Randall Park grew up watching reruns of the TV western “Bonanza.” But what he saw left him confused.
“You think of yourself as a Cartwright and then realize that everyone sees you as a Hop Sing,” the actor says in the five-hour documentary “Asian Americans,” which examines the challenges that have faced the country’s fastest-growing racial group over the past century.
Park, one of dozens who were interviewed for the two-night documentary debuting Monday on PBS, went on to star in ABC’s “Fresh Off the Boat,” a sitcom that helped usher in a new wave of TV shows in which immigrants finally ride high in the saddle.
One-note bandleader Ricky Ricardo from “I Love Lucy” has been outplayed by scene-stealing Cuban American grandmother Lydia on the new “One Day at a Time,” who boasts of her U.S. citizenship while insisting her family not forget its roots. Kwik-E-Mart proprietor Apu from “The Simpsons” has been lapped by Devi, the Indian American teenager in Netflix’s “Never Have I Ever,” who grumbles about wearing a sari but prays to the Hindu gods.
The 1970s sitcom “Chico and the Man” may have targeted bigots, but it still hung onto cliches, like having Freddie Prinze’s fatherless character mangle the English language and depend financially on a white man. In 2020, the taco shop on Netflix’s “Gentefied” may not rake in big bucks, but at least its Mexican American owners are calling their own shots.
“I didn’t grow up with a half-hour comedy about a Middle Eastern family. Most of the Middle Easterners I saw on TV were actively working against Jack Bauer on ’24’,” said “Saturday Night Live” veteran Nasim Pedrad, who plays a Persian American boy trying to navigate high school in an upcoming TBS series. “What’s exciting for me is creating something with humanity and depth. The only thing worse than no representation is a sweatier, contrived attempt at it.”
These new-generation characters are multidimensional and often conflicted, trying to honor their heritage while striving to be all-American. In short, they’re real.
In Netflix’s “Master of None,” Aziz Ansari’s Dev Shah respects his parents’ strict Muslim practices but sneaks out to attend a barbecue festival. The protagonist of “Ramy,” which returns to Hulu for a second season May 29, faithfully attends mosque but isn’t opposed to one-night stands.
“What does it feel like when you want to go to Mecca and you also want to go to Burning Man?” said creator and star Ramy Youssef, who won a Golden Globe for his performance this year. “I had never seen that played out before.”
People over politics
Many of these series strive to humanize the marginalized. But some viewers will also see them as Hollywood’s response to those who want to reduce immigration. That’s a fair assumption since these shows often were hatched during the debate over building a wall between Mexico and the U.S., the start of a crackdown on undocumented citizens and a string of hate crimes.
David Simon, best known for “The Wire,” originally passed on doing a TV version of Philip Roth’s novel “The Plot Against America,” which reimagined a world in which the United States didn’t enter World War II, triggering a rash of anti-Semitism in an alternate history 1940s. He eventually changed his mind.
“How wrong was I?” said Simon, whose HBO miniseries debuted in March. “The piece is incredibly relevant.”
In “Vida,” which returned to Starz for a third season last month, the Mexican American characters in an LA neighborhood confront ICE. In Freeform’s reboot of “Party of Five,” the kids’ parents get deported, rather than die in a car accident as in the original run.
“Coyote,” set to debut on Paramount Network this year, is seen through the eyes of a conflicted border patrol agent. But star Michael Chiklis insists the drama was never designed to make a statement.
“We’re not going to proselytize. We’re not going to preach to you,” said Chiklis. “We’re just going to tell stories with all different points of view. It isn’t about this side or that side. It’s about people.”
