Pakistani American Actor Kumail Nanjiani to Deliver Convocation Address at Cornell University

Pakistani American actor, comedian, producer and and screenwriter Kumail Nanjiani will give the keynote address at Cornell University’s senior convocation on May 23. In announcing the selection on April 16, the student-run 2024 convocation committee said the “Eternals” actor has “all the values they were looking for in the speaker —  wholesome, empathetic, resilient, dynamic and trailblazing.” He was “one of a few dozen names we had flagged as encompassing all of those values, and the committee is beyond excited we were able to land him,” said Asha Prabhat, chair of the committee.

The 45-year-old was recently cast in the fourth season of  Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building,” and was seen in Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire,” the latest installment in the franchise that began in 1984. He had a leading voice role as Mack in the 2023 animated film “Migration,” He played Somen “Steve” Banerjee, founder of the Chippendales all-male dance troupe in the Hulu miniseries “Welcome to Chippendales.”

He will next be seen in and produce FX’s “Homeland Elegies,” based on the book by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ayad Akhtar.He and his wife and Emily V. Gordon are also set to write the feature adaptation of “The Doubtful Guest,” a 1957 illustrated short story by Edward Gorey, in which Nanjiani also will star.

He spent his childhood in Karachi, Pakistan, before moving to the U.S. at age 18 to attend Grinnell College in Iowa. He majored in computer science and philosophy, graduating in 2001, then moved to Chicago, where he performed stand-up comedy at open-mic events.

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He later moved to New York City, where he continued to perform stand-up and made appearances on television, including on “The Colbert Report” with Stephen Colbert. One of his first film roles was in 2013’s “The Kings of Summer.”

In 2017, he starred in the semi-autobiographical romantic comedy “The Big Sick,” which he wrote with his wife, Emily V. Gordon, a screenwriter and producer. Their work earned them an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay.