{"id":884699,"date":"2026-10-16T19:40:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T19:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/884699\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T19:40:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T19:40:12","slug":"kal-penn-on-playing-anna-nicoles-doctor-working-with-gregg-araki-harold-kumar-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/884699\/","title":{"rendered":"Kal Penn On Playing Anna Nicole’s Doctor, Working With Gregg Araki & ‘Harold & Kumar 4’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tFollowing years of juggling acting and political work, supporting the likes of President Obama and NYC Mayor Mamdani, Kal Penn<\/a> is back in leading man mode.<\/p>\n

\n\tA day after wrapping his role<\/a> in Gregg Araki<\/a>\u2018s The Decline of Fucking Western Civilization, Deadline caught up with the actor about his busy onscreen year that culminates with his portrayal of the late Anna Nicole Smith\u2019s physician, Dr. Sandeep Kapoor, in writer\/director Thane Economou\u2019s Trust Me, I\u2019m a Doctor, which is now playing in theaters.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI was really fascinated mostly with the insecurity of the character of Sandeep, and the vulnerability and this push and pull between\u2014I think five times in the movie, he says, \u2018I\u2019m just a private person, living a private life,\u2019 but then makes every decision contrary to that, just to get attention, right?\u201d explained Penn. \u201cSo, there was that kind of juiciness to a character that I hadn\u2019t played before that attracted me to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBased on Kapoor\u2019s 2017 memoir Trust Me, I\u2019m A Doctor: My Life Before, During and After Anna Nicole Smith, the Economou-helmed biopic recounts the doctor\u2019s professional relationship with Smith as his patient, which was blurred when they began a brief friendship outside the exam room, before her death of a prescription drug overdose on Feb. 8, 2007.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlthough the Medical Board of California launched a review of Dr. Kapoor for prescribing methadone to Smith under a pseudonym in the eighth month of her pregnancy, he was acquitted on all legal counts<\/a> in Smith\u2019s death and allowed to continue his medical practice.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tPenn found during prep for the Briarcliff film that \u201cthe real Sandeep was, to my surprise, very welcoming in letting me shadow him, follow him around.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI had dinner with him tons of times, and I think through that, saw a couple of things that made me think. There are things that he does physically. He sits differently based on who he\u2019s with. If it\u2019s somebody he\u2019s clearly nervous in front of, he sits very differently than friends or family he\u2019s comfortable with. His manner of speaking and his flamboyance also, not that he\u2019s code-switching, but they clearly switch based on who he\u2019s around,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\n\tTelling Kapoor\u2019s story of his experience with Anna Nicole also involved a \u201cguerrilla style\u201d scene filmed in the middle of the 2024 West Hollywood Pride Parade, made to look like WeHo in 2005.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThane, our director, basically had 30 background artists surrounding this car, and it, shot-for-shot, needed to look like the real parade that Anna and Sandeep went on, so everything else in the background is mostly out of focus, unless you could get away with the few things that are remaining from 20 years ago, like Circus of Books,\u201d Penn noted. \u201cBut it was super interesting because you also only had one shot, right? You start at the beginning of the parade and you go through to the end and hope that you get everything you need.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Kal<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tKal Penn as Dr. Sandeep Kapoor and Abbie Cornish as Anna Nicole Smith in \u2018Trust Me, I\u2019m a Doctor\u2019<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBriarcliff Entertainment\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd while Larry Birkhead, the father of Anna Nicole\u2019s daughter Dannielynn, has expressed his disapproval<\/a> of the project, Penn concedes that it\u2019s \u201cnot gonna be a movie for everybody,\u201d but acknowledges that \u201csomebody tragically died, and I would never want to make light of something like that in a film.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tWith a busy year coming to a close, which included a \u201cfun\u201d arc as \u201ca terrible person\u201d in Season 4 of BBC\/HBO\u2019s Industry, Penn is getting ready to return to his roots following last year\u2019s news of a fourth Harold & Kumar<\/a> in the works from writers Jon Hurwitz, Hayden Schlossberg and Josh Heald.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSo, John Cho and I have formally signed on for a fourth film,\u201d confirmed Penn. \u201cJon and Hayden, the amazing screenwriters who\u2019ve written all three movies, they directed the second one, they will direct the fourth one, and they just finished the script, which John and I both read a couple of weeks ago, and I loved it. It tracks with the other three movies, and I\u2019m not just saying this because I play the guy, but it\u2019s one of the funniest scripts that I\u2019ve read in a very long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Linda<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tLinda Hamilton as Ellyn Garofalo and Kal Penn as Dr. Sandeep Kapoor in \u2018Trust Me, I\u2019m a Doctor\u2019 <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBriarcliff Entertainment\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

