DIVERSITY IN HOLLYWOOD
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| Actor John Cho is not affiliated with this campaign. |
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| John Cho is best known in the Harold and Kumar movies and as Sulu in the updated Star Trek franchise. |
I don’t know of a time when Hollywood WASN’T a diverse
jungle. “Ethnic” back in the 60’s and 70’s perhaps meant African-American or
Latin/Hispanic-American. Sure, times
have changed and roles for Asians and Asian-American actors are becoming…again
B-E-C-O-M-I-N-G…more abundant. Growing up, “Asian” movie characters – at least
in movies or on television – fell into one of four buckets. If there was a
woman’s role, she was either the submissive, exotic temptress who waited to be
rescued (and/or hid her lethal martial arts talent and only used them when the
hero arrived) OR she ran the brothel. Men’s
roles boiled down to either the archetypical evil genius bent on world
domination OR were the martial arts expert seeking revenge on the killing of
your immediate family. Ok, maybe I’m
pushing the envelope here just a bit, but my bottom line is that protagonist
roles for Asian and Asian-American men and women in Hollywood were
categorically stereotypical, limited, one-dimensional and un-integral to the
plot (unless you were Bruce Lee and you WERE the plot).
I think there has been change since then. Asian-Americans
are portrayed on television (“Fresh Off the Boat”, “Dr. Ken”, “Crazy
Ex-Girlfriend” ‘Hawaii Five-O”, etc.) and in movies (“Star Trek”, “The Joy Luck
Club”, “Slum Dog Millionaire, etc.”) in leading or supporting roles with much
more room for more!
After much hullabaloo at this year’s Oscar’s presentation
about diversity [note: when non-Asian people speak of “diversity”, are they
including Asian-Americans in that definition?] and gender equality when it
comes to representation both in front of and behind the lens, there hasn’t been
much ado about anything that I can see. Until now….
William Yu, a 25 year-old digital strategist, has started
#StarringJohnCho, a project imagining what big movies and blockbusters would
look like if Asian-American actor John Cho had a starring role. I’m actually
very impressed by this campaign because not only does it put an Asian-American
face in a mainstream movie, it subliminally makes me, and hopefully others,
think about the possibility of casting an Asian-American in more leading roles.
