MEET VIVEK
JIM CARREY SHOWED THE WAY
Toronto-based comedian Vivek Srikanthan.
Toronto-based comedian Vivek Srikanthan is a graduate of the Second City Toronto Writing Program.
He has performed with the sketch troupe Try-Racial at Toronto Fringe and Toronto Sketch Comedy Festival. He was a semi-finalist in Toronto’s Sketch to the Death competition, and has performed at TOsketchfest and Montreal Sketchfest, and was invited to the inaugural Denver Sketchfest recently.
Name: Vivek Srikanthan. According to my mother, my name means wisdom. And if you’re a believer in nominative determinism, let me tell you that it is not true.
Currently: I recently premiered my first theatrical production One Man, No City. It’s a metafictional and deconstructionist look at the modern-day BIPOC experience, specifically centered around “myself” (quotations important!) as first-generation child of immigrants who can’t speak nor knows anything really about themselves and their history, and the struggles of identity in contemporary culture.
Favourite colours: Navy blue/forest green/maroon (it all depends on the day, really!)
Favourite outfit/designer: Secret Planet (located in Toronto), I’ll always find a reason to wear their stuff.
Favourite Bollywood star: I’ve never watched Bollywood, but everyone keeps comparing my name to Vivek Oberoi’s, and he’s a pretty good looking dude, so I’ll just say him.
Favourite Hollywood star: Jim Carrey, I wouldn’t have done any of this without him.
Favourite movie: It usually goes day-to-day, so I’m going to go off the feeling of when I wrote this, and at the moment its Pierrot Le Fou (1965).
Favourite song: If I Were a Folk-star – The Avalanches.
Favourite TV Show: The Sopranos. It’s the best representation of the North American immigrant experience (in my opinion).
Favourite ice cream flavour: Mint chocolate, and if you don’t like it, then you’re crazy.
“I need to be loved, I want to be loved.”
Favourite cuisine: Mexican, because you can’t go wrong with tacos and burritos and cerveza and really anything involved in it.
Favourite restaurant: El Trompo, for all the reasons stated above.
Favourite sports: Hockey, ’cause it’s the perfect amount of finesse and physicality.
Favourite book: Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner.
I need: To be loved.
I want: To be loved.
In a perfect world: There is no such thing, and we’d be better off if we realized that.
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