\n\tPenn added, \u201cSo I\u2019m excited, but it hasn\u2019t yet been greenlit or anything, so I don\u2019t have any actual updates, other than that I read the script and loved it. So hopefully, we get to make the thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, Penn has been busy checking off a bucket list item after working with New Queer Cinema director Gregg Araki on his next film, The Decline of Fucking Western Civilization, a role he told his agent to \u201caggressively pursue\u201d after he first saw Araki speak after a UCLA screening of his 1995 film Doom Generation during Penn\u2019s undergrad years.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI didn\u2019t know anything about the film, you just kind of walk in. I\u2019m like, \u2018This is unlike anything I\u2019d ever seen before.\u2019 And then listening to his Q&A about his kind of guerrilla-style filmmaking and shooting in LA and just doing things the way that he always has done\u2014\u201d recalled Penn. \u201cSo, I was thrilled to join the cast, and I just wrapped.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tRead on about Kal Penn\u2019s experience playing Dr. Sandeep Kapoor in Trust Me, I\u2019m a Doctor, now in theaters, as well as his upcoming roles in Harold & Kumar 4, Gregg Araki\u2019s The Decline of Fucking Western Civilization and more.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: What was it about this perspective of Anna Nicole\u2019s story that appealed to you?<\/p>\n

\n\tKAL PENN: So, I didn\u2019t know very much about her story, and if I\u2019m being honest, I still don\u2019t, because the arc of playing Sandeep in the film is kind of start-to-finish from before he meets Anna to after her passing. And so, I never did the research into her, cause it just made it easier to be Sandeep. And then you wrap a film, and you\u2019re like, \u201cOK, that was it.\u201d \u2026 But the reason I said yes to the movie, I remember being a young actor in LA, at the nascent days of reality TV, and I think there was one party I went to, like an awards show, that Anna was at, but she was there with like four cameras and a huge entourage, and it was clear she was shooting a reality show. But I remember my friends and I were like, \u201cOh, does she have a reality show because that\u2019s how she actually behaves, or is she behaving that way because she has a reality show?\u201d And that\u2019s a question that the film doesn\u2019t fully answer either, it\u2019s an open question by the end of our movie. But that\u2019s all I knew about her, right? It\u2019s like, \u201cOh yeah, that\u2019s Anna Nicole Smith from that reality show.\u201d So, I see the email come in from my agent for this movie, and it was a short logline that I just skimmed, and then the script was attached. And as I\u2019m clicking on the script, I think to myself like, \u201cOh yeah, I know this story. This is about that doctor who\u2019s in prison for murdering Anna Nicole Smith.\u201d And then I started reading the script, I was like, \u201cThis is not at all what happened. How do I think that\u2019s what happened?\u201d I never followed the case or anything, but why do I think that\u2019s what happened? And then I was like, \u201cAm I one of these people who reads three tweets and thinks I\u2019m an expert on something?\u201d So, I read the script with that in my head and was really fascinated mostly with the insecurity of the character of Sandeep, and the vulnerability and this push and pull between\u2014I think five times in the movie, he says, \u201cI\u2019m just a private person, living a private life,\u201d but then makes every decision contrary to that, just to get attention, right? So, there was that kind of juiciness to a character that I hadn\u2019t played before that attracted me to it.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: What was it like undergoing the physical transformation and changing your voice for the role?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: So obviously, Anna Nicole Smith was in the public eye as a character. Sandeep is an interesting character to play because he wasn\u2019t. I guess he was in the public eye, and therefore fair game and all of that, but he\u2019s not like a household name, and I think the biggest decision in trying to figure out with Thane, our writer-director, about the right way to play him was like, \u201cI just need to ground these vulnerabilities, and these poor ethical decisions in something bigger than what\u2019s on the script,\u201d and the real Sandeep was, to my surprise, very welcoming in letting me shadow him, follow him around. I had dinner with him tons of times, and I think through that, saw a couple of things that made me think. There are things that he does physically. He sits differently based on who he\u2019s with. If it\u2019s somebody he\u2019s clearly nervous in front of, he sits very differently than friends or family he\u2019s comfortable with. His manner of speaking and his flamboyance also, not that he\u2019s code-switching, but they clearly switch based on who he\u2019s around. So, there was a bit of Alexander Technique, there was a bit of backstory to ground all of that, but that\u2019s kind of what went into the transformation. It isn\u2019t necessary because for me, it made a lot of sense, some of the things that you kind of learn about him based on all that.