Kal Penn is a very busy man.
Not only is he starring in the ABC hit Designated Survivor, he is also a consultant on the show. The popular actor, with credits ranging from the Harold and Kumar series of films to a run on House, took time out of his acting career a few years ago to serve in the Office of Public Engagement in the Obama White House, giving him a unique perspective on the fictional White House of his current series.
His advice on the fictional world is not taken as gospel, though. “It’s interesting. It’s funny. There’s a consultant for the overall content of the episodes, and then I help with the little tiny pieces, when the writers have questions like ‘Who is actually in this room? Where does the Secret Service agent stand? Would somebody have a coffee in this meeting, or is that too casual?’ Little things that I think flavor the world.
"It’s actually literally the opposite of the job that you do as an actor.
“What I love about the show is all the different plot lines, from the conspiracy stuff to the family, the politics of it. But, obviously, it’s not a documentary. The way to get kind of interesting storylines is by breaking the mold. So the more interesting conversations for me are when they say, ‘Hey, this would (or wouldn’t) happen,’ and then hear the writers and producers talk about why they’re going to do it anyway, or why they’re going to take a character in a particular direction that wouldn’t happen in reality.
“Just in terms of how that heightens the plot line, how does that heighten the stories? How do you ground something as an actor, knowing that it’s not actually that way in real life, but it is that way in the world that these television writers have created? It’s just super interesting to me, because one of the things I love about movie and TV magic is how you turn fiction into something that’s believable.”
The premise of the show is that, during the State of the Union speech, the Capitol, along with the President, Vice President, and most of Congress is destroyed. Series lead Kiefer Sutherland is one of two “designated survivors” who have been kept in a separate location to assure that the continuity of the government is preserved.
Penn plays a speech writer who becomes an integral part of the transition team as the new president tries to learn the job on the fly.
The horrifying scenario of the Capitol being blown up is graphically portrayed in the show, and hits frighteningly close to reality. Penn says, “That’s the thing, isn’t it? The premise of the show is real. There is a designated survivor who goes to an undisclosed location, but thankfully, knock on wood, we have not had what happens in the show happen.”
The set of the destroyed Capitol building is truly gut-wrenching. “The folks who designed that set have done a great job. There’s so much imagery. I think many of us don’t realize how invested we are in those things.
“So, for instance, you’re so used to seeing a picture of the capital, especially the last decade or so when the approval ratings of congress itself are down to single digits, you kind of joke when you see a picture of the capital, ‘Yeah, those people don’t do any work.’
"And then you see a fictitious image of the thing destroyed, and suddenly this feeling of loss or patriotism comes out in a way that we all know we have, but that’s another thing I love about the magic of the way they’re crafting the show. I think it taps into a lot of the feelings that we know we already have but have not been forced to think about. “
What the writers are not thinking about, in any specific way, is the current political climate. Penn says, “So far, we’ve been largely operating outside of it. There’s been a little bit of overlap in terms of some of the plot lines, like civil liberties and the right to protest and that kind of thing.
"Those things are playing out in the presidential race, especially when it comes to treatment of Muslims and immigrants at large in the election and how different folks feel about them. But that’s probably the only example.
“I think the rule, in talking to David Guggenheim, who created the show, his hope, and I am 100% sure as a actor, when you do a show like this, you want everybody to watch it. And you want everybody to be invested in it, regardless of their politics in real life.
"So, yes, I am very proud of the work I had the opportunity to do serving President Obama, but do I want people who have completely different political leanings to also enjoy the show? Absolutely. The show should have nothing to do with my own political leanings.
“And I think the fact that you’ve got such talented writers is why, without avoiding talking about issues and without avoiding going down the path of exploring things that are contentious, they’re still able to do it in a way that appeals to a wide group of folks, and I just love that. I assume it’s a hard skill. I’m not a writer. I just watch these guys in awe and go, ‘How’d you do that? That was so interesting to read.’”
And Penn knows very well the difference between the reality of politics and the kind he’s portraying in Designated Survivor. He was deeply involved in President Obama’s campaign, and later served in the White House, with a bit of time out to make a Harold and Kumar movie, for which he was under contract.
