Latest / The Vietnamese with Kenneth Nguyen / 477 - How do we reclaim our hidden Vietnamese roots? - Quentin Nguyễn-Duy

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477 - How do we reclaim our hidden Vietnamese roots? - Quentin Nguyễn-Duy · The Vietnamese with Kenneth Nguyen

• 0:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: What go to the Vietnamese podcast, everybody?
• 0:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: I have Quentin Wittenzui here with today, and I've been following you for a long time now, and thank you for coming on the podcast.
• 0:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, thanks so much for having me, Kenneth, I listened to this podcast.
• 0:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: Since I started getting into the entertainment industry after college, and it's been so essential in me understanding, like, you know, the Vietnamese, American, films in, actress in, it's so, so awesome to finally be on it.
• 0:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for asking you.
• 0:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's very flattering.
• 0:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to ask you since, you know, a lot of us know you from your Instagram account.
• 0:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're a lot of skits, a lot of funny stuff.
• 0:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: But before we get to all of that work, how did you grow up?
• 0:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: Where did you grow up?
• 0:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: How are you related to the Vietnamese diaspora?
• 0:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Sure, totally.
• 0:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for asking.
• 0:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I grew up in a plethora of places.
• 0:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: My mom, my dad, met in New Mexico and I was born in Oregon.
• 1:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: I moved to France for my first year of life.
• 1:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Both my parents are artists.
• 1:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: My dad is people in Greenwich.
• 1:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's a photographer.
• 1:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: And my mom is a painter.
• 1:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: We moved around a lot.
• 1:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: We went from France back to Oregon.
• 1:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: I lived on a farm in Oregon for about a couple of years and I went to Ohio.
• 1:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I lived in Oberlin, Ohio for a couple of years.
• 1:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: We were in San Francisco headlands for for a little bit.
• 1:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: I grew up primarily in a place called Ashland, Oregon where there's a Shakespeare festival.
• 1:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, and then I moved to Ohio for a couple of years on high school, Oberlin and Ohio, and then I went to a boarding school called Inner Lock and Arts Academy for my final years of high school to study acting when I was 16.
• 1:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: Wow, and where did you get the acting bug?
• 1:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know, dude.
• 1:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: There must have been someone, there must have been someone on the lineage.
• 1:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, both my parents are visual artists.
• 1:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was always a really shy kid, you know, so it was kind of a surprise when I got into acting, but it's been really my only focus since I was 16, I haven't done anything else, essentially.
• 2:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: really.
• 2:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 2:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 2:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 2:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 2:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: So that's really the thing that you want to really pursue and carry on for the rest of your life.
• 2:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, being in the entertainment industry.
• 2:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: Now, you know, more so a holistic approach, like, you know, I'd be happy anywhere I land, but when I was 16, I did my first plan.
• 2:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: I never had any focus.
• 2:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I was a skateboarder.
• 2:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't good enough to go pro, but
• 2:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't really have any other hobbies.
• 2:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was kind of just like a ram with like a trouble-making crowd.
• 2:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't have any hobbies.
• 2:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't do well in school.
• 2:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so when I did my first play, I got the lead role.
• 2:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I felt really good.
• 2:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I just never considered another career path or another endeavor ever since.
• 2:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: There was no love hearing that.
• 2:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Anything else?
• 2:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, super one track-minded.
• 2:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, and honestly, I think that's what it takes, right?
• 2:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: It really just takes that single focus, because then it's like, you're not really working.
• 3:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's not really painful, you know?
• 3:07
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 3:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: And if you have that inside voice that's telling you that this is, this is it, eventually it becomes it.
• 3:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 3:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 3:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there's always that thing in my head where I look back and like, man, should I have been in a counter?
• 3:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: That'd be kind of great right now.
• 3:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, but it's like, if you just pursue something with confidence, eventually like you won't know any other routes, you know, just assume whatever you picked was right, you know, especially if you feel like that thing has a really strong purpose all the pain that you go through trying to achieve that thing will feel like it is leading to something won't feel like useless pain, you know, so it's it's kind of like that.
• 3:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and I think it all adds up to the pain quote unquote, really adds to the whatever you're doing, whether it's podcasting or acting, it adds to the art because that journey of how difficult this can be for all of us, it adds up in it and it shows up in our art.
• 4:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and, you know, I'm sure, you know, like, I'm a lot of people listening to this podcast, you know, if you're Vietnamese American or Asian American or your minority, there's a ton of odds stacked against you in almost any industry and the U.S., right?
• 4:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: And especially if you're in entertainment, there's such a lack of representation.
• 4:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think those obstacles can also feel you
• 4:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: to feel like, oh no, the work I'm doing is actually more important than that other guy over there because it might be easy for them, but they're actually not trailblazing as much as I am by starting this podcast or trying to be a writer or trying to be an actor.
• 4:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, you know, I find it so you're saying ads to it.
• 4:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: But let me ask you though.
• 4:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: I am curious about what you just said.
• 4:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: Are you, do you think really that there are blocks?
• 4:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I have an idea, but I wanna hear it from you.
• 4:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: Do you really think that there are blocks and obstacles for people of color?
• 5:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm going to have my opinions about this.
• 5:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, totally.
• 5:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think I can talk about it.
• 5:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I can see you come up with my unique perspective of being primarily an actor for the past decade professionally.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think when I was especially younger, I experienced a ton of
• 5:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: just a severe lack of representation, especially if Southeast Asian, Azure Southeast Asian male actors, you can look at the sort of etymology of that lack of representation at things like Miss Saigon or plays that depicts Southeast Asian men as background or extras like apocalypse.
• 5:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Now, anything in an entertainment, right?
• 5:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: You don't really have any leading Southeast Asian men.
• 5:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have East Asian men leading.
• 5:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have white men leading, but you don't have Southeast Asian men doing anything.
• 5:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: As we're going to the college, I just didn't get any roles, like that all the plays that at my school were going to be plays that were about any other person's experience except from mine.
• 6:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then when I got into the real world auditioning, there's way less roles.
• 6:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: It can play to an advantage because I can fill that niche, but at the same time, it's just way harder odds.
• 6:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're not going to be sent as many jobs.
• 6:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: But wait a minute, let me, let me just be frank.
• 6:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: And for all of the people who are listening to this and on audio podcasts, Quentin is white passing.
• 6:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's just color what it is.
• 6:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're white and passing, but I know it is probably hard for Asian men, right?
• 6:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: But I've always wondered, like, for Asian men, not having, let's just say you're, all right, yeah, they look at you and they're like, okay, you're Asian.
• 6:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: But do you think that it's a lack of roles?
• 6:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: Or do you think it's like, we're not,
• 6:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: doing well enough.
• 6:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I'm playing devil's advocate here, okay?
