In the Running: Emmy Contenders in Conversation with The Ankler is a special series featuring Ankler Media awards editor and Prestige Junkie host Katey Rich’s chats with top talent from Disney networks and streamers, including ABC, Disney+, FX and Hulu. In the Running is presented by Disney.
Poorna Jagannathan has appeared on multiple acclaimed shows in her career — including Hulu’s Ramy, HBO’s The Night Of and Big Little Lies and Netflix’s hit comedy Never Have I Ever — but, for her, Hulu’s Deli Boys is a superlative experience like no other.
“This set is hands down my most favorite,” she says. “Between season one and season two, I was on a bunch of different sets, and all I thought about was I wanted to go home — and home is the set of Deli Boys. People say film and TV can be a family, but this really, really felt like that.”
Hailing from Onyx Collective and 20th Century Television and created by Abdullah Saeed (High Maintenance), Deli Boys is a crime comedy about two hapless brothers (Asif Ali and Saagar Shaikh) who unwittingly inherit their father’s drug empire after his sudden death. Jagannathan plays Lucky, the brothers’ auntie and a ruthless operator who has drawn comparisons to Tony Soprano.
“I absolutely think it is revolutionary to be part of a show that is such a dark comedy and portrays South Asians in this very absurd genre,” she says. “It’s such an absurd show — and it is so funny — yet the culture is woven so intensely through it.”
Born in Tunisia and raised in India, Pakistan, Ireland, Brazil and Argentina — her father was an Indian diplomat — the 53-year-old star has won significant praise for Deli Boys, including a Gotham TV Award last year for best supporting performance in a comedy.
“This character topples every single kind of paradigm on what a woman and what a South Asian woman should be like,” Jagannathan says. “She initially is presented as very maternal and turns out to be a killer with no remorse. If you just piss Lucky off, if you look at her the wrong way, it’s game over — which is what I love about her.”
Season two of Deli Boys expands the scope of the show — adding several high-profile guest stars like Fred Armisen, Andrew Rannells and Kumail Nanjiani as the noose around the family’s criminal activity tightens.
“From a cultural point of view, South Asians are in a very beginner stage of telling our story,” Jagaanathan says. “So the identity part of our stories is always woven in very heavily, and Deli Boys throws that completely out the window. The identity is there. There are no subtitles for it. It is integrated into the action. You get it, or you don’t, and you just move on. So I love that aspect of it … I don’t ever have to explain what’s going on.”
Deli Boys is streaming on Hulu.
