Aasif Mandvi

05 Mar, 1966 | Mumbai

Actor

Biography

Aasif Mandviwala is an Indian-born actor and comedian. He began appearing as an occasional contributing correspondent on The Daily Show on August 9, 2006. On March 12, 2007, he was promoted to a regular correspondent. Mandvi was born in Mumbai, India to a Muslim family. He grew up in Bradford, England until his family moved to Tampa, Florida when he was 16. After studying theatre at the University of South Florida, Mandvi worked as a performer at Disney-MGM Studios at Walt Disney World. He later moved to New York City where he began appearing in off-Broadway productions. He won an Obie Award for his critically acclaimed one-man show Sakina\'s Restaurant. On Broadway, Mandvi appeared as Ali Hakim in the 2002 revival of Oklahoma! directed by Trevor Nunn. He also appeared in the play Homebody/Kabul by Tony Kushner. He recently portrayed the German chemist Fritz Haber in the off-Broadway play Einstein\'s Gift. Mandvi played Melchior in On the Razzle by Tom Stoppard at the Williamstown Theatre Festival and appeared in the docudrama Guantanamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom at The Culture Project. Mandvi played a minor role in the 1998 film The Siege, Die Hard with a Vengeance as well as the title role in Merchant Ivory Productions\' film The Mystic Masseur. He also had a major supporting role in the independent film American Chai, playing the lead character\'s roommate, "Engineering Sam." At the time Mandvi was also involved with a New York-based band, Cowboys and Indian. He was the doctor who diagnosed Paul Vitti\'s (Robert De Niro) panic attacks in Analyze This, and had a memorable role as Mr. Aziz of "Joe\'s Pizza" in Spider-Man 2. He was also in a Domino\'s Pizza commercial. He played the doorman Khan in Music and Lyrics. He has been in numerous television shows; ER, The Sopranos, Sex and the City, CSI, Oz, Ed, The Bedford Diaries, Jericho, Sleeper Cell and various editions of Law & Order, including Criminal Intent, Special Victims Unit and Trial by Jury. Mandvi was the reader for the books on audio editions of Salman Rushdie\'s Shalimar the Clown (2005) and V. S. Naipaul\'s Magic Seeds (2004). In 2008, Mandvi began production on the film 7 to the Palace which he co wrote with ex The Daily Show writer Jonathan Bines. He most recently played a dentist alongside Ricky Gervais in the romantic-comedy Ghost Town and will soon play Admiral Zhao in The Last Airbender.