MALE SPEAKER: Sorry for the delays, everyone.
Assif, the very good boyfriend that he was,
was not willing to leave his girlfriend stranded
on Google campus.
AASIF MANDVI: Apparently, you guys
have figured out everything except parking.
AUDIENCE: [LAUGHING]
AASIF MANDVI: Which I think is the next great Google
enterprise, how to get parking on this campus.
How are you guys?
Everybody good?
Great.
Well, thank you for coming out.
MALE SPEAKER: Definitely.
AASIF MANDVI: Thank you for this.
And my book's on sale over there, for some reason,
incredibly cheap.
I don't know why.
Much cheaper than it is in real life, so get it now.
MALE SPEAKER: Subsidized for Google.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes, exactly.
MALE SPEAKER: So here we are in conversation with Assif Mandvi.
I take it, many of you are familiar with his work.
We're going to talk a little bit about your book, "No Man's
Land" today.
AASIF MANDVI: "No Land's Man."
MALE SPEAKER: "No Land's Man."
AASIF MANDVI: Starting off really well.
Thank you very much, with the wrong name of the book.
MALE SPEAKER: These notes are not even worth their weight.
AASIF MANDVI: No, "No Land's Man."
It's a play on no man's land.
It's called, "No Land's Man."
So you flip it, and that's how I came up with this title.
And now everyone gets it wrong.
MALE SPEAKER: And now, none of you will ever forget.
AASIF MANDVI: "No Land's Man."
MALE SPEAKER: Land's man.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
MALE SPEAKER: And well, what did you mean by that title?
AASIF MANDVI: I meant that I've grown up
in many different places.
I was born in India, grew up in the UK,
and then spent my high school and college years
in Florida and then New York.
And so for me, it encapsulated that immigrant journey,
that immigrant experience of living in different places,
having to be a constant.
I think a lot of what I've done is involve shape
shifting and adapting to environments,
different environments.
It's probably why I became an actor, on some level.
But that's what the title is about.
MALE SPEAKER: Mhm.
AASIF MANDVI: Should I be looking at you,
or should I be looking at the camera?
Because this is going live streaming right now, right?
MALE SPEAKER: This is going live streaming.
AASIF MANDVI: I can do either?
I can go back and forth?
MALE SPEAKER: You want to deliver something, just
deadpan.
AASIF MANDVI: Great.
I can just do that.
OK, so it's like "The Daily Show."
I'm talking to you, but then I'm talking to the people at home.
MALE SPEAKER: We break the third wall.
I appreciate that.
No, it's an interesting title.
What were you hoping to accomplish
by writing this book?
AASIF MANDVI: I was hoping to accomplish
getting a really large amount of money to write the book.
No, I wrote it because Chronicle Books
approached me to write a book.
And they said, would you be interested in writing a book?
And I had already been writing monologues, essays,
short pieces.
And everything I write pretty much has to do with my life,
because I'm incredibly interesting.
And so I just decided, oh, this would be a great venue.
I haven't actually ever written a book before.
I've written plays, I've written movies.
But to write a book felt like a challenge
that I hadn't taken on.
And it was an incredibly fulfilling, hard, lonely
experience.
But I'm very proud of it.
And I feel like I got to tell a lot of stories
about things that happened not just about me, but on a larger,
cultural context, hopefully saying something
about the immigrant experience.
MALE SPEAKER: Right.
No, it's interesting that you got
asked to write the book in that I think most authors don't have
that liberty of just saying, hey,
I'm sure you have something to say.
AASIF MANDVI: Right.
Well, I think it had to do with the fact
that I was in a little show called, "The Daily Show."
MALE SPEAKER: Probably helped.
AASIF MANDVI: And I think they were
like-- everybody on "The Daily Show" writes a book,
and so you should also write a book.
No, clearly there was a public platform
there that I think they felt like maybe I
had something to say, which I hope I did.
MALE SPEAKER: But it wasn't really like a treatise
that you would expect some "Daily Show" author to come off
their political pedestal and tell you
how politics should be done.
It was a series of vignettes about your life
and these kind of short stories.
Almost Sedaris-like, in some sense.
I hope you take that as a compliment.
AASIF MANDVI: I do.
I'm a huge David Sedaris fan, and to be compared to him
in any way at all is a huge compliment.
But that's what I wanted to write.
I came from a theatrical background
doing theater, and going to drama school, and all
that stuff.
So for me, the personal is the political.
And all stories-- the best stories are personal.
And the greatest plays and the greatest movies
all have to do with some form of family.
And so that is what I attempted to do in this book, which
is really talk about my journey, talk about my family,
talk about that, and hopefully, resonate on a larger level.
MALE SPEAKER: Mhm.
Was there a style you were trying
to emulate with the structure you went after?
Or is this just how it came out?
AASIF MANDVI: Maybe Peter Benchley's "Jaws."
But I think I failed miserably in that.
MALE SPEAKER: I think I sensed that.
AASIF MANDVI: It was a whole story
about how I got attacked by a shark
that I took out because it was completely made up.
No, I guess people like Sedaris--
I really just wanted-- I had written a play years ago,
a one-man-show called, "Sakina's Restaurant," which
was a series of also vignettes, but done in a monologue
performance style.
And I wanted to take that and turn it into a narrative,
into a book form, into a prose thing.
But it's dealing with the same subject
matter and the same general world,
but just different stories.
So I really was writing the way I write.
And so hopefully, people will like it and enjoy it.
MALE SPEAKER: I thoroughly enjoyed it.
I promise we'll get to the content in just a moment.
AASIF MANDVI: You don't have to, it's fine.
I'm totally happy to sit here and talk
about other people's books.
MALE SPEAKER: Just the structure of the book, if we could
[INAUDIBLE].
AASIF MANDVI: "Great Gatsby," it's a terrific book,
if you haven't read it.
AUDIENCE: [LAUGHING]
MALE SPEAKER: No, actually, it was interesting.
