Aziz Ansari

Aziz Ansari’s stature as a comedian, actor, and screenwriter remains closely bound to the tight-knit collective that first propelled him into the spotlight. He rose rapidly in the middle and later years of the 2000s as one of three members of the troupe behind The Human Giant, the weekly MTV series of irreverent, sketch-comedy segments modeled on Saturday Night Live that the performers themselves conceived and executed.

Of Tamil Indian descent, like Jay Chandrasekhar and several other comedians who surfaced in the early 2000s, Ansari was raised and completed his undergraduate studies in rural South Carolina before enrolling in New York University’s business program. While there he trained at the Upright Citizens Brigade and began performing stand-up alone at clubs throughout Manhattan. After a short period in Internet advertising, he found that his stage work generated sufficient income to pursue comedy full-time. His ties to the Brigade secured him the role of host for Crash Test, the weekly stand-up showcase at the UCB Theater, which in turn opened the door to the creation of The Human Giant. The troupe concluded the program after two seasons on MTV.

In 2008 Ansari joined the ensemble of Parks & Recreation, the NBC sitcom created by the team responsible for The Office. The following year he appeared with Adam Sandler and Seth Rogen in Judd Apatow’s Funny People and produced a series of online shorts to promote the feature. His first album and DVD, Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening, appeared in 2010. Two years later came the television special and CD Dangerously Delicious, whose material chronicled the comedian’s mounting celebrity and the resulting access to figures such as R. Kelly and Jay-Z. Buried Alive surfaced in 2013 as a downloadable and streamable program; the Comedy Central label later released it on CD in 2015, the same year Parks & Recreation concluded its seven-season run.