Not My Job: Mindy Kaling Gets Quizzed On Do-It-Yourself Projects

Transcript

PETER SAGAL, HOST:

And now the game where we like to invite on very accomplished people, like Kim Kardashian...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...So they can do little quiz we call Not My Job. Mindy Kaling went from being the youngest writer on the staff of NBC's "The Office" to being a star, producer and director of that show. She went on to create her own sitcom, "The Mindy Project." She is also the voice of Disgust in the new Pixar movie "Inside Out." We are delighted to have her with us. Mindy Kaling, welcome to WAIT WAIT ...DON'T TELL ME.

(APPLAUSE)

MINDY KALING: Thank you.

SAGAL: So whenever I talk to very funny grown-ups, like yourself, I always want to know - were you a funny kid?

KALING: No. I was - I was, like, a silent, sullen, fat kid.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: That was my thing.

SAGAL: Really?

KALING: Yeah. I was kind of - like, I was kind of unfriendly and suspicious of everyone around me. (Laughter) And I kind of - I didn't talk until I was about 15. It's a kind of famous story at my house.

SAGAL: Really? So you were...

FAITH SALIE: Were you writing furiously in a diary or something? How were you expressing yourself?

KALING: That would've been so much better. I...

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: I did a little bit of - I did a little bit of writing, but mostly I was just, like, harboring jealousies and anxieties.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Really?

KALING: Yeah.

LUKE BURBANK: It's so great that you got into this kind of work, then, 'cause there's no room for jealousy or anxiety in Hollywood.

SAGAL: Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: Yeah. I found it to be smooth sailing - 100 percent smooth sailing my whole career.

SAGAL: I see that. Yeah, obviously everything's gone privately well for you. But in a weird way, it has 'cause you're extremely funny and talented. And did you - when did start, like, acting that way?

KALING: Well, I think - when I was younger I would audition for plays in junior high and high school, and I would always get cast as, like, the homeless woman or vagrant.

(LAUGHTER)

BURBANK: Was that a high school play or a Phil Collins video?

KALING: Yeah, I know. Exactly. And so my parents would come to shows, and - God bless them - they would try to muster up some excitement. They were like, oh, I see - I see you're pulling another hobo. And I'm like, yes, thanks.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: So that, like, happened, like, 23 consecutive times until I moved to New York City after college. And then - and then I wrote a play, and after that play, I got hired on "The Office."

SAGAL: Well, it's kind of amazing. I want to stop and talk about that play, which I wish I could have seen. The play was you and a friend of yours, who is also female, playing Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.

KALING: Yeah.

SALIE: And you were Matt, right?

KALING: I was actually Ben. I'm surprised you couldn't have guessed that.

SAGAL: Yeah, well...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Come on, Faith.

SALIE: I'm so sorry.

SAGAL: She so obviously more of a Ben.

KALING: I'm so obviously - my demeanor, my interests. I mean, but, yeah, we played - we wrote this little play - a little strange, like, hour-long play, a comedy play. It's just a two-person play where we played Matt Damon and Ben Affleck when they were 21 years old. And the premise of this whole story was that we were - I'm trying to adapt "Catcher In The Rye" into a movie to star in.

SAGAL: Yeah.

KALING: It's like my - as Ben Affleck at 21 years old.

SAGAL: When you were doing Ben Affleck as a young...

KALING: I love that beginning. Yeah.

SAGAL: When you are doing Ben Affleck...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: When you were performing...

KALING: (Inaudible).

SAGAL: When you are performing Ben Affleck...

BURBANK: That's not a lot better.

KALING: That's not that much better. Yes.

SAGAL: ...Did you actually try to imitate Ben Affleck?

KALING: By the way, this is extremely challenging when you sound like a 12-year-old girl, and you decide your first personal endeavor is to play, like, a - like, a very macho dude. But he was always very miffed at Matt. Like, he always felt - the character, as we wrote him, was always very miffed that, like, Matt was trying to make other friends and, like, go do stuff.

SAGAL: Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: He would always be like, hey, man, well, I've been waiting to come see you for, like, two hours. Where are you? Who are you hanging out with? Like, that was - like, he was just - that was him.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: That - wait a minute. That part right there - that was Ben Affleck and not you?

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: Hey, listen, OK, I didn't say I was, like, some virtuosic comedian with impressions.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: So you did incredibly well on "The Office." You became well-known, and you got your own sitcom. And could you describe the character that you chose to play on that sitcom? You created it yourself, right?

KALING: Yeah. She's kind of a disaster. Like, she's a very - Mindy Lahiri, the character I play on "The Mindy Project" - is, like, very selfish, very wild. The kind of fun thing about the show is that my character has dated more men than I've ever met in my life.

SAGAL: Really?

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: Yeah. Like, she's dated - I think she's dated, like - I think I've certainly made out with, like, 30 men on my show or something like that.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: I understand that in your book, you reveal that all actors lie about sex scenes in some way?

KALING: Yes, I - that is probably my biggest contribution, I think, with my book - is that...

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: Every actor pretends that they hate sex scenes, and the truth is that they all love them, and they're lying.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Now, wait a minute.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: My understanding of the way sex scenes work - and I've never been on a set for a sex scene, but I've read about them - is that you're surrounded by crew, and you're cold, and you have to do it eight times 'cause they didn't get the lighting. It doesn't sound pleasant, but you think that actors actually enjoy it?

KALING: Oh, 100 percent. Yeah.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: I mean, you basically get to make out with a good-looking stranger, and it's like the only loophole in existence were like that is allowable within marriage.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: So, Mindy, I want to ask you about the new Pixar movie "Inside Out" coming out this weekend. It all takes place - or mostly takes place inside the mind of a little girl, and you play one of her emotions. You play Disgust. So what was it like when they came to you and said, we want you, Mindy Kaling, to voice Disgust?

