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Actress and comedian Mindy Kaling speech at her Hollywood Walk of Fame star unveiling ceremony on Tuesday, February 18, 2025, at 6533 Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, California, USA.
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©MaximoTV
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Actress and comedian Mindy Kaling speech at her Hollywood Walk of Fame star unveiling ceremony on Tuesday, February 18, 2025, at 6533 Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, California, USA.
This video is available for editorial use in all media and worldwide. To ensure compliance and proper licensing of this video, please contact us.
©MaximoTV
🇺🇸
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PeopleTranscript
00:00Today, Mindy Kaling Day in Hollywood!
00:10The mic is yours.
00:20Thank you so much, Nivea, I'm so in awe of you, I'm so honored you're here, Eric Garcetti,
00:27all of our honored guests that came from so far, thank you so much, B.J., thank you, fun
00:36fact, my daughter calls B.J. Uncle Fopo, I have no idea why that is, but he's such an
00:44important and integral part of my family that sometimes I forget the reason that I know
00:48him is because we work together professionally, and I'm as starstruck by him now, at age 29,
00:56as I was when I first met you, at 24.
01:01I love you.
01:02My friend, Baron Holtz, who's also here today, it's his birthday, actually, so thank you,
01:07he always says that whenever anything good happens, he says to me, take it in, men, take
01:13it in, be in the moment.
01:15And I think that I am physically incapable of taking things in.
01:21I don't know how to be in the moment, I just don't know.
01:24I'm always in the moment after the moment, regretting what I could have said in the moment,
01:30or I'm before the moment, and I'm scared of the moment, and I'm sort of hyper-preparing
01:34for the moment, but this is one of the times where I'm just going to force myself to just
01:39be in the moment.
01:41I'm so happy.
01:43I love recognition.
01:47And this is just incredibly nice.
01:50Thank you to the city of Los Angeles.
01:52Thank you to Warner Brothers, my family, the incredible Channing Dungey, who has fought
01:59some major fights with me.
02:02She's texting me from Hawaii on vacation over something at 11 o'clock at night, the Hollywood
02:08Chamber of Commerce, everyone who made this happen, and anyone who's tuning in right now
02:14instead of at school or working, I love that for you.
02:18I'm Hindu, and we practice cremation, which is a beautiful tradition that my ancestors
02:24have done for thousands of years, and so will I, but also I'm obsessed with legacy.
02:30So sometimes I get disappointed that I won't have a grave, but this, this is so much better
02:35than a grave.
02:39I am so grateful to the fans of my work, and to the audiences who got me here, who believed
02:46in me enough to think that I actually was a star, who watched my shows, even if their
02:50boyfriends said, that looks lame, or they read a review that says, we liked the first
02:56two seasons, but the third one fell off.
02:58I'm grateful to anyone who could just watch me in a movie or pick up my book of essays
03:03and wonder what's on my mind.
03:06I'm incredibly grateful to anyone who took a chance on me, and many of those people are
03:11here today, Bela Bajaria, who's kind of my fairy godmother, Craig Irwick, who's been
03:17my fairy godfather several times, and of course, of course, Greg Daniels.
03:24Greg discovered me, like in the good old-fashioned way that you discover someone.
03:30He didn't just turn on his phone and watch me in a TikTok, he had to like sit in a black
03:35box theater and watch a play, ugh, it was terrible.
03:39And that's how I got my big break, which is on The Office.
03:43And then, there is the great Howard Kline, who has been my creative partner and my manager
03:53for over 20 years, and he has held my hand through every success and every heartbreak.
03:59He and Nancy, his wife, are like my family.
04:01Howard took a chance on me as a staff writer, and he believed in me, but you know what's
04:05more important?
04:06He believed that he could one day make money off me.
04:10And you know what?
04:11That means more.
04:13That is the real compliment.
04:17I want to acknowledge my collaborators, who I'm lucky enough to consider my close friends.
04:21If you can write a movie or make a TV show with someone, at the end of it, you still
04:25want to have dinner with them, and you're not in a protracted legal dispute with them,
04:29I think that's pretty good.
04:31And there's several of them here today, Lang, Tracy, Ike, Dave, Warbs, Charlie, Dan, Akshara,
04:38I love you guys.