• 6:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: So please don't crucify me people out there.
• 6:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not saying Asian men can't act.
• 6:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm just saying I'm just closing a question.
• 6:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, please have a question.
• 6:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: It is a valid point.
• 6:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, if you think about it like say if you're
• 7:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, for say, why you've been in the States for a very long time and you've prospered economically.
• 7:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: So you're going to be given opportunities to do things like the arts that don't necessarily make money, right?
• 7:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: So you'll have a father who was an actual, a grandfather who was an actor and those things will be encouraged for you to do, right?
• 7:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so I think that you just have a larger pool of artists who are
• 7:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: Caucasian or any other race other than, you know, Southeast Asian.
• 7:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you come to the States as a refugee in 1975, you're not going to have your parents put you into arts programs.
• 7:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: Now we're getting an influx of actors because we've prospered a little bit, but there's a so much smaller pull of talent.
• 7:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: So what you say by like, oh, maybe we're in an acting well enough, it's like, well, yeah, that's probably it because statistically we don't have as many people to
• 7:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, I, for myself, I mean, I'm massively privileged by being white passing and, and having that, but still having my last name be, be what it is and also, you know, I, I do have, you know, Asian lineage, especially growing up when I, I kind of look to a little bit more Asian.
• 8:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: This is kind of a weird thing that happens with Asians, sometimes we look Asian growing up and we look a little wider as we get older.
• 8:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I really don't know what it is, probably the additive of facial hair.
• 8:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: Uh, it still factors a little bit into that, you know, but I think yeah, I think that's a that's a massive barrier is just not having that sort of like push into the arts is where kids, you know.
• 8:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then when you are starting out so young, you said 16, how do you know if you're good.
• 8:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: How do you have, no, I can actually answer how do you know, because I've asked this question so many times, but I want to hear from you, right, okay?
• 8:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: Is the kind of way that you know you're good?
• 8:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: Great.
• 8:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I want to hear like what?
• 8:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: I will tell you my answer only.
• 8:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm the condition that you tell me your answer actually, because I would love to know this.
• 9:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
• 9:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, of course.
• 9:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think I knew I was good because it was the only thing I was ever good at.
• 9:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it was I was moved schools four times on high school and it was my second school.
• 9:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: I moved to, I like, just did not know a single person and someone handed me like a little monologue.
• 9:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like a little page of text and he was like, you should add it to him for drama club.
• 9:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's
• 9:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like a it's like a theater thing you get you basically joined a group and I was a cashier So I spent all day with this monologue running it my head.
• 9:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had a lot of fun doing that I practiced it for my dad My dad was like, what are you doing?
• 9:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think I'm dodging for drama club and then I Remember like a week later, seeing the cast list and I was the lead of the school play and it was like a brand new school I didn't know a single person.
• 9:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: I haven't even introduced myself to someone yet
• 9:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, it doesn't seem like that cool of a thing now, you know, because like now, you know, I'm trying to book the leads of movies in Hollywood, so a school play in Ohio isn't that cool, but as like a 16 year old that had failed everything in life, like I had really flunked out of freshman year.
• 10:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was sent away after my freshman year to like, you know, to to live somewhere else.
• 10:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: I sucked at skateboarding.
• 10:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't good enough to even get sponsored and I was essentially headed to nowhere.
• 10:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so like to get such a massive rush of validation even though it's a very trivial thing in retrospect was it just always cemented itself.
• 10:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like oh this is this is something you should lean into.
• 10:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I hate to say I have to know that you're good and you need that external validation and to be picked, but I think as you grow up, you get hints of like what you're not going to achieve greatness at and what you can potentially be pretty good at.
• 10:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Through through events like that.
• 10:55
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, unfortunately.
• 10:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: Defining good does require comparing ourselves to whatever that standard is out there and here's what I mean by that like if you go for our dishes and you keep not getting them.
• 11:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: You tripping over lines.
• 11:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, remember your shit.
• 11:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: that's when you know you're not good.
• 11:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when you know you're good is when you are learning these things and it and it and it and it seeps in and it just stays with you and you keep getting called back over and over and over again.
• 11:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, just start to look out at the landscape and you're like, wait, so I'm getting picked.
• 11:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: 80% of the times, over like my peers.
• 11:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's when you know you're good.
• 11:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: And it takes years to kind of validate that, right?
• 11:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: But it does require a little bit of comparison.
• 11:51
  [SPEAKER_02]: And they say comparison can be the thief of joy, but at the same time it could also be the validator that you are moving in the right direction.
• 12:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: Definitely.
• 12:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: Is that your, uh, okay?
• 12:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: All right.
• 12:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay.
• 12:04
  [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I went through it.
• 12:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: I wanted to be singer and I went through that path for six years and I couldn't remember melody.
• 12:10
  [SPEAKER_02]: I could remember rhythm and lyrics the way my classmates in school.
• 12:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I was a little older at the time when I went back to school for music.
• 12:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: I think I was 25.
• 12:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'd been singing since I was 18.
• 12:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
• 12:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, vocal
• 12:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: But to do professionally, I was in school with like 30 other vocalists, and I was just watching maybe five of them pick up a sheet, they look it, they sung it three times, locked it in, and then they got on stage and they nailed it with the band.
• 12:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: Took me a thousand times to do that one thing, and I'm like, there's no way, there's not a way you can do that.
• 12:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, the self awareness is key, and you would school me at karaoke, I can guarantee you.
• 12:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're still absolutely obliterating me, I carry out a thing, that's hilarious, but that is, I think the journey of like trying all these different things in life, like my daughter, she can just pick up a song and, you know, I can just see it, it's like, but her mother is a good singer, you know, and her mother can remember lyrics and melody and rhythm really quickly.
• 13:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think you know what, she's like eight years old and I'm like there's a there's a way to do this because you have the talent and you just got to work really hard to be not just good, but you you got to like work at being great and I think that's it's how fast you can respond to training right feel like I trained as an actress with 16 right and I wouldn't say when I entered the training program I was better than any other kids I you know I started significantly behind because 16 my sound like young to be an actor, but
• 13:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of my peers, when I went to prep school were eight, and there, yeah, exactly there, their mothers and fathers were failed actors.
• 13:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: He wanted them to audition for like two.
• 13:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so like for me, I was like 16 years behind all these of my kids.
• 13:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: I lacked a lot of technical skill in just everything, really until I was like 22 or 23, and I had trained for like four or five years.
• 14:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's also a matter of
• 14:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: If you can't be good at it, do you sustain enough curiosity to pursue that thing?
• 14:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Does it, is it fun enough and meaningful enough for you to keep going with it?
• 14:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know a ton of kids who were like fantastic at acting, but didn't have the tenacity to keep learning and didn't have the humility to also be taught and couldn't handle rejection.
• 14:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: So they just...
• 14:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: fizzled out by the time they graduated college, you know.
• 14:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think that's also a fact when you're thinking about like success is like, you know, can you pick it up quick?
• 14:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: Are you naturally good at it?
• 14:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: And do you have the passion and the drive to sustain through the hard times, you know, with whatever you pick?
• 14:50
  [SPEAKER_02]: I was listening to an interview on a podcast the other day with an agent.
• 14:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I can't remember which who it was, but the agent was like quoting a producer,
• 15:02
  [SPEAKER_02]: The real challenge that we as producers are looking for is not the talent, because you can work all that in the recording studio.
• 15:12
  [SPEAKER_02]: Not the looks, all of those things, there's a range, there's a gamut of all of that range of looks and talent.
• 15:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: If you study the history of musicians and singers, but what we're looking for really,
• 15:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: is the ones that are immune to get in beat down, because that ultimately, when a producer with money invests in you as an artist, they want to keep placing the bet on that horse.
• 15:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: The whole industry, like if you're an actor, right?
• 15:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: we want to make sure that this guy will never get his ass walked and that we're putting down a five million dollar bet on his salary.
• 15:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: He'd better like show up and not be afraid to get hurt to get, you know, and I mean hurt as an ego and all of that.
• 16:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: Like this guy is undamageable.
• 16:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's what that producer was meaning is that this is a game of attrition.
• 16:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's a
• 16:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, no 100% I mean, I think that's something that's touched on to I want to touch on to with the the greatest thing is also like when you get into the real world you face no knowing you're good as an actually really hard because the baseline the norm is rejection right like a even if you go up I mean I will say my statistics off the top my head are probably on average about 190 auditions a year which I book one or two jobs.
• 16:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right.
• 16:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's actually without any sort of there I will I will I can go on Excel spreadsheet and I can compile the data that's actually without any exaggeration.
• 16:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's maybe not counting a couple short films from some students.
• 16:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not going to count those those are like the jobs that actually pay for my year.
• 16:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: So it's like.
• 16:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Crazy because right your agents are sending you things and you feel like you're back against the wall and you're you're getting a rejection as your rejection as your rejection it's you also have to hold it a little bit of inner like validation.
• 17:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: When the world's not giving you any sort of like hey you're really good at this we think you should keep going you have to really hold a lot of belief in yourself and know
• 17:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: the line between being completely delusional and unselfaware and also like being just tenacious enough to keep going in this industry.
• 17:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: So it's actually a very it's a very hard thing, you know.
• 17:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that knowing your great also has to be something that you hold internally as well as is hopefully you're going to feed back from the outside world.
• 17:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: But there's years where and we can get into that later with the career stuff.
• 17:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: But there are years where you will not hear a single person clap except for yourself, you know.
• 17:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: Man, that isn't heads.
• 17:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: And hence, and I think a lot of people know being an actor is hard, but they don't understand that the rejection to acceptance rate is actually like, it's a 98% rejection.
• 17:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: It sounds like more.
• 18:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: For a hundred and ninety and it's one ninety and you only book in one to a twice a year.
• 18:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 18:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's why you can see I'm so bad at math that this is the career path I have to choose.
• 18:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: I can't even go into accounting if I fail.
• 18:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: You inspire me, you know, when I think about your journey, this is why I do what I do because I get to listen to this inspiring journey.
• 18:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: You've been out of for 10 years.
• 18:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've only been out for six years.
• 18:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: And for me, I just knew because it was just so easy to talk to people.
• 18:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I didn't really care about the money.
• 18:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 18:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: And that's when I knew I'm built for this and it's good.
• 18:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: possible for anybody to kind of like compete with me because this is what I love doing.
• 18:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I love sitting here and I love talking and asking questions about the guests and I think that that's when you know, I think because I've been through a few art, you know, I write, I sing.
• 19:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: Just going through these processes makes you realize like,
• 19:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: You got it there, but you don't have it here, but you know, and that longevity and that kind of like the mileage I could see way out into the Tundra, you know, like any cold frostbite, I'll make it to the other side of the Tundra where there's like green grass growing to the forest.
• 19:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm gonna make it.
• 19:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, you know, that's that's kind of like what I what I'm hearing from you, you know, it's no totally.
• 19:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, like, there's no, you know, being an artist such a multifactorial pursuit, you know, I'm sure that all the things, the artistic endeavors that you really try to pursue before podcasting and and elevate in other artists has factored massively into your practice now, you know, and developing yourself awareness of what you're good at and what you need work on and, and sort of working
• 19:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: everyone in the arts the arts is your weird thing it's like you you kind of know your destination like it's somewhere over the mountain but you don't know what road you're gonna take you know it's like you're like I kind of want to be in Hollywood but like does that mean I'm a producer does that mean I'm a writer doesn't mean I'm an agent doesn't mean I'm an actor and I don't think any road is is I think people find success in any road you know
• 20:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: But when I look at, you know, a career over the long run, you know, I always, I think that people just just inhabit multiple roles, you know, and in each one builds some sort of like talent and the posing rub, you know.
• 20:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I think you just don't know which road because out of a hundred roads one road.
• 20:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: will bring an accidental benefit meeting that changes the trajectory of your life.
• 20:45
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 20:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: And another might bring it instead of the first one doing it in two years, the other one might do it in six years.
• 20:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: You just have to like, you really just have to take all the opportunity you can get.
• 20:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's a complicated thing, but as long as you have the inner drive and that passion, the optimism to go towards what you want, you'll find a way to get there, and you'll never know which way you'll take it, probably different massively from what you initially expected, but I think that's so important that arts is tangential as that is.
• 21:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, before we go into what you're currently up to, I'd love to hear in the last 10 years,
• 21:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: if you almost ever dropped out.
• 21:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my god, dude, that's such a great question.
• 21:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I can't ask you to ask him people that when I'm at dinner parties.
• 21:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: Because it's just good to get a bear somebody fruitful answers.
• 21:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: We ask artists like, hey, you're a quit.
• 21:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think this is a bad idea.
• 21:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, like after 196 of rejections where you ever like maybe maybe this is just not economically feasible now I think Was it thousand nine hundred if we're gonna add it up times ten years like all 11 thousand knows
• 22:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's fantastic.
• 22:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't even can have that mathematical ability.
• 22:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think, um, which is probably why I'm still doing it.
• 22:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: Uh, I, uh, what did I ever quit?
• 22:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I did.
• 22:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had actually very early on.
• 22:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, when I was about.
• 22:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: Let's see.
• 22:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's actually, there is two times.
• 22:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's two times if I'm going to be super honest.
• 22:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: When I went to prep school, I went from a public school to a boarding school, and everyone was so ahead of me, and I had this passion.
