-Our first guest tonight is a talented actor and comedian.
You know him from his work on "Community"
and films such as "The Hangover" and "Crazy Rich Asians."
You can see him on the hit series "The Masked Singer,"
which airs Wednesday nights on Fox.
Please welcome back to the show Ken Jeong.
How are you, Ken? -Fine. How are you doing?
Thank you for having me, brother.
Appreciate it.
-It's always a delight to see you.
And I do want to talk about your show,
which is always joyous and a show that I think
a lot of people watch together, watch with their families.
But I also want to give you a moment
to address what a difficult time this has been,
not just for all of us
but hyper specifically, the Asian-American community.
-Yes. Thank you so much, Seth.
And, yeah, just with regard to the situation in Atlanta
and the shootings in Atlanta,
my heart, thoughts, and prayers go out to all affected.
And a special shout-out to Karen Chi, your writer,
who really had a very, very eloquent piece
on the day that it happened. It was very moving.
And it is just a sign that, you know,
with the Asian-American community, enough is enough.
We're just fed up. And the study that Karen cited
on your show a few days ago, anti-Asian-American crime
has risen almost 150% in the last year.
And in that same study, overall hate crime went down 7%.
And this is precisely due to weaponizing
terms like "China virus" and "kung flu" and --
and also the fact that even in this particular crime,
there is debate whether this crime was racially motivated.
Asian-American women are two times as likely
to be assaulted in America.
This was clearly, clearly racially motivated.
This was clearly a hate crime.
And it -- You know, as a guy who used to be a doctor
and whose wife is still practicing medicine,
I have an idea of how to solve COVID.
It's mask, vaccination, common sense,
don't be an ass[bleep].
You know, but I think that -- I don't --
as a human, I don't know how to solve racism.
You know? It's so -- It --
It takes listening, learning, loving, being tolerant.
But you know -- But it really starts off,
in just our particular case as Asian-Americans,
this kung flu [bleep] has to stop.
And we really need to express that loudly.
And we are. And thank you, man.
I thank you for letting me -- letting me express that.
-Of course.
Thank you for sharing those thoughts.
You know, one thing which is often spoken about
in the entertainment industry especially,
is how important representation is
and how, you know, that can bridge the gap
insofar as you have people who are racist
who maybe never see different races in positive lights.
-Right. -And you must appreciate --
last time you were here was
season one of "The Masked Singer."
This was a show that you -- I believe, if my memory serves,
your mother was a fan of the Korean version of the show.
-Yeah. I mean, it really is --
and this is not -- this is less a plug for my show
than it is -- it is nice to be on a show
where you can, you know -- and we're one of several --
that you can just kind of take a break
and be silly for a second, you know, and just escape
the realities of it. And in this day and age,
I mean, I think that's what entertainment has evolved to.
Because, you know, there is -- there is value
in what you're doing right now, especially you.
You know, like merging, you know, political thought
and comedy and entertainment.
And myself, I'm merging just kind of, you know,
my essence as a former physician and as an overactor, I guess.
I guess my overacting is somehow -- You know what?
We're just sick of people who do it well.
-Right. -Who act.
And you know, it's just good to have --
-It's a thriving time for overactors.
-Yes, it's a thriving time for overactored, fractured,
non-talents such as myself. -[ Laughs ]
-It's just nice to have a -- have a say
in the verse of song that is -- -Now, you actually --
So, you went -- And, again, congratulations.
You're in season five of this show.
It's a runaway hit. But you went back and you did --
you appeared on -- this is the original
"Masked Singer" in Korea that you were the --
you sang as the Golden Pig. -Yes.
2019 was the Year of the Pig.
And they asked me -- a shout-out to Craig Plestis,
who is the showrunner of American "Masked Singer."
He said, "We'd love for you to go to Korea to promote it."
And I went to Korea in, yeah, around 2019
to just -- like, under secrecy. No one knew.
I was in my hotel room, just like
in the American "Masked Singer" here,
where you have to be in a hotel room
and really just be completely offline and off the grid.
So I was there in Korea for three days in my hotel room.
Like, under a mask, went straight to the studio,
performed, really got an idea
of what the contestants on the show do.
And it's like they stuck me in a small --
it reminded me of my college dorm room at Duke.
It was just, like, a little twin bed.
And it was just me. And just -- I'm rehearsing
Radiohead's "Creep" ad nauseam.
And it's something I would just do all the time,
like doing karaoke. It's like my go-to 'oke song.
And I just went out there completely nervous,
and it was -- Yeah, it was really surreal.
I got a deep appreciation
of what the contestants on the show do.
It's a shout-out to all the contestants who do it.
It's incredibly hard.
It's a lot easier, again, to overact
and to be stupid and, you know, to be --
It's so much more difficult than my lane.
-First of all, I like that like everyone who went to Duke,
you've managed to subtly drop it in.
And I just want you to know how much I appreciate that.
-What? Just because I graduated
like 1990 with a bachelor of science in zoology
and it came very organically off the tip of my tongue,
and it's from there I got into UNC med school
and then had a career in, like, internal medicine
for seven years at an HMO here in Southern California
and then jetéed over to "Knocked Up,"
directed by Judd Apatow, my first role,
and then had my own eponymous show called "Dr. Ken,"
and somehow you think I shoehorned it?
-Going a little long? -Who are you talking --
[ Laughter ] What are you doing?
You're telling people to cut me off
just because I got dewed on you, dawg.
How dare you. -Thank you for that.
'Cause I think Wikipedia is down across the nation.
So that's really helpful. [ Laughter ]
Hey, but here's my -- I have a serious question.
How -- Ken, I apologize if I'm --
So, obviously, on "The Masked Singer,"
when you did the South Korean version,
how famous are you there? Were people very excited
when they saw you? -[ Laughs ]
You know, it was kind of -- I think I'm kinda sorta.
You know, I think I'm kinda sorta famous there.
They were -- Because when -- And I knew that, going in.
So I think there's a level of familiarity,
but not intense fame. And so when I did sing,
and then you hear what the judges are saying,
they're saying, "This is Jack Black.
This is like someone amazing like Jack Black."
When I revealed myself, it was not like "Who is this guy?
Oh, we kinda sorta know it's Ken."
But it's like "Oh, it's not Jack Black."
[ Laughter ]
It was a little bit of like, "No, you're good.
We know who you are. And credit to you.
Good job. Good on you.
But we kinda wanted Jack Black."
-Did you tell them that Jack Black didn't go to Duke?
-I did. And I explained why.
And they cut everything. And I said, "How dare you?
Jack Black never went to Duke,
never had a bachelor of science in zoology,
never went to the University --" and so on and so on.
-I think we're all familiar with it now.
-I think we're all familiar with the story.
-Hey, first of all, it is very --
I think it's very exciting that there is a "Kensday"
in our week right now. -[ Laughs ]
-I want to congratulate you on that.
-I really -- this interview doesn't happen
if you're not contractually obligated to say "Kensday,"
so I appreciate that. -Made it.
-It's part of my rider. It's also part of
my "Room Raiders" deep-dive background there.
So, yeah, it's very important that you bring it up.
-Ken, congrats on the show.
It's always a pleasure to see you.
Thanks so much for being here and helping provide context
in these trying times. And next time,
I look forward to doing in it person.
-Absolutely. Thank you, brother. Thank you so much.