Aasif Mandvi To Join The "Daily Show" News Team

Source: Comedy Central

NEW YORK, March 12, 2007

Aasif Mandvi joins the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning "Daily Show" News Team as a correspondent which also includes Dan Bakkedahl, Samantha Bee, Jason Jones, John Oliver and Rob Riggle.

"Jon had long made it a mission to hire someone anyone whose name anagrammed to 'mafia divans.' Once it became clear Nadia Famvis wasn't interested, our second choice was fairly obvious," said David Javerbaum, executive producer.

Now in its 11th season, "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" is enjoying its best ratings in series history having recorded its highest rated and most watched year in 2006. The series currently averages 1.6 million total viewers (P2+) and a 1.4 HH / 1.0 P18-49 rating (1.0 million viewers P18-49).

Aasif Mandvi made his first appearance on the show as a contributor on August 9, 2006. He is the recipient of the 1999 OBIE award for his critically-acclaimed one-man show "Sakina's Restaurant." Mandvi's other New York stage credits include the 2002 Broadway revival of "OKLAHOMA!," "Guantanamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom," "Homebody/Kabul," "Suburbia," "Trudy Blue" and "Speak Truth to Power." Film and television credits include the title role in Merchant/Ivory's "The Mystic Masseur," "Music and Lyrics," "Spider-Man 2," "Freedomland," "The Siege," "Analyze This," "ABCD," "American Chai," "The War Within" "Sorry Haters," "Sex and the City," "Sleeper Cell," "The Sopranos," "The Bedford Diaries," "Oz," "CSI," "Law and Order," "Jericho," "ER," "Ed" and "Tanner on Tanner" directed by Robert Altman. Upcoming features include "Wedding Town," "The Understudy" and "Eavesdrop."