It doesn't read like an autobiography.
AASIF MANDVI: No.
MALE SPEAKER: It really has a sense of sequence,
but also a sense of just trains of thought.
I just found it wonderful to read.
It was an absolute pleasure.
AASIF MANDVI: Oh, thank you.
Thank you.
I cringe at the word, "biography"
or "memoir," or whatever, because I
don't think of it that way.
I also don't feel like I'm at a place in life
where I'm like, (OLD, CROAKY VOICE) I'm writing my memoir.
I just feel like they are stories inspired by my life.
And they're entertaining, and humorous, and sometimes
a little bit sad.
So I think they're just vignettes and little snapshots
of things in a person's life that hopefully we
can relate to.
And I deal with some real issues of race, and religion,
and stuff like that as seen through the eyes
of a little brown kid living in a white world.
So you can relate, right pal?
Yes.
Indians in the front are like, yes,
brown people in the white world.
Yes, we know.
MALE SPEAKER: Brown people in a white world.
But also, one that doesn't necessarily relate to--
AASIF MANDVI: Although here, it's sort
of white people in a brown world, isn't it?
I mean in Google, kind of a reverse thing there.
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
Race, religion, identity-- these are all definitely
very prevalent topics in the book.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
MALE SPEAKER: So were these things
that you were working out as you were writing them?
Or did you have something to say about them,
and you wanted to find the right stories that captured it?
AASIF MANDVI: It was a combination of things.
I started off wanting to say something,
and then realized I actually had something else
that I was saying, and then went down that.
It sounds really, (OLD, CROAKY VOICE)
I discovered a great deal about myself as I wrote this book.
But that's what happens when you write stories
about yourself, and your life, and things that have happened
to you that you hopefully gain a level of insight.
Otherwise, why the fuck are you writing it?
Because then, you can share that insight with others,
and hopefully they gain a level of insight into their life.
And that's how art works.
MALE SPEAKER: Mm.
AASIF MANDVI: That's how art works.
And that is one to grow on.
MALE SPEAKER: Do you have any specific examples of things
that you learned?
Things where you wrote it, and you were like, oh, yeah, that
was profound.
In those words.
AASIF MANDVI: I think it's dangerous
whenever a writer is sitting in front of his computer writing
and then stops and goes, yes.
Now, that is profound.
Most of my experience of writing was more like,
what the hell am I doing?
Why am I sitting here writing this thing?
No one cares, that kind of stuff.
But yes, there were definitely specific things
where in talking about my immigrant journey from the UK,
to the US, and the transitions that happened there,
and coming to New York as a young actor trying
to get work and then even on "The Daily Show," talking
about the experience of being on "The Daily Show," as,
at the time when I started, which was in 2006,
and W was still president.
And we were very much entrenched in this war.
And oh, wait-- it sounds like today.
But you know what I mean?
So definitely, there were insights
that came out as I wrote that.
Hopefully, that is what happens when you write.
MALE SPEAKER: Absolutely.
It was interesting to hear first person perspective.
You struggle with so many concepts
about, especially religion, feeling
like your skin is labeled like a Muslim.
But you don't really have that.
But your parents are that, and yet you connect with it.
AASIF MANDVI: Right.
MALE SPEAKER: A lot of back and forth.
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah.
I definitely tried to be honest about my personal relationship
with my struggles with Islam.
I say in the book that I've been in more bars
than mosques over the course of my life,
and I'm no representation of a Muslim, by any means.
But yet, I somehow got hired as the senior Muslim correspondent
on "The Daily Show," to which my parents were completely
flummoxed.
They were like, why would he hire you?
You don't even know how to do salaam.
But that is the outside versus the inside, and who you end up
being, and sort of the shapes that you end up
taking in order to be accepted, especially as a kid.
I grew up in England in the '70s,
and there was a lot of racism.
And I went to a boarding school.
And I dealt with the racial stuff
that was going on there, and the class stuff, and all of that.
And then I talk about the different-- like in the UK,
it doesn't matter how long you've been there.
As a kid growing up in the UK, as an immigrant, Indian parents
in England, it doesn't matter how long you've been there.
I felt like you always were a foreigner.
You would always feel that sense of being a foreigner.
And in America, it was the opposite which is true,
which was that you arrive in America.
And people are just like, ah, we're
the thousand years of culture and history and religions.
But forget that, you're an American now.
Pledge of Allegiance to the flag, you're an American.
In fact, we're going to put American
before we say who you are.
So you are now an American, Indian America.
But the thing here, I found, was that
because-- whoa, what's going on?
Yeah, we're doing an interview here, pal.
MALE SPEAKER: [LAUGHING]
AASIF MANDVI: Of course they're Indian.
(INDIAN ACCENT) What is going on here?
Is there free food?
Oh, there's free food everywhere!
It's OK.
That's why there's so many Indians here,
because you have free food.
What was I saying?
MALE SPEAKER: I think about struggles,
and religion, and so forth.
AASIF MANDVI: Anyway, yes.
When you come to America, there's that sense of,
you just get absorbed into this Americana.
There's a line in my book actually,
when I say Americans think about the rest of the world the way
New Yorkers think about the rest of America.
Which is, they don't.
MALE SPEAKER: You talk a lot about your acting influences
going back to childhood.
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah.
MALE SPEAKER: You talk about being inspired by Omar Sharif.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
MALE SPEAKER: Can you talk about why he inspires you,
and what that did to your career?
AASIF MANDVI: Well, Omar Sharif was, at that time,
before we had Aziz Ansari, we had Omar Sharif.
And Omar Sharif was the first brown face
that I saw in a Hollywood movie.
And so for me, as a little kid, watching that,
my heroes were the Fonz, or whatever.
And I would watch American television shows,
and I would want to try to be that.
And I liked the Fonz, because his real name was Fonzarelli,
and my name was Mandviwala and I figured,
we both had really dorky names.
