(CNN) Kal Penn spends his days at the fictional White House on ABC's "Designated Survivor." But the actor took to Twitter on Tuesday to remember the days when his acting career's survival meant auditioning for a number of offensive roles.

"Found a bunch of old scripts from some of my first years trying to be an actor," Penn wrote before sharing pieces of scripts in a series of tweets. "They were awful. 'Can you make his accent a little more AUTHENTIC?' That usually meant they wanted Apu."

The character Penn referenced was named "Careem," who was described as having a "slight Hindi accent."

Jeez I remember this one! They were awful. "Can you make his accent a little more AUTHENTIC?" That usually meant they wanted Apu pic.twitter.com/3F5XRORO3n — Kal Penn (@kalpenn) March 14, 2017

Apu is an Indian animated character on "The Simpsons."

Another script described a character named "Parmesh," who is a "quirky, Indian lab buddy" whose "language is peppered with Indian cultural references." It was for a pilot called "The Stones," according to Penn.

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