by Mindy Kaling
Actually, Mindy described our first meeting in her first book. In her depiction, I have the social skills of a Sasquatch, torturing her with long silences. In that interview, though, Mindy was really timid (bizarre, right?) and not showing the disco-ball light show that is her relaxed mind and that I was expecting after reading her spec script and seeing her stage show. So I gave her a lot of room to shine and open up. How could I have known that staring at her without speaking for minutes at a time didn’t put her at ease? I’m not some mind-reading Sasquatch who knows the right thing to say in every situation. By now it should be clear that I don’t really know the definition of Sasquatch.
As a mentor, I brought some craft experience developed over hundreds of table reads and rewrites on previous shows that I worked on or ran, as well as all my grumpy prejudices and bitter show-biz feuds. In return, Mindy wrote hilarious jokes and fresh dialogue, which I put on the air with glee. Whether by giving notes on her outlines and scripts, cowriting Jim and Pam’s wedding, or pitching out a new animated show (still one of my favorite yet-to-be-produced projects ever), collaborating with Mindy is a joy.
I have had the benefit of a lot of great mentors, starting with Lorne Michaels and Jim Downey at Saturday Night Live, and including Jim Brooks, David Mirkin, and Al Jean and Mike Reiss at The Simpsons. I know a lot of people are probably thinking, good for you, but nobody has ever wanted to be my mentor. You take your mentoring where you can find it, even if it is not being offered to you. Have you ever used your neighbor’s Wi-Fi when it wasn’t on a password? If you have the opportunity to observe someone at work, you are getting mentoring out of them even if they are unaware or resistant. Make a list of the people you think would make the greatest mentors and try to get close enough to steal their Wi-Fi. I wrote a freelance Seinfeld episode for Larry David; I can’t say he took any interest in my welfare, but I was able to watch him work and pick up stuff. That’s what drew me to meet with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant. They were practitioners of my chosen craft at the highest level possible, and if I had to pretend to be interested in adapting The Office for the United States in order to meet them, then so be it.
OK, I’m at about 660 words so far, and I haven’t even addressed “your relationship to young women in your life.” By the way, have you noticed what a shameless fishing expedition that question is? She just throws it in at the end of a list like I’m going to slip up and confirm my vacationing with Ariana Grande. We were photographed in the same airport lounge, OK? If there had been enough seats, she wouldn’t have been sitting on my lap. Just two random travelers killing time by hooking up. No big deal.
I LOVE SEX SCENES!
IN HOLLYWOOD, I am considered a prude. Perhaps the main reason is that I’m not a comedian who speaks frankly about my sexuality, making me the only woman in Hollywood who is not speaking frankly about her sexuality. You can’t walk down the street or be on any social media platform for more than nine seconds before an actress mentions how it’s imperative that she and everyone else “free the nips.” If you don’t know what I’m talking about, please Google it. You wouldn’t believe me if I explained it here. This is the world I live in.
People may also think I’m a prude because my television show, though about dating and romance, is not really about sex, like, say, Sex and the City was. That’s because my show is on a major network and you can’t show all that stuff, and also because my dad is alive and I would like to have lunch with him without feeling mired in dishonor.
The truth is I’m a weird mix of fearful New England prig and repressed pervert. On the one hand, I think sex is private and special, and I would rather die than ever write or talk about my sex life in any public way. And on the other, I am an unabashed lover of watching sexy situations on-screen, both as a viewer and, lately, as a participant on my own show.
My buddy Mark Duplass opening the door without a shirt on for a sexy interaction
So, there must be lots of other actors who love doing sex scenes too, right? Wrong. If you interview any actor about having to do sex scenes, you always get the same answer: they “hate” doing them.
It’s actually kind of annoying; you’re there for twelve hours; it’s exhausting.
—Justin Timberlake
There’s like one hundred and fifty crewmen watching and you see each other’s bits and pieces. The whole thing is just wrong.
—Mila Kunis
They’re hard to do. You’re doing things that you’re supposed to do with only certain people in your life.
—Kerry Washington
I am here to tell you that they are all lying. Every last one of ’em. Obviously, on-screen sex is not actual penetrative sex, but as any religious high-schooler will tell you, simulating sex can be pretty damn enjoyable as well.
And why shouldn’t it be? You get to crawl around in a bed with another person you either a) already know really well or b) are getting to know better in the most cozy and intimate way possible. Yes, it is true that an entire room of people is watching you when you shoot a sex scene. To that, I say: the more, the merrier! Most of those people are artists whose job it is to make sure your physical imperfections are cloaked in mysterious shadows. By the end of the shooting day, you’ll wish there were more people there.
MINDY KALING, TONGUE BANDIT
Earlier this year I realized that, for a long time, I had been completely breaking the rules of stage kissing. I learned that among professional actors the tacit rule of on-screen kissing is “open mouth, no tongue.” In 1985, during the AIDS crisis, the Screen Actors Guild even made this their official policy. I, however, became a professional actor on The Office at the height of my early-twenties boy craziness, and the only person I was kissing was my best friend, B. J. Novak. We did not stage kiss because we didn’t know any better. It was just lights, camera, tongue-dance.
