when kal penn born kalpen modi decided to split his first name and add an extra n it wasnt an actors obsession with numerology but a brown person in america taking a subtle jab at hollywoods fixation with hokey accents and turbans i joke that the n stands for not going to play a stereotypical cab driver frank and refreshingly free of movie star airs the 44yearold indian american actor spoke to sunday times about some honest and wildly funny stories that have gone into the making of his memoir you cant be seriousthe book is loaded with funny footnotes did it occur to you that nobody actually reads footnotesyes it did occur to me a lot of comedic nuggets are in the footnotes and if you ignore them you wont get all the jokes so theres just one part in the book that my parents had a problem with it was a joke that i made in a footnote about a close cousin weve been playing pranks on each other for years i decided to tell people in the book that he got gonorrhea grins and in the footnote i say he certainly didnt but then nobody reads footnotes and ive won the prank contest nowbe it the kid in kindergarten who called you the nword or aunties who rolled their eyes when you told them that you were going to arts school if you could have a conversation with them now what would you tell themi guess everything in the book laughs much of what kids see and hear comes from some of the things theyre exposed to on tv and the lack thereof the only exposure they had to anyone who looked like me was apu from the simpsons or people from indiana jones and the temple of doom much has changed since then so i dont think i have to go back and say anything to them they have tv as for the auntiesi cant imagine what its like to move halfway around the world away from your family in your 20s at a time when you couldnt even make a phone call i feel silly that i never considered that when i was growing up so aunties and uncles in a place like america where your parents are immigrants are a support network because ten people are there to cheer you on on the downside you have ten people trying to give you adviceas a brown actor in america race and identity issues lie at the heart of your booka lot of stories especially earlier in my career are about race and misogyny at the movie studio but then i put that in the context of today and how wonderful it is to see how things have progressed i couldnt have dreamt of turning on the tv 15 years ago and seeing the types of projects out there today mindy kaling has three shows hasan minhaj is sold out there are so many