Join us for a Career Retrospective with Anupam Kher currently starring in Hotel Mumbai and NBC's New Amsterdam
GUEST BIO
Anupam Kher is one of India’s most prominent actors. He has performed in over 100 plays and has been featured in over 500 films. Besides working in Hindi films, he has appeared in many acclaimed international films such as the Golden Globe nominated Bend It Like Beckham, Ang Lee's Venice Film Fesitval’s Golden Lion-winning film Lust, David O. Russell's Oscar-winning Silver Linings Playbook, and the recent Sundance hit, The Big Sick. Just this month, Kher was nominated for a BAFTA for his performance in the BBC TV movie, The Boy with the Topknot.
Last year Kher co-starred in The Family Man, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, opposite Gerard Butler, Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina. Kher can be seen in Netflix’s international series, Sense8, created by the Wachowski’s. Most recently, Kher starred in The Big Sick opposite Kumail Nanjiani, Ray Romano, Holly Hunter with Judd Apatow producing and Michael Showalter directing. As mentioned above, the film was the 2017 Sundance standout and one of the biggest sales of the festival. It was distributed theatrically by Amazon and Lionsgate to an amazing response, nominated across the board including Kher being nominated for a SAG Award for “Best Ensemble”. Anupam stars in the recent film Hotel Mumbai, opposite Dev Patel and Armie Hammer, based on the real-life, devastating 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks. The film is being produced by Thunder Road and Arclight Films and will premiered last month. Kher also did the miniseries The Indian Detective for Netflix and the TV movie, The Boy with the Topknot, for the BBC which he was just nominated for “Best Supporting Actor” at this month’s BAFTA Awards. Kher stars in the miniseries opposite Ruth Wilson, also for the BBC, entitled Mrs. Wilson. Currently, he can be seen as one of the leads in the NBC series, New Amsterdam, which has been picked up for a second season.
Over the years Kher has been critically acknowledged for his work. He’s received one of India’s most acclaimed awards, the Filmfare Award, five times for the category Best Performance in a Comic Role. He also won the Filmfare Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Vijay. Previously he was the chairman of the Central Board of Film Certification and National School of Drama in India. Currently he’s the chairman at Actor Prepares in Mumbai. The Government of India honored Kher with both the Padma Shri in 2004 and the Padma Bhushan in 2016, one of the highest honors given in India, for his contribution to cinema and the arts. In the past 12 months, Kher won “Best Supporting Actor” at the iifa Awards in NY…India’s equivalent to the Academy Awards, he was nominated for a SAG Award in the United States, and nominated for a BAFTA in the UK. He also has a massive following online with over 12.5 Million Twitter followers and over 1.5 Million Instagram followers.
Beyond acting, Kher is a teacher, author, motivational speaker, and an activist. He is the Goodwill Ambassador of the Pratham Educational Foundation, which works towards a general social change for all by focusing on the education of children; is a champion of gender equality; founded an acting school and was ranked #12 on Richtopia’s 2017 list of top 200 authors in the world. Kher is married to fellow actress, Kirron Kher, and resides in Mumbai, India.