And yet, he seemed to have transcended that,
and become really cool.
So I thought there was hope for me.
But then I saw Omar Sharif.
And I remember that sense of, oh.
Here's the first brown person.
And I was taken aback.
And so there was a weird hope in terms of, oh.
There's a possibility of actually
being an actor in Hollywood, or being
an actor, if you're a brown person.
Because I didn't really grow up with Bollywood
and all the Indian actors.
All of my acting heroes were Caucasian men.
So he was the first that wasn't.
MALE SPEAKER: Well, and fast forward to recent time--
really with this, now, it sounds like you actually
inspired quite a few various types brown Americans,
Muslim Americans, Indian descent, whatever.
And so it's almost as if you've, to some degree,
come most of the full circle.
Do you feel like this book is a bit of an homage to that,
hoping to inspire other young Aasifs out there?
AASIF MANDVI: That's a tough question to answer,
because you never really feel like you've come full circle.
You just end up feeling you're somewhere on the treadmill
trying to figure it out.
But yes, I am always proud when I
feel like there are younger South Asian
writers, performers, whatever, who have been inspired by what
I've done, or have read my work, or whatever.
So yes.
When I wrote, "Sakina's Restaurant,"
I grew up-- so as a young actor, you go to auditions,
and you would have to do a monologue, and whatever.
And I would always have to do something
from like, "Death of a Salesman,"
because there were no plays written for brown characters.
There were no parts.
And so when I wrote "Sakina's Restaurant," one
of the personally most fulfilling
moments was that because I created
these characters for brown actors--
because there were brown, Indian characters,
a kid came up to me one time and said, I got into grad school
using one of your monologues from "Sakina's Restaurant."
Which was pretty cool for me.
Outside of everything else, that was really cool.
Because I was like, oh.
You actually had a character that you could personally
relate to instead of doing Biff.
You could do this brown, Indian character,
and actually get into grad school with it.
So yes, that feels good.
MALE SPEAKER: Absolutely.
Actually, so you said, there were
no roles written for brown people.
But on a much more depressing level,
and one that you've written on, there
were plenty of roles written for brown people
given to white people.
AASIF MANDVI: Right.
MALE SPEAKER: And you called it-- "whitewashing," I guess,
is a term probably used in Hollywood more.
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah, there were, yes.
It's happened across- it's not just brown people,
but anybody who was not Caucasian
was often, in early Hollywood, especially,
Mickey Rooney in "Breakfast at Tiffany's," of course,
is the most famous case of whitewashing that there is.
But even in the '80s, you had Fisher Stevens
playing an Indian guy in "Short Circuit," and stuff like that.
So when they actually started to hire Kal Penn, it was cool.
When "Harold and Kumar" came along, it was like, oh, OK.
Now, we see a brown guy and an Asian guy
in the leads in a film.
So things have changed since when
I was auditioning to be a snake charmer for a commercial, which
they ended up casting a white guy.
MALE SPEAKER: I think you refer to that
in the book as potanking.
AASIF MANDVI: Potanking.
So potanking is a word that my good friend, Sakina Jaffrey,
who you might all know from "The House of Cards."
Oh, there's whole bunch of people over here.
I have not even been looking at you.
Hi , how are you?
AUDIENCE: Good, how are you?
AASIF MANDVI: Nice to see you.
So she came up with this term.
And we used to use this term when
we were actors in New York.
And it was potanking, which is basically
when they want you to embody the Indian stereotype.
And what it sounds like to them is, (INDIAN ACCENT)
potank, potank, potank, potank, potank, potank, potank.
So when we would go to auditions,
she would always say to me, how'd it go?
And I'd be like, great.
And she's like, did they have you potank?
And I would be like, yes, they did.
Because they invariably were always like,
could you do-- nobody knew that's what
it was called except us.
But that was our inside beltway slang for it.
MALE SPEAKER: Although when you look back, certainly,
the more notable things you've done.
I don't feel like you had to put on that accent.
So do you feel like you've been able to grow
through that as an actor?
Or do you still feel like you're faced with this constantly?
AASIF MANDVI: Well, no, I am faced with this still,
to this day.
And luckily, I have a little bit more leverage now than I did.
In fact, talking of when I did "The Internship,"
I had to do the Indian accent.
And they wanted the character to have an Indian accent.
And I remember going in and auditioning,
and meeting with Vince Vaughn and Shawn Levy, the director,
who were very great.
But then I got a call from one of the producers of the film
saying that Warner Brothers would
like to hire a dialect coach for you for the Indian accent.
And I said, they know that I am Indian, right,
and I have Indian parents.
And they were like, no, no, no.
They know.
But they felt like your accent was not
as strong as the other actors that were coming in.
And I was like, I know.
That was for a reason.
And so I had to push back a little bit
and be like, this guy, I'm not going
to do him as some stereotype of an Indian accent.
So I actually modulated the Indian accent
so that they wanted the accent, but I gave them
my version of what that was.
And I remember saying to them, do you
know the way Fareed Zakaria sounds?
And they were like, yes, we do.
And they're like, that's the accent I'm going to do.
And they were like, we love Fareed Zakaria.
We think he's great.
I was like, there you go.
That's it.
That's not Apu, it's Fareed Zakaria.
MALE SPEAKER: Nice.
AASIF MANDVI: Fareed is watching this right now, (MOCKING FAREED
ZAKARIA) He doesn't sound like me at all.
MALE SPEAKER: [LAUGHING]
AASIF MANDVI: (FALSETTO) Do I sound like the guy
from "The Internship?"
MALE SPEAKER: That's hilarious.
AASIF MANDVI: I don't know why I just gave him Stewie's voice.
(IMPERSONATING STEWIE FROM "FAMILY GUY") I say-- Go ahead.
MALE SPEAKER: You were raised in England.
It's an interesting background, because I
don't think anybody would have guessed that.
AASIF MANDVI: It's a well kept secret.
