Kal Penn stars in new TV comedy
The press has asked Kal Penn questions in the past regarding his favorite hamburgers because of his film “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle.” Then he got quizzed about handling medical jargon for his role on “House.” In an interview for Penn’s new NBC comedy, “Sunnyside,” a reporter asks him a question that rarely is posed to an actor — his advice for dealing with a bill going in front of the California Legislature.
That’s what happens when an actor opts to leave a popular TV series like “House” to take a job working for the Obama administration. He might still get political questions because he’s getting back to acting in “Sunnyside,” a series he co-created with a political element. It airs at 9:30 p.m. Thursdays on NBC.
Penn stars as youngest-ever New York City councilman Garrett Modi, who becomes more involved with helping his own career than working for the people. The career climb comes crashing down when Modi gets busted for public intoxication. The only job he can land is coaching a group looking to become American citizens.
The show deals with immigration but isn’t a direct response to what is currently happening in the real political world. He’s been working on getting “Sunnyside” on the air for five years.
“And, really, the topic of immigration goes back to our country’s founding, even before our country’s founding,” Penn says. “The show is definitely topical, but we are not a reaction to anything. I just want to make everyone laugh and comedy can be a vehicle for bringing people together. I think that’s something we all think is special and why we like to make people laugh.”
There’s no denying that the cast and crew have their views on immigration and Penn knows viewers have their opinions. What he wants to do is make sure the main focus is the humor, and that will make the show enjoyable to anyone, no matter what the political stance.
One of the big questions Penn faces is how long the coaching can take before the series gets to the point where all the immigrant students become citizens. He laughs and says research has shown the process can take a very long time, and to him that translates into nine years.
The cast is one of the most diverse on network television. Along with Penn, the cast also includes Diana Maria Riva, Joel Kim Booster, Kiran Deol, Poppy Liu, Moses Storm and Samba Schutte.
Penn has already been asked if the show might be “too diverse” to get a mainstream following. He has one litmus test.
“I remember, when we did the first ‘Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle’ and there was a question of ‘Will people actually like it? Are people OK with there being two Asian-Americans in a lead in a buddy comedy that also happens to feature marijuana and hamburgers?’ And it did well everywhere in the country because audiences really like characters they can identify with,” Penn says. “They like plotlines that they maybe haven’t had the chance to experience before, enter worlds that they haven’t seen. That’s what I love about comedy, and I think that’s what we are hoping to achieve with this. So, yeah, we are hoping that our reach will be very wide.”
Penn’s political ties didn’t end after being the associate director in the White House Office of Public Engagement and co-chairing Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign. He took on the role of Seth Wright, the eventual public information officer on “Designated Survivor.” Along with his acting duties, Penn was also a political consultant on the drama series.
“That was an interesting show because in the first episode it was equal parts family drama and equal parts political thriller. Then it was also an equal part conspiracy thriller, which sort of goes against the political realities of anything,” Penn says. “So my job as a consultant was not to tell them they could or couldn’t pursue a certain plotline but just to tell them if it would or wouldn’t happen.
“They would ask me if something would happen in real life. I would tell them no and they would say they were going to do it anyway. But it made for good TV, and good TV is not always grounded in realities.”
Not everything Penn has done has political ties. His past credits also include “The Big Bang Theory,” “How I Met Your Mother,” “Sisterhood of Night,” “Outliving Emily,” “Dementemania,” “Stereotypically You” and “The Namesake.”