Simu Liu
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- Talk about stress, right? - So when you got that call, you must've just been over the moon, huh? - Yeah, I cried into my pillow for a long time. It was like, you never get more, you're not gonna get more high stakes than that, you know? - Absolutely amazing. - Welcome back.

to where everybody knows your name. Today's guest is a true superhero. Many of you know Simu Liu as the star of Shang-Chi and The Legend of the Ten Rings, in which he led Marvel's first all-Asian cast. Or maybe you know him from the fantastic sitcom Kim's Convenience, or Barbie, in which he memorably played one of the Kens. I was excited to meet Simu for the first time through Woody. They worked together on a film called Last Breath,

that you'll be seeing in the future. It's based on a true story about a deep-sea diver. And it was really cool to hear these guys talk about how much fun they had together on the set in Malta. I'm surprised, actually, they got any work done. Anyway, let's get into it. Meet Simu Liu. ♪

Simu, thank you so much for being here. You're so welcome. It's such an honor, mostly for you, Ted. Woody, less so. I wear thin very quickly, so I'll catch up to Woody in a second.

Can we make an agreement, though? I just heard before we started that you guys have a routine that when one of you says a joke that's really kind of lame, you go into this mock hysterical laughter. Can we agree to do this in this podcast? Oh, definitely. And maybe going forward. You just got to have your laugh. In life, yes. But Simu and myself and Finn Cole, who's also in the movie with this –

Well, I don't know how you could have much more fun than we had. We really had a fun time. And some of it was in very tight quarters. It was. It was. It was kind of I mean, it was kind of one of those situations where the set itself was so constricting. And those, you know, it's like I feel like those scenarios kind of breed the best humor ever.

Because you just realize you got to make a joke to get through that, you know, because you're cramped in and like a bajillion things are happening around you. And you're like, oh, my God. And that situation is because you were filming Last Breath, which is a movie about...

It's about a team of commercial divers that work at the bottom of the North Sea. The North Sea. And it's based on a true story where, you know, basically the whole concept of the... They're called saturation divers is that they work...

you know, 100 meters, 300 feet below sea level. And in order for you to operate at that pressure, you have to, you basically have to live in a saturation chamber that's no, there's no bigger, really wider than like,

I would say half this room. Right. There's no, you know, you have very little space, very little privacy. You're like living on a space station and you live aboard the ship in a little tiny saturation chamber. And then when you go down to work on the, on the sea floor, you go, you climb into this little tiny thing called a bell and they lower that bell down and it's all pressurized so that by the time you get down 300 feet below sea level, you're already kind of

When you say that you, they live in there. So it's four weeks. They, they stay there. So our movie is, you know, it's, it's a true story of a diver that gets caught. What happened on this particular day, 10 years ago was that, um, there was a diver, Chris Lemons, who was, who was out and, uh, and his, and his co-diver Dave Yuasa were both underwater working. And, uh,

And the ship that they were tethered to starts to lose navigation because there's a storm. It starts drifting and it starts to pull the divers and their umbilicals. And so Chris's umbilical actually gets caught on a manifold structure underwater and it snaps. And he basically is lost on the bottom of the sea. Dude.

Did you guys have to go through any training, even though you're actors and you didn't have to really? Well, he did. He had to go through extensive because he's actually one of the divers. There's two go down and then one stays in the bell. I was the guy who stayed in the bell. So he and Finn did quite a bit of...

Yeah, yeah. We did three weeks. But after I left, you really, you were underwater a while. Oh, yeah. For hours, you'd be underwater. Yeah, you were long gone. I was living the good life. You know, but no, you had a couple of rough days where it was just you and the bell, right? And it was like you. Without you guys. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was a bummer. Yeah. So the bellman kind of stays inside this egg-shaped structure. And you've got, imagine just like this tiny cramped space and like hardwoods.

hundreds of feet of umbilical because basically as the divers go out someone's got to be in the belt to like wrangle it so there's Woody like poor Woody's like learning how to do the job for real on the day because they really just dressed in everything of what it would look like we had like real saturation divers that came in and consulted a lot what was your training? never was movie star blues a more appropriate song

That was a genuine laugh. That was. Thank you. That was good. He's a pretty funny guy. I got to give it to him. Did you shoot in that chamber where you have to be on board the ship where you're, what is it called? The sat, yeah, the sat chamber. Right.

