The table-tennis film Marty Supreme boasts a starry cast that includes Timothée Chalamet, Gwyneth Paltrow, Odessa A’zion, Abel Ferrara, and Fran Drescher—but one of its actors will likely come as a surprise to book nerds.
Pico Iyer, the travel writer known for books including The Lady and the Monk, The Art of Stillness, and, most recently, Aflame, made his acting debut in Josh Safdie’s critically acclaimed movie, playing Ram Sethi, head of the International Table Tennis Association and the nemesis of Chalamet’s character, Marty Mauser.
Iyer told the Santa Barbara Independent that he believed Safdie had seen a TED Talk he gave on ping-pong.
“We met for a long lunch in New York City, and I told Josh that I’d never acted before, and he might be better off casting my much more spirited (and photogenic) wife,” Iyer said. “At the end of the lunch, he said, ‘You seem to be a good listener, and that’s what acting is really about.’”
In an essay for the New York Times, Iyer wrote, “Josh’s offer was intriguing to me because it sounded like an invitation to a very foreign country, a film set. Acting for the first time wouldn’t be comfortable or easy, I knew, but it would take me places I’d never been before. I’ve been lucky enough, as a traveler, to visit Yemen, Antarctica and North Korea; now I could go on a fresh kind of adventure, to a land with its own language, laws, and intricate codes.”
Don’t expect Iyer to give up the literary life in favor of the silver screen, however. He told the Independent, “I’m not sure anyone would ever wish to cast me again—unless Marty Supreme inspires a flurry of spin-offs and directors find themselves in desperate need of an aging, hairless Indian who can hardly move.”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
