AAPI: Voices Moving Forward: Margaret Cho, Mindy Kaling, Dave Bautista and more on recent attacks, racism and role of representation in Hollywood

To celebrate AAPI Heritage Month, Yahoo Entertainment reached out to some of the most well-known Asian-American actors, producers, and directors for their thoughts on the recent attacks against the Asian-American community, historic racism in the United States, and ways to move forward.

AAPI: Voices Moving Forward includes commentary from George Takei, Margaret Cho, Mindy Kaling, Lana Condor, Dave Bautista, Jamie Chung, Daniel Wu, Sherry Cola, Bao Nguyen, Jeannie Mai Jenkins, Adele Lim, Jon M. Chu and Lewis Tan.

Watch the full video above.

Video Transcript

- Hi, I'm Sherry Cola.

- Bao Nguyen.

- Adele Lim.

- John M. Chu

- Margaret Cho.

- Jeannie Mai.

- Daniel Wu.

- Jamie Chung.

- And I'm proud.

- Proud.

- Proud.

- Proud to be Chinese-American.

- Vietnamese Chinese-American.

- Vietnamese American.

- Korean-American.

- Chinese Malaysian-American.

- Chinese-American.

- Korean-American.

- Asian-American

DANIEL WU: I think a lot of Americans look at Asian faces and just assume they're not from here, or they just came here. They're coming to take what's theirs, and that's not necessarily true. We've had Asian-Americans in the American fabric for a couple hundred years now.

MARGARET CHO: There's this idea that we somehow are a good scapegoat when negative things are happening in this country, and, therefore, like, we're not allowed to suffer with other Americans. We suffer because we're not American enough or there's a value put on American-ness we're somehow not privy to.

GEORGE TAKEI: At 5-years-old, I was categorized as enemy alien. It was absolutely insane. I mean, young Japanese-Americans after Pearl Harbor who rushed to the recruitment centers to volunteer to serve in the military were categorized as enemy aliens simply because we looked like this. We looked like the people that bombed Pearl Harbor.

- Upon arrival at their new quarters, the evacuees voluntarily registered. What this means for the Japs nobody knows.

GEORGE TAKEI: My mother was born in Sacramento. My father was a San Franciscan. I mean, how can they call us alien?

MARGARET CHO: When people are like, uh, what are you? No. What are you? It's a very loaded question. And for people to understand that you're othering me, you're othering my being, because you can't possibly imagine that I would be American. And that's the true nature of that question.

SHERRY COLA: My name on the roll sheet in class was my Chinese name, you know. And my parents gave me my American name, Sherry. So when the teacher would call roll in class they'd say my Chinese name or you really butcher the pronunciation, and I'd say, oh, call me Sherry.

So already from day one we're kind of masking our identities to conform to America, which is so interesting, right? The idea of an American name. Well, my American name should be my Asian name, because that is my name.

BAO NGUYEN: Attitudes have to change. People's perceptions of our community have to change. The laws have to change. And everyone, in a way, is in the front lines pointing out microaggressions, pointing out stereotypes that are negative, so I think we all sort of have a voice in that.

- The police say went on to assault two more victims. Seen this before? You're right. It's just the latest in a string of attacks against Asian-Americans.

- Tonight, a search underway for the suspect caught on video pushing this 91-year-old man.

- You can see her leaving home here and then minutes later return after being set on fire.

- A suspect barrels him down and takes off, leaving the victim lifeless on the ground.

- This man after surveillance video caught him repeatedly kicking a 65-year-old woman who was on her way to church.

LEWIS TAN: I hate to say that it's nothing new, but it's nothing new. So when I saw that, obviously, it's horrible. And it makes me angry and breaks my heart. And it hurts to look at, because you immediately connect it to your family and think, like, man, if that was my grandma, I'm going after that dude. You know, I don't care what movie I'm doing. I'm flying to wherever that happened, and I'm finding myself. It makes you feel that way.

DANIEL WU: What was the last straw for me was when the 91-year-old man got pushed down over in Chinatown. That's just, like, five minutes away from my house, and my dad is 91. So that really hit home for me, and it really angered me so much that I just felt like I was just regurgitating more anger and more hate and more negative information that I just couldn't do it anymore.