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Abbie<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tAbbie Cornish as Anna Nicole Smith and Kal Penn as Dr. Sandeep Kapoor <\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBriarcliff Entertainment\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: It\u2019s funny you bring that up because that was one part of it that I really resonated with, his experience as a closeted gay man, and that one scene at the West Hollywood Pride Parade really made me happy, just seeing that through his eyes, not just befriending Anna Nicole, but being around all of these people who accept him for him, and I\u2019m curious what was it like for you filming that scene?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: That scene is an interesting one, especially hearing your take on it, because in reality, Sandeep told me he had been to the Abbey tons of times with his friends, always had a great time, but generally felt invisible in that space. So, guys weren\u2019t coming up to him to strike up a conversation. Some of that may have been because he\u2019s a nerdy brown doctor, and Weho at that time especially was fairly homogeneous, the standard of beauty was very different. It still is like that, but thankfully less so compared to 20 years ago. So, what he had told me, and this actually ties into an earlier part of getting to know him a little bit, when I shadowed him for the first time, something clicked. I went to his office, it\u2019s still in the Valley, same office as before, it\u2019s small. And when you go in, there are like three receptionists, and his little waiting room, and then maybe three exam rooms. Glenn, I don\u2019t know about you, but when I make an appointment to see my doctor, I either talk to a fucking AI slop bot that makes my blood boil, or I have to log in and pick a slot. And in both cases, there\u2019s no appointments for like seven and a half weeks. So, when I saw the way that Sandeep works, and there\u2019s a human who picks up the phone and he knows all of his patients \u2026 it was that 1950s personal touch of doing medicine that immediately made me recognize, \u201cOK, it\u2019s not weird that Anna invited him to Pride,\u201d because it was common for him to get invitations to somebody\u2019s bar mitzvah, or your patient\u2019s Super Bowl party. Those were just things that would happen. So, when Anna invited him to the Pride Parade and then to the Abbey, it made sense that he would go. What didn\u2019t make sense is, you could have two champagnes with your patient\/acquaintance. Don\u2019t have nine bottles of champagne with her, and then don\u2019t make out with her on the couch next to the dance floor. These are objectively horrendous decisions, right? So, I think knowing all of that and then knowing in the real world, this was very grounding for me, knowing that the real Sandeep had been to the Abbey and enjoyed it, but the way he was experiencing it through the lens of Anna, it was clear to him that he was getting tons of attention from all of these people, because he was in her proximity and her orbit, and he knew that wasn\u2019t real for him. But it was so intoxicating for the night, that to me that was fun, it was tragic, it was heartbreaking. It was also no sympathy for somebody who\u2019s making bad decisions. It was all of those things, it was a night at the Abbey, you know?<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: Yeah. Did y\u2019all actually shoot at the Abbey?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: No, we shot most of the movie in Toronto, so this was a nondescript club in Toronto. The only stuff we shot in the States, in LA, was the Pride Parade stuff.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: Yeah, I was gonna say I saw y\u2019all going past Circus of Books. Was it actually filmed during the Pride Parade?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: Yeah, it was guerrilla style, so Thane, our director, basically had 30 background artists surrounding this car, and it, shot-for-shot, needed to look like the real parade that Anna and Sandeep went on, so everything else in the background is mostly out of focus, unless you could get away with the few things that are remaining from 20 years ago, like Circus of Books, so that\u2019s why you got a good shot of that. but it was super interesting because you also only had one shot, right? You start at the beginning of the parade and you go through to the end and hope that you get everything you need.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: What was it like shooting the make-out\/vomit scene, cause that seems like it could have gone wrong.<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: It was fun. I mean, it was one of those scenes that it\u2019s like 7:30 in the morning in a dingy club in Toronto. I know the story that everybody wants to hear is, \u201cWas it late at night and were you guys having a good time?\u201d Yes, we were having a good time. It\u2019s just like, first up after brushing your teeth, you get to puke.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: It broke my heart that he was forced to publicly come out in order to save his career, but it did make me happy when he finally came out to his dad. Tell me about exploring that dynamic.