KAL PENN GOES BY THE BOOK FOR THE NAMESAKE

Kal Penn relied on the novel when portraying his character in The Namesake.

Harold and Kumar star Kal Penn stars in The Namesake based on the novel by Jhumpa Lahiri about the son of old world Indian immigrants who tries to fit in with his friend’s American ways.

Kal says the story spoke volumes to him that he even tried to make the film himself.

“I actually wanted to get the rights to the book to turn it into a film with a friend of mine John Cho who played Harold in Harold and Kumar and we looked into it and found that Mira had already gotten the rights to it. The reason for that was the book was so powerful I wanted to be part of turning it into a film. Jhumpa’s writing was so detailed that everything about Gogol from his innermost thoughts to his ATM password are written in the book. So you have everything mapped out in front of you and it really spoke volumes to me.”

To develop the character of Gogol Kal literally went by the book, visiting the college the character attended.

“Especially the Yale years are really detailed in the book so I went up to New Haven for a few days, knocked on some dorm rooms. There are dorms Farnham Hall in the book and it tells you which room Gogol lives in. I knocked on these doors and saw the view physically that is described in the book with the chapel on the right. And it’s pretty remarkable writing, it’s all right there so tracing those steps and making it very real and figuring out his life journey so that those emotions are conjured up when you prepare for the scenes or you do the scenes.”

The Namesake directed by Mira Nair opens Friday in theaters.