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- [Narrator] Hunky Asian male characters.
- Cause I'm here now I'm all
- [Narrator] Some of whom are not the brightest bulbs.
- But you already knew that (beep)
- [Narrator] Presenting the rise of the Asian himbo.
- First, the himbo is hot.
Second, the himbo is very, very kind.
And third, the himbo is not really academically inclined.
- [Narrator] Which is quite different
from these representations of Asian men in film and TV.
So, when did we go from this to this?
Let's get a Historian's Take on the rise of the Asian himbo
in film and TV and what it tells us
about how Hollywood is changing.
To discuss this topic, we're gonna need some props,
some historians and a special guest.
- Wait, wait, so what is the Asian himbo?
- In the last five to seven years,
Asian male representation on screen
has gone from romantically and sexually undesirable
to very desirable.
- Okay, but what goes on this other axis?
- Previous representations of Asian men on screen portray
them as academically competent.
So, nerdy, undesirable and nerdy.
We're also seeing their move to being desirable
and yet academically incompetent.
So, between desirable and academically incompetent,
we might call this top left area, the himbo quadrant.
- Okay, so I get where you're going with this
and I can kind of visualize what we're talking about,
but it'd be really helpful for me
if we had a few examples from TV and film.
- Lucky for us, we actually have a few examples right here.
Do you know who this is?
- Yes, I do know that character,
infamously from "Breakfast at Tiffany's."
- So, this is Mr. Yunioshi
- You cannot go on or keep ringing my bill.
- Even though Yunioshi was played by white actor,
I think we should include him as one of these early examples
of the representation of Asian men in Hollywood.
- He was portrayed as undesirable
'cause he was a nag to Holly Golightly's character,
but he also wasn't particularly competent.
He was bumbling and always yelling.
- He would definitely be
on this bottom left Yunioshi quadrant.
- [Narrator] So where did this stereotype come from?
- Historically speaking,
the way that Asian men have been portrayed on screen
really goes back to the mid-19th century.
This was the era
of building the transcontinental railroad out west,
where more than 15,000 men from China came to the U.S.
and laid over 90% of that railroad track.
This was also the same era that gave rise to Yellow Peril,
a racist depiction of people from East and Southeast Asia
as threats to the western world.
While employers really coveted them for their cheapness,
the broader racism all over American society
really saw Chinese men as a threat.
As a threat for competition for jobs,
for settlement and housing
and specifically as a threat for white women.
White nativists used these racial stereotypes as fuel
to advocate for the passing of two kinds of exclusion acts.
First, immigration exclusion,
which led to the Chinese Exclusion Act.
But secondly, exclusion from romantic
and sexual and social life.
So they passed these things called anti-miscegenation laws,
in which white women were banned
from marrying outside the race.
The various laws and racial stereotypes
that affected Asian men in the public sphere
also affected the way
that they were represented in Hollywood.
A really famous example is the character Fu Manchu.
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This villain Fu Manchu was represented as,
not just undesirable, invasive and threatening,
but really monstrous.
And so, these various racial stereotypes
would have incredible and really insidious hold
over Asian masculinity.
- Another infamous early stereotype.
I know you guys probably recognize Long Duk Dong
from "16 Candles."
- Very clever dinner, appetizing food fitting neatly
into interesting round pie.
- He's definitely high on the competency scale, he's a nerd.
- He's given this really terrible nickname, the Donger.
He doesn't have a lot of time for character development
at all in the film.
And so he is portrayed as very undesirable.
Even in the 1980's,
that we get these older racial stereotypes,
not necessarily about a monstrous Asian man,
but definitely one that is the butt of all jokes.
- When Long Duk Dong is first introduced,
he's just introduced as being weird and foreign.
- What's happening hot stuff?
- A lot of Asian guys got called the Donger
or Long Duk Dong, you know,
just because there wasn't anything else to call us.
