From Sleeping On Subway Trains To Winning An Emmy | Vir Das

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Make sure your ride is your ride, with pin verification from Uber. One more way Uber is putting safety at every turn. Learn more on the Uber app. I'm heading to the Emmys for my first ever nomination. I'm trending on the news in India. I have multiple complaints filed against me. A complaint has been filed against actor-comedian Veeth Dhan. Sedition, defamation of India. While you're being celebrated in the U.S., it's causing a big uproar in India. Your high is high, and now. With my lowest low. I'm endorsing 14 brands. They all go away overnight. I have three acting projects. Four months later, I wake up, and I'm just basically unemployed. Unemployable. Every month was, "Will I make rent? Will I not make rent?" I'll just sleep on the brown line. Runs all night long in a circle. I'm lying up against the window. Soup on my chest. In that moment, you're afraid. My bank card wouldn't let me withdraw less than 20 bucks. I just remember going, "Do I exist in this country if I have seven dollars?" You eventually bootleg your way into Bollywood. I hired three cameras and shoot a stand-up special. I walked from every DVD library between Bandra and Andheri. Within six months, I was in two movies. For the person washing dishes right now, is there any message that you have for that person? Three or four, I think. At what point did you know that, either, comedy or entertaining others was a part of your dream, and that's what you wanted to do with your life? I think the first time I did a debate, there's a kid called Mohith, and he was a prefect in boarding school. And he had kind of beat the hell out of me for about two weeks running, because in my boarding school, there was corporate punishment, and it was just a thing. It was like an ex-British military academy. I'm 10, and this prefect goes up on stage, and there's a school debate, and he's doing his debate. And he opens it up with a joke, and he's like, "You're walking in the jungle, and you meet a lion. What time is it? Time to run." And something in me just went, "No, I'm 10, and for some reason, I'm horribly offended by this joke." And at the end of the debate, there's this moment where you can raise your hands and go up on stage and ask a question. This is my prefect, who's beaten me up for two weeks straight. And at 10, I raise my hand, and I still cannot tell you why I did. And I walked up on stage, and I grabbed the mic. And I was like, something stupid. I was like, "If you're walking in the jungle, and you meet a lion, it's not time to run. It's time to die," or something like that. And I get a stupid round of applause from the entire school, and I watched this guy just sitting there, boiling. And I realized how powerful the microphone is. And I also realized that in this moment, you can beat me for three weeks. I won. Because I made them laugh. So I think that's the. Just the click moment for me, where I was like, "Oh, if I can make people laugh, I'm more memorable than this beating." I'm also of Indian descent. My parents were born in India. I remember what it was like growing up as the only Indian in an American town. I was the only Indian kid in high school, and it was always tough trying to find my place. And I think so many people feel that struggle to try to find your community or belonging. You were born in India. Yeah. In Nigeria. Yeah. The minute I was born, like two months in, I was taken to Lagos, Nigeria. And my parents kind of had what I would imagine is a similar story to your parents. They showed up with a suitcase and a dream, and a tiny room with two kids in Africa. And I grew to be quite successful in about 10 or 15 years, but it was definitely an outsider experience. Nigerians and Indians are very similar people. We're loud, boisterous. Overly emotional cultures, but still quite separated within a Lagos, Nigeria. So if you're in the Indian community, you can kind of be in this tiny little bubble and you interact with the same people, you know, the same two families become your entire world. And so it is weird to be a child growing up in that atmosphere because you're in a gated compound with three houses. And Lagos can be unsafe. So you're told not to go outside the compound unless you're accompanied. So you go to school, then you come back and you're in a three house compound and whichever kid is in the next house is by default your best friend, whether you gel or not. Because you're kind of just looking for companionship. I think that's why when I was about nine, my parents were like, he needs to go to boarding school in India because he needs friends and he needs to be open. This compound is a cage. So were there moments? Were there moments where you just felt like you didn't belong? Or was it a struggle standing out so much? What was that experience like? I'd sneak out quite a bit. Like I remember there's a really fancy street in Lagos called Queen's Drive. And it's where all the white expats would stay. And so, you know, the American ambassador and the British ambassador and all of these guys. And then we were three streets behind in a tiny street called Karamo Close, right? But Queen's Drive was like a five minute cycle ride away. And they had like water and they had a lagoon. And, you know, these guys had these little jetties with their own boats and stuff. And sometimes I'd sneak out at like 3:00 PM and, you know, go sneak into a white person's boat and just kind of sit down and I'm like, I'm captain of this for a little bit. But I think when I did that, like three or four times, my parents were like, he needs to, you know, we need to send him someplace where he can, you can't put a kid in, you know, in 2000 square feet in a compound and expect them dead. Yeah. So that's kind of how my life started to be developed, you know? So when you were sneaking out, did you ever get caught? Yeah. All the time. All the time. Uh, and in retrospect was not the safest thing to do because you get kidnapped pretty fast in, in, in Lagos, but you know, I'm nine, you know, you want to ride your bike and climb trees and kind of do that stuff. You end up going back to India for school. Yeah. Eventually you land in the States. I do. Your senior year. You end up riding this piece. Yeah. It's called Brown Men Can't Hump. In college. Yeah. So let me, let me set up context for you. Yeah. I