Kelly Kapoor

Kelly Kapoor
File:Kellykapoor.png
First appearance	Diversity Day
Created by	Greg Daniels
Portrayed by	Mindy Kaling
In-universe information
Gender	Female
Occupation	Customer Service Representative
Family	Two parents, four sisters (Rupa, Neepa, Tiffany, and one unnamed/deceased)
Spouse	Ryan Howard (ex-boyfriend) Darryl Philbin (boyfriend)

Kelly Kapoor is a fictional character from the US television series, The Office. She is played by Mindy Kaling, who is also a writer and producer for the show.

Overview

Kelly is a customer service representative at the Scranton branch of fictitious paper distributor Dunder Mifflin. Kelly is the office chatterbox, usually on topics that a teenager might discuss, such as boys, dating, and celebrity gossip. She is Indian American. She also admits wanting to get married and "can't wait to get pregnant and have kids."

Biography

Originally, the character did not have any outstanding personality traits, but in "The Carpet," she became established as having a bubbly personality and being somewhat immature. She tends to engage in long-winded, one-sided conversations on relatively trivial subjects, often to the chagrin of Toby Flenderson, her former cubicle mate (he moved, claiming he was allergic to his desk). Kelly seems also to have the capacity to play dumb, as evidenced by a conspiratorial wink to the camera in "Boys and Girls." Kelly is of Indian descent. She had a sister who passed away and has three living sisters who also enjoy gossip. Her parents were in an arranged marriage. It is revealed that Kelly enjoys shopping, especially online, in "The Coup" and in "Dunder Mifflin Infinity". She also loves clothing, as seen in "The Coup" and "Women's Appreciation".

Season 1

Kelly is featured in the episode "Diversity Day," where Michael Scott conducts a diversity training seminar for his employees. When Michael suggests everyone state a race they are sexually attracted to, Dwight immediately responds "Indian," which gets a curious (and rather alarmed) look from her. Kelly leaves to go to a customer meeting and comes back in the middle of a game where everyone in the room has to put a card with a specific race on their forehead (with the race being unknown to themselves), and then must treat everyone as if they were the race on their card. Michael, frustrated that no one is playing properly, attempts to demonstrate how to play, by approaching Kelly as she walks into the room and speaking in a stereotypical Indian accent. He starts to get offensive, mentioning various Indian stereotypes, such as convenience stores and trying to offer her "Googie coogie," to which Kelly responds by slapping him and walking away.

Season 2

Kelly's race subjects her to repeated embarrassing and insulting references. For instance, she wins the "Spicy Curry" award at the 8th Annual Dundie Awards. She angrily questions an evasive Michael about why she got the award. She dresses up as Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz on Halloween, which prompts Michael to say, "Interesting take on Dorothy" followed by his suggesting that she wear a soccer uniform and dress like Jess Bhamra, a character of Indian descent in Bend it like Beckham.

During the company "Christmas Party", Kelly gives a possibly inebriated kiss to Dwight, possibly due to his comment in "Diversity Day," although this plot line did not develop (Dwight was already dating Angela). Instead, Kelly was involved in a wildly uneven relationship with Ryan Howard, the office temp. She hinted (often with little subtlety) that she wanted to marry him and have children as soon as possible, though he was strongly opposed to it and was not especially interested in her. The relationship was often rocky as Kelly suffocated Ryan with her almost aggressively perky behavior. In the episode "Take Your Daughter To Work Day", we see Kelly's manipulative side, after she witnessed Stanley's teenage daughter shadowing Ryan. Kelly lies and tells Stanley that Ryan tried to hit on the teenager, after which Stanley berates Ryan. In the season finale "Casino Night", Ryan wearily admited to Jim that he was still dating Kelly.

Season 3

At the Hindu Diwali festival, Kelly's parents criticize Ryan for not being committed to marriage and family and for not making enough money ("Diwali"); they suggest that she go for a particular, more successful man of Indian descent. When Jim Halpert sees Kelly for the first time after the merger between the Stamford and Scranton branches, he asks her what has been going on in her life, to which Kelly responds by gossiping excitedly about Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes's daughter Suri and Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's daughter Shiloh, which have nothing to do with her life. She joins Pam and Karen's party in "A Benihana Christmas" with Ryan.