Did you work together in that? Because what I'm bringing up is... It wasn't an actual set change. I mean, it was, but it wasn't... It was close quarters, though. You didn't have to bring in helium and oxygen. The reason why I bring this up is when I worked with Woody, it was a huge soundstage, but his...

His vegetarian farts were so horrible that he would shut down production. I'm just wondering what happened with you. Go ahead. Vegan. Sorry. Vegan. Which gives it an extra little pecan. They were vegan farts, to be fair. You were really nice.

I think you were really nice about it. No, that was back when I didn't chew my food. I see, I see. There was this one thing. We had an eating scene. We had an eating scene where, like, for whatever reason, like, their characters were all, you know, it's like all of the, you know, the tricks of the trade is, like, when you eat on camera, you take little tiny bites. And you remember this? And we were doing this eating scene, and for whatever reason, like, Dave...

was like wolfing down the food and he was like, are you going to finish that? And then he's taking what he was. And I just remember like before every take, this guy would just like heap stuff on his plate. Cause I had to, in the script, like I had to finish whatever was on his plate. So he would like put, just add all this.

I'm just watching him. He's getting more frustrated by the minute. This is take 12 because I'm not that good of an actor, too. It's take 12. I'm like, oh, God. Please don't make me do this again. I disagree with that statement, by the way. You're a great actor. Oh, man. Pretty cool. So do you want to back up?

How'd you get there? How did I get there? From Harbin. How do you say where you were born? Yeah. Harbin. Harbin. Yeah. Yeah. One of the, one of the coldest, um, cities in, in China. Um,

Yeah, well, my parents, my parents immigrated to Canada. They were able to get scholarships to study electrical engineering at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario. And then they were they were there for a number of years while I was being raised by my grandparents. And then I came over when I was four and a half, learned English, started school, and

Became something of a gifted child. My parents were very hopeful that I would be, I would follow in their footsteps and become like an engineer or, you know, something that, you know. Worthwhile. Worthwhile. Worthwhile. Yeah. Yeah.

But before you, so, but you were raised by your grandparents for how long? Until I was, yeah, until I was four and a half. So that must have been wild for suddenly your parents aren't there and you're being raised by your grandparents. Well, I didn't, I never knew my parents. So actually my grandparents, like my grandparents actually felt like they were my guardians. And I never, I never grew up with like,

a notion of like, I don't have a mom or a dad. I was just like, oh, this is my, my yeah, yeah. And my nine, I, and they're the ones who take care of me. They feed me, they clothe me there. Oh, they do everything. Your parents left. So your mom was in Beijing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. She, I mean, she was kind of, yeah, she was with me early on and then, and then, yeah, I went to Beijing and then went to, and then immigrated, um, with, with my father.

And I really honestly just never felt like I, I mean, I would hear their voices on the phone, but I think trying to explain that to a four-year-old, like trying to, oh, yeah, your parents aren't here. And these are your grandparents. They aren't your actual parents. But like, you didn't care. You know, at the end of the day, it was like, they're the ones who tucked you in at night. And that's all that mattered.

And then one day when I'm about four and a half, my dad shows up and he knocks on the door and he's like, hey, I'm here to take you to Canada to your new life. We're ready for you. And I was kind of like, who are you? It was very weird. He was like, you know, that feeling of being a kid and a stranger is hugging you and is lifting you up and you're just like...

I feel like everyone's expecting me to embrace this man as if I've known him my whole life. But at that point, he just felt like such a stranger. Four and a half. That's it. Four and a half. And you have visceral memories of that. Yeah, very much so. Because I remember it was very traumatic being separated from my grandparents. It was like that was the only home that I knew of.

And I felt like if you had told me, like, if you had given me any sort of agency at that age of like, do you want to go with this man into a completely different part of the world? I would have said no.

I would have said, hell no, let me stay here. I love it here. There's nothing wrong with my situation. But that was always kind of the family plan was that I was going to join my parents in Canada. I'm obviously very grateful for that now. But yeah, it was hard at the time. It must have been very hard to see then. Yeah, yeah. So let's say when you got to Canada and now you're living with these two people you barely know who are your parents.