went from New Delhi, 20 something million people, 26 million people to Galesburg, Illinois, which is a Maytag factory, cornfield college, cornfield, Kmart, JC Penney, Applebee's is fine dining. How did you end up there? Financial aid. It's just like a lovely tiny liberal arts college called Knox College. And you were applying while you were in India. I was applying while I was in India. Was that the only school you got into? Or how did you- I followed a girl, man. Like, that's the truth. Like my girlfriend was- Give me the real story. All right. Okay. My girlfriend got into Pace University in New York. So you had a girlfriend in India? In India. We were in Delhi University. We were in freshman year in Delhi University. Was that unorthodox to have a girlfriend? Oh, no. It was fine. It was fine. Okay. You know, and then she got into Pace University and I was like, I will follow you. And I was like, any American college that takes me, I will go to, not knowing how big America is, you know, that Pace University and Chicago are a 24 hour train ride apart from each other. I didn't have the money and we had limited means as a family. And so this college called Knox College gave me admission. And I was like, I'm showing up, I'll see you next year. And she was like, I'm cheating on you. And I was like, okay, new information. You learned that before you went? Yeah. So I got to come to America like free. Okay. And to experience it. So the relationship ended. Yeah. Before you came. Yeah. What was it like coming to America? It was great. It was. It was. But you're in this small town, right? You know, being in Galesburg taught me not to demonize small town America. I'm averse to content that kind of jadedly shits on small town America. Do you know what I mean? I like, I had host parents who were a cafeteria lady and a trucker, you know, in Galesburg, Illinois. People didn't know anything about India, but there was no malice. They'd be like, "Oh my God, you're from India. Does your family have an elephant?" You know? politely answer but it was curiosity so i right my experience of like america america isn't new york or chicago until very later and i found that most of small town america wants to watch the bachelor and pay their bills and go to bed at night man you know and kind of nice yeah that's been my experience so when people i would ask you questions like do you have an elephant you never took it like offensively because i think a lot of people would so my my dad has a turban i grew up you know with the turban and my dad drove a taxi for a lot of years so i felt firsthand like the racism and you know i would get questions like oh you know hey a poo you know can you get me a slurpee and stuff for me it was very hard experience these types of things but i definitely took it in a way that was offensive i think that's how they meant it i'm pretty sure and do you feel like people were just nicer in this small town and just genuinely but i also think the context of our upbringing is totally different you know because you were born here right and so you are born with the uh the audacity of belonging you know what i mean you're born in america right and so you were raised here and you were born here and you expect to belong and the audacity of belonging is by the way a very american emotion right right to be like no i'm from here i'm an american and i deserve these things i think when you show up as an international student you show up with less expectations you know yeah i expect the question about elephants i don't have the audacity of belonging at some level and i also didn't know if i wanted to stay so i kind of felt transient i was like i'm probably going to go back to india at some point propel fitness water with gatorade electrolytes zero sugar and vitamins propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self what propels you propel with gatorade electrolytes chronic migraine is 15 or more headache days a month each lasting four hours or more botox alignum toxin a prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine before they start it's not for those with 14 or fewer headache days a month it prevents on average eight to nine headache days a month versus six to seven for placebo prescription botox is injected by your doctor effects of botox may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing speaking breathing eye problems or muscle weakness can be signs of a life-threatening condition patients with these conditions before injection are at highest risk side effects may include allergic reactions neck and injection site pain and lung disease fatigue and headache allergic reactions can include rash welts asthma symptoms and dizziness don't receive botox if there's a skin infection tell your doctor your medical history muscle or nerve conditions including als lugeric's disease myasthenia gravis or lambert eaton syndrome and medications including botulinum toxins as these may increase the risk of serious side effects why wait ask your doctor visit botox chronic migraine.com or call 1-800-44-BOTOX to learn more a lot of times when we think about coming into a new territory a new environment we think about the disadvantages right yeah not belonging getting made fun of getting ostracized feeling outcasted but there's benefits as well right like this is one of them that you're describing were there certain benefits that you felt like maybe it was easier to make friends or stand out or get certain opportunities coming to america yeah being in america for my god it changed my life you know i i came to be an economics major i had a professor called ivan davidson i took a like the occasional course here and there and he called me into his office and he was like i say this to one kid every 10 years you're meant to do this and just shut up and listen to me and i'll make you an actor and i was like i feel like you say that to more than one kid every 10 years and he's like no and i was like i can't i'm an economic student from india and he's like you can do what you want and even at that level i was like no i don't think i can that feels like a very you know with that freedom and so i go home for winter's break and he calls me on vacation he's like i'm giving you the second lead in war and peace without an audition because i feel like you're meant to do this so to have that kind of faith placed in you and to kind of be like okay maybe i don't feel he's right