Moviegoers who check out the new action comedy “Everything Everywhere All at Once” starringMichelle Yeohmight wonder who plays her husband, who displays some nifty martial arts moves of his own. Some may also rack their brain over why he looks so familiar.
Well, it’s because this is Ke Huy Quan’s comeback.
Many movie fans last saw the Vietnamese American actor as Short Round, the indispensable sidekick to Harrison Ford in 1984’s“Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.”He was 12 then. Steven Spielberg loved him so much that he cast him as Data in the kids action film he produced the next year, “The Goonies.” Quan, who also went by the name Jonathan Ke Quan, was also featured in two ’80s TV series, “Nothing Is Easy” and “Head of the Class.”
But then the ’90s happened, and Quan’s acting career fizzled. Part of it is the naturally difficult transition from child roles to adult roles that many child actors struggle through. But Quan also believes opportunities for Asian actors were few and far between back then, and his career paid the price.
“After ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘Goonies,’ those roles were not offered to me anymore,” said the 50-year-old Quan, sitting beside his “Everything Everywhere All at Once” co-starsYeohand Stephanie Hsu for a Chronicle interview in San Francisco hours before the California premiere of the film at the Castro Theatre on Sunday, March 20. (All three were set to appear together at the movie’s Los Angeles premiere on Wednesday, March 23, but Yeoh tested positive for COVID-19 — or, as she announced on herInstagram, “jumped into the Covid universe!” — and sat it out.) “The roles that I had the opportunity to audition for were really minor roles, marginalized, stereotypical roles …
“我在我20岁出头的时候,我在一个十字路口where, ‘Do I continue down this path where I don’t see a future for myself, or do I want to choose the unknown path?’ So I chose the unknown.”
Faced with dwindling acting opportunities, Quan, who has extensive martial arts training, went to theUniversity of Southern Californiafilm school and went behind the camera. He was the stunt choreographer for the first“X-Men”movie (2000) and the Jet Li actioner “The One” (2001). He also wasWong Kar-Wai’sassistant director on“2046”(2004), and he credits the Hong Kong auteur for taking him under his wing.
So having built a career behind the camera, why did Quan choose to return to acting?
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Quan looks over at Yeoh and said, “Because of this person.”
“I was really content working behind the camera,” Quan explained. “But then in 2018, Michelle’s movie ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ came out. I went to see it in the theater multiple times, and it hit me emotionally on multiple levels. Watching all my fellow Asian actors up on the screen, I wished I was up there with them.
“So I called an agent friend of mine and asked him if he wanted to represent me. This was after decades without an agent. He said yes, and literally two weeks later I got a call about this amazing project that was to star Michelle Yeoh. Never in my wildest imagination did I think I’d be starring in a film with Michelle Yeoh. I’ve been a fan of hers for so many years. ”
In 1985, Quan had his last big film role in “The Goonies” and Yeoh had her first big film role in the Hong Kong action flick “Yes, Madam!” Thirty-seven years later, they are the top-billed stars in a major Hollywood movie that’s receiving critical acclaim.
“Mind blown,” said Yeoh, 59, with a laugh. “First of all, after 20 years, (Ke) has decided to grace us with his talents once again. That certainly blew everybody’s mind.”
Hsu, the Chinese American actor who appeared in“Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”last year and is a regular on the hit television comedy series “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” added: “I watched ‘The Goonies’ recently on an airplane, and now knowing Ke and getting to watch him as a young actor, I really feel that 20 years of absence.
“He has always loved doing this so much, and thank goodness that there’s been all this space that is being made so that he can show the world his multitude of talents and not just be a trope or a gimmick or something,” Hsu, 31, continued. “So I have a lot of gratitude to these two (Quan and Yeoh), for sure.”
Quan is quick to point out, however, that he’s grateful for the younger generation like Hsu too.
“Over the years, a lot of people — especially the Asian talent working in Hollywood today — when they see me, they always say, ‘Oh, my God, thank you. You’re the OG. Thank you for paving the way.’ But honestly, it’s also them who paved the way for my return,” Quan told The Chronicle in a separate interview at a prescreening reception at the Castro. “I wouldn’t be here had they not kept on pushing for more representation for Asians.”
Indeed, Quan said that in recent years working behind the camera, he had noticed that more Asian actors were being featured in more prominent roles on television and in movies, but that “Crazy Rich Asians” really brought the point home. Now “Everything Everywhere All at Once” is part of that legacy.
“It was so exciting for me because not only was it a brilliant script, but it was also a script about an Asian family,” said Quan.“I just fell in love with it. It was really refreshing to see that these characters are treated with authenticity and integrity and are multilayered. So I was just thrilled to be a part of this journey.”
在另一次采访中,关主任丹尼尔·said he and co-director Daniel Scheinert “internet-stalked” Quan.
“I remember in middle school someone showed me ‘The Goonies,’ and I was so enamored by Data (Quan’s character) because it was so rare to see anyone Asian in a movie back then, let alone someone so memorable and so funny and so smart,” Kwan said. “Ke’s been part of our subconscious for a very long time.
“When it came to casting the movie, we were struggling to find someone who is of the right age who could do the comedy, do the drama, do the action, but above all, someone who could believably be a sweet pushover. Then one day I saw a GIF on Twitter of Short Round and my brain went, ‘What ishedoing?’ From the very beginning, this man embodied this character in a way that we couldn’t even imagine existed.
“The fact that he is back and he’s in this role — a leading role,” Kwan added, “this is a big middle finger to the industry for neglecting such a talent for so long. You’ll watch this movie and be like, ‘How has he not been acting?’ ”
“Everything Everywhere All At Once”(R) is in theaters Friday, March 25.
Chronicle Senior Arts and Entertainment Editor Mariecar Mendoza contributed to this story.