• 22:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: I had this love for this thing when I was around 16.
• 22:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I just realized I just sucked, you know, like I was at the top of the top of my public school, but then when I went to boarding school, I was just, it was such a cut-through environment going from public school to private school.
• 22:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was such a at least environment.
• 22:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was kind of the poorest kid there and like my dorm like house.
• 22:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I was also the only Asian actor in my cohort,
• 23:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I was the least skilled like this like objectively talking about I had found it the year before everyone there had been there for at least four years and had done it since childhood and I didn't book a single speaking role that year.
• 23:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it was really hard because I had to convince my dad like to let me go and I had to spend the whole summer like a selling trinkets on the street.
• 23:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: My dad made these little, I love like little phone speakers that people put their phone in, played.
• 23:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I sold enough funds.
• 23:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: I made like a lot of money to get myself there and got a scholarship.
• 23:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: And he paid the rest of the tuition on the basis that I would go when I would flourish.
• 23:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: failed like flat out.
• 23:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just got I didn't get a single speaking rule.
• 23:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I got into a lot of trouble.
• 23:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: I got suspended for a month and I think I like spent that month of suspension back in my room in Ohio and I was just like, yeah, that's I just I'm not made for it.
• 24:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: So after that
• 24:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: year because I was suspended for the month that college applications were due I didn't apply to anywhere for college and I ended up going to Oberlin College because my dad works for Oberlin so I had like submitted a comment app theme and I went under Clare and I studied journalism.
• 24:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: But during that year, I was just so obsessed with theater.
• 24:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like I would go, I would go to the blaze that they put on to teach people like sex at.
• 24:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: I would go to the plays where it's like about like demonstrating like rules on campus.
• 24:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I would watch the performances and get like, oh, what worked in this play about like rules on campus?
• 24:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: What worked here?
• 24:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I would
• 24:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: I directed a play, I directed, this is our youth.
• 24:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was the first freshman in a lot of years to actually have a full-length play produced that I directed.
• 24:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was in plays, I was auditioning, I was writing plays, getting my professors to kind of oversee playwriting projects.
• 25:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: And at one point, I was just like, you know, I'm just at a school doing theater, that's not a theater school.
• 25:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: I should just...
• 25:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: go back if this is what I really want to do despite how painful it was to fail my first time.
• 25:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I auditioned for Boston University, I got a full scholarship and I went there for three years.
• 25:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that was a big deal.
• 25:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, that was really, it was a Boston University of fantastic, fantastic program.
• 25:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: But that was like my year of just, I really threw in the towel after I tried.
• 25:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: Just because I think I wasn't used to rejection.
• 25:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I wasn't used to competing at a high level.
• 25:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was such a slacker for my adolescence.
• 25:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: So when I tried to do it, it was just a shock to the system.
• 25:45
  [SPEAKER_02]: So you got to see,
• 25:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: before you quit, you got to see people performing at the highest levels, like these kids.
• 25:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Those kids were really talented.
• 25:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: And you know, I want at some of them are very successful there, but the bulk of them actually didn't continue in the arts, you know, and I think,
• 26:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Some of that early like, yeah, child actually stuff is actually like, I mean, it's a cliche for a reason.
• 26:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, I remember looking at these kids and being like, oh my god, that, you know, I can't even compete in the same level of them ever.
• 26:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now that they're not even acting, you know, there's a few of them from my classmates who are just brilliant who are still doing this for a living.
• 26:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: But, you know, I think I just made a judgment when I met them and I was like, oh, like, they are more
• 26:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: they are more worthy of this path than I am.
• 26:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I should just stay back and be a skateboarder or do something outside the art, you know.
• 26:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do you feel that way every now then?
• 26:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, every actor has like a very deeply seated kind of feeling of insecurity.
• 26:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's what drives us to keep trying to get external validation.
• 26:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I just, I don't entertain that thought anymore.
• 26:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, I'm as worthy as anyone to be here, you know.
• 27:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's what they want you to think, man, especially, you know, I'm definitely white passing, but especially if you're a minority, that people just want you to think like,
• 27:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Ah, I'm not as worthy as the rest of these people here, like, you know, it's just, it's just not, I try to fruit Ninja that thought out of my head if ever comes up, you know.
• 27:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: Fruit Ninja that thought?
• 27:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so a co-star of mine on the show called Hunting Pointer, your name is Sarah Garcia, she plays a Jennifer Morales on the show.
• 27:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: She says that every time she has a bad actor thought, like an insecurity, she fruit Ninja's it, and I just think it's a fantastic, CBT, it's great.
• 27:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: it's great.
• 27:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to start using that with the kids.
• 27:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, once you say that, it's like, and it just disappears.
• 27:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.
• 27:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like, oh, I should not addition for this.
• 27:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not right for it.
• 27:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's a fruit ninja that thought.
• 27:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: We're all that rejection means I'm not talented.
• 27:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like fruit ninja that thought, you know.
• 27:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: The second time I ever quit NLTLDR this, but the second time I ever quit was at a horrible time when I was 20, I
• 28:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: five, they just, like, my whole world went to, I mean, we had the sag strike and then we had COVID and all this stuff, but I did the Asian baby girl pilot, we could talk about that later, and it was a massive high.
• 28:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was a series regular one of the leads on that show with a brilliant director, Den Ty and my friend, Linkim Doe and Kathy Boy and Giselle.
• 28:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: But it didn't get picked up sadly by the network and
• 28:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just, that kind of like rejection, I felt like at a, that kind of age of 24 hit really hard and then that same week that I got the news, the pilot was red lit my agency, which is a three imploded the and it just burst and so I got this pieces of news when I was like 25 and I.
• 28:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: I just, I really didn't know what to do at the time.
• 28:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was kind of the lowest of the low.
• 28:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: I hadn't booked in like one year.
• 28:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't have an agent.
• 28:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: The thing that I thought was going to work out didn't work out.
• 28:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: I've been auditioning like crazy.
• 28:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was a personal trainer full time at that point, too.
• 29:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I just, I was very, very depressed that week.
• 29:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I auditioned for a play and the play I auditioned for the casting director introduced me to my agent now.
• 29:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then that was sort of like a, felt like a very kid's mid-moment.
• 29:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh man, like, there's all this hardship really, emotional rollercoaster that's really sustainable, you know?
• 29:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 29:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: Now, wow, that's amazing.
• 29:31
  [SPEAKER_02]: Really cool story.
• 29:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
• 29:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
• 29:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: And when did you start getting on the Instagram sort of work because, you know, I think sometimes now producers will look, you know, to see if an actor has a following or, you know,
• 29:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: Sure.
• 29:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: Great question.
• 29:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean Instagram for me was such a random additive to my life.
• 29:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was always that guy with an Instagram with like 2,000 followers and like one selfie of me a year.