but i'll go with it that's an american experience you know it's an entirely american experience to have that kind of audaciousness so it very much changed my life and i was a theater major the next year you know i didn't tell my parents for two years but you know uh i went from econ to theater and what did they say when they found out i uh i called my dad after three years in college and i was like guess what i'm an actor and he's like guess what you're finishing your econ degree and i was like oh shoot uh and so then i i did a double major and my my theater gpa was 3.9 and my econ gpa was 2.1 so there you go yeah you know as you describe uh the american experience is having a lot of people that believe in a dream within you that you may not even see i actually had the opposite experience you know it's interesting but my whole life i have encountered people that have over and over again told me i cannot do something i always respond to the opposite is like watch me because i thrive off of negative reinforcement and i think that's part of growing up again in the indian household at least for me but can i ask a question yeah yeah is that coming from indian people or is that coming from american people both both who's it stronger from well i would say like i grew up in an indian household and you know spent a lot of time around indians so it'd come primarily from the brown community i would say i think so i think we you know um i don't mean this uh as a generalization but i find that sometimes if you're a second generation the number of opportunities are very little little for a brown or a brown actor or a brown entertainer right and so we tend to to hold each other back a little bit because sometimes uh there's scarcity of opportunity right like you know in you grow up in india it's a brown country so you kind of have this abundance of opportunity and so it's a different you know like uh my success in india hasn't really come at the expense of anybody else's success but if i was to get a part in hollywood tomorrow for a brown leading man i pretty much know the five guys that auditioned for that along with me and that those four didn't get it do you know what i mean yeah so i know that it is at their expense because only three brown roles drop every year for a brown leading man right and it's a different paradigm of thought because you know in bollywood there are 9 000 brown roles right every year so it's just a different thing i would imagine so take me back to your your washing dishes you're studying in illinois and then you come out with this what is it a script or yeah it's a stand-up comedy show called brown men can't hump and this was like a senior project while you're at school when i was in school and i was just this was your first written piece yeah and i was tired man i'd done like five plays and i'd done the acting school thing where we all sit in a circle and cry all day and and we emote with our shoulders and walk through peanut butter whatever the the exercises were and i was like i think i need something rebellious and i was watching a bunch of richard pryor and a bunch of george carlin this 60 minute piece and did it as my my senior performance and it was god it was terrible i want to say it was uh like 55 minutes of cussing and five minutes of jokes but the first time i did stand up was 60 minutes for 800 people the very first time ever doing stand-up yeah and what was that experience is great right away right away never went back like you knew this is there's nothing else i want to do in my life absolutely yeah yeah and what was the reception like it was great it was my friend oh you know we had 800 friends yeah it was in college so the college showed up i booked the auditorium and they showed up right but then cut uh the next year i'm in chicago bombing at open mics and you discover that telling inside stories to your friends isn't stand-up comedy when you're performing for three strangers in an open mic at you know 1 a.m you discover that stand-up is a very different experience professionally but uh that bug you you get a laugh uh there's nothing that replicates that feeling it bites you pretty hard that bug so this kind of brings me into the other aspect of your story that i love which is just resilience after this 60 minute piece that you write you have this great stand-up in front of 800 people your college town but it's not like your career just takes off from there so i'm waiting for it to take off still man what are we talking about yeah that's the indian mentality i love it so what was life like um because i know your big moment came a little bit later uh when you sort of bootlegged your way and success but after college before you sort of found your first break with the acting what was that process like i i was just trying to get money man you know in chicago your everything is how do i make 800 a month that's it you just everything is that you know yeah i think we've all been in that phase where you know your bank balance to the scent right uh in your mind right at all times at that time was your dream comedy yeah and to be an actor you know i graduated from a drama program at knox and then i got into a summer program at uh at harvard with the moscow arts theater and he taught me how to act wonderful russian professors and i was like i think i want to do this and you know college is different right because college uh diversity is a very different experience so in college i was the second lead in war and peace and i was uh you know i i did shakespeare and i did winter's tale and i was the and i can remember in chicago to get a job in a mainstream theater you needed union experience like you needed to have a union card and that means you needed to have 40 hours of stage time per year and then Tony Kushner was doing a play called Homebody Kabul and so for the first time they needed brown guys with builds right so they had to relax the union rule because they couldn't find enough brown guys with 40 hours of stage experience so then you have that reality check post drama school where you're like oh the real world isn't going to cast me as the lead in Winter's Tale so I just remember like looking at a line outside the theater of just Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, Arab guys that's five city blocks long you know that didn't have 40 hours but there was one brown role and so they were all you know they were all