyway. Why is this so? It bears thinking about….)
To SST@76: Do you juggle with semantics to this degree with everything you say in real life?
Anyway, I think its great that brown characters are transcending race by having ethnicity-neutral names and backgrounds on shows. It shows brown has arrived as part of the mainstream and are no longer the other. Do you prefer caricatures like Apu Nahaseemapeliton (sp?)?
Bunch of racists, the lot of you.
Arre baba, We are like this only.
But in that case they haven’t transcended race. The only way they can be “normal” is if they are assimilated or white.
I prefer the British approach where desis aren’t considered weird, any more than italians or irish. Some characters have a lot of desiness, but that’s not a strange thing any more than having characters who are very welsh. OTOH, others have desi names and desi families, but are clearly like their peers of different races. The fact that a character is named Raj Patel tells you nothing about how he will act in a british TV series, the same as in real life.
That’s what I would like the best, personally. But yeah, sure, I think that it’s good for desi actors taht they get cast in non-desi roles.
Speaking of South Asians, race, and American TV, has anyone noticed that Kelly Kapoor on “The Office” is now dating Darryl, the warehouse manager who is African-American? Is it horribly racist of me to raise my eyebrows at that, especially given how the show portrayed her parents being so “traditional” in the famous/infamous Diwali episode?
Neal, I don’t think that makes you racist (assuming you wouldn’t disapprove of it), just race- and culturally-aware.
Remember when Ryan said ‘I think I dated someone. I think she was black?’ w.r.t. Kelly? Heh.
no, its not horribly racist. You just dont know how the mind of the silly female works when she’s broken up with by someone she really cared for, wanted to marry and have lots and lots of babies with. Er.. not that I do either. Darryl is clearly tasting the benefit of tapping some Kapoor ass as a side effect of Kelly waging some feeble revenge against Ryan. And yeah, what was with that “I think I dated a black girl” line? V. funny indeed.
Also, my favorite brown crush (post-Parminder) on TV Maulik Pancholy of 30 Rock/Weeds. Though he’s coming off gay on one show and is out on the other. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
Haha, the Namesake was an interesting movie that I can relate to alot. I hate being Indian-American, it’s so lonely
RIP Dr. Lawrence Kutner. You were the coolest doctor second to House.
Why did they kill off Kutner in House?