Aasif Mandvi
Aasif Mandvi
Aasif Hakim Mandviwala, known professionally as Aasif Mandvi, is an Indian-American actor and comedian. He began appearing as an occasional contributing correspondent on The Daily Show on August 9, 2006. On March 12, 2007, he was promoted to a regular correspondent. He is the lead actor, co-writer and producer of the web series Halal In The Family which premiered on "Funny or Die" in 2015 and an actor, writer and co-producer of the HBO comedy series The Brink. Mandvi is...
NationalityIndian
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth5 March 1966
CountryIndia
Indian culture is essentially much more of a we culture. It's a communal culture where you do what's best for the community - you procreate.
When I was 11 my friend's mom made a peanut butter sandwich. I ate the sandwich and was like, 'I'm never eating anything else again.' And I still eat peanut butter every day. I would put peanut butter on a steak.
So I had this completely unrealistic idea of what America was — but I wanted to be there.
In America, you have this kind of individualism and in the West, essentially, you have this individualism - this idea of my own personal fulfillment.
I'm Muslim the way many of my Jewish friends are Jewish: I avoid pork, and I take the big holidays off.
If you choose to be a Muslim then you believe that it is on some level wrong to show the image of the Prophet Muhammad.
The experience of being on a show that is very much in the center of popular culture is exciting. You really feel like you're reaching people.
When you're brown and Indian, you get offered a lot of doctor roles.
I came from a very different sort of background and pedigree from the people who were on "The Daily Show". I was an actor. I was sort of - the irony is that I've done as much dramatic work in my career as comedic work and I don't really think of myself as a comedian.
Traditional television as we have known it will make love to the Internet and have a child. That child will be the future. It's already happening, and it's hot!
The great joy of doing 'The Daily Show' for me is that I get to sit on the fence between cultures. I am commenting on the absurdity of both sides as an outsider and insider. Sometimes I'm playing the brown guy, and sometimes I'm not, but the best stuff I do always goes back to being a brown kid in a white world.
The artist never really has any control over the impact of his work. If he starts thinking about the impact of his work, then he becomes a lesser artist.
The Daily Show writers are incredibly smart and very well plugged-in but occasionally they would need me for certain specific things, and I'd be like, 'Yeah, I completely know how to do that; I can solve that problem,and then I'd be like, 'Mom?
People lament that there's no roles being written for South Asian or Muslim characters. But their parents don't want their children to go into the entertainment field. You don't get it both ways.