<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: It\u2019s funny, a lot of people are asking about that dynamic. I think it\u2019s interesting because it\u2019s not as compelling to me as the horrific decisions that he made. I know why we have it in the script, because you need something personal to flavor this. Otherwise, it\u2019s a legal drama, but the parts that drove the stuff that maybe culminates with the scene with his dad, there are multiple scenes that I have with Linda Hamilton, where I, as Sandeep, am withholding critical legal information from my defense lawyer, which is like, \u201cWhy would you do that?\u201d And it shows you the psychology of, he thinks that he\u2019s doing the right thing. So no matter what missteps he\u2019s making, and I think now having it out there and audiences seeing it, watching it, going, \u201cDo not make this decision, I\u2019m watching a train wreck, I\u2019m passing a car accident on the 405, I know it\u2019s gonna be bad. I know you\u2019re making this decision. I wish you wouldn\u2019t\u2014yep, there you go, you did it.\u201d It\u2019s like, understanding why he does that, he thinks it\u2019s gonna be the right thing. I remember asking him, \u201cWhy did you take the files home from your office?\u201d And hindsight\u2026 Sandeep\u2019s like, \u201cIt\u2019s two things. One, I probably shouldn\u2019t have, clearly.\u201d But he had paparazzi posing as patients, coming into his office, trying to get appointments with him. And he genuinely believed that they were gonna come in, break in in the middle of the night, and steal Anna\u2019s files, and all of her medical information would get out there. And I was just like, \u201cYeah, but the only other choice was to take home the files?\u201d I\u2019m like, \u201cBro, this does not add up. Those are not the only two choices in life, right?\u201d So to me, it\u2019s the way that he talks himself into this circle of poor decision-making that I never considered were for him, a lie on a lie on a lie. And I think in exploring the relationship with his dad, you can see the weight that had on him. In real life, if I\u2019m remembering this correctly, the real Sandeep was very open with his mom and with all of his friends, and so, crafting that relationship with the dad and the parents was, I think for Thane, a little bit more of a creative liberty for the film. It\u2019s also why I think I gravitate so much towards the bad decisions that he made with his vulnerability as opposed to any of the identity stuff, whether it\u2019s ethnic identity or sexuality or anything like that.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: I\u2019m curious if you happen to have seen Larry Birkhead\u2019s response<\/a>?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: I did, yeah.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: What were your thoughts?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: You know, I didn\u2019t really have thoughts on it, only because I think I was so hyper-focused on trying to bring Sandeep to life. I also know very little about the real Anna Nicole Smith. I think the one thing that that was important to me was, somebody tragically died, and I would never want to make light of something like that in a film. So, I remember asking Thane, I was like, \u201cThis is kind of being pitched as a dark comedy. I hope the comedy is not in the tragic passing of this woman.\u201d He\u2019s like, \u201cNo, no, no, of course not.\u201d And then you read the script and you see the dark comedy comes from the self-deprecation of Sandeep. But of course, I mean, people will have their opinions on it. It\u2019s not gonna be a movie for everybody, and so if there are folks who feel like this is disturbing for any reason, I\u2019m not the guy who\u2019s like, \u201cYou should see it anyway.\u201d You should skip this one.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"New<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tKal Penn and John Cho in \u2018Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle\u2019 (2004)<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tNew Line\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: I know that someone was talking about a fourth Harold and Kumar<\/a> not too long ago. Is that happening?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: Yeah. \u2026 So, John Cho and I have formally signed on for a fourth film, which I think Deadline reported on a couple of months ago. Jon [Hurwitz] and Hayden [Schlossberg], the amazing screenwriters who\u2019ve written all three movies, they directed the second one, they will direct the fourth one, and they just finished the script, which John and I both read a couple of weeks ago, and I loved it. It tracks with the other three movies, and I\u2019m not just saying this because I play the guy, but it\u2019s one of the funniest scripts that I\u2019ve read in a very long time. \u2026 You kind of can\u2019t make a movie like this unless it sticks with the satire and the reflection of what\u2019s happening in the world, in a way that only I think Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg can write, and I just thought it was so smartly done with the appropriate amount of the dumb jokes that always come with the Harold & Kumar movie, so I\u2019m excited, but it hasn\u2019t yet been greenlit or anything, so I don\u2019t have any actual updates, other than that I read the script and loved it. So hopefully, we get to make the thing. I usually text them once every two and a half, three weeks to be like, \u201cAny updates?\u201d So, I will do that this afternoon.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: I love the franchise, and I\u2019m curious, are you and John Cho down to keep this franchise going to the grave? We see Cheech and Chong still out there, kicking it.