Writer, producer, and actress Mindy Kaling can't get enough Office politics

POM-POM CLUB "Every day I come to work, it's nonstop sexual harassment," says Kaling, on the set of NBC's The Office

Though a devotee of Sleepless in Seattle and a self-professed girl's girl, Mindy Kaling broke into comedy by pretending to be Ben Affleck. After a critically acclaimed performance in Matt & Ben, an off-Broadway smash about everyone's favorite Beantown boys, The Office brass signed her up to write and act in the overseas import that's since become NBC's biggest comedy hit. Last season, the 28-year-old from Cambridge, Massachusetts, who plays dim-witted chatterbox Kelly Kapoor on the show, became a producer as well. In this online-only extended interview from Radar's November issue, Kaling talks about about sexual harassment, Christopher Hitchens, and NBC's new wild-child entertainment head, Ben Silverman.

When did you first start writing comedy?
When I was a kid, I was always reciting SNL sketches. At 14, I wrote a letter to Lorne Michaels. I sent him a sketch, but I thought they would just pay me $75 to use it! And what I got back was a letter that said, "We could not read this due to Writer's Guild laws." It was the most unromantic thing. Last year I worked at Saturday Night Live for two weeks as a guest writer, and I relayed that story to Lorne thinking it would bring some sort of emotional response from him. He was like, "Hmmm." So nonplussed!

How was working at SNL?
It's a really glamorous job on Saturdays, because you're in New York City, and there's a celebrity host and their friends there. But everything else—you're kind of in a cocoon with no light and fast food. I started valuing my job in L.A. after I worked there. The people are great, so smart and funny, but it's a really subterranean lifestyle.
The great thing about having shitty taste is I can always claim to be a populist.

Is it very different working on The Office now?
The great thing about our show is that if it's your script, everyone is just working on it. Nobody is trying to get their own material in because everyone knows your name is going on the episode. It's not an SNL type of competitiveness where everyone is vying for the same spot.

What did you make of Christopher Hitchens's recent article that claimed females just aren't funny?
Usually when I read Hitchens I love him, but I felt like you couldn't even take that article seriously, because it was so clearly just supposed to be incendiary. Anybody in comedy right now knows that Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Sarah Silverman, and Kristen Wiig are some of the funniest people in the world. I think he's trapped in a more old-timey version of comedy.

What's it like being one of two women on The Office's writing staff of 14?
Well, all the guys want to have sex with me all the time. Every day I come to work it's nonstop sexual harassment. They had to have some people from General Electric come down and talk to us about it. There's a lawsuit that's about to happen. But other than that, it's been great.

Speaking of women writers, when you post on your blog, you post as Mindy Ephron. Are you a Nora fan?
I adore You've Got Mail and Sleepless in Seattle. I think they are totally magical. But you can imagine, in the writers' room, people think those movies are what's wrong with America. Another writer and I would have these long debates where he would say You've Got Mail was the worst movie ever made, and I would say it was the best. So the name is sort of a joke. The great thing about having shitty taste is I can always claim to be a populist.

Your character on The Office, Kelly Kapoor, is a big ditz—is she fun to play?
I don't think there are a lot of times when Asians on television get to play total idiots, so it's really freeing. I don't act too much outside of The Office, but sometimes I do get these calls: "Would you like to be the computer technician in Die Hard 4?" And you're like, "Jesus Christ, of course not. No, no, no, no."

Is acting really what you want to do in the long term?
The cool thing about what people like Larry David, Sarah Silverman, and Tina Fey are doing right now is that they get to play versions of themselves in a really interesting way. It's a fascinating theatrical thing. You kind of know that's slightly who they are. To me that's so fascinating. That's what I would love to do. I have no desire to play Medea in Shakespeare in the Park. But a version of myself? I would love to do that.

So besides Larry's, Sarah's, and Tina's shows, what do you watch on TV?
I try to get into things like The Wire because I think it makes me seem more smart at dinner parties and stuff. But honestly, right now I am so into The Closer I can't deal with it. I have the biggest crush on Kyra Sedgwick.

You graduated from Dartmouth. Any good stories involving sorority hazings or beer pong?
I was in a sorority for one semester, but I didn't go to a single meeting. And I'm miserable at beer pong. I'm so bad. I think you're supposed to be kinda bad at beer pong if you're a girl. Then you can just keep drinking and you have more cachet as a drunk girl who's like, "Hehe, I guess I have to keep drinking!"

BREAK TIME Kaling classes up The Office snack machine

Overall, how did you like Dartmouth?
I loved Dartmouth and I think that really surprises people. If I had gone to school with any kind of legitimate art program, I probably never would have gotten any attention. But because I went to a college where there were three gay dudes and me and my best friend, we were able to do so much stuff. I felt like if I had gone to NYU I'd be dealing with all the Broadway girls. It was nice that way, to be a big fish in a small pond.

When people see me, they don't know my name. I think they're like, ''You know who looks like shit? That tertiary character from The Office whose name I don't know.''You recently made your first appearance on GoFugYourself. How did you take the critique?
I was so mortified. I thought those boots were so awesome. I went with B.J. [Novak, her costar and also a writer and producer on the show] to that event and he was like, "I love your boots." And then to have them say I was the worst-dressed person to have ever lived!

Do you have to worry about unflattering photos of you turning up now that you're more famous?
Well, I started realizing that I dress so abominably. I have this new thing when I do go to the gym—I usually wear what I wore to bed the night before. God, maybe I should be a little more conscious about what I look like—I don't even comb my hair when I go.

Do people recognize you when you go out?
When people see me, they don't know my name. I think they're like, "You know who looks like shit? That tertiary character from The Office whose name I don't know." Because I'm not a super-skinny actressy girl. They think they went to college with me.

Does the writing staff worry about some kind of "Moonlighting Curse," or about viewers losing interest in the show now that Jim and Pam are finally together?
I think we, as writers, think less about Jim and Pam and more that's it a comedy show starring Steve Carrel. Obviously their relationship is a huge reason why people like the show, but if you ask any of my writers, people also watch the show because of Dwight and Michael.

Ben Silverman, the new head of NBC who brought The Office to the network, has a rep as something of a party boy. Any good stories about him?
Technically, Ben Silverman is the father of the show, but he's more like the crazy young step-uncle. I was with my boyfriend and we ran into Ben, and he was like, "Mindy, baby, it's awesome to run into you! This is so cool! This is my friend Ryan." And it was Ryan Seacrest. I was like, "This is his life. He's always partying with Ryan Seacrest, yet he's the savviest businessman of all time."

Have you ever gotten high together?
No. The closest Ben Silverman and I have ever been is wasted together at Bungalow 8. I wish I had a great story about Ben Silverman and me doing coke at Tenjune, but I have to wait for that. I think it's inevitable that there will be some great thing with me, Ben, Hilary Duff, and James Franco where we all have a lost weekend.