queuing up for it and I was like I think maybe there's more for me at home. Did it ever get so bad that there was days where you just didn't know? How you're going to come up with the $800 to pay rent or you felt like you might be having to pack your bags and go back to India? I remember for me when I turned 30 years old it was one of the lowest points in my life because I had $600 in my bank account it wasn't enough to make rent and I thought that I was going to get evicted and have to move back in with my parents and similar to how you perceive that I thought that was the ultimate shame like here's a guy this is just in California but here's a guy who went to LA to chase a dream. Couldn't even make rent and now in his 30s is moving back with his parents. Fortunately you know I had opportunities to work out and it got me out of that hole and I realized everything happens for a reason but were there times that you remember that it was like so stressful where you weren't even sure if you were going to be able to make rents or not? I every month was will I make rent will I not make rent because I was also in a cash only universe you know so you don't have a guaranteed paycheck you know it depends on the situation. I was in a cash only universe you know so you don't have a guaranteed paycheck you know it depends on the situation. Depends on how many hours you can do it goes up and down and yeah there are moments when you you know in the new special there's a story about sleeping on the red line in Chicago which is a trippy experience you know the at the Grand Lux Cafe you know I'd get off some nights and I'd do another job and I'd wrap up by 2 a.m and then my next job was also downtown at 8 a.m so I was like am I gonna trek all the way out to like 4400 north in Chicago and then come back I'll just sleep on the brown line it runs all night long in a circle it's heated it's freezing outside and this guy called Jose taught me a trick where he the Grand Lux Cafe feeds their employees it's very nice and they give you soup it's like this thick chowder and he took their chowder and he put it into two ziploc bags that were warm and then he put every ziploc bag into a little black garbage bag and he tied two garbage bags behind my neck so that the soup wouldn't spill out and I was like oh my god I'm gonna sleep on the brown line and then he made me put my jacket on top of it and I was just insulated and warm all night long and there's a moment on the red line where I'm lying up against the window I have soup on my chest and you're woken up you know there's a tunnel and when you come out of that tunnel all of a sudden you're hit with golden light because the sun has risen while you're in the tunnel so the sun comes around a building it hits your face you wake up and then you look around the train you know for the first time and you realize that there are people who are way more unfortunate than you do they do this every night in that moment you're afraid you know because you're you're 23 you're sleeping on a train but there's a moment in this special where I talk about how this guy who's sitting next to me we just kind of got to talking to each other because we were both waiting for it to be warm enough for us to go outside and I just kind of gave the guy soup because I had soup and for him it's like a magic trick like a dude just reached into his jacket and pulled out soup and we kind of had a conversation but I don't know there's something to be found in those moments as well you know I think there was a definitive moment where I knew I was done with America and graduate to get a job as an international student and I had four I was uh I worked at a place called Carol's event staffing I was like a banquet bartender I was a dishwasher at the Grand Lux cafe I worked in an after-school program for kids and then I took over as a security guard from a guy cash jobs I then got a job at TCF bank in Chicago and I just remember having I think like seven bucks in my account and like being at an ATM in Chicago and my bank card wouldn't let me withdraw less than 20 bucks and I needed seven bucks for like a train pass or something like that and I just remember going is this worth it you know like do I exist in this country if I have seven dollars and so I think that was when I was like I think I need something else you're from an Indian family and you're the kid that has gone abroad. The version of success to that story is you stay abroad. You know, you graduate and then you go to, you know, MBA and then you get the job and now you live abroad and your family visits you twice a year and you come back to India once a year. That's the story. Typically, if you come back in 2004, you feel like a failure. And I definitely did when I left America. It took a while to get around to that. I know a lot of people are, you know, in some sort of a job that they may not love, that they may not see, you know, the growth potential in, but then they have this dream, right? Where you know that you're not where your bank account says you are. Like in your head, you're probably living, right? Like this dream. My question is, how do you stay motivated, right? How do you continue dreaming while also being stuck in the grind of doing something that you don't love? Well, you know, this will, this will sound like quote unquote podcast talk, but gratitude is a big, big, big, big, big thing. I have a reminder on my phone for 11 AM, 3 PM and 6 PM, which just pops up and say, that says find five things to be grateful for right now. So three times a day, I just kind of sit back and I'm like, right, I'm grateful for this. I'm grateful for that. And I'm, you know, that helps. And you were doing this even back then? No, this is something I've worked towards, but I've been doing it for about two years. So how do you stay hopeful? And grateful when you feel like, um, I'm washing dishes right now, but I have these big dreams. Like what gets you through those tough moments? Cause I know a lot of our audience is probably stuck in that spot. You're in your twenties, right? So in your twenties, you just kind of, is there enough money for beer, cigarettes, and to take a girl out to a burger place, right? That's, um, that's your priority. But what I would say to you, if you have an unrealistic dream and you're not in the job that you want are two things. One, you are very, very clearly not where you want to be. And it's