<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: You\u2019d have to ask John for his thoughts. I can tell you that over the years, I think after the starting with the second movie, I was basically like, \u201cMy gosh, what good fortune do I have to be able to make these kinds of things?\u201d I had loved comedy before, obviously not to compare Harold & Kumar to something that I revere, but one of the things I loved about the writing from the Jon and Hayden brains was that it almost reminded me of \u2026 one of the reasons that I loved the Muppets, and never shed my love for the Muppets in the years since, is that some of the early Muppet movies, there are jokes that are clearly in there for the adults in the room, and then there\u2019s the other stuff for the kids. And I think that what they do with these movies is, if you just wanna walk in and laugh with your friends, which is really the goal ultimately, satire and commentary aside, the number one goal of these things is always to just make anybody laugh. You laugh and you leave happy with your friends, and if you wanna find the satire in it and you like that, that\u2019s obviously in there for you too. So, I just sort of loved that and was like, \u201cI feel lucky to begin with that we made, we got to make three of them. I\u2019d be very happy if we made 50 of them before I died.\u201d I just think that the character is also so much cooler than I will ever be, and especially as the world has gotten more and more polarized, it\u2019s one of the things I love about those characters is that it means a lot to me. I\u2019ve talked to Jon and Hayden about this, and they feel the same way. It means a lot to us that people enjoy it across the political spectrum, and that\u2019s been very cool, that in a world in which we have relatively few things that we can do together anymore, I like that food, comedy, movies, music, those are still things that can kind of have that magic, and that\u2019s been very cool to see also.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: Well, as a gay stoner who went to Harold & Kumar in theaters when I was in middle school, I\u2019m looking forward to the next one.<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: Oh, thank you. OK, you\u2019re a gay stoner\u2014I just wrapped this Gregg Araki movie yesterday.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: I love Gregg. You\u2019re working with him on The Decline of Fucking Western Civilization? Awesome title. How did you come onto the project?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: So, I signed with Anonymous Content recently, and my manager basically reached out. It was like, \u201cThere\u2019s a role in the new Gregg Araki movie\u2014\u201d and I like interrupted it, but I was like, \u201cOK, let\u2019s go ahead and make that happen.\u201d He\u2019s like, \u201cWell, I\u2019m sending you the script, and here\u2019s all the details for the meetings and the all of that.\u201d It was one of those things, it almost sounds cliche, but I was like, \u201cI mean, obviously I will read it, but I can tell you right now I would like to aggressively pursue this.\u201d And part of the reason was, the first movie I saw when I moved out to LA, I did undergrad at UCLA, and it was literally the first week of theater and film school. There was a Doom Generation screening on campus, and Gregg and the cast came to do a panel and a Q&A. And I didn\u2019t know anything about the film, you just kind of walk in. I\u2019m like, \u201cThis is unlike anything I\u2019d ever seen before.\u201d And then listening to his Q&A about his kind of guerrilla style filmmaking and shooting in LA and just doing things the way that he always has done\u2014which when I talked to him about this movie, I obviously told him that story. But he\u2019s like, \u201cYou know, I always shoot in LA. I\u2019ve never shot anywhere else.\u201d And he\u2019s just sort of walking you through the things that I guess I knew as a Gregg Araki fan, but it was very cool to actually hear. So, I was thrilled to join the cast, and I just wrapped.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"Kal<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tKal Penn and Max Minghella in \u2018Industry\u2019<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSimon Ridgway\/HBO<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: You\u2019ve been doing a lot of really cool roles lately, and I was also curious about joining Industry for Season 4. What was it like working with those guys?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: That was awesome. Mickey [Down] and Konrad [Kay] are two of the smartest and most insane writers. Every script that we had, I was like, \u201cThis is amazing. I can\u2019t believe I get to do and say this.\u201d I don\u2019t know what most actors say, but I\u2019ll tell you, I always feel like, playing a terrible person is way more fun than than playing somebody who\u2019s good. And so, the Industry world, I was a fan of before, because it\u2019s a world that I don\u2019t actually know personally, but the scripts and the storylines were so insane that that was another one where that kind of offer came through, and I was super excited. It turned out that both of them are actually big Harold & Kumar fans, which is how I guess my name entered their psyche for this particular role. And I loved that they kind of counter-cast it, like Kumar is this wonderfully gregarious, friendly guy who\u2019s everybody\u2019s best friend, and the Jonah character I play in Industry is very much the opposite, incredibly flawed, womanizing, misogynistic, greed-fueled, at least you