How did it take a while to adjust? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I feel like we're still adjusting in a lot of ways. I mean, you just I think when you miss those years with each other, it was like getting adopted by my own biological parents. And there was so much that we had to learn. But then also I was like adapting to life.

in Canada and learning English at a faster rate than they were because by the time I was seven or eight, I was already speaking better English. And my parents' English was pretty good. But, you know, it's just when you're in the school system and you're listening to it every day, all of a sudden it's like you're, you know, for all intents and purposes, you become Canadian. And then there becomes a culture clash of like, okay, now we're having trouble communicating and we don't have that kind of baseline intimacy of like being together from birth and

Yeah, I mean, there were some really hard years there. And their imprint, your parents' imprint early on in their lives was pretty intense, I would imagine, in China. But they were kind of taskmasters and really expecting you to be

The golden boy. Yeah. I mean, I mean, a lot of, a lot of kids from my generation were only children because that was the policy at the time. And, uh, and so it was just like these one child would like hold the entire, and especially if like that family made the cross, you know, made the journey to, to, you know, immigrate to a different country. It was like that kid held the hopes and dreams and the expectations of like the entire family. And,

And, and that was, and that was me. And I feel like I did a pretty decent job for a hot sec. And I went to college and I, and I studied accounting and got a job as an accountant. And then like, and then less than less than a year after graduating, I got I got fired.

Cause I was a shit accountant. Well, thank God. By the way, this is the irony of life. Like you think the worst thing just happened to you and it's the best thing. You have no clue that that was the best thing that happened. Oh yeah. I thought my life was over.

Yeah. And, but why, why did you end up gravitating toward, you know, so you became like a stunt man, actor, extra, whatever. Yeah. Whatever I could kind of get my hands on. I think it was because. Wait, wait, sorry. Take me through that leap. All right. I got fired. I'm no longer an accountant. I know. I'll go be a stunt man. Was that, that clear to you or. No, no. I think, um, I think what was clear to me was that, um, what I had been doing, um,

up until that point was not working. And I mean, I should say I had, I always had like a love of movies and, and as an only child with immigrant parents, it was like you absorbed the world, uh,

through TV and through movie. Like you just, you know, it felt like being at home was a very isolating experience because it just did not reflect the world that was out there. Right. It was like you were stepping into a time capsule and all of a sudden you got two roommates from 1970s China. So in order to learn about the world, I was just watching movies and watching TV and wanting to just escape into those worlds, you know? And, um,

And then I think the other part of it, too, is like my parents worked all the time. You know, I was kind of bullied at school. So I just kind of felt like

I wanted to matter a little bit and I wanted to, you know, like have the spotlight on me for once. And so I, I had, you know, Toronto is a, I would say it's like a small ish. It's a bit of a satellite city when it comes to film production, but you know, you shot there, like there's tons of stuff. You were in a movie called man from Toronto that shot in Toronto. Yeah. Yeah. Um, you know, a lot of stuff shoots out there and, and,

I would hear these stories of friends of friends who wound up as an extra on movie sets. And those stories would kind of trickle through the grapevine. And I remember I would get so jealous and so interested. I was just like, oh, man, I wish I knew someone in the industry. I wish I knew. I wish I had an in. And I was on Craig's. I would like when I was a miserable accountant and the kind of the depths of my depression. Yeah.

I would go on Craigslist and type in, you know, acting, like find me an acting job on Craigslist, just for fun, really, just to fantasize. And I came upon a listing for Guillermo del Toro's movie Pacific Rim, which was shooting in Toronto at the time at Pinewood Studios. And I actually, I skipped work to be an extra on that set.

Because I was so I just was so interested in it. It was like the listing was specifically calling for Asian actors, which I thought was a sign from the universe telling me that I had to do it. Because, I mean, I was like, when are they going to ever ask for Asian? Anyway, you never ask for Asian actors. So, yeah, I skipped work, went on set.

