Daniel Mark Pudi (born March 10, 1979)
is an American actor. His roles include
Abed Nadir
Abed Gubi Nadir ( ''‘Ābid al-Qūbī Nādir'') is a fictional character on the NBC/Yahoo! Screen sitcom series '' Community'', created by Dan Harmon and portrayed by Danny Pudi. Talkative, literal, and sometimes overly pedantic, Abed is a st ...
on the NBC sitcom ''
Community
A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, tow ...
'' (2009–2015), for which he received three nominations for the
and one nomination for the
TCA Award for Individual Achievement in Comedy The TCA Award for Individual Achievement in Comedy is an award given by the Television Critics Association.
Winners and nominees
Multiple wins
;2 wins
* Louis C.K. (consecutive)
*Jane Kaczmarek (consecutive)
*David Hyde Pierce (consecutive)
*Jon ...
. Since 2020 he has starred as Brad Bakshi in the
Apple TV+
Apple TV is a digital media player and microconsole developed and marketed by Apple Inc. It is a small network appliance hardware that plays received media data such as video and audio to a television set or external display. Since its secon ...
comedy series ''
Mythic Quest
''Mythic Quest'' (known as ''Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet'' for its first season) is an American comedy television series created by Charlie Day, Megan Ganz, and Rob McElhenney for Apple TV+. The series premiered on February 7, 2020, and follow ...
''. He was the voice of
Huey Duck
Huey, Dewey, and Louie are Multiple birth, triplet cartoon characters created by storyboard artist (screenwriter) Carl Barks for The Walt Disney Company from an idea proposed by cartoonist Al Taliaferro and are the nephews of Donald Duck and th ...
on the
2017 reboot of ''
DuckTales
''DuckTales'' is an American animated television series produced by Disney Television Animation. The original cartoon series premiered on syndication and on Disney Channel on September 18, 1987 and ran for a total of 100 episodes over four sea ...
''.
Early life
Daniel Mark Pudi was born in
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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on March 10, 1979,
the son of programmer and analyst Teresa (née Komendant)
and Abraham L. Pudi (1955–2018).
His parents immigrated to the U.S. and became naturalized citizens: his mother came from the village of
Pokośno, Poland,
and his father came from the village of
Poduru
Poduru is a village and mandal headquarters of Poduru mandal in West Godavari district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The nearest railway station is located at Palakollu (PKO) at a distance of .
Etymology
In Telugu, "Podu" means ''Li ...
, India, and was from a
Telugu Christian
Telugu Christians or Telugu Kraistava are a religious community who form the third-largest religious minority in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. According to the Census of India, there are over a million Christians in Andhra ...
family.
Pudi grew up speaking Polish with his mother and grandmother.
He grew up on the
South Side of Chicago
The South Side is an area of Chicago, Illinois, U.S. It lies south of the city's Loop area in the downtown. Geographically, it is the largest of the three sides of the city that radiate from downtown, with the other two being the north and w ...
with brother Adam and sister Katherine but attended
Notre Dame College Prep
Notre Dame College Preparatory is a male-only Roman Catholic secondary school founded in Niles, Illinois in 1955 by the Congregation of Holy Cross. It is located in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago.The school was built by Belli & Belli ...
in
Niles, a northern suburb. In 2013, he gave the
commencement address
A commencement speech or commencement address is a speech given to graduating students, generally at a university, although the term is also used for secondary education institutions and in similar institutions around the world.
The commencement ...
at Notre Dame College Prep.
Pudi studied dance in Chicago and attended
Marquette University
Marquette University () is a Private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit research university in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Established by the Society of Jesus as Marquette College on August 28, 1881, it was founded by John Henni, John Martin ...
in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Milwaukee ( ), officially the City of Milwaukee, is both the most populous and most densely populated city in the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, Milwaukee County. With a population of 577,222 at th ...
, graduating with a degree in communication and theatre in 2001.
At Marquette, he was the first winner of the
Chris Farley
Christopher Crosby Farley (February 15, 1964 – December 18, 1997) was an American actor and comedian. Farley was known for his loud, energetic comedic style, and was a member of Chicago's Second City Theatre and later a cast member of the ...
Scholarship.
Beyond paying for a year of school, the scholarship led to him performing at an
improv comedy
Improvisational theatre, often called improvisation or improv, is the form of theatre, often comedy, in which most or all of what is performed is unplanned or unscripted: created spontaneously by the performers. In its purest form, the dialogue, a ...
event featuring
Jim Breuer
James E. Breuer (born June 21, 1967) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, musician, and radio host. He was a cast member on ''Saturday Night Live'' from 1995 to 1998 and starred in the film '' Half Baked'' (1998).
