---
title: "The Mindy Project"
year: 2012
kind: "series"
canonical: "https://film.one/tv/the-mindy-project"
fi1m_id: "the-mindy-project"
imdb_id: "tt2211129"
tmdb_id: 44857
wikidata_id: "Q62564"
fi1m_score: 72
critics_score: 74
critics_reviews: 7
published: "2026-09-30T20:42:36.838630+00:00"
updated: "2026-09-30T20:42:37.673461+00:00"
region: "US"
licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL."
---

# The Mindy Project (2012)

Created by Mindy Kaling · 22m · MPA TV-14 · Comedy

## Identity

The Mindy Project

- **Canonical:** https://film.one/tv/the-mindy-project
- **Type:** Series
- **Fi1m ID:** the-mindy-project
- **IMDb ID:** tt2211129
- **TMDB ID:** 44857
- **Wikidata ID:** Q62564
- **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2211129/, https://www.themoviedb.org/tv/44857, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q62564

**Fi1m score: 72** · Critics 74 from 7 reviews

*In a sentence:* Six seasons of a woman refusing to learn anything from the romantic comedies she has memorised, and we mostly cheered her on

> Mindy Kaling’s sitcom about a doctor who has watched too many romantic comedies is funny, brightly dressed and carried by her sparring with Chris Messina. Its supporting cast never settles and its first season wobbles, but it earns its six seasons more often than not.

## Synopsis

Dr. Mindy Lahiri (Mindy Kaling) is an obstetrician at a New York practice who has arranged her life around romantic comedies and is angry that it has not become one. In the first episode she gets drunk at an ex-boyfriend’s wedding and gives a speech she should not. Back at work she shares the practice with Dr. Danny Castellano (Chris Messina), a divorced, disapproving colleague who tells her what he thinks of her, and Dr. Jeremy Reed (Ed Weeks), an Englishman she occasionally sleeps with. The office runs on nurse Morgan Tookers (Ike Barinholtz), receptionist Shauna Dicanio (Amanda Setton) and Beverly (Beth Grant), who is not good at her job. In the same building, a pair of midwives, Brendan Deslaurier (Mark Duplass) among them, are taking the patients.

## Review

Mindy Kaling came up on the American *The Office*, and with a show of her own she gave herself a lead nobody would call likeable. Dr. Mindy Lahiri is an obstetrician, good at her job and hopeless at the rest of her life, who has decided she is in a romantic comedy that has not started yet. *The Mindy Project* ran for six seasons and 117 episodes on that idea. It is funny, uneven, and carried a long way by Kaling and Chris Messina arguing in corridors. We recommend it, with the caveat that it takes most of a season to work out what it is.

Kaling plays Lahiri as vain, loud, careless with other people’s time and kind to her patients, and she softens none of it. The joke is that Mindy thinks she is Meg Ryan and everyone around her knows they are in a workplace sitcom. Messina’s Dr. Danny Castellano is the ballast. He plays grumpiness as tiredness rather than charm, moves like a man whose back hurts, and disapproves of Mindy with a steadiness that starts to look like attention. Their arguments over the front desk are the best scenes the show has.

Salvador Pérez Jr.’s costumes do more storytelling than the scripts admit. Mindy comes to work in clashing prints and coats you could see from the street, dressed each morning for the day her life turns into the film she has been waiting for. Kathleen Widomski gives the practice the beige carpet and cramped kitchen of a real medical office, which makes the wardrobe the only fantasy in the building. Marco Fargnoli lights it bright and flat, and nothing in the photography asks to be looked at. David Rogers cuts fast enough that a weak joke is gone before you have finished not laughing at it. Jesse Novak’s music is bouncy and brief.

The supporting cast is where the show never settled. The first season churns: Amanda Setton’s Shauna Dicanio and Zoe Jarman’s Betsy Putch come and go, and Ed Weeks’s Dr. Jeremy Reed is a different and fussier man by the second season. Ike Barinholtz’s Morgan Tookers, a nurse with a criminal record and no filter, is the best thing the writers found: he says the worst possible thing at every turn and means well by it. We laughed at him more than at anyone. Adam Pally’s Dr. Peter Prentice arrives as a frat boy and becomes the kindest person on the staff; Beth Grant’s Beverly has one joke and lands it every time. Garret Dillahunt and Fortune Feimster, as Jody and Colette Kimball-Kinney, arrive late, and Xosha Roquemore’s Tamra Webb is asked to be sharp and little else. The turnover keeps the office from becoming the family the genre depends on.

The early episodes are the trouble. Mindy’s behaviour swings from week to week in the first season: one episode she is the only adult in the practice, the next she is the reason the practice is failing, and the writers do not seem to have agreed which. A running plot about rival midwives, with Mark Duplass as Brendan Deslaurier, goes nowhere much. The show sharpens as it goes, and the last two seasons, at 14 and 10 episodes, are the tightest, which suggests it never had 24 a year in it.

