Mindy Kaling

Vera Mindy Chokalingam, (born June 24, 1979) known professionally as Mindy Kaling, is an American actress, author, comedian, writer and producer who stars as Kelly Kapoor on the NBC sitcom The Office. Kaling is also a co-executive producer and writer of 22 of the Emmy Award-winning show's episodes.

Career
Kaling was last seen on the big screen opposite Ben Stiller and Amy Adams in Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian. She made her film debut as the object of Paul Rudd's unwanted affections in the Judd Apatow directed comedy "The 40-Year Old Virgin." She followed up by voicing the character of "Tourist Mom" in the blockbuster animated comedy Despicable Me. Kaling's first film role was in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which starred Steve Carell. She also made an appearance in the film Unaccompanied Minors as a waitress. In 2007 she held a small part in License to Wed starring fellow The Office actors John Krasinski, Angela Kinsey and Brian Baumgartner.

In Fall of 2011, Kaling will release her first book, titled The Contents of My Purse, which will be published by Random House's Crown imprint. The book will be a collection of comic essays detailing moments from a woman's life, including everything from relationships to fashion. Crown describes Kaling's collection as a mix between her own blog "Things I Bought That I Love" and Nora Ephron's popular Broadway play Love, Loss, and What I Wore. Per Kaling signing her blog posts "Mindy Ephron" and listing the writer-director's You've Got Mail as one of her favorite films, it is evident that Kaling is a big fan of Nora Ephron. Kaling took to her Twitter account to describe the book in her own words: “My book will be essays and personal anecdotes, pictures, fashion, and general opinionated bossiness about how women should live” and “My book will be about being over 30 and settling. ‘Find the Right in Mr. Wrong.’”

Kaling is currently scribing The Low Self Esteem of of Lizzie Gillespie with fellow The Office writer Brent Forrester. Now Variety reports that co-writers Forrester and Kaling are jumping to feature films with The Low Self Esteem of of Lizzie Gillespie - the story of a woman whose lack of self-worth has limited her choice in men to losers until her life takes an unexpected turn when she is pursued by the "hottest guy" ever. Along with Mandate Pictures, producing the film will be fellow actor John Malkovich and his Mr. Mudd production label as well as the team behind 2007's indie hit Juno. Nathan Kahane from Mandate is a big proponent of Kaling and Forrester's writing talents as "the most comically endowed writers out there."

On the side, Kaling writes about shopping in a blog called "Things I Bought That I Love". It recently was featured in Esquire under Women We Love: The Endorsements -- Things We Are Riveted By, Intrigued With, And Incapable of Not Adoring. Kaling has expanded her brand of quirky comedy to the microblogging site, where she now boasts more than 250,000 followers.

What all these projects share is a comedy that majors in romantic entanglements and minors in slapstick. NY Magazine states "Her voice is impassioned, relatable (which might account for the 1.2 million people who follow her on Twitter), and oddly comforting to anyone who has felt like they don’t entirely belong.

The Office
"Well, all the guys want to have sex with me all the time. Every day I come to work it's nonstop sexual harassment. They had to have some people from General Electric come down and talk to us about it. There`s a lawsuit that`s about to happen. But other than that, it`s been great." --- Mindy Kaling On being one of only 2 female writers on a staff of 14 for "The Office" (2005).&#91;1&#93; Kaling can be seen on The Office ''where she stars as Kelly Kapoor. Mindy Kaling's portrayal of airhead Kelly Kapoor on the hit series The Office is so good, it's easy to forget that in real life, her considerable brain power has gone into producing and writing the show as well. Kaling has written over 18 episodes including "Niagara", which scored her an Emmy nod. Kaling has also ventured into directing and wrote and directed the hugely popular webisode and music video "Subtle Sexuality" in 2009. In early 2004, she was hired as a writer and performer for the American version of The Office. In a 2007 interview with The A.V. Club, Kaling stated that the Kelly character is "an exaggerated version of what I think the upper-level writers believe my personality is."&#91;2&#93; After the "Diwali" episode, Kaling appeared with Daniels on NPR's Fresh Air.&#91;3&#93; ''

The Office has been nominated and won multiple awards including: Writers Guild of America Awards, Television Critics Association Awards, Screen Actors Guild Awards, Golden Globe Awards and Emmy Awards. Kaling was singled out when she was nominated for a 2008 Image Award in the "Outstanding Writing in a Comedy Series" category for The Office episode "Branch Wars".

“Mindy has long been considered the best writer on The Office, and every actor on the show thinks she writes for them best. There is the extra little ‘smile’ that infuses her scripts, which is hard to quantify. My guess is that it stems from a real loving sense of the superspecific inner life of every character. Characters aren't joke machines to her, or types to satirize. As a person, she's incredibly sentimental, more than anyone I’ve met, but she's also incredibly sharp. She's unabashedly both. That allows her to express real emotions without shyness, but also without clichés.” B.J. Novak

Most recently, Kaling has directed The Office webisodes of The 3rd Floor. When Ryan (B.J. Novak) decides his next great endeavor is a scary slasher movie, Kelly Kapoor (Mindy Kaling), Erin (Ellie Kemper), Kevin (Brian Baumgartner), Meredith (Kate Flannery), Creed (Creed Bratton), and Gabe (Zach Woods) all pitch in.