Neel Kolhatkar

Neel Kolhatkar (born 30 March 1994) is an Australian comedian, YouTuber and actor. As of October 2024, Kolhatkar has received 91.1 million views on his YouTube channel.

Early life Neel Kolhatkar was born on 30 March 1994 in Sydney, Australia, and grew up in the suburbs of Hurstville and Monterey in the city's St George area. His parents are of Indian ancestry, both from Maharashtra state; as part of a collective diaspora of first-generation Indian migrant professionals. His father migrated in 1988.

After a gap year spent performing stand-up comedy, developing characters, and exploring the comedy scenes of Montreal, New York City, Los Angeles and London,

Career

Early career and YouTube success While in high school, Kolhatkar recognised that YouTube was a place where original comedy could be posted to an audience. He would post unedited, independently produced material under the username neel30394. His third upload, Shadows, was shortlisted for the Trop Jr film festival in 2009.

He first received attention for his video Teenage Girls, which earned them 1,000 subscribers, and then for his Australia in 2 Minutes video. The latter, a video parodying different Australian personalities, increased his subscriber count to 10,000 users

Since Australia in 2 Minutes, Kolhatkar has collaborated with Playboy Fragrances in the production of a commercial for their Eau de toilette Playboy Generation. The video, featuring influencer and model Hannah Perera, was posted on their YouTube channel and featured on Playboy Australia's Facebook page. As of July 2020, the video has over 587,000 views. He has also received funding from Screen Australia and Google to produce Crossing the Line, an eight-part YouTube series ‘investigating perspectives on offensive comedy’.

Throughout his career, Kolhatkar has continued to regularly post new content and in June 2016 launched his secondary channel Neel TV. As of July 2020, it currently has 38,500 subscribers and 3,500,000 total video views in addition to his primary channel's 601,000 subscribers and 76,400,000 total video views. He won this competition while still in high school.

Appearing in a similar showcase in the 2012 Sydney Fringe Festival show Barely Legal, At age 18, he was the youngest solo performer at the Sydney Fringe Festival that year. the show was recommended by Time Out magazine.

His next stand-up show, GENeration ComedY, debuted in 2014. Kolhatkar first performed the solo show at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in the Trades Hall before taking it to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Performing at the Assembly Hall, the show received poor reviews, including three two-star ratings by Chortle, WOW247 and The List and two three-star ratings by Fresh Air and Broadway Baby. before featuring at the Sydney Comedy Festival, New Zealand International Comedy Festival, Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and Perth's Fringe World Festival that same year. Unlike his first show, Truth Be Told 's run earned acclaim from a number of critics worldwide, including Australian-based theatre magazines Weekend Notes as well as a four star rating from the United Kingdom-based The Skinny.

In 2016 he presented Neel Before Me, his third solo show. The show debuted at the Perth's Fringe World Festival before featuring at the Adelaide Fringe, Melbourne International Comedy Festival, and Sydney Comedy Festival. He then took the show to comedy festivals across the world to mixed reviews; its New Zealand International Comedy Festival run received mixed opinions from comedy critic Lord Sutch of The Ruminator in contrast to its ensuing Edinburgh Festival Fringe run, which Broadway Baby gave 5 stars. A full recording of the show, performed at Sydney's Metro Theatre, was released on his main YouTube channel in September 2017. His second comedy special, it has over 670,000 views as of May 2020.

Kolhatkar began 2017 by performing at the Mardi Gras Comedy Festival Gala in February. The gala, held at Sydney's Enmore Theatre as part of the annual Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, featured him alongside internationally recognised comedians Hannah Gadsby, Stephen K. Amos, and Tom Ballard. After this, he presented his fourth solo stand-up comedy show #ObjectifyNeel. Performed at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, the Sydney Comedy Festival, Perth's Fringe World Festival and in a number of regional Australian locations, the show received positive reviews from comedy critic Desiree Walsh of WeekendNotes Kolhatkar ended 2017 by headlining The Comedy Store's Christmas Spectacular, performed in Sydney.

His fifth stand-up comedy show, Live, played at the 2018 Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Brisbane Comedy Festival, Perth Comedy Festival, Sydney Comedy Festival, and Adelaide Fringe. The material from the show later formed part of his third stand-up special of the same name, filmed at The Comedy Store in Sydney in November 2018. He again performed Live at these same events in 2019 as well as at the Canberra Comedy Festival and Newcastle Comedy Festival. The show's 2019 run at the Adelaide Fringe received a four out of five star rating from Silvana Weyerhauser-Maher of The Iconic Blonde.

His sixth stand-up comedy show, Harder. Bigger. Better. Stronger., was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. He was due to perform at the 2020 season of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival at the Australian Institute of Music's Melbourne campus.

