Bryn Mawr Native Kat Dennings Wins Early Acclaim in New CBS Comedy

LOS ANGELES—If some TV critics are right, a Bryn Mawr native will be among those nominated for an Emmy next July. That's how highly many critics regard the performance of Kat Dennings, who co-stars in a new CBS comedy, 2 Broke Girls, which will premiere on Sept. 19.

Dennings plays Max Black, an impoverished waitress at a greasy spoon diner, who befriends and shares an apartment with the new waitress, the daughter of a wealthy family that lost everything because the father was a swindler in business.

"Part of the reason why I relate to this show so much is because we didn't have any money when I was growing up and I used to get all my films from the library," Dennings told Bryn Mawr-Gladwyne Patch. "My mom would get me classic movies and stuff, and I actually wasn't allowed to watch TV as a kid growing up except for, like, PBS' Sesame Street."

The daughter of a scientist and a speech therapist, her parents decided that Kat would be home schooled.

"I think my parents were sort of disenchanted with the school system at that time," Dennings said. "Rightfully so, I think. But, yeah, I think that's why I was also kind of a weirdo."

Watching films on TV, Kat developed a desire to be an actor. A friend of her brother's had a small role in a TV show and Kat met his manager. "She sent me on auditions in Philly and then in New York. Then I would just start getting commercials."

That's when she was selected to play a guest role on HBO's Sex and the City. In an episode called Hot Child in the City, Kat played a bat mitzvah girl who acted much older than her 13 years.

"It changed my life," Kat said. "Really it did. Before that, I was living in the forest and I didn't even have cable. We had to get cable to watch that episode."

Since then, Kat became known to film audiences for her roles in The 40-Year-Old-Virgin, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and, most recently, Thor. For a while, it appeared her future lay in films, not television.

"I think it got to a point where I have done so many small films and I've worked really, really hard and then some of these things just disappear," she explained. "Four months of your life never get seen, and you start to feel kind of tired."

She said she felt drained by the complete physical transformation in Thor. When that film wrapped, she got a copy of the script for 2 Broke Girls. Coincidentally, the executive producer, Michael Patrick King, was executive producer for Sex and the City.

"I want to do something where people will definitely see it because I'm a hard worker, and I want to work hard and I want people to appreciate it," she said. "I hadn't thought about doing TV, but when this came along it almost seemed like a gift."

Every summer, TV critics from all over the country attend a press tour in Los Angeles to get information about new fall programs. When asked by Bryn Mawr-Gladwyne Patch, several said they considered Kat the best newcomer to TV this fall.

With or without the critical praise, though, Kat considers herself fortunate.

"This is exactly the answer to everything I've been wanting," she said. "I'm just really lucky that this came along."