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Are Mindy Kaling and B.J. Novak a Couple Again? Mindy Project Star Dishes on Dinner Date With Her BFF

Star opened up recently about her past relationship with her Office co-star—and now they're under the microscope!

By Natalie Finn Oct 20, 2014 10:33 PMTags
Watch: Is Mindy Kaling Dating B.J. Novak?

Are Mindy Kaling and B.J. Novak more than friends once again?

The former Office mates have been under the are-they-on-again microscope ever since Kaling opened up to Howard Stern about just how deep her feelings were for Novak back in the day, and a recent spotting of the besties at dinner did nothing to dispel the speculation.

But while the creator and star of The Mindy Project assures us that there's nothing new to report about her and Novak on the romance front, she admits that she's rather enjoying the vigilant interest in her love life.

"I'm so boring that I see him at least once a week just to hang out, and now it has, like, a patina of coolness to it—which I love," Kaling told E! News during a sit-down on the set of her hit Fox sitcom.

 "We went to dinner before we saw Gone Girl, so I love that that very boring anecdote errand-slash-meal was considered sexy."

Meanwhile, Kaling had told Stern last month that her relationship and subsequent not-by-choice breakup with Novak was "years ago," but it was pretty painful at the time.

"That was the hottest I've ever looked because I stopped eating," she cracked. "When I get depressed I stop eating. So I was so miserable and so beautiful. I remember waking up, barely getting out of bed and we worked together but I didn't care. I had no makeup on...I was real miserable."

Beth Dubber/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images

Asked about Kaling's take on what happened, Novak, who has guest-starred on The Mindy Projectcalled it "an honest and heartfelt account of a complicated and mostly wonderful relationship."

"The highlight of that experience for me was my mom calling to sort of pry, like, 'So, what do you think of what Howard was saying? Sounded pretty interesting to me,'" Novak joked with Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live. "Like Howard Stern would somehow end up as part of my mom's sort of gentle harangue as, 'When are you gonna get your life together?'"

But that wasn't even the first time that Cohen had pumped Novak for details—during a February appearance on WWHL, the Saving Mr. Banks star opened up about his and Kaling's long-ago relationship, and the way he put it did make it sound kinda complicated. 

"I would say it was a great and terrible chemistry, and it reflected what we were like in real life," Novak said. "No one ever knew if we were together or not, including us. We weren't always on the same page on a given day or a given hour. We fought a lot. We were each other's best friends. We were inseparable and not talking to each other, often on the same day. And people didn't know, if she was gone, they would ask me where she was, and vice versa. We were like E.T. and Elliott a little bit."