Howdy, Young Mindy! Netflix’s Never Have I Ever set for release on April 27.
1. Release Date & Trailer
Hollywood’s South Asian powerhouse of comedy, Mindy Kaling, is once again the talk of the town with her latest creation Never Have I Ever set to hit Netflix screens on April 27.
What is more, Mindy brings with her the story of a nerdy brown teen’s hormone-charged sophomore year in present-day America!
Never Have I Ever follows 15-year-old Devi, who desperately wants to lose her virginity and shed her reputation as a “not so doable nerd.”
Devi is being played by a 17-year-old Tamil-Canadian newcomer, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan. In the most 21st century way ever, Kaling had posted all over her social media that she was looking for South Asian females for a new Netflix show. And Maitreyi was selected from an open audition of over 17,000 girls.
A dashing Richa Shukla plays Kamala, Devi’s cousin from India, who is getting her Ph.D. from Caltech. While Poorna Jagannathan (seen on Big Little Lies) is set to take on the role of Nalini, Devi’s mother.
Other actors included in the cast are Benjamin Norris, Adam Shapiro, and Ramona Young.
2. Devi as a Young Mindy?
In an interview with Variety, Mindy explained how the show came to be. “Netflix approached me about doing a series on young Mindy,” she said. “I wasn’t as interested in telling a period piece about an Indian girl growing up in the ’80s, but I told them I’d love to do a show about a 15-year-old Indian girl now.” Thus, was the show born!
Coming from a family of architects and doctors, Mindy’s teen years still seem quite similar to Devi’s – that of an overachieving nerd struggling to deal with all her raging hormones.
According to Mindy, growing up in Cambridge, Massachusetts, she spent her high school days “staring longingly at boys who would never look at me and having, like, very inappropriate thoughts about them.”
However, it doesn’t make Mindy feel frivolous about her work. In a 2014 interview to Guardian, she recalled how her ailing mother suffering from cancer would love to sit down with her children to watch Modern Family.
“When my mom was very sick, we’d watch Modern Family, and it was a rest from that situation, that was so wonderfully needed. I know that’s what entertainment can do at its very best,” she said.
Given the times of corona and social distancing in what was once a globalized world, Mindy’s latest production could not have come at a more opportune moment. A relief and a refuge in comedy when all that is heard is horrifying news everywhere!
Co-created with Lang Fisher – you guessed it right, of the Brooklyn Nine-Nine fame –Never Have I Ever promises big laughs even in the trailer released this week.
Also, the show has been narrated by tennis legend John McEnroe. Growing up, Kaling’s parents were huge fans of McEnroe, so it’s a perfect fit for him to have a role in the series based on Mindy’s teenage years.
3. Brown Relativity
Mindy Kaling is known to humorously tackle questions of racism and sexism in her works. Of Never Have I Ever, Kaling says that “we are programmed to see Asian girls in a certain way on teen shows” — often as nerds with overbearing parents.
While examples of white teens misbehaving abound in pop culture—think Superbad or Booksmart—we don’t see it as often for Indian girls or black girls or Asian girls.
“Seeing a South Asian lead character just be a ‘normal’ American kid, to me that’s unusual, you never see that on television. But the good news is that it’s totally normal now. I’m excited for people to check it out,”
said series director Kabir Akhtar in an interview
South Asian families will especially find the show relatable, considering the creators have inspired Nalini’s character from Mindy’s own brown parents.
“South Asians will threaten violence very casually–I grew up with my mom saying things like, ‘If you drop the cookie on the Persian rug, I’ll break your arms and legs and throw them out of the house.’ And that’s kind the stuff that will come out of my mouth sometimes with my own children–so the character very much lives in the world I grew up in,”
said Poorna Jagannathan, playing the role of Devi’s mom
Get your Netflix passwords ready for a laughter riot this quarantine season starting April 27 coz Mindy be returnin’ to town!
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