Anders Holm and I make out naked in a shower with thirty people standing two feet away.
So when I created The Mindy Project and I was suddenly acting in all these romantic situations, it never occurred to me to ask my scene partners if they minded tongue kissing. I just kissed as I would kiss naturally, and they always reciprocated. If they were psyched or felt bullied, I will never know, because no one ever mentioned it to me as an issue. So, if my math is correct, I have broken SAG rules about twenty-one times. And you know what? If they take away my SAG card because of it, I can only say: it was worth it.
THE SEXIEST THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED TO ME
I’ve had the privilege of making out with dozens of actors on camera. Once I had to do a particularly involved make-out with an actor who happens to be a married acquaintance of mine. The shot was complicated and the director spent hours shooting it over and over. The sheer number of takes made me feel self-conscious about my ability to make out in an authentically sexy way. Between takes, in a moment of insecurity, I turned to my scene partner and whispered: “God, this is taking forever. Am I doing this terribly?”
He looked me in the eye, took my hand, and gently guided it to the front of his pants where I felt the unmistakable presence of an erection. My jaw dropped. He winked at me, said, “I think you’re doing just fine,” and dropped my hand.
We never spoke of it again. It is, to this day, the sexiest thing that has ever happened to me.
WHY ALL ACTORS MUST LIE
So why are all your favorite actors and actresses lying about enjoying sex scenes? Well, a couple of reasons:
1) Creepiness. Anyone who announces they love filming sex scenes is going to be perceived as some kind of weirdo who gets their jollies off at work. No one wants to act with them, as honest (and, frankly, as entertaining) as they sound.
2) Vulnerability. People don’t like to admit they loved shooting a sex scene, because, like sex, what if the other person didn’t like it that much? I once complimented my friend Seth Rogen on his on-screen kissing skills. Then later, while we were waiting during a lighting setup, I shyly asked him what he thought of mine, an
d he took a moment to think, and replied: “To be honest, I don’t really remember.” That’s what Seth Rogen thinks of my kissing. So good he didn’t remember it fifteen minutes later.
Seth Rogen: Great kisser, nice energy, beard not too scratchy
3) Significant Others. Actors are the only people in the world who are allowed to essentially stray from their marriages physically and there are no repercussions. Zero. In fact, if they’re especially good at sex scenes, thousands of people will want to steal them away. If you are the unlucky spouse of an actor, the last thing you want to hear is that, in addition to him getting to fake-cheat on you by virtue of the most unfair loophole of all time, he also really enjoyed it.
4) Integrity. In kabuki times, actors were literally prostitutes, and we have spent centuries trying to distance ourselves from that profession. Occasionally we have setbacks, like The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. But in general, it’s very important for us not to seem like we are being financially compensated for sex acts. People already think acting is the world’s easiest and most frivolous job, besides Miss Golden Globe. So we all have this tacit agreement to keep our traps shut about the world’s best job perk.
That is why I, a noted Hollywood bad boy with nothing to lose, must be the person to tell the truth. Sex scenes are the tits. You’re welcome.
COMING THIS FALL
I’VE BEEN IN the television business for eleven years, which is a very long time. Not long by regular-job standards, but, at thirty-five, people around here are beginning to call me seasoned. “Seasoned,” for those of you not in show business, is the worst insult you can call a woman. It means a cross between “old,” “disagreeable,” and “only wears slacks.” TV is a young man’s game, like professional sports. And after eleven years, you’re not the rookie, you’re the old guy in the dugout talking about the old days and spitting into a tin can. That last part is the only part I actually do.
Every pilot season, the trade papers all publish loglines of the upcoming pilots that are going to be shot. I now can see certain tropes get recycled over and over. I’m not just referring to familiar characters you’ve come to expect on most shows (for example “boozy mother-in-law,” “candid black best friend,” “hyper-articulate child of dum-dums,” and “incomprehensible foreigner”). I’m talking about premises for entire series that seem to get reused perennially.
Much like my love for romantic comedies, I enjoy most television. I could only make this list because I have watched more TV than an angry thirteen-year-old child of divorce. The only thing I will not watch is reality television. “Watch how we pick a singer!” “Watch how we turn this old crappy house into a cool new one!” No, you do that! I don’t need to see the process. I live the process. Let me relax.
Here are the kinds of shows that networks seem to be clamoring for lately.
BOY-MAN MUST FACE THE ADULT WORLD
Carter can’t keep a job. His girlfriend left him for smoking too much pot. His dog ran away because he never went outside. He high-fives his African American roommate while they play Xbox. He lives in filth. He sometimes wears his pants inside out. This is the story of how he became the attorney general of the United States of America.
THE STAUNCH OVAL OFFICE DAME
This briskly paced show centers on our heroine, a tough, highly educated woman in a high-pressure job full of gross, sexist men. She is the very best person at her job, and she is so moral she would send her own husband to the electric chair if he was found guilty of shoplifting. But she harbors a terrible, humiliating, dark secret: she’s dyslexic. And, in the world of this show, that could get her impeached.