Early life
Breuer was born ...
and
Dave Chappelle
David Khari Webber Chappelle ( ; born August 24, 1973) is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He is best known for his satirical comedy sketch series ''Chappelle's Show'' (2003–2006), which he starred in until quitting in the middle of p ...
, increasing his interest in studying improv.
After Marquette, he performed in
summer stock theatre
In American theater, summer-stock theater is a theater that presents stage productions only in the summer. The name combines the season with the tradition of staging shows by a resident company, reusing stock scenery and costumes. Summer stock the ...
in Wisconsin, studied at
The Second City
The Second City is an improvisational comedy enterprise and is the oldest ongoing improvisational theater troupe to be continually based in Chicago, with training programs and live theatres in Toronto and Los Angeles. The Second City Theatre op ...
in Chicago.,
and joined ''Stir Friday Night!'', a sketch comedy ensemble of Asian-American performers. Other SFN alumni include
Steven Yeun.
Career
Pudi became a
recruiter for an
executive search
Executive search (informally called headhunting) is a specialized recruitment service which organizations pay to seek out and recruit highly qualified candidates for senior-level and executive jobs across the public and private sectors, as well a ...
firm before moving to Los Angeles in 2005 to seek television and film roles. His job, whereby he was a
remote work
Remote work, also called work from home (WFH), work from anywhere, telework, remote job, mobile work, and distance work is an employment arrangement in which employees do not commute to a central place of work, such as an office building, ware ...
er, permitted him to attend auditions, helping him avoid the "struggling actor thing in terms of waiting tables, temping and so on". He performed in several
television pilot
A television pilot (also known as a pilot or a pilot episode and sometimes marketed as a tele-movie), in United States television, is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell a show to a television network or other distri ...
s before joining the cast of ''
Community
A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with commonality such as place, norms, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given geographical area (e.g. a country, village, tow ...
,'' which he starred in for six seasons from 2009 to 2015.
He has appeared in multiple television advertisements for such products as
Snickers
Snickers is a chocolate bar made by the American company Mars, Incorporated, consisting of nougat topped with caramel and peanuts that is encased in milk chocolate. The annual global sales of Snickers was over $3 billion .
In the United ...
,
Verizon
Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas in ...
,
McDonald's
McDonald's Corporation is an American Multinational corporation, multinational fast food chain store, chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechri ...
,
T-Mobile
T-Mobile is the brand name used by some of the mobile communications subsidiaries of the German telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom AG in the Czech Republic (T-Mobile Czech Republic), Poland (T-Mobile Polska), the United States (T-Mobile ...
, ''
Pokémon
(an abbreviation for in Japan) is a Japanese media franchise managed by The Pokémon Company, founded by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures (company), Creatures, the owners of the trademark and copyright of the franchise.
In terms of ...
'', and ''
Far Cry 4
''Far Cry 4'' is a 2014 first-person shooter game developed by Ubisoft Montreal and published by Ubisoft. It is the successor to the 2012 video game ''Far Cry 3'', and the fourth main installment in the ''Far Cry'' series. Set in the fictional ...
''. In 2012, he appeared as a celebrity contestant on
GSN's version of ''The Pyramid'' with fellow ''Community'' cast member
Yvette Nicole Brown
Yvette Nicole Brown (born August 12, 1971) is an American actress, comedian, writer and host. She starred as Shirley Bennett on the NBC sitcom ''Community'', as Dani in the 2015 version of ''The Odd Couple'' on CBS and as Dina Rose on the ABC sit ...
.
In film, he portrayed Arash in the comedy film ''
Road Trip: Beer Pong'', and starred in the comedy horror film ''
Knights of Badassdom
''Knights of Badassdom'' is a 2013 American comedy horror film, directed by Joe Lynch, written by Kevin Dreyfuss and Matt Wall. It stars Ryan Kwanten, Steve Zahn, Summer Glau, and Peter Dinklage.
Plot
In a forest, a group of friends are partic ...
'', which was one of the highlights of
Comic Con
A comic book convention or comic-con is an event with a primary focus on comic books and comic book culture, in which comic book fans gather to meet creators, experts, and each other. Commonly, comic conventions are multi-day events hosted at con ...
