Why Not Me? (14 page)

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF MINDY KALING

F
OR 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 arrive 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).

5:00 a.m.

No, this is not a still from
Paranormal Activity
. This is what I look like while I’m sleeping just before my five a.m. alarm. I had my brave assistant Sonia trail me for a few days to document my goings-on. Yes, I am a little worried that these photos are on her phone. No, I didn’t do a background check when I hired her at the bus station. Guys, relax! Sonia’s chill and loves God. That’s what her tattoos say.

5:07 a.m.

Here you can see my daily ritual of lolling in bed for an extra five to seven minutes, delaying the inevitable. This is a portrait of me at my most miserable.

5:15 a.m.

Ah, here we have some naked early-morning showering, just a little something to keep you perverts interested.

5:45 a.m.

Now I begin my drive in the dark from West Hollywood to Universal Studios. I have seen some fascinating examples of humanity in these hours. Meth heads arguing in the parking lot of a Kumon, a man pleasuring himself on a bus-stop bench. Years ago I would’ve called them creeps. Now I call them my commute buddies.

6:00 a.m.

I report to the hair and makeup trailer, where, suddenly, I am completely awake and very chatty. My morning chattiness is not reciprocated by very many other actors I’ve ever worked with. I don’t get it at all. Who wouldn’t like to experience the sun rising to a monologue about Khloe Kardashian’s line of girdles? Adam Pally and Chris Messina like to remain silent in the hours of six a.m. to eight a.m., which is excruciating to me. B. J. Novak is famously grumpy in the morning. After years of morning fights, I finally came up with the brilliant idea of doing a “B.J. coffee check,” where I would peer into his cup of coffee to see how much of it he had drunk. I would not even attempt to talk to him until it was more than two-thirds done.

7:00 a.m.

Now I must put on my costume. Sometimes, it’s a chic layered outfit featuring designers such as Oscar de la Renta or Marni. Other times, it’s a pregnancy fat suit. At the end of season 3, Mindy was pregnant, but when you are a size 10, you’re not super excited about wearing extra padding all day. For vanity reasons, I wanted to be the world’s most svelte expectant mother, so I asked my costume designer, Sal, for the “Bethenny Frankel special.” He said no. What does a pregnancy pad feel like? It feels like wearing Spanx stuffed with a spongy foam pumpkin. Great! Love it! There are no small parts, there are only plump actors who dislike pregnant parts.

7:45 a.m.

Today we are shooting an episode with American treasure Stephen Colbert. He plays a Catholic priest and former drug and sex addict who once did it with Madonna on an airport baggage carousel. I like to take beloved television icons and have them say terrible things on camera for laughs. Peabody this, Colbert.

8:00 a.m.

One of the responsibilities of being a writer-performer is that after I rehearse with the other actors, I make adjustments to the script on the fly. Here’s director Michael Spiller, writer Tracey Wigfield, and me talking through the lines and looking for places we could make changes. Michael’s probably saying something like “This is perfect, I don’t see how you could improve
any
of it! Go to craft services and treat yourself to a doughnut.”

8:20 a.m.

I have two writer-producers on set, the likable Midwestern writing team of Ike Barinholtz and David Stassen. Ike plays Nurse Morgan, and it surprises people that he’s a writer, because Morgan is an ex-con who pronounces the word “intelligence” with a hard
g
. Ike and Dave’s job is to write alts, run them in to the actors on set, and wear matching gingham shirts. For two sweet, well-raised men, their jokes can be breathtakingly raunchy. But at their core, they are old-fashioned Chicago gentlemen who will always open a door for you or eat seventy buffalo wings with you.