Naren Weiss (born March 15, 1991) is an

actor An actor (masculine/gender-neutral), or actress (feminine), is a person who portrays a character in a production. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medium of the theatre or in modern media such as film, radio, and television. ...

playwright A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes play (theatre), plays, which are a form of drama that primarily consists of dialogue between Character (arts), characters and is intended for Theatre, theatrical performance rather than just Readin ...

, and former

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person, or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin , . Models can be divided in ...

. He played

Osama bin Laden Osama bin Laden (10 March 19572 May 2011) was a militant leader who was the founder and first general emir of al-Qaeda. Ideologically a pan-Islamist, Bin Laden participated in the Afghan ''mujahideen'' against the Soviet Union, and support ...

Kamal Haasan Parthasarathy Srinivasan (born 7 November 1954), known professionally as Kamal Haasan, is an Indian actor, filmmaker and politician who predominantly works in Tamil cinema. Considered as one of the most accomplished actors of Indian Cinema, Haas ...

's film on

terrorism Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of violence against non-combatants to achieve political or ideological aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violence during peacetime or in the context of war aga ...

'' Vishwaroopam'', Dekker in the ABC series ''

Deception Deception is the act of convincing of one or many recipients of untrue information. The person creating the deception knows it to be false while the receiver of the information does not. It is often done for personal gain or advantage. Tort of ...

'', and is known for his work in theatre in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

and

the United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Early life

Born in

Nassau Bay Nassau Bay is a city in Harris County, Texas, Harris County, Texas, United States, bordering the outermost southeastern edge of the city of Houston. It is located in the Clear Lake (region), Clear Lake Area near Galveston Bay, directly adjacent to ...

, 30 minutes outside of

Houston Houston ( ) is the List of cities in Texas by population, most populous city in the U.S. state of Texas and in the Southern United States. Located in Southeast Texas near Galveston Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, it is the county seat, seat of ...

, Weiss's family bounced around various places in the U.S. until, at the age of 12, the family migrated to

Madras Chennai, also known as Madras ( its official name until 1996), is the capital and largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost state of India. It is located on the Coromandel Coast of the Bay of Bengal. According to the 2011 Indian ce ...

. While finishing his education, he found his love for the stage in several school and college productions, and went on to attend

Madras Christian College Madras Christian College (MCC) is a liberal arts and sciences college in Chennai, India. Founded in 1837, MCC is one of Asia's oldest extant colleges. The college is affiliated to the University of Madras but functions as an autonomous institut ...

and

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn in New York City, United States. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls nearly 14,000 students on a campus in the Midwood and Flatbush sections of Brooklyn as of fall ...

. He is of mixed ethnicity and worked as a model during college, appearing in campaigns for Sprite, Bank of India,

The Chennai Silks The Chennai Silks is chain of retail textile shops in South India. History Its founder Thiru. A. Kulandaivel Mudaliar, who was living in a village near Avinashi, entered the business in 1962. However its first textile shop was started in Tiru ...

and on magazine covers like

India Today ''India Today'' is a weekly Indian English-language news magazine published by Living Media, Living Media India Limited. It is the most widely circulated magazine in India, with a readership of close to 8 million. In 2014, ''India Today'' laun ...

. He was discovered by VJ

Paloma Rao Paloma Rao (born 4 February 1986), is an Indian music VJ, RJ and actress. Career A graduate of B.Sc. Visual Communication from Loyola College, Chennai Loyola College is a government aided private Catholic higher education institution run ...

while performing onstage, leading to his becoming a VJ for Channel UFX. He comes from an athletic background, and turned down several scholarships to play basketball at the collegiate level to instead focus on acting.

Career

Naren Weiss began his career onstage in

Chennai Chennai, also known as Madras (List of renamed places in India#Tamil Nadu, its official name until 1996), is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Tamil Nadu by population, largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost states and ...