Pretty much got found out right away, got fired like less than a month later. So, you know, very clearly. Oh, was that a part of what caused you to get fired? Yeah, yeah, definitely. I would say, I mean, I don't know. So it wasn't about being a shit accountant. Well, there was all, yeah, I mean, there was also that I did. I did also fail the first of my exams. From that moment on though, you're hooked and you're in the business. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, I, I had no job, but I was like, I might as well give this a shot. It was never really meant to be a long-term thing though. I got to say, I, I,

As somebody who looked like me 12 years ago, God, I had no delusions that I would become – all of a sudden I would have a TV show or my own movie. I was like, oh, I would love to be the Asian guy that is working at the convenience store that gets robbed. I would love to be that guy who –

And, and that would be enough for me, you know? And, and of course, you know, you go in with that, with that kind of thinking, you're like, Oh, maybe I'll just do it for a little while. And then you just get hooked and you, you know, I was pretty successful early on. I booked my first couple of like speaking roles here and there relatively quickly. And then I just found myself on set. And I think the more that you're exposed to it, the more that you meet people that are working in the industry, the more you just start to feel like, Oh, maybe I could just, maybe I could, if it

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So tell me about that transition to finally, you know, scrounging around to finally getting Kim's convenience. Yeah. And then that blowing up. I mean, it was like it. I've said this before, but it's like it's like I had been in credit card debt.

For years before, you know, I was I just kind of had convinced myself that that was going to that was going to be my life. And and I had made peace with it. I was OK with the life of a starving artist. As you know, we all have to make peace with at some point, like what we where we are, what we do. This is not the norm. You know, we're extremely, extremely lucky. But but yeah, I was. So when I when I got the when I got the call.

I just cried because I knew it was lifting me out of credit card debt. I knew that I would no longer be the black sheep of the family that I had become because, as we were saying, when all of these immigrant dreams rest on this one kid and then he gets himself fired before he turns 23 and then decides to become an actor...

You've got like, you can imagine how my parents feel. And then you imagine how like the family in China feel where they're just like, well, he went fucking crazy. Wow. See, this is why you should never leave, you know? And you were aware of that in real time. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I basically, you know, I used to go back and visit quite often. And basically what just happened is I stopped getting invited back.

I just stopped getting invited back. My parents were like, you know, well, we'll see you. We're going back to China for a bit and we'll see you in a few weeks. And there was no like, come with. It was just like, yeah, you stay. You stay here. We would rather pretend you don't exist.

um this is pre kim's convenience yeah yeah and and not to say that that was the only reason why my parents are speaking to me now we doesn't hurt it doesn't hurt it definitely doesn't hurt things but no we we had kind of done a lot of work prior and they they had in in their own way made peace with it as well but but that was a huge step up for me it was it was a

great for our relationship because because you know they were able to really see me make a living doing what i what i loved and what i set out to do initially and and if that was the happy ending to my entire career i would have been totally happy right you know um but now i'm here with you guys i don't think it would have been totally i mean you would have wanted to keep going

You know what I mean? You're right. Like, I sometimes think, oh, if I had just been Woody on Cheers, like, that's pretty fucking great. You know what I mean? That's hitting the lottery, you know? But on the other hand, you also think to yourself, well, I sure would have liked to have done something else. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fair enough. So, so, uh,

Then the transition from doing Kim's Convenience to when you got Shang-Chi. Tell me about that. So...

it's really hard for canadian actors to actually start auditioning in the us you got to get like uh you got to get a visa in order to get a visa you got to get an attorney who you basically have to prove notability within your profession you're an a you have to apply to be an alien of extraordinary ability that's what the o1 visa is called so getting on kim's and all the press that that kind of came with that was enough to um get me my my visa and once i got that it was in about 2016 i started coming down to the states to audition

whenever I wasn't shooting Kim's Convenience. And it was a tough... You had an agent in LA? Yeah, I had a manager that I just emailed out of the... I was like 3 a.m. sending out mass emails saying,

And this one guy, Chris, um, you know, responded and, uh, he's still my manager today. Very, very great. Yeah. Best email that he ever responded to. Before you got that. I'm happy about it. Responding to that. Yeah. He's pretty happy. He's pretty happy. And there's about 400 other people who are kicking themselves in their inbox. They're like, ah, shit. He did email me. Um, yeah.

