Mindy Kaling Joins the Cast of 'Running Point' Season 3 as Divya, a Rival CEO for Isla Gordon

Mindy Kaling helped build Running Point from behind the camera. In its third season, she is stepping in front of it. Netflix confirmed on Monday, October 19, that Kaling — a co-creator, writer and executive producer of the basketball comedy — will join the cast in a recurring role, according to Showbiz Junkies and TheWrap. Production on season three is underway in Los Angeles, and the announcement answers a question Kaling herself had been asked in public months earlier: whether the writer-performer wanted in on a set she had repeatedly described as the happiest she had ever worked on.

Kaling will play Divya, described by Netflix as an outspoken, confident chief executive of a popular gambling app. The character description, carried by both Showbiz Junkies and TheWrap, draws the comparison and then the conflict in the same breath: like Isla Gordon, the team president played by series star Kate Hudson, Divya is proudly the first female leader in a male-dominated field — and their similarities end there, with Divya becoming a thorn in Isla's plans all season. No further role details have been disclosed beyond that official description, and Previously is not adding any: how many episodes Divya appears in, and exactly how a gambling-app executive collides with the front office of a professional basketball franchise, are questions Netflix has not yet answered in its announcement.

A showrunner's cast, now including its co-creator

The move has a precedent inside the same writers' room. As Deadline reported, in coverage syndicated this week, fellow co-creator Ike Barinholtz took a recurring on-camera stint as cousin Benny in season two. Kaling now follows the same path in season three. The series was co-created by Kaling, Barinholtz and David Stassen, who serves as showrunner, according to Just Jared and Showbiz Junkies. Its executive producers, per Showbiz Junkies, are Kaling, Stassen, Barinholtz, Hudson, Howard Klein, Jeanie Buss and Linda Rambis.

Buss is the real-life figure behind the fiction. Running Point is inspired by Jeanie Buss, the Los Angeles Lakers' acting governor, and follows Isla Gordon as she takes charge of her family's professional basketball team — the fictional Los Angeles Waves — and tries to run it in an industry that did not expect her to be the person in charge. That premise is what makes Divya a pointed piece of casting rather than a cameo: season three is bringing Isla a rival who has lived a version of her own story, in an adjacent business, and who apparently has no interest in being an ally about it.

Hudson steps behind the camera, too

Kaling's casting was not the only first in Netflix's announcement. Hudson will direct the first episode of season three, marking her television directorial debut, according to TheWrap and Showbiz Junkies. It is not her first time directing altogether: TheWrap notes that Hudson previously wrote and directed the 2007 short film Cutlass, made for Glamour Magazine's Reel Moments series with a cast including Kristen Stewart, Dakota Fanning, Chevy Chase and Kurt Russell, and nominated for Best Narrative Short at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival. Directing the premiere of a season she also leads on screen — opposite a new recurring character played by the show's own co-creator — makes the season three opener a genuine changing of the guard behind the scenes, even as the cast on screen stays recognisably the same.

That returning ensemble is extensive. Season three stars Hudson alongside Drew Tarver, Scott MacArthur, Brenda Song, Fabrizio Guido, Chet Hanks, Toby Sandeman and Justin Theroux, with Ray Romano, Uche Agada, Ken Marino and Jay Ellis appearing in recurring roles, according to Showbiz Junkies and TheWrap. Kaling joins that recurring tier. The announcement also placed the production in context: TheWrap reported that Running Point is one of several Netflix projects filming in Los Angeles at the moment.

What the numbers say about the show Netflix is investing in

The series arrives at season three with a real audience behind it. TheWrap reported that Running Point premiered in February 2025 and reached the top of Netflix's Global Top 10 English-language shows list, ranking in the Top 10 in 89 countries and standing among Netflix's top 15 shows of the first half of 2025. Season two, which debuted in April 2026 according to Showbiz Junkies, placed in the Top 10 in 82 countries, and TheWrap put the comedy's combined viewing at more than 75 million views across both seasons. Those are the streamer's own reported figures as carried by TheWrap, and they explain the confidence of a production announcement that leads with two creative firsts rather than a premiere date.

On that last point, viewers will have to wait. Showbiz Junkies reported plainly that Netflix has not announced a season three premiere date yet. What has been announced is the shape of the season: a producing team stepping on camera, its star stepping behind it, and a new character designed to press on the exact nerve the series was built around — what it costs a woman to lead in a business that keeps testing whether she belongs there. Kaling said in April, at the show's Contenders Television panel as reported by Deadline, that nothing would make her happier than joining the cast, calling it the happiest set she had ever been on. Season three is that wish, written into the show as a problem for Isla Gordon.

More from the TV desk: Hulu's Phony premieres today with Connie Britton and Sam Nivola, and browse the full schedule in our TV section.