JAMIE CHUNG: When the administration started to spew rhetoric, I knew violence was going to come.

SHERRY COLA: He was very adamant, right, on not even changing his verbiage.

DONALD TRUMP: It did come from China, so I think it's a very accurate term.

SHERRY COLA: That absolutely was the reason why Asian people were being attacked on the street. And there were over 3,000 attacks in the last year against the Asian community. And it was the Atlanta shooting that made us realize we're at our wit's end.

- But the killings came at a time when attacks on Asian-Americans have increased since the start of the Coronavirus pandemic.

JEANNIE MAI JENKINS: When you say it, I get chills. So it wasn't just a murder. It wasn't just fetishizing of Asian women, but it was also classism. And it was also racism. And there were just so many things in it. And then to watch the sheriff come out and announce it as, don't worry you guys, it's not a hate crime, this guy was just getting rid of his temptations. He's got some sexual addictions, but that's it.

- He was pretty much fed up and then at the end of his rope, and-- and yesterday it was a really bad day for him. And this is what he did.

MARGARET CHO: He had a bad day. That he wasn't racist. That's really an insane thing to ask a murderer. And try to motivate us to understand him is really the height of problematic white privilege and how we need to dismantle that system people.

DAVE BAUTISTA: The people that are hateful, the people that express bigotry, they're just loud, and they're aggressive. We're just not going to let you be louder than us anymore. It's just we're tired of hearing from you. So we're going to be louder than you, and you're going to realize that there's more of us than there are of you. [CHUCKLES]

JAMIE CHUNG: We're looking for long term change. We're looking for policies to be really harsh on hate crimes. There's still so much work to be done, but we're in a phase where we need to keep this conversation going and talk less about awareness and more about long term goals.

DANIEL DAE KIM: What happens right now and over the course of the coming months will send a message for generations to come as to whether we matter. Whether the country we call home chooses to arrest us or include us, dismiss us or respect us, invisiblize us or see us.

JOE BIDEN: My message to all of those who are hurting is we see you. The Congress said we see you. And we are committed to stop the hatred and the bias.

DANIEL WU: I was doing distance learning with my daughter, and I was sitting next to her and they're in their music class. And they're singing this land is your land, right, this land made for you and me. And I almost lost it there, because I was listening to the words thinking in my head, this is not true. This song is not true. It's not made for everybody.

Look what's happening right now. And in the bitterness of that song, that hit me really hard. And I had to kind of step away, because I was like, you know, I might cry here. This country has a lot to unpack before we get on the right road, you know.

- Oh, darling, I am sorry, but I lost my key.

- But that was two weeks ago. You cannot go on keep ringing my bell.

- What's happening, hot stuff?

- Any girl?

- Any girl.

- OK. I don't know where to start.

- You haven't finished your nuggets yet sweetie. OK, there's a lot of children starving in America, right.

[? [SPEAKING CHINESE] ?]

- And the Oscar goes to Chloe Zhao, Nomadland.

BAO NGUYEN: For the longest time, us as a community on screen, our images have been diminished and devalued.

SHERRY COLA: I didn't see my face on TV really at all. You know, there was Ross's girlfriend played by the brilliant Lauren Tom.

JEANNIE MAI JENKINS: When I was growing up I had Jackie Chan and Connie Cheung, and that's about it.

SHERRY COLA: I saw people like Margaret Cho who is one of my biggest inspirations, and that was probably, like, maybe midway in my life.

MARGARET CHO: My Korean name is Moran. Moran. Moran! Moran! That's my mother calling me. Comedy really has to inform your racial identity, because it's like the eternal outsider really is the insider in comedy. And so as an outsider and still being an outsider, even within race, Asian-Americans are very much an outsider when we consider race, especially in the way race is viewed in the United States.

BAO NGUYEN: Many people sort of know the name Bruce Lee, know his films, but they don't really know the man. And without Bruce Lee there wouldn't have been many examples of the leading Asian-American male. You don't see a Black president until first you see them on television, on film, right? So there is that aspirational quality. And with Bruce Lee, sadly, because he passed away so young, it took 40 years, in a way, to close that gap between him and our generation.

