{"id":287050,"date":"2026-02-16T18:10:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T18:10:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/287050\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T18:10:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T18:10:09","slug":"its-always-sunny-actor-shelly-desai-dies-aged-90","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/287050\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018It\u2019s Always Sunny\u2019 actor Shelly Desai dies, aged 90"},"content":{"rendered":"

Actor Shelly Desai, who was well-known for starring in It\u2019s Always Sunny In Philadelphia<\/a>, has passed away aged 90.<\/p>\n

Well-known for playing the role of landlord Hwang in the sitcom, Desai appeared in a variety of projects across his career, including in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation as V\u2019Sal, and TV series Men Of A Certain Age as Carlos.<\/p>\n

The news of his passing was confirmed by his family, with stepdaughter Dawn Lerman Vaccaro writing on Facebook: \u201cThe kindest person in the world passed away today. I am beyond heartbroken.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was my mother, Phyllis\u2019s husband, soul mate, \ufffcmy stepfather, my kids grandfather \ufffcand my cheerleader for all \ufffcmy creative projects. \ufffc\ufffcBesides his friend and his family the thing he cared most about was acting and charity. \ufffc\ufffcLast month he filmed three commercials.\u201d<\/p>\n

She added that Desai \u201clived in an amazing life and believed in reincarnation\u201d, encouraging fans to share posts of him to share in a planned documentary, before adding: \u201cWhen we could wrap around our heads around all of this, as it was very sudden, we will print out all these wonderful post memories and stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

She further said in a separate post: \u201cHe was that guy if you watched enough TV, films, or plays, you saw him \u2014 and said it: \u2018Oh, that guy.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cWith over 92 credits, he was a completely memorable character actor who could walk into a scene, raise one eyebrow, and suddenly everyone else had to work harder. That\u2019s how he showed up for his friends and family, too. He was my mom\u2019s longtime boyfriend and soulmate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Desai was born in Mumbai (then Bombay) before moving to the US in the 1960s to pursue studies in engineering, though found his way into acting.<\/p>\n

He established a career in New York theatre in the 1970s, before breaking into TV, with his many credits across the decades including roles in in The A-Team, Hill Street Blues and St. Elsewhere, as well as Friends, E.R., Where On Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? and Curb Your Enthusiasm.<\/p>\n

On the film side of things, he starred in the likes of Phantom Of The Paradise, Toys, Thelma & Louise and Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2.<\/p>\n

Alongside his stepdaughter, Desai is survived by wife Phyllis, stepdaughter April and three grandchildren.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Actor Shelly Desai, who was well-known for starring in It\u2019s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, has passed away aged…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":287051,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[156,111,139,69,38,437],"class_list":["post-287050","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-top-stories","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=287050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/287050\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/287051"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=287050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=287050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=287050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}