• 29:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 29:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, I never cared about it because I came from the theater and theater actors from New York.
• 30:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think we always just kind of like scoffed that social media.
• 30:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I met a guy named Sam Lee.
• 30:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's one of the actors on the Brother Son.
• 30:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's also a creator.
• 30:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: When I was shooting the Asian Baby Girl pilot, we all went out to dim sum and I met him and he was shooting Brother Son at the time.
• 30:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: and we just hit it off and we started hanging out and I would help him film some reels and I thought it was so fun.
• 30:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was also a playwright and college I would write plays and that was like a really big thing that I was passionate about.
• 30:34
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so to me I feel like writing plays and after a while he was like, you know, why don't you do your own thing?
• 30:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Why don't you try to
• 30:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: Do your own content and I was like, dude, what the heck would I make content about like I don't want to make I just was like what am I gonna do and then I met a buddy named Ray Cam Daddy Dumpling on Instagram and and we had all hang out and and Ray Cam There's a lot of content about learning Cantonese and at the time I had been learning Vietnamese for about three years So he was like do content about learning Vietnamese and so for me as okay, you know, I can practice my Vietnamese on a weekly basis
• 31:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I can also see what it's like to use Instagram.
• 31:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I started using Instagram to connect with the language.
• 31:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that was my only, that was my only goal.
• 31:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: And now it's expanded towards more things.
• 31:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 31:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: And do you find that now that you have, you know, this, the, the chops to kind of make these, does it add to your real at life acting experience?
• 31:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think a lot.
• 31:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you know, we live in a day and age where like media, the blood line between vertical and horizontal entertainment is kind of blurring and you see social media stars getting Amazon show deals.
• 31:47
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you see like people like Jerusalem are now like hybrid celebrities that are noisy.
• 31:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: Missed them Brad Pitt to Jan Alfa or something, you know?
• 31:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, crazy to witness.
• 31:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's crazy, it's insane, you see like the even the showrunner of our Northodox of, so I'm not over compensating as TikTok star.
• 32:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think since doing this, I've found a little more traction.
• 32:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: But I think it's also really important for actors to create and on social media because
• 32:20
  [SPEAKER_00]: We just do so much work that's unseen, like we do so many auditions.
• 32:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: They're so great and they're so funny and we just think they're bad because they never get a response.
• 32:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right, but like I think it was a necessary survival thing for me because I would put my stuff out into the ether and people would like it and share it and respond to it.
• 32:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: To create on a daily basis was really essential for my literal survival.
• 32:43
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that the exposure I've gotten, the following I've gotten has helped, especially actually in the Vietnamese American kind of film making it, yeah, yeah, but mostly it helps me because it's helped me just like feel validated in my heart.
• 33:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
• 33:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, have you been to Vietnam?
• 33:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I won't recently, I've been, I've been six times now to suck on it since
• 33:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was nine when I first went and then a couple of other times my dad, but I think probably my most impactful times were like, my probably my most impactful time actually I visited from I was off to episodes of Hunting Party, which is the show I just shot.
• 33:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was there from December to early January and it was just really impactful because I went
• 33:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I felt like I just really connected with people there.
• 33:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I felt like there's a lot of creative energy.
• 33:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: And there's so many people doing awesome things over there.
• 33:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I felt like a kind of a real homecoming.
• 33:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, uh, uh, it was just a really awesome time.
• 33:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we need your dad move there.
• 33:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, he's there kind of like six months out of the year, but he has an apartment.
• 34:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: Uh, he's had since 2020.
• 34:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: God, God.
• 34:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, but he's retiring this year.
• 34:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think he's probably going to spend more time there.
• 34:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: I didn't have kids, I'd probably live in view like that.
• 34:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: I know, right?
• 34:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: Claudia, life dude, it's just so good.
• 34:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: I read my scooter around and like stopped for little, not every corner.
• 34:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: No question about it.
• 34:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: No question.
• 34:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I know.
• 34:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: I've gotten crucified for saying that online on other people's podcasts, other conservative.
• 34:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, they're like, then go back and live there.
• 34:27
  [SPEAKER_02]: Why are you living here?
• 34:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: Good kids, man.
• 34:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: Kids, I don't want to pull my kids out of, you know, and
• 34:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: The United States is a great place.
• 34:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's not like it that raw.
• 34:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's a great place.
• 34:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: We have a lot of issues, but you have issues.
• 34:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, yeah, we all have issues, but when you think about the landscape of Vietnam and living in Vietnam and visiting Vietnam, do you ever think that you could live there and become
• 34:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: fixture there and you know blended with the language and you really, and you're integrated.
• 35:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's a great question.
• 35:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think if I, if I live in Vietnam, I would never, I would never be Vietnamese.
• 35:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I'm not Vietnamese.
• 35:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm Vietnamese American, you know, and I'm very hyper aware of that when I'm there.
• 35:17
  [SPEAKER_00]: I am a visitor.
• 35:19
  [SPEAKER_00]: right and so I can do it I can do it respectfully and I can do it in a way that I think adds value to the community but I will never be part of Vietnam in the way that someone who's born there is and I can speak you know I can learn how to speak and all that but I don't know if I be able to sustain a life there just just by a basis of that you know
• 35:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'd always be at least a bit cute, you know, and and people are very welcoming, right?
• 35:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's the most welcoming country I want to do to me.
• 35:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: No one ever brought up my outsider status.
• 35:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: No one ever made me feel inadequate for not being able to speak that well.
• 35:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, nobody ever called you white passing.
• 35:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, let me have people called me by asking me, kidding.
• 36:03
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, I don't, I'm just like a tall, like a Dutch man speaking Vietnamese, like, you know, like, but not anyway that's ever felt demeaning or hostile, you know?
• 36:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 36:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: So what's next?
• 36:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: What's on the table for you these days?
• 36:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: What are you trying to push and work on?
• 36:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, a super good question.
• 36:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: Right now, I just finished 13 episodes of Hunting Party for the season two.
• 36:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's a show in NBC, peacock and Netflix, and that was just a wonderful, awesome, wild ride.
• 36:39
  [SPEAKER_00]: I play a character called Ben Jones.
• 36:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, and I'm going into filming a new short film by director Josh Campbell called Mishi this weekend, actually, so I'm prepping for my role.
• 36:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Where I play, um, like, uh, chronically addicted gambler, um, and so there's some twists and turns in that role that I'm really excited for.
• 36:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And really, at the moment, I'm trying to double down with social media and just just,
• 37:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: make quality content and really see where that trend takes me this year.
• 37:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I started a joint kind of Instagram account with my friend Sam Lee called performing males on Instagram.
• 37:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: So we're trying to IDA and populate that page with a couple of skits kind of like a kind of like an Asian American keen peel type thing.