So, but, but those few years were, yeah, it was hard because coming down to the U S with the exchange rate, we weren't making that much money off of Canadian television. It really wasn't a have, I was living, but I was by no means a lucrative venture at all. Um, I was just kind of middle, middle class working actor still, but I was hemorrhaging money and just trying to be in LA as much as I could, because again, yeah, I knew that, um,

I love my home country of Canada very much, but I knew that if I wanted to pursue – if I would attain any sort of long-term sustainability for my career, I'd have to go to L.A. I'd have to make it in the States. And so I was just year after year coming out, auditioning. There were some close calls. As you guys probably know, being on a show, it can be golden handcuffs sometimes, right? Because you sign –

You see a contract in front of you. You've never seen that amount of money before in your life. And they're like, but we're going to need you for six years and you're not going to be able to do any other shows. And you sign on the dotted line and you're like, great. I just just pay me. I don't fucking care. But then but then you go down to L.A. and there's all these new shows that come up and they're like, well, we can make it work with your schedule. We just need your show to sign off on it. And then there's, you know, business affairs, whatever.

from one end to the other. And then before you know it, that deal's evaporated. You don't have enough, you know, you're a, you know, my manager's calling me and being like, ah, they pulled the offer. They pulled the test deal. And so it was a lot of years of that. It was a lot of years of, of honestly, maybe just not being good enough and me still kind of working through my skills as an actor. Cause I was still very much learning as I was going, you know, I had no, I had no formal, I had a lot of formal accounting training, but very little formal acting training. Yeah.

And, and then, you know, 2019 rolled around and it was like, I just been, I just feel like been beating that door down and beating that door down for like so long. And finally it was starting to crack. And in February, I, I was on my first US network TV show. I was on Fresh Off the Boat on ABC.

And then shortly after that, I shot like a little indie movie in San Francisco. And then three months later, I was Shang-Chi. So it was like once it started, once I started noticing that first crack, like it all just kind of finally came down. Wow. And that was the so what was the audition process like for Shang-Chi? Yeah. So I basically we got a we got a call to put these scenes on tape like dummy scenes. They were scenes from Good Will Hunting.

And nobody would tell me what it was for. And so I did my best Matt Damon impression. I was like, how do you like them apples? And I put it on tape and I sent it in. And then we heard nothing for like a month and a half. By then knowing what it was for? Getting more and more of an idea, yeah. But at that point I was like, there's no way. I'll throw my hat in the ring, but like,

There's no fucking way they would pick me. There's just, there's just too many talented people out there. They're going to pick someone stuff like that doesn't happen to me, you know? Um, but then, but then, you know, yeah, about a month and a half later. Um, and it was right around the time that we had a bit of a shooting break on Kim's convenience. They were like, Hey, are you going to be in LA anytime soon? We'd love for you to sit down with the director. And I was like, yeah, I booked my, you know, booked my ticket out. Um, and,

you know, met Destin who you've worked with. Yeah. It was just absolutely phenomenal. Um, and then, and then from there did kind of like a callback. And honestly, I feel like that callback was where I won the part. Cause it was like Destin and I in a room together, we were working at some point I was kind of like still on book. And then he was like, Hey, how about we just throw the scenes away and we just kind of vibe and improv. And I was like, okay, let's do it. You know? Um,

And I very clearly remember I came out of that room and I was just like, I was hyperventilating. I think because I had done so well, I felt like I had done well enough and I couldn't admit it to anyone. I didn't want to say it out loud because I was afraid I'd jinx it. But I was like, I think I may have just won the part. And yeah, a few days after that, I get a test deal and then I fly out to New York where they've like, you know, they...

It's marvelous. Big company, you know, they set up this like full screen test with the wardrobe and that, you know, and the and the, you know, you're on a soundstage with a full camera crew. And and Aquafina was there was my scene partner. She'd like, you know, generously given her time because she was already cast at that point to do a chemistry read. And then and then I blacked out. Some things happen. And then two days later, I got the call.

