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" There was one week where I got mistaken for Hasan Minhaj, who is on 'The Daily Show;' Kunal Nayyar, who's on 'Big Bang Theory;' and Karan Soni of 'Ghostbusters.' This was one week. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Theory
Big
Daily
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" You really need to have that discipline. It's not even discipline. I just put down these rules. It's not like a vague, 'Motivate yourself!' and do something. It's specific hours set aside every day for certain things. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Day
Rules
Discipline
" Think about when you were 12 or 13. The stuff I watched was awful! I tried to watch a 'He-Man' cartoon recently, and I was like, 'Oh my God!' I just had, like, a small brain. I was stupid. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Stupid
You
Brain
" I grew up watching 'Ghostbusters' and 'Knight Rider' and Hot Wheels commercials. When I got to college, having never set foot in America, I knew more American pop-culture references than my friends did. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Hot
America
Friends
" I'm from a family of doctors, and I think they really wanted me to be a doctor. I even sort of assumed I would be a doctor. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Me
Family
Doctor
" In popular culture, there isn't any other conception of Islam and Muslims other than what you see on the news... When you go to a theme park, you see Muslims riding roller coasters and eating ice cream. Why doesn't anybody think of those Muslims when they think of Muslims? "
Kumail Nanjiani
Think
You
Culture
" I just hope that there's a market for somebody who looks like me as the lead of a rom-com, you know? "
Kumail Nanjiani
Looks
Like
Know
" My parents don't really understand my career. They don't really bring it up that much. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Up
Understand
Parents
" I never really got into game shows. The easiest one is 'Wheel Of Fortune' because you just have to know words, and for the most part everyone knows words. "
Kumail Nanjiani
You
Everyone
Game
" I didn't know if I could be funny on stage or write a joke. But I saw that there are no rules. If you're funny offstage, you can figure out a way to be funny onstage. "
Kumail Nanjiani
You
Way
Stage
" I still don't have a real appreciation for music because I didn't really start listening to it until my 20s. My wife knows everything about music, and I try and get her to educate me, but it's just not part of my DNA. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Appreciation
Listening
Me
" I never decided I wanted to be an actor. I just started doing standup because I love standup. Everything else has sort of been these tiny steps leading to this. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Doing
Never
Love
" I remember my jaw would hurt because I wasn't used to speaking English all the time. Like how, even if you exercise, you'll play kickball one day, and then you're like, 'Wait, I run, but new places are hurting because I don't use my muscles this way.' My mouth was not used to making these sounds. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Run
Exercise
Hurt
" You just don't see Muslims being matter-of-fact Muslim. They're always defined by their Muslim-ness. We're either terrorists, or we're fighting terrorists. I remember seeing 'True Lies' and going, 'Why are we always the bad guys?' "
Kumail Nanjiani
See
Bad
Remember
" Living in Pakistan, you didn't have a sense of how huge and varied America was geographically. I had visited once. I thought of it as this crazy, happy, exciting place where everybody's rich, and there's stuff everywhere. Compared to Pakistan, it's not untrue. Compared to Pakistan, the streets are paved with gold. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Rich
Thought
Happy
" I'd love to be in action movies. I've been trying to convince people. I don't think it's anything physical holding me back. I think it's a general vibe thing that's holding me back. I don't project action confidence, maybe. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Confidence
Love
Me
" I don't go, 'It is now time to change Americans' perception of Muslims. It's going to be a long day.' I think you just try to be unique and try to be yourself, and if something good comes of that, then great. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Change
Day
Yourself
" My mom told us never to reveal that we were Shia in school. You would find out that some other kid was Shiite, and you would whisper, 'Hey,' or you would see someone at the mosque, and you'd be like, 'Hey, that kid's Shiite!' There was a lot of tension, a lot of violence in Karachi between Shiites and Sunnis. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Violence
School
Mom
" I love, love, love the street-cart food. Gyros are like a meat-flavored fruit roll-up. A meat roll-up. "
Kumail Nanjiani
I Love
Fruit
Like
" Honestly, I would love to be friends with Fox Mulder on 'The X-Files.' That's almost a little too obvious, but that would be my answer. I'd love to hang out with him. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Hang
Love
Answer
" I think, you know, a lot of the business of comedy is taking your personal experiences and making them relatable to other people. "
Kumail Nanjiani
People
Know
You
" It happens to people. People ruin things they love! I'm sure the guy who played Jar Jar Binks loved 'Star Wars.' "
Kumail Nanjiani
Ruin
Things
Loved
" I moved to New York first and was really apprehensive about moving to L.A., but I really, really like it. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Like
Moving
New
" I started doing standup because of Hugh Grant's best-man speech in 'Four Weddings,' which is basically a standup routine. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Routine
Started
Doing
" I know a lot of brown actors who play terrorists because they're physically intimidating. For me, it was like, 'O.K., you'll be the nerd.' So I've played the nerd. I've played food-delivery guys. But I always tried to find something in the characters so that they weren't just defined by what they looked like. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Know
Play
You
" You can go slow. Allow your dreams and goals to change, but live an intentional life. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Change
You
Live
" Because of the Internet, you're sort of forced to deal with people from very different backgrounds and beliefs. It's a great challenge of our time, and depending on when you ask me, I feel optimistic or pessimistic about it. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Great
Challenge
People
" When generally people make race-based jokes to me - even if they're not technically racist, they're sort of based on me being Pakistani or whatever - on Twitter, you know, I block a lot of people who say something weird about my name or something. It does bug me generally, but it is all about context. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Me
You
Weird
" I started a podcast about 'X-Files' and ended up on it. Then I started a podcast about video games, and I'm in the new 'Mass Effect' game. I have to pick the stuff I love and do a podcast on it. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Love
Video Games
Game
" I've always played some version of a nerdy guy or something like that. I mean, one of my story lines on 'Silicon Valley' is that I am very bad with women! "
Kumail Nanjiani
Story
Women
Bad
" I had this very strict rule when I began auditioning that I wasn't gonna do a thicker accent, because it was like, 'I can't tell if it's supposed to be funny because he talks funny.' And now I feel like there are certain characters that I could play that could involve doing a thicker accent, as long as it's specific to that character. "
Kumail Nanjiani
Funny
Doing
Character