• 37:23
  [SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
• 37:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
• 37:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: I always try to tackle it as that because I love
• 37:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: Legends.
• 37:33
  [SPEAKER_02]: Legends, they are so brilliant with the North Indian and you see, you know,
• 37:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: Jordan Peel and the directing that he's done since he's loved that key in Peel and it's just like amazing just work that they do.
• 37:49
  [SPEAKER_00]: He's incredible.
• 37:50
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you talk about hybrid artists like, yeah.
• 37:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Jordan Peel is the OG social media to like actual legit Hollywood.
• 37:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: Kind of like artists, you know.
• 38:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Their fans has a guy.
• 38:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: I was watching one of their skits literally earlier today.
• 38:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: I still watched their skits like religiously They just made such an outstanding body of like content that that group so funny.
• 38:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: They did now they did and Then you you realize like
• 38:21
  [SPEAKER_02]: before them, there were other teams of people doing it, but they didn't do it like that.
• 38:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: Whatever their special sauce was, they didn't do it like that.
• 38:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then when I think about Vietnam, what go ahead, go ahead and say something?
• 38:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: No, well, I think, you know, I want to hear it thought after that, but I think the special sauce is a lot of their skits are actually really socially conscious.
• 38:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: They actually have a lot of critical thought behind them.
• 38:40
  [SPEAKER_00]: Like, so much of them contain actually really complex,
• 38:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: like like like like kind of like race theory if you look at a lot of their things and like having to do with being mixed African American like you can some of them are just pointless and funny but a lot of them are actually like way deeper than people are giving up.
• 39:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: I would I would actually fight back with you about or listen for I would fight back and say every one of them that you watch has social commentary.
• 39:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
• 39:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I say that because it's always about something that's raw and wrong.
• 39:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 39:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's always right.
• 39:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then the straddling that boundary of like raw and wrong.
• 39:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then you're like, then you watch like get out and you watch,
• 39:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: the movies at Jordan Peel makes the horror films.
• 39:28
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then there's all this social commentary.
• 39:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, you realize it's like, oh shit, this guy's like not just an entertainment filmmaker, but he's like making commentary on the United States that we live in.
• 39:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I know, no, I just think that if you can tell that there's someone just depth with the comedy trope, I'd true, but I think that's why it lives so, you know, like I, you know, he really lets loosen his long form stuff, but you can tell on to the surface of like, you know, there is the obviously the black ice is something that's actually like you can trail down like the stuff they're joking about and see a lot of complex theory on it.
• 40:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: And
• 40:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's even stuff that's like less kind of deep like just like fragile masculinity stuff like You know it's just like how I was washing the like one really guys like man.
• 40:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm a grown-ass man I don't want to have that and he starts crying at the table and he's like, oh, the problem with man and you're like Oh, he's talking about how how fragile that drilled man's he goes on
• 40:25
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so like it's like really funny, but it's because I think they're I think they're so evergreen.
• 40:30
  [SPEAKER_00]: They keep they keep being repeatedly.
• 40:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: They have so much, you know, actual death behind them.
• 40:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: So let me ask you when you write and you put together this stuff with family.
• 40:39
  [SPEAKER_02]: You said yeah.
• 40:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 40:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: So when you put together your key and pure stuff right.
• 40:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Do you do you think about the quality level, the bar that you're trying to like okay.
• 40:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, and how do you know if you're like coming close to the target of what they've done?
• 40:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, no, totally.
• 40:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: You can feel such a funny, I mean, actually a really apt comparison because that's who I would.
• 41:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: I can't even be audacious enough to say it inspired to be like them because they're such great, but I aspire to, you know, be a fraction of how great they were.
• 41:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I think for me, it's like I come from the playwriting world and I have so much
• 41:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: creating 120 page plays that are socially conscious, that are funny, that have been rehearsed for months before they go up.
• 41:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: So when I entered the social media world, I have an equal amount of passion for just like dumb videos of like AI dogs, like fucking doing the nanny or something.
• 41:36
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that like things are still funny that are like 30 seconds, but I always try to think like if I had a rubric and I use this with Sam Lee by use it by myself too.
• 41:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's like does this thing have a message does it have does it kind of give
• 41:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that gives something until the cultural like ethos that doesn't belong there previously.
• 41:56
  [SPEAKER_00]: So like for instance, me and Sam, Lee just did a video called Asian Americans returning home to their motherland for the new year or something.
• 42:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: And we did the thing where we wore the Adidas viral jackets and we're like, and we're like, and we're being like, wow, like,
• 42:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, you can actually say, shit, shit, and everyone will think you're native.
• 42:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: And so, like, it was because we were there and we were like, man, it's just so great to be like Asian where this Asians and we were looking around.
• 42:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's like no Asians.
• 42:22
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, wow, we're like the most, we're so clipped.
• 42:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: And we see an end style just didn't article where they featured an interview from me and Sam, because they're talking about the viral, uh, Dita's Chinese jacket and why it was a trend and how that video kind of
• 42:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: That kind of came about because when we were thinking of what videos to make, what videos to not make, we usually go with the ones that just have a little bit more of like, is this commenting on something that people are relating to?
• 42:53
  [SPEAKER_00]: Is this like a capturing a moment in time that should be studied from a sociological perspective?
• 42:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: We had a bunch of videos about hinge to like about like unoriginal guys on hinge and unoriginal girls on hinge.
• 43:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think a lot of it was just like,
• 43:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Trying to find a moment in time for me, even with my wage and stuff, where it's like, we should talk about this.
• 43:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: We should talk about something that's not talked about.
• 43:14
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, and if it doesn't fulfill that requirement for me, it doesn't, I don't want to pollute the world with more content and this over saturated internet age than that already exists, you know.
• 43:26
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's an elephant in the room.
• 43:37
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's a lot of content on YouTube, there's a lot of content on Instagram.
• 43:40
  [SPEAKER_02]: There's verticals now with other AKA micro dramas.
• 43:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: That are really replacing the position of film, little long-form feature films are being kind of like, it's kind of like,
• 43:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: dwindling the the roles.
• 44:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, are you feeling that?
• 44:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: Are you preparing for that journey ahead?
• 44:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: Or are you are you are you just booking off TV and film stuff that you don't really care?
• 44:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: You mean there's a sort of competition between vertical dramas and TV is that where you start film?
• 44:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, I think feature film TV TV not so much but feature films are like kind of drawing up
• 44:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: doesn't have good actors and yeah well for me it's like I think that like essentially my view is that things always remain the same they just take different
• 44:42
  [SPEAKER_00]: shapes.
• 44:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: For instance, there's always going to be a demand for long form really good cinematic content that gives you something to think about non-long after you watched it.
• 44:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: There's always going to be a huge market for just trash, right?
