Disney+ will premier a new action-comedy series called 'American Born Chinese' that debuts in May and is based on the novel by Gene Luen Yang. The series creator, Kevin Yu, along with actors Chin Han and Ben Wang joined Cheddar News to discuss how they became involved with the project and what the series brings.

Cast & Creator of Disney+ Action-Comedy 'American Born Chinese' on What the Series Brings

American born Chinese is a Disney Plus series uh that comes out in May and it's based on Jean Lion Yang's graphic novel. It's an award winning important seminal incredible graphic novel that we're bringing to the screen. Um And it's eight episodes and we have the director of Shang Chi Des and Daniel CRE. We also have two up and coming actors Michelle Yu and K Kan. Um as well as these two incredible talents, Chin and Ben Wang. So we're really excited. It's an action comedy. Um it has Chinese mythological gods, it has kids in high school that are trying to make the soccer team. So it's got a little bit of everything. So um as you mentioned, has gods of Chinese mythology. How does it give it a kind of superhero twist? Oh, that's uh these uh characters, obviously we've lived with for a long time. I mean, they, they find themselves into Asian uh mythology. Uh my stories as well. So, I mean, it's, it's really wonderful to see the clash of both worlds because I mean, there are parallels everywhere. But uh you know, it's, it's the most inopportune time, especially when it comes during a time of, uh, of growth and uh awkwardness in high school. So, I, I, I think, uh, it's gonna be, it's gonna have something for everyone. Now, Ben, we were talking about this earlier. That's you here on the post here. Yeah, I know it's, they missed my bald patch. So, so when you were, uh, doing research for this role, did you read the graphic novel? And was there a part that really stood out for you? No, that's funny. I Gene on the first day of filming Jean who wrote the graphic novel, um he was like, it's like you're playing like this awkward, like teenager character, you have to do a lot of research. And I was like, no, I, not a, not a single shred of re actually, that's the truth because I read, I read the script that you guys wrote and it was everything was already so like familiar to me that I was like, oh, I don't actually what this requires isn't actually for me to do research, what it requires is for me to really just bring myself and was there a part of this character that really connects with you a lot? Yeah. All of it, all of it. I mean, it's, it's just I just go on set and be, and then everyone was like, that's great. And I was like, oh, we started um yeah, so Kelvin, everything everywhere all at once cleaned up at the Oscars that was a South by darling last year. How does it, how does it feel to actually see Asians and Asian Americans finally getting recognition in Hollywood? Yeah, I think, you know, you, it's a, it's a process and so you have things like fresh off the boat and master of none and eventually Crazy Rich Asians. And then, and so we're trying to be, try to move the needle if we can in terms of not only put faces on the screen that look like ours, but how deep can we get? How nuanced can we get and how can we tell more and more specific stories? So we're grateful to be standing on their shoulders. It's serendipitous that I think about a year ago. Exactly. Everything everywhere was here at this very festival premiering. So um we're, we'll draft off them all day long and it's an incredible film and it's incredible time to be making this kind of content.