Rati Gupta’s ‘Big Bang’ moment
A lot rides on what her character Anu will do.
Will “The Big Bang Theory” conclude its 12-season run with a big Indian wedding for Raj Koothrappali, the last single original character on the longrunning CBS hit?
Your guess is as good as that of Rati Gupta, the series newcomer who plays Anu, the all-business-all-the-time hotel concierge chosen by Raj’s father to be a potential bride for the incurably romantic astrophysicist played by Kunal Nayyar.
“I have no idea what’s going to happen to Raj and Anu going forward,” she tells USA TODAY. “I just know they’re still around and still together. Maybe there’ll be a wedding, maybe not.”
Just last week, that looked pretty iffy. Anu and Raj had fought and nearly ended their relationship as the pair struggled to reconcile a traditional arranged marriage with modern American life. Ultimately, they decided to slow things down and, as he put it, “start the relationship from the beginning, not in the middle.”
Gupta, 34, who was born and raised in northwestern Indiana by parents who met in India via an arranged marriage, says the practice has evolved a lot.
For Indian-American singles today, she says, “it’s just like any other culture where a person (asks) their friends and family to help them find someone and introduce them to people and set them up on blind dates.”
In fact, she adds, “the only difference between meeting someone on Tinder and a modern arranged marriage is that your parents did the typing for you.”
But what Gupta wants even more than a TV wedding is for her character to share a scene with her off screen “Big Bang” bestie, Mayim Bialik, who plays neurobiologist Amy Farrah Fowler. And thanks to her pre-med studies, she says, she can “hold down a scientific conversation” with Bialik, who earned a doc- torate in her character’s field.
“I grew up watching Mayim (in ‘Blossom’) as a little girl,” she says. “So I was excited to meet her, and she is the most lovely human. She feels like a big sister to me now. Amy and Anu haven’t had a moment on the show together so that’s what I’m waiting and hoping for.”
As for the rest of the cast, she says, “they’ve been great. … Now that I’ve been around for a while, they kind of treat me like I’m one of them. Like, of course, I’m there. They kind of expect me to be around. So it’s comforting.”
After 12 seasons, the rest of the actors, many of whom have spouses and families now, may be past the point of having viewing parties.
But that hasn’t stopped Gupta from throwing her own.
“I get together with some friends most of the nights I’ve had episodes airing,” she says. “It’s exciting. It’s a fun show. I’m going to enjoy it. My friends enjoy it. … So it’s a fun Thursday night activity for us now.”
And should Raj and Anu end up getting married, her friends have even come up with a title for a spinoff, which they shared with “Big Bang Theory” cocreator and executive producer Bill Prady. She found that “kind of embarrassing but also kind of funny.”
“Anu Raj,” Gupta reveals. “It’s a play on her name and the word new. It’s kind of smart. I don’t hate it.”
“Now that I’ve been around for a while, (her castmates) kind of treat me like I’m one of them. ... They kind of expect me to be around. So it’s comforting.”