2011, according to
HitFix
HitFix, or HitFix.com, was an entertainment news website that launched in December 2008 specializing in breaking entertainment news, insider information, and reviews and critiques of film, music, and television. In mid-2010 HitFix crossed the 1,00 ...
.com. He starred in the Jones Street Station music video for "The Understanding". He has made
cameo appearance
A cameo role, also called a cameo appearance and often shortened to just cameo (), is a brief appearance of a well-known person in a work of the performing arts. These roles are generally small, many of them non-speaking ones, and are commonly eit ...
s in many internet videos, including
BriTANicK
BriTANicK () is an internet sketch comedy duo from Atlanta, Georgia, that consists of Brian McElhaney and Nick Kocher. McElhaney graduated from the Atlanta International School and Kocher graduated from The Paideia School. They attended New Yor ...
's "A Monologue for Three". Pudi had a cameo appearance in ''
Captain America: The Winter Soldier'', and the live episode of ''
Hot in Cleveland
''Hot in Cleveland'' is an American television sitcom on TV Land starring Valerie Bertinelli, Jane Leeves, Wendie Malick, and Betty White.
The series, which was TV Land's first original series, premiered on June 16, 2010, and was TV Land's hig ...
'', as well as a cameo in ''
Star Trek Beyond
''Star Trek Beyond'' is a 2016 American science fiction action film directed by Justin Lin, written by Simon Pegg and Doug Jung, and based on the television series ''Star Trek'' created by Gene Roddenberry. It is the 13th film in the ''Star T ...
''.
In the autumn of 2014, Pudi appeared in the
off-Broadway
An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer tha ...
musical ''FOUND''. He played the lead role in ''
The Tiger Hunter
''The Tiger Hunter'' is a 2016 American comedy film directed by Lena Khan, written by Khan and Sameer Gardezi, and starring Danny Pudi, Jon Heder, Rizwan Manji, Karen David, Iqbal Theba, Samuel Page, Parvesh Cheena, Michael McMillian, and Kevin Po ...
'', an independent film directed by Lena Khan in 2016 and funded through a
Kickstarter
Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...
campaign. In 2017, Pudi began voicing
Huey Duck
Huey, Dewey, and Louie are Multiple birth, triplet cartoon characters created by storyboard artist (screenwriter) Carl Barks for The Walt Disney Company from an idea proposed by cartoonist Al Taliaferro and are the nephews of Donald Duck and th ...
in the ''
DuckTales
''DuckTales'' is an American animated television series produced by Disney Television Animation. The original cartoon series premiered on syndication and on Disney Channel on September 18, 1987 and ran for a total of 100 episodes over four sea ...
'' reboot. He also appeared as Teddy on the NBC sitcom ''
Powerless'' in the same year.
Pudi plays Brad Bakshi in the TV series ''
Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet'', which premiered in February 2020. His theater performance for
En Garde Arts
En Garde Arts is a New York City-based theatre company, and a pioneer in the field of site-specific theatre.
Founded in 1985 by Artistic Director Anne Hamburger, the company was New York’s first exclusively site-specific theatre, leading audien ...
' series Uncommon Voices was made public in August 2020. The work in progress, entitled ''Running'', tackles his attempt to piece together his relationship with his father, which affected his personal identity, cultural background, and his experience with racism throughout his personal life and career.
He reunited with ''Community'' co-star Alison Brie in the 2022 film ''
Somebody I Used to Know
''Somebody I Used to Know'' is a 2023 American romantic comedy film directed by Dave Franco and co-written with his wife Alison Brie. The film stars Brie, Jay Ellis, and Kiersey Clemons. It was released on Amazon Prime Video on February 10, 20 ...
'', written by Brie.
Personal life
Pudi is married to Bridget Showalter. They met while attending Marquette University in their freshman year.
[Halverson, Steve.]
'Community' star has ties to Dyersville
''Dyersville Commercial'', September 16, 2009. Their twins, a son and a daughter, were born in January 2012.
Pudi is also a runner and has completed several
marathon
The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...
s.
Pudi bought a house in
Pasadena, California
Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district.
I ...
, in 2014.
Filmography
Film
Television
Video games
References
External links
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pudi, Danny
1979 births
Living people
American male actors of Indian descent
American male comedians
American male film actors
American male television actors
American male voice actors
American male writers
American people of Polish descent
Indian people of Polish descent
Male actors from Chicago
Marquette University alumni
21st-century American male actors