How to American Read online

  “Dad, where is Gary?”

  “He’s right here.”

  Dad pointed to the wok in front of him, sizzling with fried chicken. And then I realized, Gary and his friends were never meant to be our pets; they were just farm-to-table dinner. I felt sick to my stomach. I was sure I would never be able to love again after that. I cried through dinner that night. But I have to admit: Gary was delicious.

  Watching American action movies was the thing to do in Hong Kong. We were obsessed with all the larger-than-life American action heroes: Arnold, Stallone, Seagal and Van Damme. We watched Terminator 2 every other weekend on our VCR. The opening sequence with the killer robot revolution scared the shit out of me, but then Arnold would drop out of the sky naked and save us all. One of our favorite local celebrities was Stephen Chow, a comedy legend in Hong Kong who later became an international star with Shaolin Soccer and Kung Fu Hustle. Stephen created a genre of comedy films in Hong Kong called mo lei tau. Translated from Cantonese, it literally means “nonsense.” He mixed slapstick humor with his signature deadpan demeanor, much like Leslie Nielsen in the classic Jerry Zucker films like Airplane and The Naked Gun. Stephen was my hero and his mo lei tau films were my first comedy inspirations. My favorite film of his was From Beijing with Love, a spoof of the 007 series, featuring Stephen playing a bumbling low-end Chinese spy. The physical and prop humor were topnotch. The Chinese 007 pulls out a top-secret gadget kit. It has a mobile phone that is actually a shaver, a shaver that is actually a hairdryer and a hairdryer that is in fact a shaver. The creativity of these gags gave me some of my fondest childhood memories. Stephen Chow was my Hong Kong version of the Three Stooges, Laurel and Hardy and Peter Sellers.

  My dad RICH-ard, my brother Roger, aka Roy, my mom Ah-Mee and Jimmy the washed-up Ping Pong star.

  HOW TO PURSUE YOUR DREAMS WITH ASIAN PARENTS

  In America, people always tell me:

  “Money can’t buy happiness. Do what you love.”

  In my Chinese family, my dad always tells me:

  “Pursuing your dreams is for losers. Doing what you love is how you become homeless.”

  The most important values in American culture are independence and freedom. The most important values in Chinese culture are family and obedience. And by no choice of my own, I am caught in between the two worlds. Having emigrated from Hong Kong to Los Angeles, I live my life in an often difficult duality. I grew up believing in the Chinese values my parents instilled in me, but I longed for the American value of pursuing what I loved. I have always been jealous of American kids and their freedom to do whatever they want. It’s so simple for them; they don’t have to follow a different set of Chinese rules back home. They get to frolic around the neighborhood streets and play in their tree houses by themselves with no parental supervision. My mom didn’t even let me cross the street by myself. I had to hold her hand until I was fourteen years old. Asian parents are more protective than a lioness with her newborn cubs. Ever since we moved to America, I had to ask myself, Am I Chinese or am I American? I was caught between the two cultures and their polarizing beliefs. Should I follow my family’s rules and be an obedient Chinese son, or should I follow my freedom and be an independent American man?

  TOP FIVE CHINESE RULES

  1. Respect your parents, your elders and your teachers. NEVER talk back or challenge them under any circumstance.

  2. Education is the most important thing. It’s more important than independence, the pursuit of happiness and sex.

  3. Pay back your parents when you start working. We were all born with a student loan debt to our Asian parents. Asian parents’ retirement plans are their kids.

  4. Always call your elders “Uncle” or “Auntie,” even if they are not related to you. NEVER call them by their first names.

  5. Family first, money second, pursue your dreams never.

  Whenever I tried to challenge my dad on his Chinese beliefs, he’d sternly put down the hammer: “You never ever talk to your father like that. It’s disrespectful to challenge your father. I’d never dream of doing that to my father.” How could I argue with that logic? So instead of forcing my parents to accept the American mindset, I quietly rebelled. I obeyed my parents’ rules inside our Chinese household, while I pursued my dreams in the American world outside. I promised my parents I’d finish my college degree in economics, but then I turned down a job in finance to pursue a career in stand-up comedy after I graduated. My dad thought I was crazy. But I figured it was better to disappoint my parents for a few years than to disappoint myself for the rest of my life. I had to disappoint them in order to pursue what I loved. That was the only way to have my Chinese turnip cake and eat an American apple pie too.

  When my parents found out I was frequenting comedy clubs, they prayed it was just a delusional phase I would grow out of. Bankers, doctors and scientists are what make Asian parents proud. Being an artist in China is the peasant work of a lowly clown. Stand-up isn’t even a thing in China. My parents still refer to stand-up comedy as “talk show.” My mom would ask me:

  “So you are doing your talk show tonight?”

  “Sure. Just like Jay Leno.”

  I stopped correcting her after a while.

  The closest form of stand-up in traditional Chinese culture is a two-man act called xiang sheng, or “crosstalk.” It’s a live stage act, usually made up of a big buffoonish character and a straight man doing sketch comedy routines, often singing along to a rhythm. It’s like Laurel and Hardy meets Jay-Z, in Mandarin.

