John Cho frustrated by portrayal of Asian characters
John Cho thinks Asians have historically "been seen as less than men" in America.
The 50-year-old actor - who was born in Seoul, South Korea, before moving to the US as a child - feels frustrated by the depiction of Asian characters in Hollywood films.
He explained to the Observer newspaper: "I don’t want this to sound whiny, but we have been seen as less than men for so long.
"I fully appreciate that Asian men who are younger than me may be living in a different world, but certainly my generation was dismissed by larger society so much, and I just know from all my friends that they had a breaking point. And when it happened, you didn’t want to be around to see it, because the clenched fist in the pocket was often literal – it could come flying out.
"It was definitely a young man thing, but it was also informed by a culture that doesn’t value us very much.
"We grew up with that, and it took me some time to untangle it and to calm down and to not think that people are after me."
Despite this, John acknowledges that different generations react to insults in different ways.
For instance, he claims that his dad's generation - most of whom grew up in Korea - have thicker skin than he does.
The actor - who starred in the 'American Pie' franchise - shared: "You can call them every ethnic slur in the book. It doesn’t matter to them. They didn’t grow up here.
"I was thinking people in Asia don’t really think of themselves as Asian per se, because they’re the majority - they just are, just as a white person walks around without needing to put an adjective before white."
