Indian-origin comedian among world’s top 10
By IANSWednesday, July 15, 2009
TORONTO - Russell Peters, Canadian comedian of Indian parents who came from Kolkata, has been ranked among the Top 10 Earning Comedians in the world by Forbes.
Jerry Seinfeld tops the list with $85 million. Another Canadian Howie Mandel is also in the list.
Born in Toronto to Anglo-Indian Bengali parents Eric and Maureen from Kolkata, the 38-year-old Canadian superstar earned $10 million between June 2008 and June 2009. He is also the host of the Juno Awards - Canada’s equivalent of the Grammy awards - each year.
Because of his ethnicity, the Indian Canadian has become very popular in multicultural Canadian society. His jibes at people of colour - as non-whites are called - in his comedies but provoke no racial reaction as he is one of them.
Peters spends much of his time in Los Angeles and Las Vegas these days as he is developing new sitcom projects, a romantic comedy with Billy Crystal and acting as executive producer for television specials.
But currently he is in the middle of his 20th Anniversary Tour across Canada. On Friday, July 24, he is scheduled to perform at the largest in-door show in Canada at the Bell Centre in Montreal as part of the Just For Laughs festival.
He is also a big draw on YouTube, with over 30 million hits so far. His comedy “Outsourced and Red, White and Brown” has set new sales records in Canada.
Peters was also the first Canadian comedian to have the first-ever sell-out crowd at Toronto’s famous Air Canada Centre in 2007.