think so until you realize he also got fucked over by Max Minghella\u2019s character. But I had the best time making that. We were in London and Cardiff for I guess about two months last year, and those are the kind of writers where they\u2019re so smart\u2014to me, that show is not binge-able because it\u2019s so dark, in the same way that Succession was not binge-able for me, which is a testament to how good it is, where it\u2019s like I need a week or two between episodes to sit with this. I need to sit with it and think about it. But then, the rewatch rate for me is super high also, where I\u2019ll go back and catch things that I hadn\u2019t caught the first time. Just kind of placing a lot of those things in the work when you\u2019re doing that was great. And most of my scenes were with Max Minghella, who I just think the world of. What a phenomenal actor and director.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: But I know your character Jonah might have an ax to grind. Do you think he could potentially come back for Season 5?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: I would love if he did. I don\u2019t know if he will. Look, I\u2019ll take him if he comes back. I definitely think he left with a huge ax to grind, and the last scene that you see him in is just wasted at a strip club in Miami, so who knows where he goes? But you know what, let me pitch him, to throw this one out there. He he could do a spin-off. That\u2019d be fine\u2026 I mean, that\u2019s not a real thing.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: Let\u2019s just manifest it.<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: Sure, sure, I\u2019d do that. My point is, it\u2019s rare to have kind of all those layers and that darkness to a world. Prepping for that, I remember texting either Mickey or Konrad. I was like, \u201cHey, I\u2019m walking around. I had a list of places where bankers go in London, Canary Wharf. What\u2019s a good bar if I wanna just listen and eavesdrop on conversations with bankers?\u201d And they\u2019re like, \u201cWhy would you do that? Go have a nice fucking meal at Chiltern Firehouse. Don\u2019t.\u201d I was like, \u201cNo, no, no, guys. Come on, I\u2019m not method, but I\u2019ve got this week to immerse myself in this insanity.\u201d I just think they\u2019re so thoughtful, they know that world really well, but they\u2019re not restricted by it. The friends I talked to who work in that world, they\u2019re like, \u201cYeah, a lot of that stuff comes from a very real place.\u201d It\u2019s clear that they had spent time there before crafting these characters, and so, as somebody with very little business sense, I just love a good nerdy deep dive into character background and what the hell I\u2019m actually doing, learning all the terms. \u2026 I love the research that goes into it. And so, for something like Industry, even for a half-season arc, it was cool to just be fully immersive and kind of learn as much about that world as possible, to bring that shady dude to life.<\/p>\n

\n\tDEADLINE: I know you have a few other upcoming projects. Can you say anything about Contra or What the Fuck Is My Password?<\/p>\n

\n\tPENN: Yeah, What the Fuck Is My Password is very funny. It\u2019s basically about, a guy who essentially loses a crypto password, and things that happen to him after that. I\u2019ll be vague because I can\u2019t remember how much they put out there, but it was very funny. We shot that in New Jersey. And then Contra is this super dark, almost like a 1980s style chess thriller that\u2019s based on\u2014I didn\u2019t know that this was real. There are these underground chess competitions called Contra, where basically these really good world-class chess players will get a shady sponsor who has to drop like $100,000 as an entry fee, for example, to these underground competitions, in the hopes that they also will then recoup most of the winnings, go to the person who invested in the entry fee for this contestant. So, this is a movie about the underworld of that and the greed. So, I play a not nice guy. I play one of the gangsters who\u2019s kind of controlling one of these Contra chess organizations. It was very cool. We shot in Bangkok last year, and I think they\u2019re wrapping up post now. But it was interesting, the movie doesn\u2019t take place in Bangkok, so it was one of those tax benefit things that I guess the producers felt like that was the best place to shoot. But the crews are fantastic. It\u2019s definitely a grittier feel. I haven\u2019t seen the rough cut yet, but at least what they were going for stylistically was the Rambo, Terminator, late 1980s, early 1990s kind of feel. So visually, I think it\u2019ll look pretty wild.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Following years of juggling acting and political work, supporting the likes of President Obama and NYC Mayor Mamdani,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":884700,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[88,171447,371298,62845,206,371299,324796],"class_list":["post-884699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-gregg-araki","tag-harold-kumar","tag-kal-penn","tag-movies","tag-the-decline-of-fcking-western-civilization","tag-trust-me-im-a-doctor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=884699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/884700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=884699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=884699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=884699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}