Jimmy O. Yang Quotes

Why is it when a white actor or even a black actor does a British accent, it’s considered art?

My job is to go into that audition and be good enough of an Asian actor – or an actor in general – to land that role so they don’t have to go out and hire a white guy. My job is to make sure I capitalize on these opportunities that other people created.

I went to school for economics, and especially in Asian culture it’s not really a viable job for my family to be an artist.

With a lot of pop music, they just have one song and a good beat, but there’s not necessarily that much talent.

I was always pretty good with making deals. When I was in sixth grade, when Pokemon cards were hot, I might have started with, like, three or four cards, and then at the end of the year, through trading with my friends and everything, I ended up with the biggest card collection in my school.

Nico Santos I’ve known from Bay Area stand-up, and he lives right by me so we hang out all the time.

It comes from within to not be ashamed of our brothers and sisters who have accents.

I understand the whole constant foreigner stereotype, but for me it’s important to portray immigrant characters like Jian-Yang and Danny Meng with humanity.

I have some scripts, I’m putting a couple of projects together with people I want to work with. I think that’s the most exciting part, when you can hopefully create your own content and find the people that you love that you get to work with.

Usually when you’re Asian and you’re on set, you’re the only Asian there. Either you’re the token Asian or you’re the Asian sidekick.

Look, to be honest, when certain movies like ‘Ninja Assassin’ came out, that had a sexy, sexy Asian man with a six-pack, that made some people think, ‘Maybe I should go out there and date an Asian dude.’ And that did pretty good for us in a way of representation.

I spoke English when I moved to the U.S.A. but I had an accent. To get rid of it, I watched a lot of TV-shows and tried to repeat after the tv-hosts. I liked shows about hip-hop.

It’s a fine line between hack and good comedy.

I know Asian actors out there won’t even audition for a role that have an accent. But for me, I was the kid with an accent. I still have an accent to some degree.

Just because I don’t speak English with an accent anymore doesn’t mean that I’m better than the people who do.

It’s maybe a better thought to change the perception of an accent than to avoid it all together.

I think you have to experience life and then pull certain experiences into your act and your character’s life, whoever you play, so you’re full.

Mother always tries to buy things for a reasonable price. I was never allowed to buy things at full price. Probably, it’s rooted in the Chinese mentality. We are very thrifty.

The great thing about the comedy world is that everybody is somewhat of an outsider. That’s the community where outsiders feel like they’re insiders.

Whatever ethnicity you are, yes, absolutely you have to be proud of who you are man. I am really really proud to be Asian, I got to say.

I tried my hardest to be the opposite of a stereotypical Asian student.

My dad played my dad in ‘Patriots Day’ and that’s why he thinks that’s a good movie.

Comedy and drama are like two different sports; they both require athleticism but they’re different.

But my comedy hero was Stephen Chow. His deadpan comedy, all the stuff he wrote like ‘From Beijing with Love,’ it’s incredibly funny.

I studied economics and thought I wanted to play with the stock market – my dad was a financial adviser – and I was going to go down that path. I was an intern at Smith Barney.

Certain stories, like my mom leaving when I was 15-years-old to go back to China because she didn’t quite assimilate like we did, that was a moment that was very sad in my life.

It’s so great when there’s a catchy song that’s fun and easy to listen to, but there’s also a real artist behind it.

I worked at Big 5 Sporting Goods, selling shoes and stuff like that, for a couple of summers.

That’s what’s great about standup comedy: the instant feedback. You get up on stage, you tell a joke, if it doesn’t work, come back the next day with a better version of it.

I tried to be a rapper. I tried to make beats before I got into comedy, and that’s still one of my hobbies.

When you are in America, at least for me, as an immigrant, I try to be as Americanized as I could. I just want to be an actor, I don’t just want to be an Asian actor necessarily.

When a Spanish actor does an accent, that’s sexy. When Peter Sellers did a French accent in ‘Pink Panther,’ that’s funny – he got nominated for a Golden Globe. How come whenever an Asian actor does an accent, he’s stereotyping?

When I quit my internship and started doing standup to pursue my dreams and do that full time – I feel like that’s when I ‘Americaned.’

I don’t know why people feel the need to do this to me, but my friend asked my dad, ‘Aren’t your proud of Jimmy now that he’s a successful actor?’ And my dad was like, ‘No, not really. I wish he was a scientist.’ I guess scientist is more noble in the Asian culture.

I was competitive ping-pong player. I played in youth tournaments, under the age of 13.

I’m just a quirky, funny dude.

Other Asian actors, especially American-born actors, sometimes shy away from immigrant roles.

When I became an American citizen, nothing’s changed because I’m still Asian.

I hope I can get to more and more of the Chinese audience and kind of lead the way to maybe, y’know, inspire seems like a big word, but y’know… inspire to get people into entertainment because I think we can be just as good as anybody else.

Nate Dogg is my favorite artist. I cried more when he passed than when Michael Jackson did.

I’ve heard other actors saying they don’t want to play a character with an accent at all. To me, that’s kind of an insult to somebody like me who did have an accent.

I’m generally pretty excited about new gadgets, new tech, A.I., stuff like that.

A lot of people go on this journey of finding themselves and then eventually realize that their true self wasn’t on the outside but it’s always been there.

I tried a bunch of things, like Jiu Jitsu boxing classes. I don’t know why, but I did.

I went back to Hong Kong for the first time in 17 years and I was culture shocked in Hong Kong.

When I was graduating college with an economics degree, I had no idea what I wanted to do. I was kind of scared. So I was just trying everything.