  A few years ago, I finally mustered up the courage to invite my parents to my stand-up comedy show. It was at one of the nicest clubs I’d ever performed in: Brad Garrett’s Comedy Club inside the MGM in Las Vegas. When I was ten, my family and I stayed at the MGM on a vacation from Hong Kong to Vegas, so surely my parents would know this was a legitimate five-star establishment. I sat them down at the best seat in the house and made sure all of their food and drinks were taken care of. They were the VIPs and I was the star that night. I had a killer set. Everyone in the audience was laughing head over heels. I finally proved to my parents that all the time I spent doing “talk shows” at comedy clubs wasn’t in vain.

  After the show, my parents came out and saw the crowd of adoring fans surrounding me. They waited in line with everyone, and I made sure to take my time greeting each audience member so they could see just how loved I was. When they finally reached the front of the line, my excited comedian friend Jack went up to my dad and asked him:

  “So what do you think about your son? He was great, right?”

  “No, he’s not funny,” my dad flatly replied. “I don’t understand.”

  Jack’s face dropped as he awkwardly looked over to me. But there were no tears on my face, not even a hint of surprise. Most people would have been devastated at their father’s disapproval, but that was the exact answer I expected from my dad. I knew he wasn’t going to understand stand-up. And I knew he was too honest to lie about how he felt. But I wasn’t upset, because the joke was on him: I had spent the better half of my set making fun of him. This was exactly how I got my material. This exchange with my dad at the MGM would eventually make it into my set.

  When my dad finally watched an episode of Silicon Valley he said, “I don’t think your stand-up is funny, but I think Silicon Valley is very funny. You and your big white roommate are funny together.” That’s probably the nicest thing he’d ever say about my career. In a Chinese family, we never say, “I love you.” That was his equivalent of a crying father hugging his son after winning the state championship football game. “I love you son, I’m so proud of you.” After all, Dad wasn’t a full-on hater. He didn’t understand stand-up, but the dynamic between me and T. J. Miller on Silicon Valley was like the xiang sheng that he grew up with in China, and my deadpan delivery was like the Stephen Chow movies we watched back in Hong Kong.

  My dad is also an actor. But I didn’t come from an acting legacy like Angelina Jolie and Jon
Voigt; Dad started acting after I did. When I finally started booking some roles he said, “If it’s so easy you can do it, I can do it.” Fine, I’ll show him how hard it is. So I called my agent, Jane, the next day and asked if she’d be interested in signing my dad. “Sure, I can use an old Asian guy on my roster,” Jane said. Apparently old Asian dudes are rare commodities in Hollywood. This would surely show him the trials and tribulations I had to go through to become an actor. I’d give it a month before he called it quits on these grueling auditions. Two weeks later, the old man started booking everything. He booked four out of his first six auditions, an unheard of success rate. My dad called me, “I booked another one! This is so easy, why isn’t everybody doing it!” My dad was a natural and I was a struggling actor. My plan completely backfired.

  One of the roles he booked was playing a Chinese mob boss on a Chinese television show called Little Daddy. It was a meaty three-episode arc that shot in San Francisco. I didn’t think much of it when he landed the role, assuming it was probably some second-tier production. Little Daddy became one of the most popular shows in China. It went on to sweep the hearts of a billion Chinese people. All of our relatives and family friends from China called and congratulated my dad on his brilliant performance. My aunt from Shanghai called him and exclaimed, “Richard! You were so good in that role! Your son must have taken after you! I hope he succeeds just like you.” I fucked up.

  However, this apparent curse did eventually lead to an unlikely breakthrough for me. When my dad was killing it as the hottest old Asian dude to hit Hollywood since Mr. Miyagi, I was scraping together small, two-line parts on TV. Then my dad got an audition to be a scientist on one of my favorite TV shows, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. It was a prominent role and they were looking for an older actor to play a Mandarin-speaking scientist. I was so jealous of this opportunity, and my dad had never even heard of the show. When he called me the night before to run lines with him, I reluctantly agreed. It felt like a girl that you like calling you to tell you about another guy she likes; it was pretty painful. The next morning, Jane, our agent, gave me a call. She asked bluntly, “Hey, do you think your dad can handle this role? It’s a lot of dialogue in Mandarin and English.”

  “Yeah, I think he’ll be fine.” That was half a lie. My dad might have been killing it in his earlier auditions, but they were mostly commercials and Chinese television. This was a comedic part on an American improvised comedy show. But I vouched for my old man because, well, he’s my old man.

  But Jane’s agent spidey sense was tingling. “Maybe I’ll call the casting director and tell them to bring you in and read for the part instead.”

  I couldn’t say no, but I also didn’t want to throw my dad under the bus, so I just passively responded, “Whatever works.”

  “Okay, I’ll call them.” Now I had less than two hours to prepare for the audition for myself, and I also had to explain to my dad what happened. I called him right away to catch him before Jane.

  “Hey, Dad, I think Jane wants me to audition for the part instead,” I said sheepishly, waiting for him to punch me through the phone.

  “I think that’s good, I don’t think I’m ready anyway. You will do better than me.”

