Who is Ke Huy Quan?

Brut America

"I thought everyone had forgotten about me."  You might recognize him from his child actor days in the "Goonies" or "Indiana Jones." After 40 years of not landing a role, he just won an Oscar. This is the incredible life of Ke Huy Quan.

Transcript

00:00This is Ki Huy Quan. He was a rising child star in the 80s, then Hollywood forgot about him.

00:05Now, nearly 40 years later, he's making a comeback worthy of the big screen.

00:09Not good enough. Thank you.

00:11Not tall enough. I blame myself.

00:14I thought everybody had forgotten about me.

00:16Born in Vietnam in 1971, he and his family fled the country when he was just seven years old,

00:22arriving in Hong Kong where they would spend a year in a refugee camp.

00:26I was so young, I didn't understand why we gave up the place we called home

00:29to get on a boat in the middle of the night with 3,000 people.

00:33In 1979, his family emigrated to the United States.

00:37In 1983, he went to a casting call with his brother,

00:40but ended up being the one who was noticed by the casting director.

00:43The next day, he was called back to meet the film's director, the legendary Steven Spielberg.

00:48And my mom thought, you know, Hollywood, her famous director.

00:54So she put me in this three-piece suit.

00:56Steven came out, saw how uncomfortable I was, gave me the biggest hug and says,

01:01Ki, I want you to come back next day, but wear something comfortable.

01:04Three weeks later, he flew to Sri Lanka with his mother

01:07and started shooting Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

01:11Short run. Step on it.

01:13Okey dokey, Dr. Jones. Hold on to your potatoes.

01:16At 14, he co-starred in the cult classic The Goonies,

01:20becoming one of the most well-known child actors of his generation.

01:24And then his phone slowly stopped ringing.

01:27For 35 years, he only had a handful of acting roles in film and TV.

01:31In my late teens and my early 20s, when it was extremely difficult for me to get a job,

01:38I never blamed anybody.

01:41I thought I was not good enough.

01:44I thought I was not tall enough.

01:46I thought I was not good looking enough.

01:47I thought, you know, perhaps my acting, you know, wasn't good enough.

01:52And that's why I wasn't landing these roles.

01:54Hollywood writers were just not writing roles for Asian actors.

01:58Finding it difficult to get acting roles,

02:01he took a job behind the scenes as a stunt coordinator,

02:03working on the 2000 film X-Men in 2004's 2046.

02:08In 2018, inspired by the success of Crazy Rich Asians, he decided to get an agent.

02:13And I had serious FOMO.

02:16When I saw so many, the entire cast made up of Asian actors,

02:21and I go, wow, I wish I was up there with them.

02:24And so the idea of getting back into acting, that's where it started.

02:27Just two weeks after securing an agent,

02:29Kwon was asked to audition for the role of Wayman Wong

02:32in Daniel Kwon's Everything, Everywhere, All at Once.

02:35For the longest time, you know, I said this before,

02:40where the characters, you know, that I went up for,

02:42it's only, it didn't have a character name.

02:44It only lasted a page or two on the script.

02:46So this was very thrilling to read.

02:48And I thought this role was written for me.

02:51The film premiered in March 2022 at the South by Southwest Festival

02:55to resounding critical acclaim.

02:57For this role, Kwon dominated awards season,

03:00receiving the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor.

03:05All I wanted to when I decided to get back into acting was just a job.

03:09And everything that has happened since our movie came out

03:12has been incredible beyond anything I could have ever imagined.

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