04:40Your brilliance is really why I'm here.
04:42And sure, there's probably like a group chat going on where you're talking about me, but
04:48you know what?
04:49I don't know.
04:50It won't hurt me.
04:51And also, if you ever do mess with me, you'll be getting a letter from my attorney, PJ Shapiro,
04:55who's also here.
04:57Love you, PJ.
04:59I really enjoy when people call me a multi-hyphenate.
05:03But really, it's only possible because of my reps, Kevin, Ryan, Maha, Joe, Rick, Michael,
05:11and my publicist, Katie and Morgan.
05:14I love that I can create a TV show, act in a cool movie, do a pharmaceutical ad for psoriasis
05:20medication, and then head to fashion week.
05:22And you know what?
05:23That's versatility.
05:24So thank you.
05:27My two oldest friends are here, Jocelyn and Julia, whom I adore.
05:33They knew me before hair extensions and lash extensions and trips to Korea to get calf
05:39extensions, which haven't worked, by the way.
05:41I'm still pretty short.
05:43And they knew me when this was all hypothetical.
05:46And they just listened to me strategizing like a crazy person in dorm rooms and middle
05:51school hallways.
05:52But they were the ones that said, men, I think you could actually do this.
05:57Kate the Great, Linny, Caroline, you guys keep my life actually afloat.
06:01And I can't even begin to know how to thank you.
06:05I remember as a kid watching messy TV with my mom and my dad.
06:10We'd watch Friends, Frasier, Seinfeld.
06:13And my whole family came together for it.
06:15My mom would come back from the hospital where she worked really long days delivering babies
06:20as an OBGYN.
06:21And my dad would have just driven two to three hours back from his job site in Connecticut.
06:27And despite how challenging the days were, we would all sit together at night and watch
06:31it to come.
06:33It was more than entertainment for us.
06:35It was our way of relaxing.
06:36We could put down our defenses from hard days and just be together.
06:41I find it so powerful, that kind of storytelling on TV, how it was able to bring us together
06:47when words failed us or just took too much energy.
06:51I think it's remarkable.
06:53I think it's so remarkable how many connections that you can make by sharing laughs.
06:58And from the earliest age, I thought, I want to do that.
07:01I need to do that.
07:03And so lastly, I'm so lucky that my dad is here today.
07:10Can you believe it, dad?
07:12He and my mom encouraged me to be an artist by giving me the gift of autonomy.
07:18These are Indian immigrants in the 1980s and 90s.
07:22And I can't tell you how rare that is and how that as a story is one that I don't always
07:26see with my contemporaries.
07:28As a helicopter parent, I can hardly understand how they were able to do that.
07:33But I love you so much, dad.
07:36And I love you, mom.
07:37Okay.
07:38So I did it, folks.
07:39I am really in the moment, and it feels strange but nice.
07:43And now that we're done, we can all drink cocktails and eat meatballs at the after party.
07:48And you can meet my three rambunctious children.
07:50And thank you so much for coming in the middle of the day.
07:52It means the world to me.
07:54Thank you to all my friends.
07:55Anyone I didn't see here, I'll see you afterwards and thank you in person.
07:59But it means so much to me.
08:00And thank you, everybody, for watching at home.
08:05The Honorable Councilwoman Nithya Raman.
08:16And I will keep this very short because you are here to hear from Mindy and not from me.
08:21But I did want to just say on a personal note, as an avid consumer of rom-coms and sitcoms
08:28throughout my youth continuing till today, Mindy has kept this art form alive in Hollywood
08:33personally.
08:36And it has been incredible to watch.
08:39And I will also say that it is only thanks to Mindy's work and incredible success that
08:44my daughter, Kaveri, a proud Tamil American, will never have to wonder, as I did when I
08:50was young, whether she was worthy of being the star of a rom-com herself.
08:59I've watched in awe and with pride as you've made your mark on the global stage.
09:05And when I heard that you were about to make a physical mark on the city of Los Angeles,
09:10as the only South Asian representing this city, I knew I had to be here to congratulate
09:13you personally.
09:15So thank you, Mindy, for all your work.
09:17And my heartiest congratulations to you.