  I was surprised by this rare moment of vulnerability from my dad. This time, he ran the lines with me. I didn’t have time to second-guess myself when I went into the casting office. What do I have to lose? This wasn’t my part to begin with. Then I got the part, my biggest role yet, on one of my favorite comedy shows, thanks to my dad. And it just so happened that particular episode, “Flowers for Charlie,” was written by the writers/executive producers of my favorite drama on TV, Game of Thrones, David Benioff and D. B. Weiss. I fanboyed super hard when we took a group photo with my favorite drama show creators and my favorite comedy show actors. David, DB, the gang from Always Sunny and I posed inside of the gang’s pub. My dad becoming an actor led to one of the brightest highlights of my acting career.

  Glenn Howerton, D. B. Weiss, David Benioff, Asian kid who took the job from his dad, Charlie Day and Rob McElhenney.

  Three years later, I made my big-screen debut in Patriots Day. I returned the favor and got my dad a role to play my dad in the movie. In the drama I played the based-on-real-life hero Danny Meng, the Chinese immigrant who was carjacked by the two terrorist brothers responsible for the Boston Marathon bombing. It was an honor to play Danny and get to know him in real life. Peter Berg was the director and Mark Wahlberg was a producer and the star of the film. We made sure to portray every detail accurately to honor the real-life victims and heroes of the tragedy. When Danny is first introduced in the film, he is facetiming his parents back home in Sichuan, China, speaking Mandarin. Originally, they cast a Chinese actor from Boston to play my dad, but unbeknownst to the filmmakers, he spoke Mandarin with a thick Cantonese accent. Since I was born in Hong Kong to parents from Mainland China, I was fluent in both dialects. Although the American audience wouldn’t know the difference between Cantonese and Mandarin, it meant a lot to me to get it right for the Chinese-speaking viewers. Pete trusted me and agreed to recast the dad. And I asked him, “What about my dad? He’s an actor.” They flew my dad out to Boston the following week. He played the scene brilliantly. It was a big deal for my dad to make his feature debut and share this experience with his son.

  On the set of Patriots Day with director Peter Berg, my fake mom and my real dad.

  One of the shining moments of my life was taking my parents to the Patriots Day premiere at the world-famous Grauman’s Chinese Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard. We shared the red carpet with all the stars from the film, Mark Wahlberg, Kevin Bacon, J. K. Simmons, John Goodman and Michelle Monaghan. I couldn’t believe I was part of this incredible cast, and so was my dad. It was wonderful to share the red carpet with my parents and sit by them when they watched my movie debut. The highlight of the night was the after-party. My parents and I were seated across from Kevin Bacon, who is officially one degree separated from me. (Sorry, I know this joke is played out, but I had to.) My dad kept nudging me in the arm and whispered, “Hey, you think we can take a picture with Kevin Bacon?” For once in my life, I’m on the same level with Kevin Bacon, why can’t I just enjoy it? I don’t want to be a fanboy! But I relented, knowing that selfie would mean a lot to my parents. So I went up to Kevin with my parents satellited around me. “Hey, Kevin, nice to meet you.” This was the first time we’d met, since we didn’t have any scenes together in the film.

  “Hey!” Mr. Bacon enthusiastically replied. “Nice to meet you too.”

  “Kevin, these are my parents, and they are big fans of yours. Can we take a picture with you?”

  “Of course!”

  Kevin was incredibly nice. He leaned in and said to my dad:

  “So, what do you think about your son in the movie—he was great, right?”

  Oh no! Kevin Bacon is making the same mistake Jack made outside of the comedy club in the MGM.

  I braced myself for my dad’s response:

  “Yes, yes, my son was in the movie. You know, I was in the movie too.”

  Dad was too busy giving himself a plug, instead of throwing me under the bus. Thank God. He took out his phone and snapped a selfie.

  All the years of disappointments from my parents seemed to have vanished after this Kevin Bacon selfie. To see them happy was a bigger achievement than any accolade I could get from Kevin Bacon. I’ve learned to embrace my dad as a fellow actor, but he’ll never see me as an actor; I’ll always be his son who fucked up the rice.

  This fanboy moment has turned out to be one of our favorite family portraits.

  CHAPTER TWO

  HOW TO

  IMMIGRANT

  My family emigrated from Hong Kong to Los Angeles in 2000, when I was thirteen years old. Thirteen is an awkward transitional period for any prepubescent teen. Not only did I have to learn about my newly found pubes, I had to move to a new country, learn a new language and assimilate into a
new culture.

  My parents moved to America hoping for a better college education for my brother and me. To most foreigners, America has the most prestigious universities and the best job opportunities for college graduates. Ironically, the only people who might disagree with that sentiment are people who actually live in America. The grass is always greener and the college diplomas are always shinier from a different country. Even though Hong Kong is one of the biggest metropolitan cities in the world, it just doesn’t seem to have the same opportunities America has. You can make it big as a banker, a real estate developer and a doctor in Hong Kong, but you can literally be an astronaut, a rock star or anything you want in America. We moved here believing in the American dream.