fine to acknowledge that. But please never forget that you are where 5,000 other people want to be. It's not where you want to be, but 5,000 other people want to be where you are right now. No matter how bad it is, there is somebody who wants where you are right now. And nothing is permanent. Could get worse, but definitely could get better too. Oh yeah, no, I love it. I mean, so, you know, the takeaway being first off, always remember that there's people that will be there for you. And if you're not there, you're not going to be they were in your shoes right now, no matter how bad things seem like for yourself, you were still in America pursuing this dream. Whereas a lot of people that they would die to be in your shoes, even if they only had $6 in their bank account or anything in America, the amount of people that would, that would want to be in my shoes. Right. You know? So yeah. And then remembering no state lasts forever. I always say like eventually every storm, every dark cloud runs out of rain. Keeping that in context is hard is practically hard when you're in that low state, but you know, feeling lasts forever, whether that's a low or a high, and that keeps you humble during your highs as well. Keeping that in mind. And then the third thing is just always be working on one thing. Always trying to improve yourself, at least in one way that is advancing yourself towards your dream and your goals. Yeah. And then you are this bowl, for instance, like this is a, this is a Kintsugi bowl, right? At the end of the day. So what's great about this bowl is the cracks. The blue part of the bowl is success. And it's not very interesting, you know, but, the golden lines are the most interesting part. And that's, that's the moments of helplessness. You know, that's what makes this bowl a good thing. So yeah. Yeah. That's beautiful. I mean, that's why I'm guessing you picked up on the chairs, the bowl, the whole design is that when we break, we often feel like all is lost, but the real beauty is when we get put back together and we actually become stronger. And that's what makes us uniquely us. Gatorade Electrolytes, zero sugar and vitamins. Propel hydrates better than water to help you get the most out of your workout and get back to your best self. What propels you? Botox, onobotulinum toxin A prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine before they start. It prevents on average eight to nine headache days a month versus six to seven. Seven for placebo. Effects of Botox may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions, including Gehrig's disease, myasthenia gravis, or Lambert-Eaton syndrome, and medications, including botulinum toxins, as these may increase the risk of serious side effects. Why wait? learn more. With Share My Trip from Uber, you can send your live trip location to the ones who matter most. Like Dan and Hannah, who always wait up to make sure their daughter gets back to her college dorm room. Or Tiffany, who's running late as usual and her friends are tracking her trip to make sure she's actually on her way. Look, she's right there. She's three minutes away. Or Sam, who never goes anywhere without her roommate knowing exactly where she is. Some journeys are meant to be shared. Share your ride in real time with Share My Trip on Uber. So you had been trying to find success in America. You did not find it at first. Yeah. And so that's when you decide to sort of pack your bags. And did you feel like you were giving up on your dreams? Here's how it went. Actually, I got into grad school. I was in Chicago in that in that year and a half that I was doing all these jobs. And then I got into the Alabama Shakespeare Festival to study an MFA in Shakespeare in Montgomery, Alabama. There is one other brown person in Montgomery, Alabama, I know because we saw each other in a parking lot and ran towards each other like two pandas would found each other in the wild. It was like a Bollywood type. Yeah. And then he was from the Middle East, but close enough, close enough. And I'm in Montgomery. It is month three and I dropped out of college. So I came back to India, a postgrad dropout. And the tape of Brown Man Can't Hump got taken to the India Habitat Center, which is a theater in Delhi that houses 380 people. So you come back as a dropout to India. Like, what was that feeling? It's shame. It's out of shame. I'm a postgrad dropout because at least my parents, when I went to Montgomery, they were like, oh, my son's on a path to become a teacher. Like he can teach theater. He'll become a professor. Very respected profession in India. Now I'm a college dropout and I booked this theater and we sell out because there's nobody doing like young standup. So you still had your comedy dream that was fully alive. And your goal was to come back to India and pursue comedy. Okay. In India, was that a big opportunity? It didn't exist. At that time? As pure standup? No, not at all. So how did you create something that didn't exist? I went to this lady called Vidyun Singh with the tape of Brown Man Can't Hump. And I'm like, let's do this here. And she's like, can you make it clean, please? And I was like, yeah. You already had this tape from, you filmed it while you were in Illinois. It was the tape from college. Okay. Same tape from college. You just filmed it on a camcorder or something. It was like low budget type thing. But it was enough to convince her. Yeah. To give you the shot and put together this crowd. So was that like a paid opportunity or? I think I got paid, but it was very cheap and tickets were very cheap and young people showed up and it was all in English. And then we started getting a little buzz, you know, and then this lady called Sabina, who was the editor of a newspaper, she was like, you need to leave. You need to go to Mumbai tomorrow. You're going to hit a ceiling in Delhi, get to Mumbai. I'm going to set you up with this corporate gig. I did a corporate gig for the Times of India, which is a newspaper. This is one of those moments where I was emceeing an event, one of my first few corporate gigs, but there's moments where like the universe lets you know you need to be undeniable. And I was sitting there and there were 20 Bollywood stars that I'd seen growing up at this award ceremony and I killed, killed hard. And they called me into their office the next morning. They're like, we're starting a TV channel. You're going to be a