Rajiv Surendra

Rajiv Surendra is a Canadian actor, artist, and writer. He is best known for his portrayal of Kevin Gnapoor in the 2004 teen comedy film Mean Girls and for his 2016 memoir, The Elephants in My Backyard, which chronicles his bid to win the lead role in the 2012 film Life of Pi. Career Acting As an actor, Surendra played Chuck Singh in the third season of the YTV sitcom System Crash (2000), Max in the comedy film Fast Food High (2003), Barney Oscarson in an episode of Canadian teen comedy-drama television series Radio Free Roscoe (2003), Kevin Gnapoor in Mean Girls (2004), and Jajeev in the short film 6 ft. in 7 min. (2005). Writing In 2016, Surendra published the book The Elephants in My Backyard, a memoir of his failed attempt to win the lead role in the 2012 film Life of Pi. He read Life of Pi for the first time on the set of Mean Girls in 2004 and noticed many parallels between his own life and that of the novel's lead character, Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, including the fact that Surendra himself grew up in a home adjacent to the Toronto Zoo. To prepare for the role, Surendra temporarily dropped out of school at the University of Toronto and travelled to Pondicherry, India to learn the specific dialect of the character. Upon returning to Canada and going back to school, Surendra learned how to swim. While he did meet with the casting director of the film, Surendra was not selected to play the role of Pi. He reflected on these experiences in The Elephants in My Backyard. The book was longlisted for the 2017 edition of Canada Reads and Surendra was nominated for the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize in 2017.