Wow. That's great. Talk about stress, right? When you got that call, you must have just been over the moon, huh? Yeah, I cried into my pillow for a long time. It was like, you're not going to get more high stakes than that. Absolutely amazing. I just knew my entire life was about to change. And I was in my 500 square foot apartment in Toronto just like,

And then, yeah, four days later, they flew me to San Diego to Comic-Con. And then I was announced in front of the whole world. And I was on stage with Angelina Jolie. And I was wearing these ripped jeans from Zara that were $20. And just sharing the stage with all these Marvel superheroes that I just...

literally i just saw because the end game had just come out you know it was like the biggest movie ever and all and all of a sudden i was just there with them so it was it was a it was fucking surreal and because of that announcement at comic-con you just blew up right as far as people recognizing you or knowing you or i mean yeah it was that that was a that what i would say was like a

a small blow up. And then when the movie came out and hit, you know, in the middle of the pandemic for it to do as well as it did, it became such a, such a conversation because, you know, the, you know, the industry was struggling and, and,

You know, we were struggling to figure out whether we would all survive the pandemic. The movie ended up being like the highest grossing domestic movie at that point until Spider-Man came and kicked our ass. But but so that was in 2020, the end 2021. So we shot in 2020 and then 2021.

September it came out. So I have some, can I, now you're famous. Now you're pretty much current. You've gone off and made more movies since that. Did you lose something with fame? Did you lose? I mean, I saw your interview with Kevin Hart, which was a great interview, but.

It is a double-edged sword. I mean, it's great. It's wonderful. It's your dream. But you do... You pay for it. Yeah. You pay for it. You have to be willing to let some things go. A lot of people I found could put their fears of being abandoned by you on you, and it's your fault. You're not going to be the same. Oh, he's changed. Did you get any of that? No.

I have great, I have and continue to have great people around me. I have, I believe to be the best friends and family in the world, you know, um,

Especially my parents and I feel like have just been to hell and back and we're stronger than ever. I love them so much and have a really, I think, thorough understanding of their journey to immigrate and really all of that being so that I could have the ability to pursue life on my terms, which was an incredible gift that they gave me. And so I think in my personal life, I've been very lucky in that I don't think that too much has changed there.

You need the friends that'll give you shit at the end of the day, you know? And my friends give me a lot of shit. I seem to have no limit of that. It seemed like, could we put a cap? No. So how did your parents respond? They must have, when Shang-Chi came out and was such an over-the-top success, how were they, you know, how did they take it? My dad retired.

My dad retired, which is great. It was a surefire. I mean, I think before there were, there was no, there would be no conversation of retiring at his, he retired at 60.

And, you know, I know that he would still be working today if I hadn't gotten that part. Oh, just to support you, you mean? Yeah, I think he would, you know, there was always a sense of like, he would be putting squirreling money away just in case I needed it. His loser son quit another accounting job. Yeah, his loser son, exactly, exactly, exactly. So all of that, yeah, I've just been really lucky with my family and all that. But where I feel like,

I've lost something is maybe just the, you know, in just the bigness and the speed at which it's kind of happened for me in the sphere of like the social media of it all, I think is that I think I've lost the ability, you know, it's kind of like you lose control of your own narrative in a way because you're just kind of, you're out there and I think people feel like you're out there and so they feel like,

based on what they see or what they read that they know you. And so it entitles them to give opinions and say things that are completely not true and based in reality. And I think for a while, I really struggled with that because I came from a grassroots TV show where

Every night when the episodes would air, we would tweet with our fans, and everyone was so kind and so great. It felt like a small community, and everyone was supportive of each other. But there's something about the bigness of the last couple of things that I've been in that comes with a global...

aware, but, you know, that awareness doesn't mean that every single person is going to take the time to know you and who you are before passing some sort of, so, you know, whereas before I would love to like read everything that was said about me and like, you know, it would, the internet really was like a place of support. Now it's like a very different, different place. And so I feel like a lot of

What I feel like I have to do as someone coming into fame in this era is learn to step back from that and tune that out. Which ain't a bad thing. No, no. Mental health-wise. No, I think it's the best decision I'll make. You don't want to compromise on your vacation. In fact, you deserve more on vacation. Experience more.

