‘Mindy Project’: Mindy Kaling on Danny and Mindy’s future and revolving love interests

It’s a big week for FOX’s “The Mindy Project.” The freshman comedy will air two episodes — one tonight (April 2) and another on Thursday (April 4) following “American Idol” and a special “New Girl” — and introduce two new love interests for series creator and star Mindy Kaling’s character Dr. Mindy Lahiri.

Anders Holm (“Workaholics”) begins a four-episode arc tonight as a character Kaling describes as a “minster with a lot of swagger. It’s almost like he’s a minister crossed with a Vegas party promoter.”

He and Mindy quickly hit it off and enter into what Kaling calls Mindy’s “raciest relationship yet. It’s a very funny dynamic to have that with a Christian minister.”

Thursday’s episode welcomes guest star Josh Meyers (of “Mad TV” and the real life young brother of “Saturday Night Live” head writer Seth Meyers, who guest starred in “Mindy” episode “Hiring and Firing” earlier this season) as a male prostitute who Mindy helps transform a la Julia Roberts and Richard Gere in “Pretty Woman.”

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But even with these revolving love interests — and the looming arrival of guest star Chloe Sevigny as the ex-wife of Dr. Danny Castellano (Chris Messina) — some fans still want to know if Mindy and Danny have a future together. Kaling says she enjoys the “fun and unexpected” chemistry she has with Messina but notes, “the characters are so different from each other, I don’t think either characters have ever dated anyone like that in their personal lives.”

And it doesn’t sound like pairing the characters up, like Jess and Nick on “New Girl,” is the immediate game plan. “Every week we have fun new guest stars, and that’s really fun for our writers to think of,” Kaling adds. “Any guest star could come or any new cast member could come on the show and change [the dynamic] completely. I think about on ‘The Office,’ Ed Helms [as Andy] wasn’t even a character until Season 3, and then he was such a major force of the show.”  

“So when I think of the life of the series, I think ‘What if somebody new comes in for Danny, some really funny, great character for him to fall in love with?’ Or what if someone like that comes in for Mindy?”

“[Mindy and Danny’s relationship] is one of the things that people talk to me about, so I don’t want to ignore it. At the same time I just want to see what else is out there since the show is still so young.”

Still, Kaling admits there could be perks with going in that direction: “Of course, I’ve imagined what it was like to kiss Chris Messina.”

Photo/Video credit: FOX