MALE SPEAKER: Well, your accent doesn't tell that at all.
AASIF MANDVI: Right.
It's funny.
Sometimes people hear it-- I feel
like I have one of those accents where sometimes, people
are like, once I tell them I was raised in England,
then they're like, oh yeah.
I totally hear it.
And I'm like, no, you don't.
You think you do now, because I just told you that.
But I grew up in the north of England.
So I had a very thick Northern accent, like that, really--
[GRUMBLING]
(NORTHERN BRITISH ACCENT) Right, where are you going?
Oh yeah, great.
Like I sound like that.
And imagine if I sounded like that now.
But I think, again, going back to the whole idea of adapting
to various, different environments,
I think I got to Florida and realized
that nobody knew what I was talking about.
And when I was living in Florida,
the combination of a northern, British accent
with an American accent ended up making
me sound like I was from Brooklyn.
And so people thought I was from Brooklyn
when I lived in Florida.
I'd never even lived in Brooklyn.
And so it was really interesting,
because the way it melded together.
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
And you didn't just move to Florida,
you moved to Tampa, Florida.
AASIF MANDVI: Tampa, Florida.
MALE SPEAKER: It's the gem.
AASIF MANDVI: Which is the armpit of Florida.
No, I'm kidding, Tampa.
Love you, love you.
No, it was great.
That was America to me when I got to Tampa.
I was like, America's full of strip clubs,
really awesome strip clubs-- like,
the best strip clubs in-- no.
And Chik-fil-A's.
It's Chik-fil-A's and strip clubs.
But that was America, Florida.
I think I thought my life would be like I'd just
be hanging out with a dolphin all the time,
and living on a sailboat.
But I ended up in the suburbs of Tampa, Florida.
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah.
MALE SPEAKER: Some of the stories were fish out of water
to some degree.
But also, you embracing it much more--
or rather, your father embracing Americanism to a degree.
AASIF MANDVI: Right.
You're talking about brunch, aren't you?
MALE SPEAKER: I am, a little bit.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
My dad, when he first came to Florida, he called us.
We were in England, and he came out on a reconnaissance mission
to see if he wanted to move the family to Florida.
And he called us, and he was like, they
have this wonderful thing here.
It is called, "brunch."
It is breakfast and lunch.
They have a third meal, brunch.
He thought it was an in-between meal.
He was like, there's breakfast, then there's brunch,
then there's lunch.
And I was like, I don't think that's what it is.
I googled it.
No, I didn't.
There was no Google back then.
People had dictionaries.
He was obsessed with this idea of this brunch thing.
So I remember, that was one of my first-- hello, hello.
How are you?
They're just on their way to class.
So it was one of these first memories of America,
was coming to America and then going to get brunch at IHOP,
or wherever.
So I have a story about that actually,
in my book, about how my father was obsessed with that.
MALE SPEAKER: Well, and he also addresses
what he thinks to be the golden rule of American consumption,
which is like, eat as much as you can.
AASIF MANDVI: Eat as much as you can.
Eat it all!
Because look, the idea that America is the land of plenty.
For him, he took that literally.
And he was like, let's go to Albertson's and take pictures
of huge jars of peanut butter and send them back to India
to make them jealous.
I don't know.
But he definitely embraced American culture
with open arms and an open mouth.
MALE SPEAKER: You also wrote about your experience
and your first star or lead role with "The Mystic Masseur."
AASIF MANDVI: Yes, "The Mystic Masseur."
MALE SPEAKER: What did you learn from this experience?
What did that take away?
AASIF MANDVI: Again, when I was doing "Sakina's Restaurant"
off-Broadway, which is the one man show that I wrote,
a gentleman by the name of Ismail Merchant approached me.
And Ismael Merchant, for those of you who might not know,
was the merchant in Merchant Ivory.
And they made all these amazing movies back in the '80s,
like "Remains of the Day," and "Howards End,"
and "Room With a View," and won a lot of Academy Awards.
And they created an entire genre of films, period films.
And so Ismael came up to me after the play and was like,
I've got a movie that I'm making based on V.S. Naipaul's book,
"The Mystic Masseur," and I'd like
you to play the lead in this film.
And so it was a tremendous opportunity as a young actor.
I'd had like, two lines on "Law & Order," at that time.
So it was great.
But it was nervewracking and terrifying.
And he was a Barnum & Bailey type
character, like larger than life.
I remember one time-- well, when I first met him,
he took me to this restaurant that he claimed that he owned,
but none of the waiters knew who he was.
But he was like, (INDIAN ACCENT) I
love-- this is a wonderful restaurant.
I own this.
And then we had this meal, and he gave me the book.
And then he said, you must read this book immediately.
We are making the film.
And it's going to be terrific, and blah, blah, blah.
And then I didn't hear from him for a year.
And then, like a year later, he called me.
And he was like, you have to go to London
for a costume fitting.
And I was like, what?
I don't even know if I'm doing this movie.
I haven't talked to you in a year.
He was like, of course we're doing it!
And he really offended.
And so he was like, of course!
Why would I-- and I was like, because it was a year ago.
And so then he flew me to London.
But the crazy thing was, he was literally
one of the cheapest people.
The man has passed on now.
And God bless him, and I loved him.
And he was like a crazy uncle to me, and gave me this amaze--
but he was one of the cheapest people in the world.
Anthony Hopkins once said that Ismail Merchant
will steal the cream out of your coffee if you don't watch out.
And he sent me to London for a costume fitting,
and he refused to give me what's called "per diem."
So per diem is basically food money to eat, and take cabs,
and whatever.
So I was going to be in London for the weekend,
and he wouldn't give me lodging.
He wouldn't give me a hotel.
He was basically like, you'll stay in my flat.
And then my manager at the time was
like, you have to give him some money to eat.
And so he got frustrated and called me over
to the Merchant Ivory offices on 57th Street, where I walked in.