, acting and writing in plays for The Little Theatre, the Stray Factory, and The Hindu Metroplus Theater Fest. He found success as a young stage actor and received visibility from the Indian media, being called "enchantingly scraggly and gloriously flamboyant" (''

The Hindu ''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It was founded as a weekly publication in 1878 by the Triplicane Six, becoming a daily in 1889. It is one of the India ...

'') and "annoying perfection" (''

The New Indian Express ''The New Indian Express'' is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper published by the Chennai-based Express Publications. It was founded in 1932 as ''The Indian Express'', under the ownership of Chennai-based P. Varadarajulu Naidu ...

''). He had a small role in '' Good Night Good Morning'', notably played

in '' Vishwaroopam'', and had an unsuccessful audition run for the title role in '' Life of Pi''. He played a separate character named Pi years later in the Chinese film '' Love is a Broadway Hit'' directed by Peter Lee, a long-time friend and associate of ''Life of Pi'' director

Ang Lee Ang Lee (; born October 23, 1954) is a Taiwanese filmmaker. His films are known for their emotional charge and exploration of repressed, hidden emotions. During his career, he has received international critical and popular acclaim and List o ...

. He acted in the United States in 2014 in New York City. His performance as an Israeli

immigrant Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not usual residents or where they do not possess nationality in order to settle as permanent residents. Commuters, tourists, and other short- ...

in Meron Langsner's
Over Here
' was successful, and he had other roles at the

Geffen Playhouse The Geffen Playhouse is a not-for-profit theater company founded in Los Angeles, California by Gilbert Cates in 1995. It produces plays in two theaters in Geffen Playhouse, which is owned by University of California Los Angeles. The Playhous ...

Kennedy Center The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts, commonly known as the Kennedy Center, is the national cultural center of the United States, located on the eastern bank of the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. Opened on September 8, ...

Off-Broadway An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer tha ...

, and guest roles on American television shows such as '' Elementary'', '' The Brave'', ''

Broad City ''Broad City'' is an American television sitcom created by and starring Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson. It was developed from their independent web series of the same name, which was produced between 2009 and 2011. The sitcom, like the web serie ...

'' and others. For his work on ''The Brave'', NBC submitted him for consideration in the Outstanding Guest Actor category for the 2018 Primetime Emmy Awards, although he did not receive a nomination. He is one among a small number of playwrights from the Indian subcontinent writing in English, and has had his work performed around the world; including at the prestigious Hindu Metroplus Theater Festival,

National Arts Festival The National Arts Festival (NAF) is an annual festival of performing arts in Makhanda, South Africa. It is the largest arts festival on the African continent and one of the largest performing arts festivals in the world by visitor numbers. The ...

, Hollywood Fringe Festival,

Alliance Francaise An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or sovereign state, states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an a ...

Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...

, various global Short+Sweet Festivals, and across

. His book ''Deepak and Raj: Two Indian Plays'' reached #1 on

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology company * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek myth ...

's playwriting list in 2020.

Personal life

Naren Weiss speaks multiple languages, and was a

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''trans ...

for '' Madam Secretary''. He also taught playwriting at

The City College of New York The City College of the City University of New York (also known as the City College of New York, or simply City College or CCNY) is a public research university within the City University of New York (CUNY) system in New York City. Founded in 18 ...

Books

*''God is Dead: Ten Short Plays and Stories'' (2019) - contains the piece '' Maya from Madurai'' *''Deepak and Raj: Two Indian Plays'' (2020) *''A Halfway Celebrity Actor Without a Home: Some Poems'' (2021) - illustrations by Ujwal Nair *''A Marginally Better Place: Performance Manuscripts'' (2021) *''Something More than Broken Love'' (2021) - poetry, with illustrations by Ujwal Nair

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Weiss, Naren Living people 1991 births Writers from Houston American male stage actors American male models of Indian descent American male actors of Indian descent American male writers of Indian descent American dramatists and playwrights of Indian descent People from Houston County, Texas Brooklyn College alumni Madras Christian College alumni