VJ. And I was like, great, what's a VJ? And they were like, move to Mumbai in three weeks. And I did. And then I found the news channel and it all kind of went from there, man. You eventually bootleg your way into Bollywood. Walk me through that. So I'm working at a news channel in Mumbai. I've moved to Mumbai to be a comic. There's no comedy scene. And then there's a big Bollywood star called Aamir Khan. And he starred in the movie called Rang De Basanti. And I go to a cinema in town and I'm just watching it. And all of a sudden, I see this ensemble around this big Bollywood star. I'm like, oh, I could play one or two of those roles of the other guys. I'm not the star, but I could be one of those. So this thing seems to be opening up where there might be a place for someone like me. And I miss acting. You know, I haven't acted between 2003 and 2007, which is when this move happens. So that's four years of not really doing any dramatic work. I'm like, okay, I'm getting to Bollywood. I'm 5'8". I have no family. I have no connections. I don't know a single casting director. I go to Aram Nagar in Mumbai, where all the casting directors are and guys stand in lines for audition. Everybody I see is 6'3 and gorgeous and massively talented and muscular. And I'm like, oh, I'm not going to stand out in this line for sure. So I have a lack in my bank account. A lack is $10,000. U.S. dollars. U.S. dollars. At that moment in time, it's probably. Let's say it's $10,000. And I hire three cameras and shoot a stand-up special. And I probably spend $3,000 or $4,000 doing that. And then I have a DVD guy. And I can design a cover that is good enough where it would stand out or at least look like it belonged with international DVDs. And I called it Viragra. And take the comedy pill, Viragra, something like that. It was terrible. But I walked. I found every DVD library between Bandra and Andheri, which is a pretty long walk. It's like saying between here and West Hollywood and Beverly Hills and more. I found every DVD library where new directors rented DVDs from. And I gave them 10 free copies. This is when these stores were very popular. Very popular. Everyone had to go to these stores to get their movies. And they were like, who's this kid? But the DVD looked good. And I was like, I want nothing. Just. Enjoy it and make some money off of it. And that got into two production houses with like 30 Ds. And they auditioned me. And within six months, I was in two movies. Where we are in the story right now, does that kind of transition like your career within Bollywood and you go more into acting at this stage? I do. I do. Before you got back into comedy. Is that right? Yeah. I do a lot of acting. I lose myself in it. I get to be in this movie called Deli Belly, which is a massive hit. And life changes overnight. How did you get that role? I auditioned off the DVD. It's one of the first two auditions. And then it's my second movie. And it's a massive hit. And overnight, everybody kind of knows who you are. But you were not the six foot three ripped guy. You're a handsome guy. Yeah. But like, so was that like still in the back of your mind? Yeah. And then studios start coming at you with cash and saying, oh, we'll turn you into some version of that guy. Right, right, right. You know, I've been in 14 movies. Right. And I'd say five of them are really good. And then nine of them I wouldn't watch. I'm just being honest. Like there were a lot of like, oh, I get to be in this thing with this studio. Let's go. Right. I didn't know how to study a script and know who I was. You know, sometimes you, if you're a golden retriever, or if you're an Alsatian, try and be the best retriever that you can be. But what people can smell is a golden retriever trying to be an Alsatian. And when it comes to acting, there are certain things that will suit you. And there are certain things that will just not suit you, no matter what. And given your background, height, looks, et cetera, et cetera. So the reality of that, you have to become conscious of as an actor really quick. I kind of came to LA on a quick trip. I got signed by an agency. And when I was here. Were you a success at this time? I was a success at this time. Okay. I do a spot at the Laugh Factory. Ten minutes. And I fall in love with stand-up again. I just have this feeling of, my God, this felt better than the last two movies I did. And it's no money, but I kind of tell this agency, I'm like, I'm going to take a year and I'm going to travel America and the world and see if I can find my voice as a comic again. And if it doesn't work out, I'm going to go back to doing movies. Right. If they'll have me. And at the end of that year, I was at the Hollywood Improv. Netflix, HBO, and two other networks showed up to see me do a Friday night showcase. Just coincidence or you knew that they were there? No, we invited them. Okay. How did you get to them? Your agency? My agency. Okay. And then Netflix. You didn't drop off DVDs at the Netflix office? No. They saw me kill at the Improv and Netflix was like, let's do a special. Just from that one performance? From one performance. Yeah. And at that time, were any specials given to Indian-born? I'm the first one. You're the first one? Yeah. Did you realize that at the time? No. I just was working on jokes. Then I was like, oh, I cannot do anything else and get this right. You know, so I have to singularly focus on this. And then that special came out. And then suddenly this American kind of coexistence opened up in my life. Is that what brought the American audience to you? Yeah. Before that, did you have any like notoriety? I'd never toured America before that, you know? So yeah. So were you living in America when you were working on that special? No, I was kind of in and out every two or three months, but I was doing like clubs, right? So I was doing the Punchline and I was doing, you know, the some club in Charlotte, North Carolina, like the Arlington Improv and I'm getting calls from like Mumbai being like, what the hell are you doing in a Ramada in, in Arlington, Texas or whatever. And I'm like, I'm, I'm trying to work on this thing. Would it matter like how much they were offering you or like. I was losing money. I lost a lot of money that year. Wow. You were losing money, but you were still going on tour just to build this experience or for the Netflix special? No, I only got the special at the end