Film and television career Kolhatkar's television debut was in the No Laughing Matter Comedy Gala, a live comedy special aimed towards raising funds for Suicide Prevention Australia and the National Coalition for Suicide Prevention. The special was broadcast on The Comedy Channel in November 2013. He followed this by playing a variety of small roles in the show #7DaysLater and appearances in SBS's Stand-Up at Bella Union as well as the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Mediacrity program.

His first major acting role was in the 2015 short film Modern Educayshun, which he also wrote and directed. Available online, it has 19,8 million views on YouTube. The video has drawn mixed responses; Mike Byrne of The Fordham Ram labelled it ‘nothing more than a stale and shallow condemnation of culture’ but Jim Weaver of Texas radio station KKYR-FM described it as ‘brilliant’. Later in 2015, he appeared in SBS's Comedy Runway pilot episode Tip Rats.

He appeared in one episode of the 2016 television show Soul Mates before presenting the five-part documentary series Virgin Bush in 2017, produced by ABC Comedy. Later in 2017, Kolhatkar featured in an episode of Just for Laughs Australia alongside fellow Australian comedians Alice Fraser and Dave Hughes. The episode aired on The Comedy Channel on 18 November that year.

In 2018, Kolhatkar received prominent attention for his role in the Network 10 series Street Smart, where he played Uber driver Raj. Alongside the rest of the Street Smart cast, which included notable Australian entertainment figures Tahir Bilgiç, Maria Tran, and Casey Donovan, he was nominated for 'Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series' as part of the 2019 Equity Foundation Awards. The Street Smart cast eventually lost to the cast of the SBS series Homecoming Queens. Receiving poor ratings for its premiere, the show was moved to a different time slot after one episode and later cancelled after one season.

Following Street Smart, Kolhatkar had small roles in the television programs Little Sista, Pilot Week, and Sistas. It is yet to be released on television, but made its world premiere at the 2019 South by Southwest Film Festival.

Other endeavours Kolhatkar, along with comedian Jordan Shanks of YouTube account FriendlyJordies, co-hosts Neel + Jordan, a weekly podcast where they discuss different topics and themes from Byzantine history to modern comedy and Harry Styles' fashion. He has also founded a small business that teaches improvisational and drama skills to children and teenagers, developed from a similar practice he would engage in as a high school student during lunch and after-school hours. This business operates in the South-east Sydney area. Neel also hosts another podcast, Sex Cells, with sexologist and relationship therapist Eliza Joy Wilson.

He has also featured on Queen Victoria's single Give Us Ya Money and released a song titled Netflix and Chill, featuring Australian musicians Allday and KYA. The music video for the latter, uploaded to his YouTube channel, has over 195,000 views as of May 2020. In May 2020 he released Bounce for Me, a single released under his alias 'The KogDog'. It is available on Spotify.

In 2017, Kolhatkar spoke at NSW Youth Council's annual conference addressing the role of technology in driving social change and released excerpts of his stand-up comedy material to ITunes as a comedy album. The album takes its name from his third solo show, Neel Before Me. He later released a second set of excerpts of his stand-up comedy material to iTunes in July 2019, titled Half Hour Happy Ending.

In 2018, he was engaged by the National Rugby League as part of their campaign to re-popularise the annual State of Origin rugby league series between New South Wales and Queensland. Alongside influencer Michael Beveridge, Kolhatkar participated in the campaign #BetterStateDebate, producing a number of videos released throughout the three match series debating various topics. The videos were featured on the National Rugby League's YouTube channel. Campaign agency We Are Social also developed GIFs of him for online use. He regularly uses anecdotes to "critique the normative picture of society people experience". He also employs character comedy, using tropes like cross-cultural "speech, dress or mannerisms, a high degree of irony, and blending stereotype and archetype" when depicting different cultures of Australian society. Comedian Isaac Butterfield has described his comedy as "articulate, smart, and educated", Such criticism is in accordance with the issue of using race as a comedic tool. Addressing this issue with Beat Magazine, Kolhatkar has commented that he has learnt to "revel" in that response the longer he has been performing. stating his willingness to take comedic risks because "the best comedy pushes the boundary just enough to tread the fine line between tension and hilarity".

Influences Speaking to The Partae and The Creative Issue, Kolhatkar has stated his influences include American comedians Eddie Murphy, Bill Burr, George Carlin, Russell Peters and Chris Rock. He has expressed an interest to work with Kevin Hart and admires comedians who are individual and truthful.

Personal life Kolhatkar supports the St. George Illawarra Dragons, a professional rugby league team that plays in the National Rugby League. He has cited Jordan Peterson's 12 Rules for Life as a highly influential book in his life.

Filmography Film

Television