Kal Penn Is Ditching Obama for Kumar

Less than a year after Kal Penn’s character suddenly committed suicide on House so that he could work for the Obama administration, the news breaks that he’s headed back to Hollywood. Not to play a brilliant, up-and-coming doctor on the critically acclaimed and brilliantly written Fox series, but to star in … the third installation of Harold and Kumar? Um, yes.

Filming on the Christmas-themed flick, which may or may not be shot in 3-D, begins in late June. Kal Penn will be there, instead of at his job as Barack Obama’s associate director of public engagement, where he was working under his real name, Kalpen Modi. See what he did there? He took his first name and split it up into two names that sound vaguely more American than his actual name. Maybe if Barack Obama had campaigned as Bo Rock we could have avoided a lot of controversy. Where were you then, Kalpen??

I suppose there’s a possibility that there was a contractual obligation for him to show up to do the third film, but this kind of reminds me of when Michael Jordan played baseball. (Look, people, I know I can’t replace Kelly, but at least I am trying to talk about sports.) Like, it sounded like his one true passion in life, the opportunity to pursue a long-held but largely undefined dream, but when you get down to brass tacks, waking up early every morning to work your ass off battling red tape for zero recognition and $50K a year is considerably less awesome than being rich and famous. If I’ve taught you people anything, let it be this: Don’t make a sex tape, and don’t ever convince yourself you should be working harder than you have to. The long-term consequences of both are painful.