Against the American workplace comedy it sits below *The Office* and [*Parks and Recreation*](https://film.one/tv/parks-and-recreation), which built their offices out of people who stayed, and above most of what tried romantic comedy on television. What it has that they do not is a lead who refuses to improve. There is a scene in the second season, which we will not describe, where the office goes quiet around Mindy, and we were moved more than a show this brightly lit had prepared us for. It was Messina’s face that did it.

Watch it two at a time, with the first dozen episodes forgiven in advance. It is a 15 certificate for good reason, being frank about sex in a way American network comedy rarely was, and at its best when it stops reaching for romantic comedy and lets its people go to work.

*Fi1m score 72, published 30 September 2026.*

## What the critics say

Most critics like The Mindy Project, and the praise clusters on Mindy Kaling herself: her writing and her performance of a woman whose romantic hopes and self-regard keep tripping over each other. Several reviews find the show a confident, knowing play on romantic-comedy conventions, and a couple single out its light touch with Mindy’s Indian-American background. The central pairing is generally judged to work, and the later seasons are credited with giving the supporting characters lives of their own.

The reservations are about everything around Kaling. Early reviews find the medical-practice setting underdeveloped and the supporting cast weak, and the two mixed notices, from The AV Club and Paste, fault inconsistent characterisation and thin episode plots, with Paste finding Mindy herself increasingly hard to like. The spread is fairly wide, from warm to lukewarm, and it tracks time: the pilot notices and the retrospectives are the kindest, the mid-run episode reviews the coolest.

## Straight answers

**Is The Mindy Project worth watching?**

*The Mindy Project* is worth watching for anyone who likes a workplace comedy with a lead who refuses to improve, and we scored it 72. Mindy Kaling and Chris Messina arguing in corridors carry it a long way. The first season wobbles and the supporting cast keeps changing, so forgive the first dozen episodes in advance.

**How long is The Mindy Project, and what is it rated?**

*The Mindy Project* has episodes of about 22m and is rated TV-14 by the MPA in the US. It is a comedy series.

**Where can I watch The Mindy Project in the US?**

*The Mindy Project* is streaming on Hulu and Disney+ in the US, and it is also available to buy from Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video from $34.99. Availability is checked daily; the links above go straight to each service.

**How violent or frightening is The Mindy Project, and is it suitable for children?**

*The Mindy Project* is a 15 certificate in the UK and TV-14 in the US, and it is not violent or frightening at all. The rating comes from its frankness about sex, which is blunter than American network comedy usually managed. It suits older teenagers and adults; younger children would find little in it for them and a good deal their parents would rather explain later.

**How does The Mindy Project compare to Broadcast News?**

*The Mindy Project* takes its central idea from [*Broadcast News*](https://film.one/film/broadcast-news), a woman brilliant at work and a mess everywhere else, and stretches it over six seasons of sitcom. The film is the better made of the two, tighter and more perceptive about its people, though too forgiving of their faults. The series is looser and funnier in bursts, and its lead never learns, which is either its charm or its limit depending on your patience.

**What should I watch after The Mindy Project?**

After *The Mindy Project*, try [*Broadcast News*](https://film.one/film/broadcast-news) (1987, Fi1m 84): Holly Hunter is brilliant at work and a mess everywhere else; Kaling clearly took notes. Then [*Fleabag*](https://film.one/tv/fleabag) (2016, Fi1m 90): Another woman narrating her own bad decisions, with more grief under the jokes; and [*Moonlighting*](https://film.one/tv/moonlighting) (1985, Fi1m 82): The original two-people-bickering-until-something-happens show, and still quick on its feet.

