After securing his breakthrough role as Rajesh Koothrappali in The Big Bang Theory, Kunal Nayyar quickly rose to fame, earning a staggering $1 million per episode at the height of the show’s success and becoming one of the highest-paid actors on television ever.
Before walking into the audition that would change his life, Nayyar’s days looked worlds away from Hollywood stardom. He spent his early years in America scrubbing toilets, teaching acting, and hustling through a string of side gigs—all while racing against a ticking visa clock and competing against a sea of other hopefuls.
“I just did any job I could. I cleaned toilets in my first year in 1999, I was in the housekeeping department. I did every and anything I could,” the 44-year-old actor recalls in an exclusive interview with Fortune. “There was no job that was beneath me.”
“I needed to book something big for me to be able to apply for a permanent resident card, and then I auditioned for Big Bang, and then the rest is history.”
“But I only had one year left on my visa, because when you graduate as an international student, you get one year’s free work. So I was up against it in terms of timing.”
From toilets to television stardom—here’s every odd job Nayyar held in between
While he chased auditions, Nayyar worked any job he could find, often pulling 16-hour shifts, to juggle college with his side gigs. At one point, he even coincidentally got work experience in a lab like his famous character—or more specifically, he worked as the school’s computer lab manager.
“I taught acting. I would get paid to do some comedy for corporate events. I was a waiter,” he says. “I had a great job on Sundays; I would wash the windows of this church in Portland, Oregon.”
To give himself the best shot of landing a breakout role, the British-Indian actor moved from Philadelphia, where he was studying his master’s degree to LA.
“I did some commercials, I played a terrorist on NCIS, I did a bunch of sort of smaller acting jobs, and was auditioning at the same time.”
Today, he has an estimated $45 million net worth. He’s starred in many more roles on our screens, written a book, and has a string of ventures to his name, including Good Karma Productions and most recently, a document storing app, IQ121.
But looking back, he says those odd jobs along the way weren’t just a means of survival. They grounded him.
“It was just a very happy time, a simple time,” he says, adding that it taught him humility. “No one is higher, no one is lower. We’re all just trying our best.”
That lesson, he explains, stuck with him even when fame arrived. “There’s a great quote from a very old spiritual teacher: We’re all just walking each other home. That is how I felt. In all these jobs were all in this together. It taught me community and also allowance for other people in my life who I would not have come across on this journey.”
Handwritten notes got him noticed by Hollywood’s inner circle
While talent and hard work opened doors, Nayyar turned to a personal tactic that his father taught him, to make a lasting impression on hiring managers—or in his case, casting directors, producers, and Hollywood stars.
“If I met a producer or someone who I thought would help me, I would always write them handwritten notes, always. No matter what,” he says.
These weren’t just perfunctory thank-yous. He’d often include a meaningful postcard or a photo that connected to their interaction. “Something that I thought would make me think of them during a meeting,” he adds.
He’s not convinced the small gesture made him stand out for jobs in the early days, per say—but it’s had a lasting effect on his career. “I just thought that was a nice way for people to remember me,” he says, adding it helped turn casual encounters into lasting relationships.
“I’ve cultivated deep relationships with people who, at the time, were not even in high positions, and now are,” he adds. “I’ve been doing this 18 years now, so that’s 18 years of goodwill in the industry. And now those people are my friends that I’ve known for a long time.”