I walk into this room where there's BAFTA's, and Oscars,
and pictures of him with Anthony Hopkins and Hugh Grant
everywhere on the walls, and stuff.
And he's screaming at James Ivory,
who was the other part of Merchant Ivory,
about how Harvey Weinstein is an uncouth pig.
Which, you know.
He's not the first or the last to say that.
But he was screaming about this.
And then I sat there for about 10 minutes
while he was on the phone.
And then he finally looked up.
And he said, OK.
Your manager is telling me that you
have to have money to eat when you are in London.
So here's what I'm going to do.
So he takes out a piece of paper.
And he writes on it, dear Mr. Khan-- oh no.
He says to me, he goes, there's a wonderful Indian restaurant
down the street from my flat.
And he writes, dear Mr. Khan, please
let my friend, Aasif Mandvi, eat whatever
he would like on the menu when he comes to your establishment.
Signed, your friend, Ismail Merchant.
And he rolls it up, puts it in an envelope.
Gives it to me, and says, you go to this Indian restaurant.
He will give you whatever food you require.
That means I literally only had to eat Indian food.
And then he's like, but when the bill comes, remember,
he's supposed to give me 50% off.
So he wanted a 50% discount on this free food.
So that was him.
But he was crazy.
And then he accused me of having sex on his chair when I was--
house was like the inside of Sotheby's or Christie's.
Everything was from Rajasthan from the 1600s.
He had the raj, and he had these antique chairs, I guess.
And they were in his dining room, and I sat on them.
And they broke because I was leaning back,
because the TV was in his dining room.
So I break the chair.
He has a dinner party.
Some woman sits on the chair, it breaks because I had broken it.
And I tried to put it back together with glue.
And then he proceeds to tell the entire dinner party
that me, his guest, had been having
sex on his antique chairs and broken them.
And I'm standing there.
And everyone looking at me, like why would you do that?
That's a terribly impolite thing to do.
And I'm like, what?
MALE SPEAKER: Well, you've mentioned "Sakina's Restaurant"
a couple of times.
I do want to talk about that.
Because it really only showed in New York,
or maybe in New York and Chicago.
AASIF MANDVI: Well, actually, we played in a couple of places.
We played in New York, and then we
toured it around a little bit.
We brought it to LA.
We took it to London, to the Bush theater in London.
And for a couple years, I was touring around with that show.
But when we did an off-Broadway in New York,
it was the first play about a South Asian family written
by a South Asian that was done on the mainstream New York
stage.
And so we got quite a bit of attention just
from that perspective.
And then we made it into a film called, "Today's Special,"
which is available on Netflix.
And it was good.
It was good to do.
MALE SPEAKER: So your roots are really in dramatic acting.
AASIF MANDVI: Really, yeah.
I went to drama school.
The whole "Daily Show" thing came out of left field,
and has changed my life, and has been
a tremendous opportunity for me.
But my love is really theater, in the same way
that John Oliver goes back to do standup in the clubs
where he grew up.
I grew up doing theater.
And also, in drama school, you don't
think of comedy versus-- in Hollywood,
they're like, you can do comedy and drama?
What?
They're amazed by that.
But in drama school, you do it all.
You're doing Chekhov and Moliere.
MALE SPEAKER: Mhm.
AASIF MANDVI: A little Chekhov, Moliere drop, boom!
MALE SPEAKER: So how prepared were you
for this "Daily Show" opportunity?
I couldn't get the sense of how much
standup or comedy experience.
AASIF MANDVI: I had comedy experience.
I'd been in a sketch comedy group.
I hadn't really done standup, but I'd done more improv,
sketch stuff.
And when "The Daily Show" came along, the great thing for me
was specifically, John was not looking for a comedian.
Because I think they often go scout comedy clubs or places
like that.
He was looking for an actor.
And so when I came in to audition for "The Daily Show,"
it really was for a one-off gig where
they had written this Middle East correspondent character
and realized, oh.
We don't have a Middle East correspondent.
So they had to audition people.
So I came in, auditioned, and he actually
offered me the job that day.
Like I basically came in and was like,
I don't know what I'm doing here.
I'm just going to do my best Stephen Colbert impression.
And so I did this impression of Stephen Colbert.
Jon turned to me, said, welcome to "The Daily Show."
And I was on that night.
And the weird thing was that I went out--
it was the weirdest day of my life.
So I walk out onto the stage at the rehearsal.
Because we usually rehearse around 4 o'clock, and then
we tape at like 6:00.
And at 4 o'clock, I go out there.
And usually, in the audience, there's
a few producers, and some of the writers, and stuff.
And everything's changing, and they're writing.
So I go out there for this rehearsal,
and I look out in the audience.
And there's a guy sitting there with a baseball cap.
And he's just hanging out.
And I'm looking at him.
And I look a little bit more closely.
And it turns out that it's Bruce Springsteen.
And of course, my first reaction is, holy God,
Bruce Springsteen works at "The Daily Show!"
But he didn't work at "The Daily Show."
He was just visiting.
And so then I do the show, and then Bruce Springsteen
comes back.
So not only did I meet Jon Stewart the first time
and was on "The Daily Show," I also met
The Boss who came backstage, and told me that I was very funny.
And I him, you're a very good singer.
You're good at singing.
What can I say?
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah, you mentioned that they hired you,
and you were on that night.
I was going to ask, is that protocol for "The Daily Show?"
AASIF MANDVI: No.
I think I'm the only person that's
ever been hired that way.
Because I was hired as a one-off.
It was just going to be for that one night.
And then Jon, god bless him, kept
calling me back and just saying, hey.
You want to come back and hang out and do another piece,
and whatever?
And so I just kept coming back.
And eventually, after about four months, what I realized was,
that was my audition period.
That was my trial.
And then after four months, they offered me a contract.
And then I was there until now.
MALE SPEAKER: So I was going to ask.
I've had a fantastic run there.