There's an episode of "Fresh Off the Boat"
where Jessica, the mom, is berating Lewis for going on TV
and kind of making a little bit of a fool of himself.
- You know what it reminded me of?
Your favorite character.
- No.
- From "16 Candles"
- Don't say it.
- Long Duk Dong.
- Until something else comes along
and you have a different interpretation
of what it means to be an Asian male,
that's the one that kind of sticks in people's heads.
- This next one's gonna be fun
because it's a double whammy.
Kumar portrayed by Kal Penn and Harold by John Cho.
- "Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle" classic.
Okay, so this is tricky.
Harold's character is portrayed as pretty competent.
He has a professional job, he makes good money.
He is seen as hardworking, but he's also a huge stoner,
which is kind of over on the incompetent side.
- We're so high right now.
- Kumar's kind of the same
and middling in terms of desirable and undesirable.
- I see this movie as a sort of turning point
for the representation of Asian masculinity in Hollywood.
- You know, it breaks stereotypes in a lot of ways
'cause Asian Americans are often seen
as kind of squares and geeks and nerds.
It's strange that we would ask so much of say Hollywood
to depict Asian men as being desirable
or just capable of love and loving and being loved,
but that's something that we've had to grapple with.
And so, a film like something like "Harold and Kumar"
where guys are seen as just normal dudes out for a night,
that also can go a long way
towards making Asian men desirable.
- [Narrator] So if Harold and Kumar were pivotal characters
in changing Asian male representation,
when do we start seeing more of the himbo?
- Delivering Chinese food all day can be depressing.
Like when people yell out, "Food's here!"
as if they have a family.
- Dong from "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt", I think he's here.
- We have a himbo.
- We have a himbo!
He's definitely high on the desirability scale
and how he's portrayed,
but he's not portrayed as very bright.
He's sweet, so he has himbo trifecta
and he's right up here as a romantic lead.
- Right around the same place, is Josh Chan
from "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" - From "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend"
- He is incredibly desirable.
- You didn't like touch some dirty glasses
and then try to pop a pimple on your face, did you?
- No.
- And kind of academically incompetent, but very sweet.
- Next one, from "The Good Place".
- Jason Mendoza.
- Jason Mendoza, boom, another himbo.
Reggie from "Riverdale".
- [Narrator] So why has this form
of representation of Asian men, a himbo that's handsome
yet kind of ditzy, become so popular?
- I think Hollywood has pivoted
from the stereotypical, undesirable Asian male figure,
to the Asian hunk, the Asian thirst trap,
because they started to find that Asian representation
and diverse representation on screen
was incredibly profitable.
Hollywood over the last five to seven years
has had its start at a racial reckoning.
Producers and production companies are being called out
for not having diverse writers, not having diverse casts.
- There's 17 million Asian Americans in this country
and there's 17 million Italian Americans.
They have "The Godfather", "Good Fellas", "Rocky", "The Sopranos".
We got Long Duk Dong.
So we got a long way to go.
- Movements for a diversity like #OscarsSoWhite
or #StarringJohnCho.
- One thing that I really was hoping with StarringJohnCho
was to show that it's not just Asian roles
that Asian Americans play, we can play the lead actor
or the romantic lead in a role that is not race-specific.
- Those all have kind of an additive effect
to the conversation about diversity
and inclusion in Hollywood.
- These older tropes like "The Hunk", right?
The himbo romantic co-lead, now being opened up
for diverse cast and specifically Asian American men.
- Hey.
- Hi.
- Well that just shows like, well, change is possible,
you know, for better or for worse
we can change the way our stories are told
and the way that we are characterized.
- I think that representation is definitely changing,
it's definitely altering.
Thanks a lot for showing me your theory
and for letting me do some history arts and crafts,
we don't get to do that too often, right?
- Yeah, and thanks a lot for helping me out.
This was really great.
- [Narrator] Thanks for watching "Historian's Take".
Make sure to like, subscribe, and comment.
See you next time.
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