Kal Penn (Kalpen Suresh Modi) is an American actor, chef, producer and civil servant of Indian origin. He has portrayed the popular TV character Lawrence Kutner on the television program ‘House’, and appeared as Kumar Patel in the ‘Harold & Kumar’ film series. He has also received a lot of critical acclaim for the film ‘The Namesake’. Penn has also taught at the University of Pennsylvania in the Cinema Studies Program. Penn worked as an Associate Director in the White House Office of Public Engagement for two stints during April 2009 - July 2011. After his White House stint, he appeared in the hit television series ‘How I Met Your Mother’. His immigrant parents wanted that he should become a doctor or a lawyer when he grew up. But Kal had a dream of entertaining people from his very childhood and chose to become an actor instead. After all his hard work he eventually got roles in films and television movies and made his mark on the audience of different age groups. He has won nominations for his role in various movies and even won some of them.