I know that correspondents come in and out of "The Daily Show."
AASIF MANDVI: I've actually been away from "The Daily
Show" for the last six months because I've
been doing an HBO series called, "The Brink," which comes out
next year with Jack Black and Tim Robbins,
and a whole bunch of really great actors.
And it's a half hour comedy staying
in the geopolitical satire world.
But it's a half hour comedy about the end of the world.
Not specifically the end of the world,
but like a huge global crisis.
So if "24" or "Homeland" was a comedy,
this is what it would be.
So it's great.
And I'm very excited about it, and HBO's
very excited about it.
It comes out next year.
So I've actually been away from "The Daily Show."
So I've actually now am more part time on "The Daily Show."
I gave up my office.
And now, I'm just going to job in whenever they need me,
or whatever I'm free.
MALE SPEAKER: So now there's an open role
for Senior Muslim Correspondent.
AASIF MANDVI: It is.
It's great.
And again, Jon has been the greatest boss, because he's
let me go off and do movies and other things,
and then come back and always have a home
at "The Daily Show."
And so this one, he was like, look.
You're going to be gone for six months.
Why don't you just-- because it always feels like I
go off and do other stuff.
And he was like, rather than that, why don't we
just have you come in whenever you need to come in
and do stuff?
So you'll still see me on the show,
I just probably won't be there on a full time basis.
MALE SPEAKER: I see.
Yeah.
You've had some pretty great correspondent
names, as they are good at it.
My favorite is probably Senior Foreign-Looking Correspondent.
AASIF MANDVI: Looking Correspondent, yes.
That's my favorite too.
MALE SPEAKER: You said you started out as Stephen Colbert.
I've got to imagine, you really molded this role
into something.
So when did you envision yourself on "The Daily Show?"
AASIF MANDVI: I never did.
This is a tough question.
Because other people, I've always been like,
oh, your persona on "The Daily Show" is so--
and the thing is, I can't think about it.
If I become aware of that, then I am dead in the water.
Because for me, I just go out there and try to be funny,
and communicate, and try to hit the jokes, and do the thing.
And my persona is something that just has developed organically
over time.
I think all of that, all of the correspondents
have their very specific persona.
But it comes, hopefully, out of an organic process.
And it took a while for it to evolve.
But I don't try to think about it that much.
Because otherwise, it will go away or something.
So I don't worry about it.
MALE SPEAKER: Interesting.
I have many favorites, in terms of scenes from your show.
And you've got a couple that you've
made quite a mark on the world at large, in terms of influence
that your work has actually had on the people
outside of "The Daily Show," and thinking specifically
of the politician from North Carolina--
AASIF MANDVI: Oh right, yes.
MALE SPEAKER: --where you may have just let him say things.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
MALE SPEAKER: What was that interview?
AASIF MANDVI: That has become my most famous interview now.
And it was primarily because-- we do interviews
like that a lot.
And people say crazy things all the time.
I think what happened in this instance was,
here was a GOP guy in North Carolina saying
the N-word and other things on national television
at the same time as the GOP was trying to reach out
to African American voters in that same county.
So what was sad about it was the GOP fired him.
But it almost felt like they fired him
because they were like, listen.
You're not allowed to say that out loud.
We are trying to get black people to vote.
But it was like that.
But anyway, once he got fired, then it became national news.
And Rachel Maddow, and CNN, everyone was talking about it.
But that was one of those situations where
you don't realize the impact.
You never know.
You just basically go in there, and let
people-- Stephen Colbert, again.
I go back to Stephen Colbert, because he said to me
when I first started at the show.
He said, when you put a camera in someone's face,
they get a lobotomy.
And you want to take advantage of that as much as you can.
And the other thing is, use the silence.
When you don't speak, they will continue to speak,
and they will fill the silence.
And eventually, they will do the thing which I call,
I fucked the chicken moment.
They will say, I fucked the chicken.
And once they say, I fucked the chicken, you have your piece.
That's it.
Then you can just be like-- (MUMBLING) I think we're done.
We're good here.
Oh, we've got everything.
You pretty much fucked the chicken?
Yeah, I fucked the chicken.
So sometimes it takes a long time
to get to the I fucked the chicken moment.
And sometimes, they say, I fucked the chicken right away.
But eventually, hopefully, if the piece goes well, they
will say, I fucked the chicken.
I'm just going to see how many times I can say,
I fucked the chicken.
MALE SPEAKER: Is that at all a reference
to Jon's favorite news clip he'd picked up where someone's like,
keep fucking that chicken.
AASIF MANDVI: Keep fucking that chicken.
Yeah.
And it is exactly that.
It is like, when they say that thing
that they or their lawyers wish they had never said
is when you have the piece.
And that's what happened with Don Yelton, where he basically
started on this whole, oh, I'm making fun of Obama.
He had a cartoon of Obama as a witch doctor,
and he said he was making fun of Obama's white half.
Which first, didn't even make any sense.
And so once he went on that roll,
I knew that I just had to stay out of the way.
Now, my job was not to encourage or discourage.
It was just to step back and let him go.
And that's what happened, and sometimes those things
work out really well.
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah.
So do you have any personal favorites
that you look back on?
Clips that you were just--
AASIF MANDVI: I do.
That one is obviously a favorite of mine.
I also loved the time I asked Governor Rick
Scott to pee in a cup.
We were doing a piece down in Florida
about mandatory drug testing for people on welfare.
It was a valid piece.
But what was great about it was, Rick Scott
was having a press conference to announce his budget
for the upcoming year.
And we thought it would be great.
Because what we realized is that like, a lot of these people who
are advocating this law, their reasoning
was that welfare is taxpayer money.
And therefore, the taxpayer should
know where that money is going.
And so these people should be drug tested.
But surprise, surprise.
The people who are also lawmakers
in the state of Florida are getting paid by the taxpayer.
And so why should they not be drug tested, as well?