“It was incredible. It’s funny, this is probably easier to discuss with your audience. The folks who read it will understand. It’s harder to people like my college friends. They’re like, ‘What do you mean?’
“My plan when I moved to D.C., was to stay for two and a half years. There are a lot of people who take a sabbatical from whatever their private sector job is for a year or two, and now, in this case, eight years. And they’re doctors and lawyers, and professors, and they serve in the administration and then go back to what they were doing before.
"So, to a large extent, I was not very different at all. I happened to be one of the few who left an arts career, but there were others.
“But the reason I had to leave halfway through was because I had this outstanding contract to do a Harold and Kumar movie, which sounds so ridiculous. ‘Wait, we’re doing this now?’ and they said, ‘Yeah.’
“No, no, I’m taking a sabbatical from acting!”
“You can’t. You have to do this movie.”
“No, but we have to wait a year and a half, guys! This guy’s about to pass health care reform. What excuse would I possibly have?”
“They’re like, “Uh, your contract, dude.”
“So, OK, all right. I talked to my team, and they said, no, you have to go do this. Which, by the way, I love that character so much, so it’s a wonderful problem to have. But it was just… how bizarre, right, that you’ve got to leave your public service job to shoot a stoner movie because you had an outstanding contract before you went into government.
“And it just so happened that when that movie was done that they had not yet filled the position that I had when I was at the White House the first year. A lot of times in government, and government jobs, they sometimes have this backlog that they don’t fill. So, I was able to go back into it and finish up what was then another year and a half. “
As to how an actor ends up working for the President of the United States, Penn says, “For the office I was in, which was the Office of Public Engagement, people have a pretty diverse background.
“A lot of times, when you have a candidate like President Obama was in 2007, where he was down 30 points in the polls, he was clearly the underdog, both in the primary, and even within his own party, he wasn’t the favorite choice at the time.
"So, when you’re working on a small campaign like that, you end up being trusted to execute things that you have to do under very limited resources, as opposed to campaigns that are really well-funded, that are huge, where there are multitudes of people working in different jobs, and so because of that, you really get a sense of how the candidate thinks, what their policies are, how they want to execute them.
“So, it’s not uncommon for a lot of the early campaign staff to end up working for the elected official. This happens to folks who run for senator, for state house of representatives, and things like that.
“You remember that there was the writers strike in 2007, and we couldn’t shoot House for the longest time. That’s when I started volunteering for the Obama campaign, because I was living in L.A. at the time, and I loved being on the show, but we couldn’t shoot anything.
“So, I did one trip to Des Moines, Iowa, in 2007 - I think it was in September or October of ’07 during the strike, and totally just fell in love with then-Senator Obama’s campaign staff and the types of things they were doing and the energy, so I ended up essentially moving to Iowa for a month and a half, almost two months leading up to the Iowa caucuses, which was the first state to have their primary, and then had a chance to go to 26 other states on his behalf after that.
"And he had an arts policy committee, which focused on things like arts education and cultural diplomacy. We just did a cultural diplomacy trip to Cuba, the first ever, and so there are things like that that tie in both the acting work as well as organizing for two, two and a half years into the type of role that I had. So it’s not as out of left field as it might look.
“Plus, it’s really not that uncommon. That was a really cool thing. When I got to D.C. and started working at the White House, I had a guy sitting next to me in the office who was the president’s point person on energy and environment outreach, young guy, early 30s.
"He had been CEO of two tech companies in San Francisco, so his real life experience was working in tech and clean energy before he stepped into government, so he wasn’t a bureaucrat by any means, either. So, in that kind of thing, you really have a lot of people that you’re surrounded by.”
And, in case he didn’t have enough to keep him busy, Penn has also been a part of academia for several years, recently earning a certificate in international security. “I finished the certificate in international security a couple of years ago, and I taught one semester at the University of Pennsylvania, a film studies class. And then I taught last year at UCLA, which is where I did my undergrad, and that was a sociology and political science class on young Americans in the Obama presidency.
"I loved both equally. Obviously, the film class I have a soft spot for, because I’m an actor first and foremost. That’s my big love. But the seminar on sociology and political science was really interesting also. My grandparents were teachers. I feel like that’s probably where I get it from.
“But I’m also kind of a huge nerd, so I loved it. I’d love to teach again. “
