Kal Penn's 'Sunnyside': All the actors in the series come with their real-life immigrant stories
A new comedy series, 'Sunnyside' has rolled out on NBC with comedian-actor Kal Penn in the lead. The show centers around the lead character Garrett Modi, the youngest New York City Councilman ever, who lives the American Dream but soon comes crashing down, thanks to the game of power and glamor of politics. His life is changed again when he's hired by a diverse group of idealists who dream of becoming American citizens and give him a new sense of purpose and a chance for redemption, as long as he remembers where he came from.
To keep it real, the show creators brought in a cast of immigrants or their first generation, with the exception of one person. The episodes are peppered with Penn's personal experiences and of the other members of the cast.
"We’re getting real stories in the process… We’re trying to tell a bunch of different stories around the subject. It’s not one specific thing to everyone," creator of the show Matt Murray said during the show’s panel presentation at the summer TCA press tour. Co-creator Chuck Lorre added, "The story we wanted to tell, the story I wanted to tell, is about the greatness of first-generation immigrants [and] about the focus and discipline, the hard work [and] rigorous honesty that goes with coming here and grabbing ahold of the American dream."
Here's a look at the cast and what it was like for them to live the American dream as an immigrant.
Kal Penn
Kal Penn plays the role of Garrett Modi, whose career was ruined by drug charges. The actor, whose real name is Kalpen Suresh Modi, was born in Montclair, New Jersey, to Gujarati Indian immigrant parents. For his summer vacations, he visited Gujarat, India, as a child and has fond memories from his home town.
The actor changed his name as a joke and it worked wonders for him as his audition callbacks rose by 50 percent. "Almost as a joke to prove friends wrong, and half as an attempt to see if what I was told would work (that anglicized names appeal more to a white-dominated industry), I put 'Kal Penn' on my resume and photos."
His interest in politics, later on, grew when he heard stories of his grandparents marching with Mahatma Gandhi during the Indian independence movement. He was also a former White House staffer who spent two years as an associate director in the Office of Public Engagement during the Obama administration.
Diana-Maria Riva
Diana essays the role of Griselda, a hardworking Dominican immigrant and one of Garrett's students who's scared of being deported. Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, she is an American actress of Dominican heritage. Talking about her struggle with adjusting in her family after marriage, Riva said in an interview with Cine Snob, "I married a Mormon. I used to joke that every way we celebrate is a sin to them. His family embraces me. They love and accept me, but there were a couple of things I had to learn about respecting their religion and beliefs."
Joel Kim Booster
Joel Kim Booster plays Jim Hao, a member of a wealthy Asian family seeking American citizenship. Born in South Korea, he was adopted by a white American couple as an infant and was raised in Plainfield, Illinois in a conservative Christian family.
Homeschooled for a long time, he went to public school only when he was 16, which he described as his "first time being around non-religious people." He was gay since childhood but kept it a secret. When his parents found it out after reading his diary, he moved out and began to couch surf until he stayed with a family friend. Later, he found out that the biological son of his parents was also gay. In a stand-up show, he put the spotlight on how he knew he was gay before he knew he was Asian.
Kiran Deol
Kiran Deol plays the role of Mallory in the show. Known for 'How to Get Away with Murder' (2014), 'New Girl' (2011) and 'Farah Goes Bang' (2013), she was born in Britain and raised in Boca Raton, Florida.
In an interview with The Laughter Effect, she shed light on her struggle as an immigrant. "What is more patriotic than an immigrant? I mean immigrants literally embody the fundamental ideals of what the whole nation was founded on and there is something very celebratory about that."
"I hear so much vilification of immigrants in the current climate and there is so much animosity right now towards them. So I decided then to ask, how can I tell a story that’s going to challenge the current rhetoric and say, 'how can you decide if you don’t like immigrants when you haven’t really met that many of them?'" she added.
Poppy Liu
Poppy Liu, who plays Mei Lin in the show, brings her identity as a migrant queer person of the Asian diaspora into the art and entertainment industry. She is a Chinese-American actress born in Xi'An, China, who was raised between Minnesota and Shanghai.
Intermingling with the white culture held her back from one of her greatest passions, poetry. "I didn’t see representations of myself in the world, in a way that represented me or how I felt. And, as is the immigration story of many folks, assimilation and learning Whiteness was a part of my growing up," she said.
Moses Storm
Moses Jacob Storm plays the role of Brady in the show. The actor was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan as one of the six children of missionary parents in a "food insecure" household. Storm and his siblings were raised by their religious parents on a converted Greyhound Bus after he reached the age of two.
Storm recited a well-received monologue for a non-profit group for storytelling, The Moth, titled 'It Pays to Be Poor'and was awarded the title of The #MothGrandSlam Champion for his performance.
Samba Schutte
Samba Schutte plays the role of Hakim. A Dutch-Mauritanian actor, comedian and writer, he was born in the Sahara Desert and grew up in Ethiopia until the age of 18. Frequently mistaken for being an Indian, he said in an interview: "I definitely have fresh energy when I come on-stage because of my background, being African-Dutch, my mother being Muslim, my father being Christian, all those things combine and make everyone just go 'whoa, I didn’t expect this'."
Not only is 'Sunnyside' a lighthearted watch, but also an innovative way to tackle immigration in a new light. Created by Kal Penn and Matt Murray, 'Sunnyside' is all set to roll out on September 26 starting at 9.30 pm on Thursdays.