### Reviews we read (7)

- **The Guardian**, Guardian staff reporter (90/100, inferred): The Guardian praises the sitcom as a whip-smart, funny, and heartwarming ode to romance. It singles out Kaling’s portrayal of the contradictions of millennial womanhood and the chemistry of the main cast. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2021/oct/04/the-mindy-project-mindy-kalings-quirky-irreverent-sitcom-is-an-ode-to-romance)
- **Vulture**, Matt Zoller Seitz (85/100, inferred): Seitz finds the pilot a confident, thoughtful comedy that playfully riffs on romantic-comedy clichés. He praises its stellar writing and cast, especially its understated treatment of Mindy’s Indian-American identity and assimilation. [Read](https://www.vulture.com/2012/09/tv-review-the-mindy-project.html)
- **IndieWire**, Hanh Nguyen (B+): The critic sees the final season as poised to be the show’s most meaningful, offering resolution while leaving Mindy’s romantic future open. They praise its resilient, positive portrayal of Mindy and the way it gives supporting characters their own arcs. [Read](https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/shows/the-mindy-project-review-final-season-hulu-1201875381/)
- **The Hollywood Reporter**, Tim Goodman (75/100, inferred): Goodman finds the pilot promising and calls it one of the season’s few worthwhile half-hours. He praises Kaling’s believable portrayal of Mindy’s romantic desperation, while noting that the medical-practice setting is not yet fully developed. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-reviews/mindy-kaling-project-tv-review-371268/)
- **Variety**, Brian Lowry (70/100, inferred): Lowry finds the season opener encouraging and says the central couple’s dynamic works well. He faults the weak supporting cast and calls the secondary plot disposable. [Read](https://variety.com/2014/tv/reviews/tv-review-foxs-new-girl-the-mindy-project-1201302789/)
- **The AV Club**, David Sims (C-): Sims finds the episode frustrating and underwritten despite some genuinely funny moments. He singles out the characters’ inconsistent behavior and the thin midwives plot as its main weaknesses. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/the-mindy-project-two-to-one-1798175178)
- **Paste**, Amy Amatangelo (5.8/10): Amatangelo is losing confidence in the series, finding Mindy increasingly unpleasant and the episode’s central plot unconvincing. She praises the joke about Mindy’s jeans, which lands with perfect comedic effect. [Read](https://www.pastemagazine.com/tv/the-mindy-project/the-mindy-project-review-danny-castellano-is-my-gy)

## Details

- **Created by:** Mindy Kaling
- **Creator:** Mindy Kaling
- **Director:** Michael Spiller, Michael Weaver, David Rogers, Marco Fargnoli, David Stassen, Ike Barinholtz, Rob Schrab, Beth McCarthy-Miller, Charles McDougall, Alex Reid, Alex Hardcastle, Geeta Patel, Paul Lieberstein, Claire Scanlon, Kate Dennis, Linda Mendoza, Lynn Shelton, B.J. Novak, Ryan Case, Peter Lauer, Daniella Eisman, Wendey Stanzler, Ken Whittingham, Roger Kumble, Nisha Ganatra, Neal Brennan, Lang Fisher, Don Scardino, Jesse Peretz, Greg Daniels, Rachel Lee Goldenberg
- **Writer:** Mindy Kaling, Tracey Wigfield, Matt Warburton, Charlie Grandy, Lang Fisher, Chris Schleicher, Jeremy Bronson, David Stassen, Jack Burditt, Ike Barinholtz, Guy Branum, Chris McKenna, Adam Countee, Alina Mankin, Gabe Miller, Jonathan Green, Jonathan Fener, Josh Bycel, Miranda Berman, Harper Dill, Tucker Cawley, Landon Young, B.J. Novak, Jen Vierck, Meredith Dawson, Mackenzie Dohr, Sonia Kharkar
- **Cinematography:** Marco Fargnoli
- **Editor:** David Rogers
- **Music:** Jesse Novak
- **Production design:** Kathleen Widomski
- **Costume design:** Salvador Pérez Jr.
- **Producer:** Mychelle Deschamps, Lorie Zerweck
- **Cast:** Mindy Kaling as Dr. Mindy Lahiri; Chris Messina as Dr. Danny Castellano; Ed Weeks as Dr. Jeremy Reed; Amanda Setton as Shauna Dicanio; Ike Barinholtz as Morgan Tookers; Beth Grant as Beverly; Xosha Roquemore as Tamra Webb; Adam Pally as Dr. Peter Prentice
- **Runtime:** 22m
- **Certificate (MPA):** TV-14
- **Release (the US):** 25 September 2012
- **Genres:** Comedy
- **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcKf9DHwN5I

## Where to watch in the US

- Hulu: streaming, hd
- Disney+: add-on, hd
- Apple TV: buy, sd
- Amazon Prime Video: buy $34.99, sd

*Checked 2026-09-30.*

Also available in: AT, AU, BE, BG, CA, CZ, DE, DK, FR, GB, HR, HU, IE, LT, NO, NZ, RO, RS, SE, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country.

## If you liked this

- *Catastrophe* (2015): Sharon Horgan and Rob Delaney turn a relationship into a six-year argument, and it is funnier for it.
- *Broadcast News* (1987), Fi1m 84: Holly Hunter is brilliant at work and a mess everywhere else; Kaling clearly took notes. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/broadcast-news.md)
- *Fleabag* (2016), Fi1m 90: Another woman narrating her own bad decisions, with more grief under the jokes. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/fleabag.md)
- *Jane the Virgin* (2014): Romantic fantasy taken seriously and sent up at once, an hour at a time.
- *Moonlighting* (1985), Fi1m 82: The original two-people-bickering-until-something-happens show, and still quick on its feet. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/moonlighting.md)

---
© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/the-mindy-project