• 44:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: And what soap operas were and what, you know, via drama is kind of R and like, you know, although like kind of things are going to be
• 45:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't I don't think it diminishes the market for actually if you look at the Emmys this year the TV shows are outstanding quality Like I think that a lot of movies have shifted to just being incredible limited series The pit was just one of those medical dramas where I was like this is just a trailblazing work of art and TV add a lesson to something that I love something add a lesson just mind blowing and that's like easy
• 45:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: insane and it's like a play right it demonstrates so much technical skill from everyone involved no vfx uh no bad and shot one shot right and same with same with the pitch shot and real time that takes as a writer that takes so much skill and um i think i've seen on president and skill on tv i think i've seen a little bit of the movie industry be diminished but i do think that if you also look at
• 45:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: you know the the Oscars like those things will always bring in a lot of audience I do think there's going to be a rise in vertical like dramas and like micro dramas but I don't think it's going to replace quality work.
• 46:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's going to replace like let's sell boppers were you know.
• 46:15
  [SPEAKER_02]: I think I I think I have to agree with those yes you know that assessment is is probably right on the run mark.
• 46:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to help.
• 46:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 46:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 46:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: Where are you guys at?
• 46:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: No, no, no, I think so, but, you know, there's probably a lot of room left in Vietnam too for this growth.
• 46:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I think 80% of micro dramas, the vertical dramas on your phone, the markets in China, it's a percent China.
• 46:42
  [SPEAKER_02]: And the rest of the world has not had anything caught up yet.
• 46:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 46:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it's like blowing to think about it's my blowing it's my I mean there's a market there is a market I mean I won't deny that But I think a lot of people wonder if like vertical microjama is going to replace real TV and to me I just don't I just don't I can't imagine a world where people are like no, I'm gonna
• 47:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: people are going to go to like vertical movie theaters, you know, it's like you're never going to like one to, it's just something I think that's like just a passive form of entertainment I don't think it will replace any part of the industry.
• 47:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: I hope you're right.
• 47:20
  [SPEAKER_02]: I hope it's like, you know, we can't, you can't always eat fast food.
• 47:24
  [SPEAKER_02]: You can't eat fast food maybe one to month once we, I mean, there's a lot of people eating it every day, but I mean for the most part as a healthy person, you don't want to, you don't want to eat it more than once a month.
• 47:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: But,
• 47:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: at what level, the high-end market of making food is actually going way.
• 47:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's diminishing these restaurants don't make money.
• 47:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: So it's just the same thing with every industry that we're looking at these days.
• 47:49
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's like the shifts are happening.
• 47:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: But that's why it's in the beginning with you.
• 47:54
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're in a very good place.
• 47:57
  [SPEAKER_02]: in this industry.
• 47:58
  [SPEAKER_02]: You're not too late, not too early.
• 47:59
  [SPEAKER_02]: The pocket of change is happening now, and you can, you know, you can get on quick enough and transfer you form.
• 48:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: We'll get off.
• 48:07
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 48:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I think that the artists who survived longest in this world are the ones who adapt, you know, and who can move freely like you have a podcast.
• 48:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're just talking to me about how you wanted to write books about people on the film industry and you listen to like a
• 48:26
  [SPEAKER_00]: And for me, that's embracing something as opposed to shine away from it and demonizing it because it feels like it's it's foreign, you know, and Hopefully we can continue to distribute like good quality content no matter what the platform is.
• 48:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think I'll ever act in a vertical drama, but if I ever make like an internet series, you know, I'll try to make it as quality as possible and I'll also chop it up to vertical
• 48:51
  [SPEAKER_00]: Um, but hopefully that vertical TV series has good writing in it has good acting in it is only a fraction of my practice, you know.
• 49:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: Um, I would, I would be careful with saying never because and who's why what I think I think right now it's all crap.
• 49:06
  [SPEAKER_02]: Acting that's coming out and these verticals are just horrible.
• 49:10
  [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
• 49:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: But just like the iterative process of cooking or making art, I think things will get better, right?
• 49:17
  [SPEAKER_02]: I think it will get really good.
• 49:19
  [SPEAKER_02]: And because of you think about it, it's just an evolution of an art form.
• 49:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: And as they're getting better, instead of punching in close to make things cheaper, they're gonna come out a little bit wider, water.
• 49:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: And then at some point, they're gonna max out on how far back they can cause you know, then the details you can't see through your phone, whatever that is.
• 49:38
  [SPEAKER_02]: the storylines are going to get so good because the competition is going to be fierce and then they're going to be like right now you have like actors that are not great in it but then all of a sudden you have like the really good actors being you know so instead of putting down 300 grand a make a vertical and then making a million in in sales off of it you could probably put a million dollars in a vertical and hope to get a runaway hit like a $200 million
• 50:05
  [SPEAKER_02]: vertical, you know, like, is everybody's like, like, God, I'm going to think about, right?
• 50:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I don't, I mean, you're right.
• 50:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're right.
• 50:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I don't disagree.
• 50:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's just the natural progression of everything.
• 50:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: Totally.
• 50:13
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
• 50:14
  [SPEAKER_02]: That's what was like, I mean, you shouldn't say never know, that's just been, maybe a good thing.
• 50:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 50:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 50:18
  [SPEAKER_00]: After they vertical, they're not there to think about their million dollar project.
• 50:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: I might, I might take you up on it.
• 50:25
  [SPEAKER_02]: Because what if they're like, you know, I'm like I call my friends like 20 my friends.
• 50:29
  [SPEAKER_02]: Did you just see the one that Quentin just did yeah, she does amazing and then those 20 to their their 50 70 friends that they and it just like exponential multiplies and so the ceiling is not and I'm sure this is happening in China.
• 50:41
  [SPEAKER_02]: It's no longer like you put.
• 50:44
  [SPEAKER_02]: some people put 70 grand down to make a vertical.
• 50:47
  [SPEAKER_02]: Some companies put 300 up to 300 grand, but they make 5 million 10 million back.
• 50:52
  [SPEAKER_02]: And you do that like 20 times a year, you're making a lot of money.
• 50:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, yeah, it's a good idea.
• 50:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
• 50:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, what a thing.
• 50:58
  [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, good.
• 50:59
  [SPEAKER_00]: But no, I would be crazy if there's such a thing as blockbuster verticals where, you know, I'm at a feeling, yeah.
