News Editor Ezra Silk caught up with actor Kal Penn, star of such films as “Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle” and “The Namesake,” after Friday’s rally to talk about candidate charisma, Obama’s unifying potential, and the importance of pronunciation in international relations.
Ezra Silk: So you got the politicians opening for your speech?
Kal Penn: It’s usually the other way around.
ES: Where else have you been besides Yale?
KP: Yale’s coming up now. Today we were at UConn [University of Connecticut]. Yesterday we were at BU [Boston University], BC [Boston College], Emerson and Tufts. A couple of schools in South Carolina—Clemson.
ES: Ned Lamont says that the media is failing to cover the personal stories of this election. Tell me an untold story about Barack Obama.
KP: I saw him at a rally in Malibu, Calif. at this lunch, and it was mostly entertainment industry folks. He noticed that there were Hummers and SUVs parked outside, and he waits until he gets to his environmental plan and interrupts his speech and is like, “Wait a sec. Who drove a Hummer today?” And nobody raises their hand. So he says, “No, seriously, there are a couple of Hummers outside. Who drove them?” Nobody raises their hand. He says, “I know you’re not going to raise your hands, but you don’t need to drive that. Trade it in for something else. Drive a hybrid car or something.” Just calling these people out. They’re certainly wealthy enough to drive a more environmentally friendly car. But how amazing to actually have a president who’s not scared to say, “You need to drive something else.”
ES: With the recent endorsements from Caroline and Ted Kennedy, what do you make of the parallels between now and the ’60s? Do you buy that 2008 is like Bobby Kennedy 40 years later?
KP: Don’t be so cynical. I don’t think it’s an issue of something being bought and sold, and I’ll tell you why. Caroline Kennedy, for example, for her to figuratively pass the torch from her father on to Senator Obama means a lot, not in just the tagline of the scroll on Headline News, but because of what it signifies. It means that both people on the left and the right and independents are actually coming together to support somebody that they are excited about and that to me goes way beyond being a Democrat or a Republican. It goes way beyond any of the things that have divided us in the past. It’s an issue of who’s actually going to give us things like healthcare and access to education, and after the last eight years, how are we going to be proud to be Americans? And that issue is something that we haven’t had a rallying point behind and a leader to inspire us.
ES: Why has charisma been deemed less important in a political candidate in the past?
KP: Who knows—maybe our choices have been limited in the past. I kind of alluded to this before, but every time I’ve voted I’ve always just felt like I was voting for the lesser of two evils. Until this point, I’ve never had a candidate who inspired me enough to say ’This is the right thing to do.’
ES: I’ve felt bad about not wanting to vote for Edwards. Though his populist, two-Americas stance seemed generally respectable, I basically didn’t instinctually trust, or like him. How much do you think this election is about charisma?
KP: I think that charisma inspires us, and charisma makes things more interesting to watch, but I think that charisma goes way beyond just the sake of charisma. It goes into what you’re actually going to be able to accomplish. It takes 60 votes to get something passed in the Senate. Somebody who has the ability to bring folks together and not be a polarizing figure is the person who’s going to get things accomplished. So that has to do with being likeable and having charisma. In terms of the international playing field, you know, Barack is the only candidate who pronounces Pakistan correctly. What’s the best way to go about dealing with a military dictatorship in a foreign country that has nuclear weapons next to a war zone? Is it to go in there and pronounce the name of the country wrong? These are such small things, right?
[A staffer for the Obama campaign approached and told Penn they were leaving.]
ES: By the way, how often do people ask you if you want to smoke weed?
KP: I actually don’t smoke weed in real life.