Hurt by Ryan's comments in "Business School," Michael moves Ryan's desk next to Kelly's as a form of punishment. Kelly is excited by the move, though she and Ryan bicker (and passionately make up) frequently. In "The Negotiation," Kelly reveals that Ryan once laughed at her during a date when a boy on a Ferris wheel spilled his milkshake on her. Ryan just replies "Well, that was funny; that's why." She also questions Ryan's bravery, mentioning that he once called her for help when he thought there was a "murderer" in his apartment. All this bickering makes Toby wonder in a talking head interview if Michael purposely put Ryan and Kelly together next to him just to punish him. Toby comments, "If he did... genius."

Despite her often frivolous and immature behavior, Kelly is seen in a rare professional capacity in "Product Recall." She trains Oscar, Angela, and Kevin for taking customer service phone calls after an obscene watermark is printed on Dunder-Mifflin paper, prompting too many complaint calls for Kelly alone to answer. She is very enthusiastic about this new task, and mentions that sometimes when she is bored she will make up a name for herself or talk in an accent (such as imitating Bridget Jones) while on the phone. Unlike Angela, who cannot bring herself to follow Kelly's advice and say "I'm sorry" to irate customers, Kelly demonstrates notable skill at soothing the angry callers.

In "The Job," Ryan abruptly ends his relationship with Kelly after receiving a promotion to the corporate headquarters. According to a short NBC advertisement that aired after the season, Kelly spent much of the summer crying, and her days in the office were spent under her desk not speaking or associating with anyone.

Season 4

Kelly spends most of season four getting over her breakup with Ryan and beginning a new relationship with Darryl Philbin. In "Dunder Mifflin Infinity", Kelly attempts to get back together with Ryan by telling him she is pregnant with his child. Kelly is overjoyed when Ryan agrees to have dinner with her, but the plan backfires when he learns that she is not actually pregnant. Ryan later tries to have her job outsourced to India.

A relationship sparks with warehouse foreman Darryl, after he protects Kelly from Dwight's anger over her purchasing paper online while he was trying to best the website in sales. She delightedly confesses that she didn't really need paper; she just loves the cute and friendly seeming website, particular the way the paper "flies" into the shopping cart icon.

In the episode "Money", Kelly and Darryl kiss in the conference room in front of Ryan, confirming their relationship. Kelly does not seem to to have forgiven Ryan, however, as during a grammar discussion of objective and subjective case, Kelly complains that Ryan used her "as an object." Darryl seems at times much less enthusiastic about the relationship, evoking Ryan's previous attitude toward Kelly. He declines to go on a date with her in favor of spending time with his daughter, and when Kelly presents him with an ultimatum (her or his daughter), he does not change his mind. However, he complains in a talking head interview that Kelly primarily seems interested in him when Ryan is around. He also gives her some rare straight talk, showing that he can view their relationship in a mature way. A bemused Kelly tells the cameras, "Darryl Philbin is the most complicated man that I have ever met. I mean who says exactly what they're thinking? What kinda game is that?"

In the episodes "Local Ad" and "The Deposition", it becomes clearer that Kelly and Darryl are dating. In the latter episode, Kelly becomes confrontational and insulting towards Pam when Darryl keeps beating Jim at ping-pong. Pam finally gets fed up and challenges Kelly to a game. However, it becomes clear immediately that Kelly and Pam are evenly matched at ping-pong, as they both are abysmal.

In "Goodbye, Toby", Kelly shows that she still bears a grudge against Ryan, who has been arrested on charges of fraud. She describes in detail the how she looks forward to visiting her Ryan in prison, where the other inmates would be sure to check her out and tell Ryan that they wish they had an ex-girlfriend as hot as Kelly.

Other Information

• Kelly was created because Michael needed to be slapped by a minority in the episode "Diversity Day."
• Kelly's parents in "Diwali" were played by Mindy Kaling's real parents.
• She wanted to name her and Ryan Howard's future child Usher Jennifer Hudson Kapoor. (not Howard)
• She is a frequent user of Netflix.
• In a deleted scene during "The Job", Kelly gives Pam wrongheaded advice about Jim, saying Jim is not into Pam. Pam then interviews that she and Kelly have nothing in common and that she needs new friends.
• In another deleted scene from "The Job", Michael Scott describes his planned new apartment once he gets the Corporate job, a 1-bedroom place in Queens he will share with a man named Chokalingham--in real life, that is Mindy Kaling's full last name.
• A deleted scene from "The Dundies" reveals that Kelly has a physical attraction to Toby, but is turned off by the fact that he has a daughter, referring to her as "that stupid kid."

Critical response

Slate magazine named the character as one of the reasons they were looking forward to the return of the show in fall 2007.