of this year. Wow. So you've just bet on yourself every single time. Yeah, man. Some call it denial. I love how relaxed you are about that. I just put my life savings into this DVD and then that works. And then I just put my life savings to go on this tour and like, I love how you risk it all at every step because we're all like so afraid, right? To go after our dreams and like, what if things don't work out? And I just love how that was never even part of your psychology. No, no, no. It is very much a part of my psychology. I don't want to pretend like I'm not worried. It's not going to work out or that it'll be bad or that it'll take a downturn. But I don't see myself as having any other choice than to bet on myself because I don't assume that anybody else will. Was it helpful to know that you've already slept on the red line in a subway in Chicago? You know what like that low looks like. And if you need to go back to that, you know you can. So why not risk it all every time? I would love not to go back to that, to be honest, but I don't know how long this journey will last. I suspect it won't be this phase of it. It won't be long. You know, there will be time for another artist. At some point, I will no longer sell out an arena. Maybe at some point, I will not fly first class. I won't be able to star in something eventually. That's just life as an artist. It helps to think of the train and the red line in those moments. At this stage, your career is starting to take off even more, right? Yeah. You end up doing multiple Netflix specials. I do. You end up winning an Emmy. I'm going to end up winning an international Emmy. Yes. How was that feeling? I don't remember much of it. It's trippy to win one, man. You don't remember what's happening. But there's a cool full circle thing. My manager's name is Reg. We won the Emmy. He's on stage with me. And we get off stage and we're walking through a kitchen to get to the press junket. So they kind of take you through the backstage of this hotel. And there's a dishwashing station. And Reg just stops me and he's like, yo, take a picture, man, next to a dishwashing. Because you used to be at this station. So I have like 52 seconds after I won an Emmy. I have a photo next to a dishwashing station that my manager made me take. That was kind of cool. I would never have celebrated that. I wouldn't have been like, look at me, you know, but he was like, yo, yo, yo, yo, yo, stop. Right. Take this photograph. It's important. Yeah. So you're at the peak of your career, right? And you've got multiple Netflix specials now. You've just won an Emmy. Yeah. Right. In all objective measure. Yeah. So you're at the peak of your career. You're this huge success. And then you take this risk. Well, the risk you're going to talk about is pre-Emmy, just so we know. Oh, okay. I was going to ask about the timeline. So this is pre-Emmy. So I'm three Netflix specials in. Gotcha. One special has been nominated for an Emmy. Okay. And then I take a risk. So then you take a risk. You're in the US and you do this skit about the two worlds, the two Indias. And while you're on stage, I mean, this is being applauded. Like you have a standing ovation almost like within the US because you talk about some controversial things. But meanwhile, while you're being celebrated in the US is causing a big uproar in India. I should clarify. I did this video about the duality of my nation and that we need to remember that the light exists. Right. And, and head towards the light because we're only talking about the darkness. I put it up on social media, on my YouTube and you know, it's, it's one of many videos. So this was in like, a stand-up that you did. This was just a YouTube video that you upload. It's just a YouTube video and it's seven minutes of new material that I wrote that afternoon. So I was like, yeah, what could go wrong? And I put it up on my YouTube, much like I've done many times before. And then somebody took a bit, edited it and put it on social media and then the news channel carried it and the rest was the rest. And so I'm heading to the Emmys for my first ever nomination. And I have, uh, I'm trending on the news in India and, uh, I have multiple complaints filed against me. Complaints from the government? Uh, no, from powerful people, but I have police complaints filed against me. Sedition, defamation of India, um, et cetera, et cetera. And so I have to. While you're in the car ride, you find out about all this. The same, the day before. The day before. I'm in New York. And so you're like, you're highest high. And with my lowest low, I'm endorsing 14 brands. They all go away. Overnight. I had three acting projects. They all go away. Overnight. I switched my phone off for four months because the level of, you know, hate and threats coming in is quite intense. My wife and I go to Goa, which is a beach town and just kind of lick our wounds for a little bit, you know, and the news cycle goes away and the cases get fought and you deal with that and they go away. But the phone's still off. And if you're ever in a moment like that, where you're the number one trend in the country for like a week and you're on every mainstream, I was on the homepage of the BBC. It was insane. And I was like, this is all negative. All negative. Yeah. I mean, or is it like divided or was it divided? It was very divided, but the story is about the hate. Uh, right. The two India's video got shared, I believe about 35, 40 million times on WhatsApp primarily. A lot of it's, you know, uh, just a few people to who have power to hate and the process is the punishment, you know? So to fight all of that and to go away, et cetera, et cetera, that's the punishment really because they've shut down your career. And four months later, I wake up and I'm just basically unemployed, unemployable. Everybody's like, we love him. We love what he did, but yo, we can't take this kind of heat. What year is this? This is 2022. Yeah. Okay. And I write a joke about it. And you write a joke about what happens about what happened. The first joke I wrote was, uh, I was on the homepage of the BBC with the headline comedian polarizes the nation. Do you know how badly you have to screw up before the British say that you divided India? Uh, is the, the, the first joke that I wrote this like on Twitter or what are you no, I just wrote it down in my notebook. And I was like, I think this is a show. I