So this was our premise that we went in with,
and we thought we would take it to the highest
level in Florida, which is the governor himself.
And so we interrupted a press conference of his
with about as many journalists as there
are sitting in this room right now,
and asked him if he would give us a urine sample.
And I had the cup right there.
I said, you can do it right now.
We'll all turn around.
You could just give us a quick sample.
And he was not happy about that.
I think at first, he was trying to be polite.
But eventually, he was like, I'm running
this press conference, not you, OK?
Sit down.
And so even though he got mad and shut us up,
we had the moment.
And what was great about it was, when it aired-- first of all,
before it aired-- because every media outlet in Florida
was in that room.
Meanwhile, none of them made a sound while I was doing this.
They were just gobsmacked and sat there,
afraid to laugh, afraid to do anything.
Because they want to get in that room again,
and I don't give a shit.
You know what I mean?
So they're all like, we want to be invited to this party again.
We are not going to make fun of the host.
So they all sat there.
But the minute we walked out, they came upon us.
And they were literally like, that was amazing.
We wish we could do that.
And then it was in all the Florida newspapers,
it was on all the local news.
And my parents, who live in Tampa, of course,
my dad calls me.
And he just answered the phone.
I'm like, what?
He's like, what did you do?
And he had heard it on the radio and on the local news.
And then when the piece aired, I realized how much Floridians
hate Rick Scott, and they were so happy that happened.
So that's one of my personal favorites as well.
MALE SPEAKER: That's hilarious.
OK.
Well, we are at the top of the hour.
Since we started a little late, I
wanted to give us a few minutes for questions.
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah.
MALE SPEAKER: Of course, Aasif's going
to want to get lunch after this.
We've got a book signing.
Make sure you grab a book.
I think they take credit card, perhaps even Google Wallet.
Who knows?
So we didn't have--
AASIF MANDVI: You're putting $10 with a credit card?
Just, come on.
You just give him the $10.
MALE SPEAKER: So any questions from the audience?
AASIF MANDVI: Yeah.
Right here.
MALE SPEAKER: Repeat the question for--
AASIF MANDVI: Ah, yes.
So she said, why do people agree to do interviews
when they are going to get, I think you used the term,
"hosed?"
I think people have things to say.
People are passionate about what they believe.
And, look.
Sometimes, we're talking to people
that no one else is willing to talk to.
Let's face it.
But sometimes, I think it's honestly that people really
do feel passionately about certain things.
And going back to the Don Yelton thing,
I don't think he realized that he was being racist.
I think he thought he was being honest and revealing
some real honesty about the whole thing,
not realizing that he was coming off as a complete racist.
And so I think people don't always
realize how the thoughts in their head
sound when they come out of their mouth.
And I talked to a woman once who tried to convince me
that one in five Muslims was a terrorist.
And then she said, do the math.
And so I did.
And it would make about 500 million terrorists.
And I thought to myself, why the fuck
has it taken us so long then?
If we have that many people working for us?
Jesus, we are the worst!
But things like that.
And then she was amazed that she was getting threats
from people when that piece aired.
And not from Muslims, from like liberal white people who
were like, you can't say that.
That's just not true.
So I think people just don't realize sometimes.
Yeah?
How the work?
Well, I think theater is a great grounding, base level education
in terms of acting and [INAUDIBLE] now.
Even in "The Daily Show."
For example, people always think, oh, Aasif Mandvi--
you're just yourself on "The Daily Show."
But I'm actually not myself.
I consider myself playing a character who
happens to have my name, and a whole team
of Jewish writers who can travel with him wherever he goes
and a greenscreen that he walks around with.
But the thing is that it was a great education.
Theater was a great place to start.
Because if you can do theater, it
teaches you everything about how to be on television and film.
You can't always do the other way.
You see film actors or TV actors trying to do theater,
and they fail.
But from theater to television, I think often,
it gives you the tools.
And playwriting, just in terms of how a scene can work,
and what makes.
And it's great.
Because on the brink, I'm actually a co-producer
and a writer on the show, as well.
And so it's been really great to be
able to work with those writers on a TV show.
And a lot of those guys are playwrights as well,
who have transitioned into television writing.
In fact, a lot of the great television writers
today started as playwrights.
Lewis Black started as a playwright.
Not a lot of you knew that.
That's one to grow on.
There you go.
Yes?
AUDIENCE: Hi.
Is this working?
Hello?
Yes?
OK.
So I had a question about "The Internship."
I was actually a Google intern, and I
want to say that it's wildly inaccurate.
AASIF MANDVI: Good, good, good.
Yes?
AUDIENCE: And I was wondering how--
AASIF MANDVI: I didn't write it, by the way.
AUDIENCE: Has that changed your opinion?
Like being here today also, how has that
affected your opinion of what Google is, and did
you like think of it differently?
AASIF MANDVI: I don't see anybody doing a lick of work
on this campus.
AUDIENCE: [LAUGHING]
AASIF MANDVI: Here's what I've seen.
I've seen volleyball.
I've seen people stuffing their faces with food.
Everyone's got a takeout container, wherever they go.
And I've seen people just riding their bicycles.
It's like a daycamp.
It's like a retreat.
AUDIENCE: It's like a playground for adults.
AASIF MANDVI: It is, yes.
I have not seen one person coding, nowhere.
MALE SPEAKER: Yeah, you told him to shut his computer.
AASIF MANDVI: Of course, the one overachieving Indian
is like, I was coding!
I've been coding all day!
You were on Facebook.
You were tweeting, I'm sitting in [INAUDIBLE] right now.
No.
But what did you say?
Has it changed my opinion?
Not one iota, no.
It was a movie.
And so obviously, there were wild inaccuracies
needed in it to tell the story.
But did you guys all have to watch the movie?
Was it a mandatory thing?
They were like, now, we will again,
have our next screening of, "The Internship."
You will get an F for the semester if you don't watch it.
