Constance Wu Quotes

We went through a period of time when if you were of Asian descent, you would play a terrorist or you would play, you know, like, the 7-Eleven guy or you would play that. And then really watch television now.

Certainly, living in the U.S., as I have for over two decades, you see how Asians are portrayed in the media... I didn't see myself represented, you know, when I used to look at ads on TV.

I think women are sick and tired of being portrayed as victims, a lot of the time anyway, the bulk of their time on film.

Casting ethnic characters is a very hard thing to do, but it's important. It's also interesting.

I felt pretty good growing up. I didn't feel a lot of prejudice or racism. But I do remember, if there was going to be a movie or a television show with Asian characters, I would go out of my way to avoid them, because they portrayed all Asians as either ridiculously good or ridiculously bad; you know, the whole Charlie Chan-Fu Manchu thing.

Usually, when you are an ethnic person or a trans person, in your average, everyday, unsophisticated television show, you are there for that reason. And they clearly justify and overexplain why. You very rarely see a transgender actor playing the part of a grocery-store clerk without having to say, 'Oh, look at that trans person.'

Asians narratively in shows are insignificant. They're the cop or the waitress or whatever it is. You see them in the background.

It's not enough to be diverse in your casting. You have to service those characters; you have to make them fully well rounded because people are watching.

For me, whenever I would see a lot of 'black films,' I didn't feel represented in it. I didn't feel connected to the characters or the situations or the humor.

I'm Asian, and I'm an actress, and I've been doing this since I was a teenager, so if anyone understands the conversation about misrepresentation and underrepresentation, it's me. I live and breathe it; this is my life.

I hope my daughter will be able to see shows starring Asian people that has nothing to do with an Asian story.

I never grew up thinking, 'Why aren't there any Asians?' But then Lucy Liu came on, and I was like, 'Oh my God, she is my favorite.' I was nothing like her, but I just loved her because she was the only Asian I saw.

I am representing my community, in a sense, especially given the fact that there are not as many Latino actors out there.

Growing up, the only Asian face I saw on air was Connie Chung or extras on M*A*S*H. That was it. You could either be Chinese delivery guy No. 4 or maybe one day read the news.

There's part of me that would love to wear a ruffly collar and do a period drama, but that's not going to happen. You don't have Asians in those sorts of things.

Women are so appallingly represented in movies.

Imagine a film such as Inception with an entire cast of black people - do you think it would be successful? Would people watch it? But no one questions the fact that everyone's white. That's what we have to change.

I remember reading scripts when I started in the business, and [Latino roles] were either nonexistent or written as the maid or a drug dealer. We're no longer just that. I'll play any part that challenges me. What's important is that all races have choices.

In the early days of my carer as an actor, I shared what was then the prevailing attitude of Negro performers :;that the content and form of a play or a film scenario was of little importance to us. What mattered was was the opportunity, which came so seldom to our folks ... Later I came to understand that the Negro artist could not view the matter simply in terms of of his individual interests, and that he had a responsibility to his people who rightfully resented the traditional stereotyped portrayals of Negros on stage and screen.

Whoopi Goldberg looked like me, she had hair like mine, she was dark like me. I'd been starved for images of myself. I'd grown up watching a lot of American TV.

This is the problem with being Indian. It's hard to be one of the family members. Everybody is white usually [in the movie].

You have never had fair press in America.

I am proud of being a Southerner. I wasn't about to let Southerners on my show be stupid or aw-shuckses who just sit on the front porch and spit in the yard. I wasn't about to do that, and I made that very clear from the start. I was kind of the gate-keeper on that stuff.

So many times we're portrayed in ways that we don't want to be portrayed, in ways that make us seem so ridiculous.

There's this belief with no merit that media with women at the center applies only to women, but media with men at the center applies to everyone.