The next project from Kal Penn (aka Kumar) will be a comedy, featuring the actor as an aspiring NPR reporter who ends up working at a “Fox News-type channel,” according to Deadline. The single-camera ABC comedy called Fair and Balanced will see Penn reunited with Harold & Kumar writers Hayden Schlossberg and Jon Hurwitz.
Considering Penn’s liberal leanings — he even worked underneath President Barack Obama as Associate Director in the Office of Public Engagement from 2009 to 2011 — we’ve got a feeling that there will be some serious spoofing involved on the show. The show’s title is taken directly from Fox News, which uses the phrase as its slogan (to many an eye roll from the left side of the political aisle).
Penn’s political experience in the White House, in which he also worked as a member of Obama’s National Arts Policy Committee, will no doubt give him plenty to work with in his new role, as will his many appearances on talk shows during his work with the Obama administration.
Penn will executive produce the show with his partner Dan Spilo of Industry Entertainment. Hurwitz and Schlossberg will also executive produce with their co-producer Matt Lottman. Penn also announced recently that he’ll be joining Fox’s competition special Superhuman, as well as making an appearance on Hulu’s Deadbeat. Earlier this year, he hosted a National Geographic show about maps and data called The Big Picture.
Also upcoming for Penn are a couple of projects on the silver screen: William H. Macy’s The Layover, and a Bruce Willis and John Goodman-starring Cullen Brothers film.