KALING: I said, how dare you.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: I've never been so insulted in my life (laughter). I'm a beautiful angel. How could you pick me for Disgust?

(LAUGHTER)

BURBANK: Frankly, I'm disgusted you would even suggest that.

KALING: And I'm disgusted. And then I was like wait a second. I like this character. I know I was just upset. Well, the thing with the character of Disgust is she's - she is, like, a tiny, green, mean girl. She's, like, a 12-year-old girl who's, like, incredibly impatient and hates everything and is always rolling her eyes.

SAGAL: Right.

KALING: So I feel like I've made a career off of playing versions of this.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Right.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: This was a character, as they say, that was in my wheelhouse.

SAGAL: Right.

KALING: Ben Affleck, Disgust - like, these are two things I can play.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Well, Mindy Kaling, what a pleasure to talk to you. We've invited you to play a game we're calling...

BILL KURTIS, BYLINE: It's The Home Improvement Project.

SAGAL: So you do a show called "The Mindy Project."

KALING: No, I understood it, and I enjoy it. Thank you.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: All right.

(SOUNDBITE OF CHEERING)

SAGAL: Let just explain for the slower people. You have a show called "The Mindy Project," so we thought we'd ask you three questions about different kind of projects - home improvement projects. Get two of these right, you will win our prize for one of our listeners. That prize, of course, Carl Kasell's voice. Bill Curtis, who is Mindy Kaling playing for?

KURTIS: Olivia Otieno from Nairobi, Kenya.

SAGAL: Really? Nairobi.

SALIE: Wow.

KALING: Whoa.

SAGAL: Yeah, I know. It's heavy.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: The heat is on.

SAGAL: On two separate occasions - this is your first question. On two separate occasions, Home Depot has faced lawsuits from would-be do-it-yourselfers who were very upset when they went to a Home Depot and what happened? A, they went to the restroom and found the toilet seats were strongly, quote, "adhesive," unquote. B, floor staffers called them, quote, "Homo-Depot-sexuals" (ph).

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Or, C, they searched the store for someone to help them and realized the place had been completely abandoned for hours.

KALING: Abandoned how? Like, "Walking Dead"-style, where there's, like, (inaudible). I don't understand.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: That would be - that would be more helpful. I have been at the Home Depot...

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: ...looking for help for hours. And if I had seen a zombie...

BURBANK: Yeah.

SAGAL: ...With the apron, I would've asked the zombie for help.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: All right, but one of those things happened twice, leading to lawsuits.

KALING: OK. I wish it was the first one because that is a - that's a great image to have in my head, but I feel it's the last one.

SAGAL: The answer actually was the first one.

AUDIENCE: Oh.

SAGAL: It was the adhesive toilet seats.

KALING: Oh, man.

SAGAL: They feel that the adhesive - this happened once in Colorado and once in St. Louis, and they actually think that that the St. Louis incident was a copycat gluer.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: Somebody heard about the first incident and said, I'm to do that at my Home Depot. All right. Customers themselves sometimes misbehave down at the Home Depot, such is the case in which two people did what? A, used one of those pre-assembled storage shed they've got in the parking lot for a private assignation, if you know what I mean. B, had a loud and dangerous light saber fight in the aisle with fluorescent tubes.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: C, tried to give one of the many toilets on display in a real-life test.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: OK, I'm - each image was so vivid that I forgot the question.

SAGAL: All right.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: One of these things happened. Somebody was arrested for one of these things. Was it when, A, two people got into one of those sheds and got busy in the parking lot.

KALING: Yeah. Right. Who hasn't done that? I don't know why anyone would get arrested for that. Yeah. Continue.

(LAUGHTER)

SAGAL: You may not have known that was illegal, Mindy, but just for future...

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: It is my God-given right to go to a shed at any Home Depot and do what I like in there.

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: What if it was - what if it was - what if was the first one?

SAGAL: What if it was the first one?

KALING: Yeah.

SAGAL: If it was the first one, I'd say you are right. Do you want to pick the first one?

KALING: I want to pick the first one.

SAGAL: You're right. Hey.

(APPLAUSE)

KALING: (Inaudible).

SAGAL: This happened in South Carolina - 2013. The couple was removed from the shed and charged with indecent exposure and disorderly conduct. All right. Last question, Mindy. If you get this right, you win. There are plenty of celebrity home improvement specialists you can turn to on TV, including which of these? A, Lee Majors, host of "The $6 Million Bathroom." B, Mr. T., host of "I Pity The Tool." Or, C, Mikael Gorbachev, former Soviet premier, host of "Tear Down That Wall And Put Up A New One."

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: It couldn't - the second one is so silly. That can't be real.

BURBANK: Have you seen TV?

(LAUGHTER)

KALING: You're right. I'm also - I also produce the silliest show on TV.

SAGAL: Yeah.

KALING: OK, yeah, maybe the second one.

SAGAL: Mr. T., "I Pity The Tool - is that your choice?

KALING: Is that - yes, that's my choice.

SAGAL: It is true. That is the one.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Bill, how did Mindy Kaling do on our show?

KURTIS: Mindy got two right. The audience got three right.

(LAUGHTER)

KURTIS: So put them together, and Mindy's a winner.

(APPLAUSE)

SAGAL: Congratulations, Mindy.

KALING: Thank you.

SAGAL: Mindy Kaling is, of course, a TV star, a producer, a best-selling author and stars in the new Pixar movie "Inside Out," opening this weekend. Mindy Kaling, thank you so much for joining us. What fun to talk to you.

(APPLAUSE)

KALING: Thank you, guys.

SAGAL: Bye-bye. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.