POOR MARIA
This is the charming tale of a lovely Latina “regular looking” girl (that is, she would be considered a perfect “10” if she were white). She has a heart of gold but is underestimated by everyone around her … except the handsome white CEO of the corporation where she sweeps the floors. Will he whisk her away like the dust particles in her bin? Or will he fire her when he finds out she is part of the Floor-Sweeping Union that wants their salaries to be raised to $4 an hour?
REMAKE OF GRITTY ISRAELI SHOW ABOUT TERRORISTS/INFIDELITY/MENTAL ILLNESS
This well-produced and depressing show will be the one you know you should be watching but just can’t make yourself do it. Let’s examine the best case here. You invest the time watching the show, you mention it at a party, and some guy tells you how much better the original Israeli version was. Ditto for British comedies about the workplace.
DAD! MOM!
You know that thirty-eight-year-old guy in your office who falls to pieces when his seventy-year-old parents get a divorce? Then Dad moves in and has to learn Internet dating? And Son reverts to behavior he did when he was ten! No? Well, you’re the only one, because there are usually five pilots about this very subject at any given time at every network.
THE ABANDONED SPINSTER CLUB
A confident workaholic woman named Marcia or Alex comes home to find her husband cheating on her in her own bed with his secretary. It’s always the middle of the afternoon and it’s always happening in her own bed. I find this little detail especially horrifying. It’s bad enough that it’s happening, but we need to wring out as much humiliation as we possibly can. “You know what would make the cheating even worse? If it were happening in her own bed next to photos of their kids and stuff.”
The rest of the series explores her journey to accepting a new life as a sex-positive fortysomething. She will have a really fun assistant who’s an expert on all the new, slutty dating techniques. Also, everyone on this show drinks wine while sitting on couches. And they’re in jeans and barefoot with one foot tucked under them. Think about it.
HOT SERIAL KILLER WHO’S KIND OF LITERARY
He leaves sonnets pinned to all the corpses. The murdered prostitutes all have the first names of Jane Austen heroines. The kindly police commissioner’s name is Chuck Dickens. The whole thing takes place in a tough housing project in Newark called Stratford-up-by-Avon. A melancholy English actor plays the lead in this mystery drama, and he uses his accent no matter what country it takes place in. This is everyone’s mom’s favorite show.
NEUROTIC SENSITIVE GUY IS ALSO SUPER UNHAPPY
Usually a half-hour cable comedy show. This wealthy L.A.- or NYC-based man, who makes his living doing something creative, is miserable despite having suffered no traumas or having any immediate health problems. If there are kids, they are only invoked to interfere with sex life. The pilot will always involve a child’s birthday party with a bouncy house, or a clown who breaks character when not around the kids. Deemed brilliant and hilarious, this show usually has no jokes.
SUPERHERO: BEFORE!
You know that famous superhero with his own franchise of blockbuster movies? He’s great, isn’t he? Wouldn’t you like to know what he was like when he was a kid, way before his cool powers took effect? No? OK, how about what his mom and dad were like? No, they don’t have any superpowers. It’s just an awesome, talky prequel, with lots of prophetic talk about what will happen in those movies you love so much.
TALKATIVE CHUBSTER SEEKS HUSBAND
A sexually unapologetic fashionista tries to find love in the big city … wait a second! This sounds like the premise of my show, The Mindy Project. But it’s not my fault. I didn’t come up with this format. Not many people know this, but The Mindy Project is actually based on a famous Venezuelan show called Puta Gordita, or “The Chubby Slut.”
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF MINDY KALING
FOR THE PAST eleven years, I have lived the life of a vampire. Starting with The Office, my dual jobs as a comedy writer and an actor required me to wake up before the sun has risen, return home after the sun had set, and pace around in windowless rooms all day. Were I not dark-skinned, my skin would be translucent and pale like a vampire’s. Also, I drink human blood for beauty reasons.
Then, when I created my own show, The Mindy Project, it just got more pronounced. I had to arriv
e earlier to set in the morning, stay later at night, and work on the weekends. It’s a subterranean life for mole people, but as we all know, mole people have exciting and sexy lives. Sure, there are moments of panic and occasional bouts of crying, but there’s also the joy of creating something I love. And since I don’t have kids yet, I don’t have the guilt of leaving them to come to work every day. Ha-ha, working mothers! Suck on my callow existence! I also did that thing that corrupt politicians do where I hired all my friends to work with me, so that’s very nice as well. I like to think of myself as the Rod Blagojevich of television.
“What exactly do you do all day?” people ask me. I think the perception to many is that I sit all day in a candy-colored office surrounded by giggling tweens, where we compare whale-tails and prank-call boys, not unlike Katy Perry’s video for “California Gurls.” I wish that were my life, but sadly it’s not. I would love to have Snoop Dogg waiting in my office in a cupcake-print suit to tell all my problems to. Wouldn’t we all?
To help describe what it’s like, I thought I would show you, for a picture is worth a thousand words (and, as it turns out, a lot easier than writing a thousand words).