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Penn was born in Montclair, New Jersey to an engineer father and a mother who worked as a fragrance evaluator for a perfume company; both of his parents were immigrants of Indian Gujarati ancestry.[1] Penn is an alumnus and graduate of Freehold Township High School, but is sometimes said to be a graduate of Howell High School where he was active in the school's theater productions, and The Fine and Performing Arts Specialized Learning Center for three years. He attended UCLA where he double majored in Film and Sociology. While at UCLA, he was a founding member of the underground intellectual society, "6 South". He also played a big role in the on-campus club, Sangam, which has also disbanded.

Penn's feature film debut came in 1998 in Express: Aisle to Glory. He has since appeared in American Desi, National Lampoon's Van Wilder, Malibu's Most Wanted, A Lot Like Love, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle, Dude, Where's the Party?, Love Don't Cost a Thing, Superman Returns, National Lampoon's Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj, Epic Movie, The Namesake, and Harold & Kumar 2. Penn was featured in the The Lonely Island's rejected Awesometown MTV pilot music video, along with his friend Brandon Routh (who played Superman in Superman Returns).

Penn says that he chose the stage name Kal Penn (from Kalpen Suresh Modi) as a lark: “Almost as a joke to prove friends wrong, and half as an attempt to see if what I was told would work (that anglicized names appeal more to a white-dominated industry), I put ‘Kal Penn’ on my resume and photos." His audition callbacks rose by 50%. Penn has stated that he prefers his birth name and uses "Kal Penn" only for professional purposes.

In January 2007, Penn appeared in the first four episodes of the sixth season of 24 as Ahmed Amar, a teenage terrorist. Penn says he nearly turned down the role due to personal ethics, stating, "I have a huge political problem with the role. It was essentially accepting a form of racial profiling. I think it’s repulsive. But it was the first time I had a chance to blow stuff up and take a family hostage. As an actor, why shouldn’t I have that opportunity? Because I'm brown and I should be scared about the connection between media images and people's thought processes?"

Also in January 2007, he appeared in the spoof comedy Epic Movie as well as the television show Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, where he played a recognition-starved rapist and murderer. In May 2007, Penn received the Asian Excellence Award for Outstanding Actor for his performance in The Namesake.

In fall 2007, Penn joined the cast of the FOX medical drama House as one of Dr. House's new fellowship applicants. According to E!, Penn has signed on as a regular on the show along with Olivia Wilde and Peter Jacobson and this was confirmed in the plot of the episode Games.

In spring 2008, Penn served as visiting lecturer in Asian American Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He taught a course titled “Images of Asian Americans in the Media”.

In 2008, Penn campaigned for Senator Barack Obama's presidential bid with House co-star Olivia Wilde He appears in the Obama video, Si Se Puede Cambiar by Andres Useche. Penn is also a noted vegetarian, this is noted as for filming of Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle, technicans made veggie castles for him for the burger scenes.

Penn was a guest professor at the University of Pennsylvania in the spring of 2008. According to his students, he refuses to be called "Kal Penn," which he considers a sign of disrespect, and instead prefers "Professor Modi." Although he is a well known actor on film, at UPenn, he is as strict as any other professor.