A few years back when Halle Berry won her Academy Award for her performance in Monster’s Ball, the actress gave an emotional acceptance speech about how doors seemed to now be opening for people of color in Hollywood (Denzel Washington also won an acting Oscar that year). While I applauded, I wrote at the time that I thought it might be a little premature to say that any real shift was taking place in the industry.
I’m still skeptical, especially when it comes to Asian Pacific American representation, but something strange happened while I was watching last week’s Golden Globe Awards ceremony.
I felt hopeful. Why?
Because I can’t remember another major film awards show that had so many artists of color, including those of Asian Pacific descent, nominated and even win.
The multi-global drama Babel won as Best Picture in the Drama category, the all-black American musical Dreamgirls won for Best Picture Musical or Comedy, Clint Eastwood’s WWII epic Letters From Iwo Jima for Best Foreign Language Film, the multicultural TV hit Grey’s Anatomy as Best TV Series Drama and the Selma Hayek-produced Ugly Betty for Best TV Series Comedy. This doesn’t include the actors who won that night including Forest Whitaker for The Last King of Scotland, Eddie Murphy and Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls, America Ferrera for Ugly Betty and, hell, I’ll even count Sacha Baron Cohen as Borat.
But before we break out the champagne, I should point out that almost all the projects honored above still portray Asians as foreigners. This applies to Heroes, Lost, Babel and Letters From Iwo Jima. Only Grey’s Anatomy features an Asian American character (played by the amazing Sandra Oh).
The good news is that these screen foreigners are all three-dimensional ones and I would argue that they are characters as interesting as anything else out there. How many white actresses this year were as moving as Kikuchi in Babel? Can you name another character on TV that was as joyful and fun to watch as Oka’s Hiro in Heroes? I think an argument can be made that the quality and quantity of roles for APAs are improving in Hollywood, but let’s see more Asians who are also Americans and let’s see more in general.
For the first time in the 10-plus years I’ve been out in Hollywood, it feels like we’re actually on the cusp of real change. But when you’re on the cusp of something, it’s easy to fall over into oblivion.
So what can you do?
Support the talent that’s out there. If you think Masi Oka’s character is great, encourage more portrayals along those lines — write to the show’s producers, and let them know. If you want to see more films like Letters From Iwo Jima, tell everyone you know to pluck down their money and catch it while it’s still in theaters.
And just as importantly, support the talent that’s coming up. The Asian artists who are making their marks in Hollywood now spent years struggling. We need more to join their ranks both in front of and behind the cameras. The next big things are probably not that far away and you can see their work in your local APA film festivals or in small theaters.
We have a rare opportunity here to build on something that’s promising. Let’s not blow it.