Kat Sinivasan

As E! Entertainment’s first African presenter – and first international presenter ever – Kat can’t ever afford an off day. Here, the former musician tells us exactly how he stays ‘on’ – and what keeps him going.

- Nkosiyati Khumalo

GQ: How did you go from music and singing into television?

Kat Sinivasan: I studied classical music in university. And that’s when I got my first job in television, which was a search for a [musical] group. While I was doing the show, we recorded an album, and did a country-wide mall tour. While we were filming that show, they were looking for presenters at YoTV, which was filming at the same studio. So I caught wind of them searching for young guys particularly, and I decided to go and audition. So technically it all started on television, although the first television job was as a recording artist. I’m a triple threat. I’ve always really just enjoyed being in front of an audience performing.

GQ: What do you enjoy most about what you do now?

KS: I think now it has stopped being about instant gratification and it’s about building toward an ultimate, greater purpose. One thing I realised about dreams is that the minute you achieve a certain dream, you have to dream bigger and get a new dream. I always want to push myself to the next level – that’s what I enjoy about my career; being constantly out of my comfort zone. I think it was a realisation, when I became an E! host. Watching it from a distance, it’s easy to think, ‘If I can just get in there, then my entire life is made.’ Once I got in there, however, I realised that’s where the work actually begins. I had set myself up for a bigger task that I needed to take a lot more seriously than I ever had imagined. It’s sobering, and it hit me in the nicest of ways – and it was a realisation that I ended up falling in love with, because it’s what I live for.

GQ: What do you think makes a great presenter?