• 51:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's funny I say that because I actually am, I'm participating in this thing called short form, which is like a,
• 51:11
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's basically a platform that is for very good quality vertical skit series, so like my the series on ambition for them I can't talk about too much now because it's kind of in development, but it's like half drama, half comedy, I wanted to make something that had a little bit of meaning, but also it's mostly funnier, eight part series, one minute each, and so those will be in the efforts of elevating the sort of like
• 51:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: content creator medium, which is like verticals, you know, and I think like, yeah, as it iterates throughout the ages, you'll probably get some some really awesome stuff in the next few years, you know, it's mind blowing to think about, you know, next thing you'll know, I'll be on a vertical directed by then dintai, you know, I'm going to be like, oh my gosh, shout out to our boy, did one an Emmy, yeah.
• 52:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: If it's better than funny, you come in now.
• 52:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: You coming out telling anytime soon?
• 52:06
  [SPEAKER_00]: Well, no plans yet, you know, but depends.
• 52:12
  [SPEAKER_00]: Depends what happens with work, you know, love that layer.
• 52:16
  [SPEAKER_00]: You're coming into your room.
• 52:18
  [SPEAKER_02]: I'm coming in New York next week and you know, we'll meet up and hopefully you get to come to the panel that I put together at Columbia University with Tony Booye Yeah, and spit real citrus with Brittany Tran over there and we have him on the panels.
• 52:34
  [SPEAKER_02]: We have Kevin win and we have Dustin win.
• 52:36
  [SPEAKER_02]: We have three.
• 52:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: That's so excited.
• 52:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: You have like all the heavy hitters and so excited to be hitters.
• 52:43
  [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, heavy hitters.
• 52:48
  [SPEAKER_02]: What do you think the evolution of the Vietnamese culture for you, for you specifically, will be?
• 52:55
  [SPEAKER_00]: The evolution of Vietnamese culture in my life, or evolution of Vietnamese culture at large.
• 53:00
  [SPEAKER_02]: I want to hear both.
• 53:01
  [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, you brought up too.
• 53:03
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I'd leave it open-ended, but you specified too, so I'll touch it with both of them.
• 53:09
  [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, sure, totally.
• 53:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: I could say, I could look at it in my life.
• 53:15
  [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I was raised, you know, by my mom, whose white and I was raised, you know, apart from my Vietnamese American family, from my formative years.
• 53:28
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I had almost no connection except for,
• 53:31
  [SPEAKER_00]: kind of here say, you know, in my last name.
• 53:33
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I always felt a little bit like I would taste Vietnamese food and I would just crave it and I would see, you know, like I would just gravitated towards like Vietnamese stuff a lot as a kid.
• 53:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I always felt a little other because it wasn't
• 53:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: cool.
• 53:52
  [SPEAKER_00]: It was still kind of looked down upon.
• 53:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: I grew up in a lot of predominantly way places.
• 53:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: And then in college, I think I met other Asian Americans in some Vietnamese and I started stepping into that role.
• 54:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: And after I turned like 24, 25, I really realized like, oh, this is one half of my DNA.
• 54:08
  [SPEAKER_00]: I should really understand this.
• 54:10
  [SPEAKER_00]: And that's when I started this group of my friend Lim Kimdo with called Beat Slons.
• 54:13
  [SPEAKER_00]: So to get the community together,
• 54:21
  [SPEAKER_00]: My Vietnameseness and accepting it and celebrating it because I always felt like as a part of myself that I had to hide to just survive growing up and then now, you know, I
• 54:35
  [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like it's, you know, it's something that I want to raise my kids with if I have kids.
• 54:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: And it's something that I want to keep the traditions alive with.
• 54:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I want to keep the language alive.
• 54:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: I want to keep celebrations with that alive.
• 54:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: I want to, you know, hopefully, like, you know, really, we really continue the pride in my culture.
• 54:57
  [SPEAKER_00]: So that's the evolution of Vietnameseness in my life, personally.
• 55:00
  [SPEAKER_00]: I love it.
• 55:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
• 55:02
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
• 55:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think that the cinema scene in Saigon is just exploding because it's blown up because of government is more lenient with things, there's so many talented artists over there I've been talking to a few cinema scene, there's a so amazing, there's Amber Grease that got released, that was really cool, it's movie and
• 55:24
  [SPEAKER_00]: I think there's going to be more Vietnamese American films made in Vietnam if there's still more leniency in how production goes there.
• 55:29
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I think it's going to be one of the... You can look at Khan and like a lot of the film festivals, a lot of Vietnamese American directors are just doing really well.
• 55:37
  [SPEAKER_00]: You know, I saw inside the Yelek of Kunshel is gorgeous.
• 55:41
  [SPEAKER_00]: It's such a scenic and cinematic environment that country.
• 55:45
  [SPEAKER_00]: So I think it will be kind of like what Korean cinema is in about 10 years, you know.
• 55:53
  [SPEAKER_02]: I couldn't thank you so much for coming on the podcast today, the one thing that I look for to with every guest, especially young people like you, is that I got to record.
• 56:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: you in your early days.
• 56:09
  [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, this is pretty early for you.
• 56:11
  [SPEAKER_02]: You will experience some breakout role and come back in a few years.
• 56:16
  [SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, then we have this on tape because I wish, you know, I've never known Dustin for a long, long time.
• 56:22
  [SPEAKER_02]: And I wish that I had the podcast.
• 56:23
  [SPEAKER_02]: 20 years ago when I met you know and so here we are you and I were at that junction where this is early enough to kind of like explore what you're going through and please always feel free to reach out and and hit me up if you have a new release or a project that you want to talk about because this is what this is here for.
• 56:46
  [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, Kenneth, it's amazing what your platform is doing for the community and more than that.
• 56:54
  [SPEAKER_00]: It really means a lot to tune in and see other people of the centering what I want to do.
• 57:01
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm so, so honored to be a part of that.
• 57:04
  [SPEAKER_00]: So thank you.
• 57:05
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'm looking forward to checking in in 10 years.
• 57:08
  [SPEAKER_02]: know next year next year the year after yeah I come come when you have a project coming out you know that's that's what we're here for you know yeah people are seeing me on Instagram with real citrus is brand by Brittany Tran who from day one you could hear the credits at the end of each podcast Brittany was part of that so you know her and I you know we we are just
• 57:30
  [SPEAKER_02]: trying to put Vietnamese cinema out there in the map.
• 57:32
  [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, you're part of that world with us.
• 57:35
  [SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, every time you have a new project, you hit us up and you hit me up and, you know, we will make this all amplifying.
• 57:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: I will.
• 57:44
  [SPEAKER_00]: So, you kind of.
• 57:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, Quinn.
• 57:46
  [SPEAKER_02]: We'll see you very soon.
• 57:48
  [SPEAKER_00]: I'll see you soon.
• 57:49
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you for listening to the Vietnamese with Kenneth Wynne.
• 57:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: Special thanks to Brittany Tran, to Jane Wynne, Catherine Wynne, Tina Fam, Sydney Jamie and Crystal Tran.
• 57:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: Please find us on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok at the Vietnamese podcast.