took another two months and I wrote a show about it. And then I put my phone on and I announced a toll. And it sold out in six minutes. And I wasn't expecting it. So you still had this incredible fan base. Yeah. And now they were deeply connected because they connected with the material. Right. And they were ready to fight for you. And then we did this massive tour in India and this massive world tour called the wanted tour that turned into a Netflix special. We shot a Netflix special at the end of it. That was about this experience. And then of being canceled on the internet or being canceled. I mean, canceling by a country almost. Yeah. Yeah. Like, yeah. I find American cancel culture, very cute. You know, uh, when a comedian's like, Oh my God, man, like a mob came after me on Twitter. I'm like, shut up. Uh, you have no conception of what consequences are beyond social media, but this happened in 2022. I was underground most of 2022. I shot this in October, 2022. It came out in December of 2022. It was nominated for an Emmy the next year and it won an Emmy. So just, I think the lesson. The lesson is if talking gets you into trouble, keep talking, man, you know, like that's the thing that gets you out as well. So a show about the hate turned into an Emmy. I've said this multiple times, but I think that's what I love about my job is it's literal alchemy. You know, you can take and turn it into a golden statue with laughter. I talk so much about how you can use your greatest pain to serve your greatest purpose. And in some odd way, you know, everything again, good and bad always is happening for us, not to us. And you really do have to have that healthy perspective because if you had not gone through what you did, that may not have ever led to you coming out with the special that eventually won the Emmy. Yeah. Yeah. But again, to clarify, it's not a bold choice. It's the only choice I had. And it's, it's forever made me a different comedian. It's right. It's made my voice what it is right now. One of the things, um, you know, when people are stuck with some sort of decision and usually it's, they're in some spot of like, just fearing for the worst, right? Like, Hey, what if I apply for this job and I do this interview and I don't get it. If I go for this sports team and I'm rejected, if I put out my first podcast episode and nobody watches it. Right. But what I always say is what is the worst that can happen? Like, right. Just think about the worst for you. It might be that red light, red line. And you've been there before you've survived that. Right. So what's the, the worst is just something that you've already survived anyway in your life. So why not go for your dream? Absolutely. Right. And why not, why not fail at the thing you're good at and the thing that makes your heart sing rather than feel it's something you didn't even believe in. If you're going to go out, man, go out swinging and, and, and, and hold the right. You know what I mean? Don't, uh, don't go out on someone else's back. That's that, that's not a life. Yeah. You know, for the person, you know, that's washing dishes right now, or maybe laying in the train station on the red line. Like, is there any message that you have for that person? Like three or four, I think this too shall pass. Don't dilute feeling how horrible this is. The worst thing that's ever happened to you is the worst thing that's ever happened to you. Right. I don't know who said that, but it's true. And in that moment, don't let people patronize you into, into believing that it's not that bad. It is that bad. Feel that it's that bad. Acknowledge that it's bad give yourself permission to to feel the moment and i think you'll be able to move on from the moment quicker but understand that the moment is temporary right so if you're washing dishes right now and it sucks you have full freedom to be like this sucks i feel horrible and i think sometimes acknowledging that feeling puts distance between you and the feeling passive distance so sometimes if you're washing dishes or if you're struggling and you're broke and you can just be like okay i'm struggling and i'm broke and i feel terrible right now it's almost like you've externalized your story right and you feel like you're watching your story and you can then objectively make choices you know because i feel like people are like i don't know what's going on give yourself the permission to feel what's going on and acknowledge what's going on and then tell yourself that it will not go on forever that's it that's beautiful this was an incredible interview so inspiring thank you so much for your time thank you for having me on any journey using uber it helps to know you're getting into the right car pin verification adds an extra step to make sure your ride is your ride before the trip begins your app gives you a unique pin just tell it to your driver and they'll enter it in their app before the ride can start hey what's your pin two five three eight that way you know you're in the right car taking the right trip and your driver knows you're in the right car and you're the right passenger make sure your ride is your ride with pin verification from uber one more way uber is putting safety at every turn learn more on the uber app i just want to give you the space to process it michael said elena paused i don't think i want to see anybody else this is the love story of real hinge couple elena and michael written and read by me raven smith listen to the free audiobook now relax and let kroger delivery handle your grocery shopping this week we start with only the freshest items then carefully pack your order in our refrigerated trucks and our cool trucks keep your food fresh right to your door fresh groceries your way with kroger delivery and right now enjoy free delivery on orders over fifty dollars kroger fresh for everyone with summer coming to an end you're going to be spending more time indoors get your home ready and you're ready to go and save up to fifty percent off custom window treatments during the labor day mega sale at blinds.com from room darkening to light filtering shades finding the perfect fit is easy get free samples expert design help and professional measure and install services or diy with confidence and support every step of the way shop up to fifty percent off site-wide plus huge savings on door busters right now during the labor day mega sale at blinds.com