AUDIENCE: So you had said that when you came to the UK,
you obviously were not treated equally like others.
Did you feel like you became equal at some point?
Or did you have to come to America for you to feel equal?
AASIF MANDVI: Did I feel like I became
equal when I got to America?
You haven't been in America very long, have you?
Look-- from my perspective, there is much more
representation of South Asians in the media,
and on television, and in general out there.
Do we still have a long way to go in terms of that?
Yeah.
Look, at the end of the day, Hollywood still
prefers white people.
They're easier to light, apparently.
You don't need all those gobos and things.
But look, we are a technological milestone in the history,
and this place is full of Indian people.
So I consider that a little bit of a victory.
AUDIENCE: I don't mean as a group.
AASIF MANDVI: Right, you mean personal.
AUDIENCE: I mean you.
AASIF MANDVI: Here's what I did.
I got on TV, and then that is the great equalizer
in terms of having a platform to be able to say things.
Even the fact that you guys are listening to me talk right now.
But in a larger cultural context,
do I still deal with racism, and all of that stuff?
Yes, absolutely.
But I think, hopefully, now what I
do is, I just show them my "Daily Show" card
and get right through security.
Yes, right here.
AUDIENCE: Hi.
So I'm also a child of immigrants.
AASIF MANDVI: Yes, good.
Good.
AUDIENCE: Trinidadian immigrants.
So West Indian, not East Indian.
AASIF MANDVI: Well, "The Mystic Masseur" was set in Trinidad.
AUDIENCE: Yeah, Naipaul.
AASIF MANDVI: And I had to do a Trinidadian
accent for that movie.
AUDIENCE: Did you?
AASIF MANDVI: Do you do a Trini accent?
AUDIENCE: See, don't put me on the spot.
AASIF MANDVI: Come on.
AUDIENCE: I can't do it.
AASIF MANDVI: I'll do mine if you do yours.
AUDIENCE: I can't do that.
I can't do it.
AASIF MANDVI: (TRINI ACCENT) Ya don't
like to do that Trini accent?
No?
Come on!
AUDIENCE: (TRINI ACCENT) Oh, well now.
AASIF MANDVI: (TRINI ACCENT) Oh, now.
AUDIENCE: OK, OK.
I see it.
AASIF MANDVI: (TRINI ACCENT) Never
call, you never call to say, cat, how you is dog?
AUDIENCE: (TRINI ACCENT) You can't
do a Trini accent like me.
AASIF MANDVI: Nice, nice.
AUDIENCE: And I also moved around a lot
once I moved to America.
So I was wondering, did you ever reconcile
all of those different pieces and parts of yourself
into one single identity?
Or do you still think of it as, well, there
are just multiple parts to my identity.
AASIF MANDVI: I think the multiplicity becomes
the source of where your creativity comes from,
where your power comes from, where all of that stuff
comes from.
I'm jealous of people who are one thing
and can identify with that one thing as them.
I've never felt that.
So the multiplicity and the shapeshifting
has always been my source of power and creativity.
So it took me a long time to realize
that was a positive, and not a negative.
But once I got there, I realize that now, that is what I do.
Good question, good question.
See now, those are the kinds of questions we're looking for.
No, I'm kidding.
Anybody else?
AUDIENCE: There's time for one more.
AASIF MANDVI: Right there.
AUDIENCE: I was wondering what your thoughts were
on colorblind casting.
I know that "Grey's Anatomy's" a show that they've mentioned.
It's a thing I was wondering if you
think it's the future of casting.
AASIF MANDVI: Colorblind casting?
Like you mean anybody, any ethnicity can play any role?
AUDIENCE: Yeah, so they don't have
a typical look for the character.
AASIF MANDVI: Listen, that is, I think, the tapestry of America.
I don't think we're going to get to a place
where we will have-- unless, maybe they could probably
do it if they were adopted.
I was going to say, brown parents with white kids.
But you could do that in a certain scenario.
But I think in terms of, there are roles out there
that anybody can play, in terms of,
it doesn't matter what ethnicity you are?
I don't think we are there yet.
But there are still more roles for white people
than anybody else.
And there's always that one role for the brown person.
I was just having this conversation earlier today
with someone where it was like, there's
one role for a brown person and 50 roles for white people.
So that still exists.
And hopefully, that will change.
And Shonda Rhimes is someone who is actually
pushing the boundaries of that, pushing the envelope.
And this is why I've always said,
we need more ethnic, or at least minority immigrant,
whatever you want to call it-- writers, producers, creators
out there, and people who are shaping the culture in the way
that Google is.
Because ultimately, those things get reflected back
into the media and into the larger society as a whole.
Let's face it; one of the reasons
I was cast in "The Internship" as the head of the Google
intern program, and I'm South Asian,
is because you guys are here at Google.
And so that representation needs to be shown.
If that movie had been made 20 years ago,
there would have been no Google.
But if it was a movie like that, it
would've been a white guy in that role playing
the boss, as it were.
So I think that, for me, personally, was something
that I benefited from in terms of the larger
cultural visibility.
MALE SPEAKER: A great message to end on.
We are out of time.
But we do have a book signing--
AASIF MANDVI: We do.
MALE SPEAKER: --for "No Land's Man."
AASIF MANDVI: "No Land's Man."
MALE SPEAKER: I think it's going on sale within a couple days.
We've got some early advanced copies.
AASIF MANDVI: You've got some advanced copies.
It actually goes officially on sale on November 4th.
If you don't get one today, you can preorder it
on wherever preorders happen.
MALE SPEAKER: And then when does "The Brink" come out
next season?
AASIF MANDVI: "The Brink" comes out next year.
MALE SPEAKER: Next year?
AASIF MANDVI: Yes.
So they'll all be on HBO next year.
And then I'll be back on "The Daily Show" this fall.
MALE SPEAKER: Let's hear it for Aasif Mandvi.
AASIF MANDVI: Thank you very much.
[APPLAUSE]