Television is mostly about entertaining and sometimes enlightening – but, occasionally, it can make a difference to the world.
The sitcom Fresh Off the Boat hits all the marks. Because of it –along with ABC siblings Black-ish and Dr Ken (and, at CW, Jane the Virgin) – network TV's American family-photo album is starting to look more diverse and authentic.
The contribution of Fresh Off the Boat is especially notable. It's the first prime-time network comedy about an Asian-American family since Margaret Cho's All-American Girl in 1994, which lasted only one season. Dr Ken star Ken Jeong (Community, The Hangover) gladly acknowledges that the success of Fresh Off the Boat paved the way for his series.
"Even if I wasn't a part of any of it, never in a million years would I have thought any of this would happen," says Jeong, who guest stars in the season-two finale of Fresh Off the Boat. "It really is beyond satisfying" to see two shows on the air and with characters of different Asian origins, he adds.
Fresh Off the Boat follows a Taiwanese-American family's mostly eager plunge into the melting pot of 1990s America. On the flip side, Black-ish is about a contemporary African-American family's efforts to hold on to its cultural identity. Dr Ken, about a Korean-American husband and father, gives the formulaic domestic sitcom a cheerful ethnic tweak.
Without losing sight of their primary job, to be funny, the ABC shows make the case that there is – cynics and malcontents aside – a suburban-lawn-sized patch of common ground to be found. The shows' ratings are proof that viewers are responding, with both Fresh Off the Boat and Black-ish secure on ABC's schedule and Dr Ken returning for a second year.
As Fresh Off the Boat wrapped up the season, stars Randall Park and Constance Wu, who star as parents Louis and Jessica Huang, took a break to reflect on the effect it has had. Executive producer Nahnatchka Khan and Chelsey Crisp, who plays neighbour Honey, weighed in later.
Randall Park
“I get stopped on street all the time, with people telling me how much the show means to them and that they watch it with their families,” says Park, adding that it is not just Asian-Americans, but “everyone”.
“It’s easy for us to buy into the myths out there that people don’t want to watch a family that’s different from them on TV, that it’s going to be too foreign for people,” he says.
Fresh Off the Boat is disproving that. But Park recalls his own early concerns about how his character would be portrayed.
“Even though in the grand scheme of sitcom history there’s a tradition of the goofy dad, to me it was a point of concern because there weren’t a lot Asian sitcom dads to balance that out, or even Asian characters in general,” he says. “He is a character, for sure, but the writers have done such a great job of humanising him.
“For all the silliness to this character, there’s a loving side, a serious side.” Louis has shown “what a father could be, an immigrant could be – or just a man could be,” Park says.
Constance Wu
Wu also felt the weight of high expectations.
“Some people wanted it to tackle race issues, and there’s some people who think the more progressive thing is to not look at race issues and just have [the family] tackle normal issues such as puberty or cooking,” she says.
But the writers have managed to do both.
“There were episodes about raceless things and ones that really did focus on the uniqueness of our story and navigating through an Asian-American lens,” Wu says. “You can’t please everyone but the writers have been smart to go on both sides of the issue.”
Viewers have told her, through tweets, Facebook and Instagram, that it is “inspirational to have Asian-American characters, and rather than trying to hide their culture, they celebrate it and take ownership of the story,” she says.
Nahnatchka Khan
The writer-producer marvels at TV's sudden burst of inclusiveness, which also include Aziz Ansari's Master of None and Priyanka Chopra in Quantico.
“The difference in the past year has been enormous,” Khan says. “The fact we were right in the middle of this kind of change is incredible, and we’re really grateful for it. The more, the merrier. Let’s just keep going.”
Chelsey Crisp
Honey, the supporting white character in a series dominated by Asian-Americans, is a role that Crisp welcomes.
“It feels pretty remarkable that we finally got there, and it feels really special to be a part of the show that did it,” she says.
It also evoked a memory of why diversity matters. “My best friend is Korean-American, and when we were growing up there was no one that looked like him on TV,” Crisp says. “When I first read the pilot, reading the family’s experience of going to Orlando and being the only Asian-American family, it reminded me so much of my childhood friend, Richard.”
• The season-two finale of Fresh Off the Boat is on OSN First Comedy HD on Friday, May 27 at 7pm
artslife@thenational.ae
