Oy, for a blog on the world of improv, I accidentally stumbled into a brouhaha. What started with 16 candles became a nice little bonfire...
...it was just a small remembrance of something in a popular movie from twenty years ago. It struck a chord in me and I wrote about it. The Tribune.com had it on its frontpage yesterday with a link that read, "An Asian Man recalls suffering while others laughed at Long Duk Dong." While technically true, I have never personally called myself an "asian man."
Born and raised in New York City, I moved to Chicago 15 years ago. I am nerdy student of the American Revolution. I've read almost every biography written on John Adams.
He's been my favorite Founding Father since I was 12. I can perform the entire movie musical, 1776, from memory. Technically, if I must be labelled, I'm an ABC; an American Born Chinese. I usually call myself, American. Hell, I know more Freman words than I do Chinese words.
For the world of comedy, nothing ticks me off more than the cheap laugh. A cheap joke from someone who usually does better is even worse.
Tomorrow, probably to the consternation of my ChicagoNow bosses (we got a lot of hits over the weekend), we'll be back to the improv. Thanks for reading... in the interests of staying on topic (improv, comedy, theater) I'll try to stay out of the comments.
Oh, one more thing... one of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, had a press conference over the weekend at WorldCon.
He shared this memory with iO9.com: He also said that for years, execs from major studios would call him up about making a movie of his novel Anansi Boys,
and say "We love this book. Can the characters be white?" Gaiman would reply no, because the book was about the children of the African spider god and the characters in the book are all African American. And the execs would reply, "Black people don't like fantasy." And when Gaiman would accuse them of being racist, they would backpedal and say "No, no, we're just being practical."
Filed under: movies
Tags: Anasi Boys, comments, Gaiman, John Adams, racist
Yeah, but you look Asian. And your avatar icon is Asian. And your last name is Asian. And that's all that matters, right? Right?
...don't get me started about cultural insensitivity in America.
"An Asian Man recalls suffering while others laughed at Long Duk Dong" was a terribly written headline.
I agree with you, Steph. That was a terrible headline.
Enjoyed your post. In John Hughes world there were no people of color. So for him to create a ridiculous caricature of an "Asian man" never made any sense to me. As a Latina who grew up in the suburbs, I dealt with my share of taunts too. We can't be defined by stereotypes.