LEWIS TAN: I think that it does make a difference in regards to the way that you're seen on screen, because the more that we open up doors and share our stories of people and people are familiar with seeing Asian faces in a cool way, and in a culturally positive way, I think that it will eventually help.

DAVE BAUTISTA: If I can be that guy and be an inspiration for somebody, then, you know, with pride I want to be that guy.

LANA CONDOR: I feel like it's my mission to keep telling stories that make people feel less alone and represented. It's the most rewarding part of doing these films. And there was this one time we were doing this big panel.

I saw this girl in the front of the crowd, and she had this little handwritten letter, a little note that she was holding up. And it just said, you saved my life. If these movies just saved one person's life I-- that's it. That's-- I've done it. I've done it. My career, that's it. That's it.

ADELE LIM: When the movie was greenlit everyone kept coming up to me saying, you must be so excited, you know, to be able to shoot in your home country, to tell the story. And I was, but, really, all I felt was the pressure. And just before it came out I remember just thinking, just-- just let it not tank. Let it please not tank.

But when it came out, we had such a groundswell of support from, you know, the community, from the Asian-Americans at large, and, really, from all audiences. So to this day, I'm still blown away. I can't believe any of this is happening.

MARGARET CHO: The success of films like Crazy Rich Asians or shows like Empire are important because they're outsized versions of Asian-American life that nobody can attest to the truth of. Nobody can attest to the authenticity of it because it's like, is that real? Are the people like that real? Well, I guess they are in some places.

JON CHU: It's not the sexy, big movie that's going to change things. It's not Crazy Rich Asians. Sorry. It's nice-- it's a nice headline. I love that. I love it. But it's not that. It's literally, you know, when my friend texts me like, hey, I want to fix this. Tell me the place to donate that will make this better. And I'm like, bro, you've made fun of Asians since we were three years old about making jokes, and I would laugh along.

So I think it's those, like, different conversations that no one's going to see, no one's going to applaud. You just do it, and you move on with your life. It's uncomfortable. That-- those-- I do believe that those little differences are the only way forward.

MARGARET CHO: Asian-American Pacific Islander Heritage Month.

JEANNIE MAI JENKINS: AAPI Heritage Month.

BAO NGUYEN: I'm just going to say AAPI Heritage Month, because it's a tongue twister.

JEANNIE MAI JENKINS: It is our responsibility to make this month a celebratory moment for everybody to educate them about the-- the history, the resilience, the accomplishment and the contribution to this society that AAPIs have been a part of.

JAMIE CHUNG: Really living the American dream. Starting a business, owning a home, you know, having a family, sending our kids off to college, like, it's-- it's pretty beautiful.

DANIEL WU: It's a moment for us to express our pride but also express our strength and the beauty of our culture.

BAO NGUYEN: Sometimes for better or for worse, this is the month where people are focusing in on our stories. And I see that opportunity arising, and I hope it's not just a moment in May but it continues way past this month.

MARGARET CHO: It comes down to, we want to live. We want to live. We're just as terrified of this pandemic as everyone else. We didn't cause it. We didn't bring it.

JON CHU: There is a-- a sense of unity that we haven't seen ever, maybe. And we're starting to find each other and find how we can help each other in this.

MINDY KALING: When I was growing up I was a child of Indian immigrants. I kind of think that there was this idea that it's like, OK, keep your head down. Don't make a big stir. Don't make a big fuss about things. And now seeing young Asian-American people, particularly young Asian-American women, using their platforms to show when there's, like, injustice or ways that we can help, I've just been very inspired.

JON CHU: I'm no longer scared of being called an Asian-American director. I'm like, hell yeah, I am an Asian-American director, so let's go.

JAMIE CHUNG: Life, especially as a female Asian, it's like, oh, you know, just be really small. Don't take up space. Don't be a bother. And it's, like, just take up the space. Be unapologetic. You deserve to be there. You know? We deserve to be here.