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Feels like you were, how you were raised, the whole, the immigrant, the child who everybody put their hopes into, your shoulders were learning how to be broad at a pretty early age so that this, with the movie, the first superhero Asian character, all of that stuff where people lay all this kind of weight on you, feels like you were almost...

trained to be able to handle that amount maybe the yeah the chosen yeah the chosen one yeah maybe no i i i mean i feel i feel like many things have happened in my life in in such i mean i don't i don't think i'm a particularly religious person but i i do feel like at time like you know the

just the way in which my life has unfolded. It's impossible to go through what I went through and not feel like in some, like there's just some sort of, there's something weird about the timing of everything and, and how everything in my life has come full, full circle in a way. Like I remember, you know, I was, I was, I was on my like college, you know, hip hop dance team, like

doing dance, you know, competing with these other colleges, doing dance. And my parents are like, what the fuck are you doing? None of this will ever matter in your life ever. Like, this is so useless. Why are you wasting your time? And then I get cast in a Greta Gerwig movie where I'm out there, you know, doing choreography to an eight count. And like, you know, it's just that there's just been a such so many of those full circle moments that it's just impossible to like,

really wrap my head around. Um, so I'll say I've been, I've been very lucky in going through what I've, what I've gone through. And, and yeah, I mean, I, I feel like there is an element of, of like living with some sort of expect burden of expectation, my, my, my whole life, which, uh, which for better or for worse, I guess, prepared me for whatever this is. I don't know. I mean, that's what a superhero is, right? I mean, carrying the burden of saving the

world or the universe or whatever it's kind of all very perfect now you're cornering me and forcing me to say i am a superhero which i mean if you must if you put the words in my mouth yeah you're saying it i'll take it let's have one of those laughs yeah

By the way, that's fucking great. That was my first real attempt at it. That's a fun one, right? That's good. It's fun, right? Woody really perfected the jaw movement as well. Oh, yeah. Okay, this may be premature, but I remember early on, I was very lucky that early on in the Cheers fame, you know, like about third, fourth year or whatever, that

Somehow I realized, or someone wise told me or whatever, that you can feel the energy coming your way because people know you all of a sudden. - Everybody knows your name. - Yeah. Damn, that was good.

I deserved it. I deserved it. That's not a bad joke. That was good. I know. But anyway, being an actor, celebrity with a lot of attention is like being a four year old in a room full of adults who are all focusing on that child. You can spin a kid out like that if everybody's going, oh, look at that little boy, you know. And it's the same thing, I think, being a celebrity. All that energy can really fuck you up if you just absorb it. Mm hmm.

Somebody told me or I whatever that it's power. That energy is energy. So if you use it and deflect it into something you care about, you can make use of

For me, it was oceans. Actors are the ones usually who stand in front of the tent and say, hey, thank you for watching Cheers. Yes, let me sign an autograph. But will you please come in and meet this marine biologist who has something amazing to tell you. I survived

Much better dealing with fame knowing I had something to do with it. Yes to make you sir. Yes He's got something to do with it. He makes a freaking mountain of money. Ah I Told you my dad retired I mean that's uh, you're gonna have to support your parents, but I think it's premature I don't mean to be saying what are you doing? You know or anything like that? But does that ring a bell or does that make sense or I?

Yeah, yeah. How do you deal with it is what I mean because it is a crap load of energy coming your way. Yes, yes. I think it kind of turns, it can turn anybody into a narcissist, right? Because all of a sudden you are the center of the world and then you're right. The moment that you start buying into it, it's like it's over for you. You really have to, I think, you know, in my very, very short time in the public eye, I think I've started, I've really realized that

you know, that will come and go and the eye of the world will come and go. But, you know, what you, yeah, exactly what you can do to be a conduit in a moment towards whether it's an idea or a cause or something, you know, for me early on, at least like this was pretty simple for me, like,

even just existing as an Asian, Asian American person in the public eye. And, and,

Being, you know, even like somebody who could talk on press and not be like, you know, and I say this with the most amount of love because I feel like I idolize people like Jackie Chan and Jet Li. But they were a different type of Asian character that I think was a lot more palatable to Western sensibilities of like, oh, here's like an Eastern mystic martial artist character.

and who doesn't really speak English, you know, and, and, and I, I was, you know, I really just wanted to be the guy that could shoot shit on, you know, on, on camel or whatever, and sit down and tell a joke. And that there, there was something even like revolutionary about that. Um, so in the beginning it was really about just the representation of it. And, and now I feel like

you know, as an extension of just being more globally known, I suppose, is like, you know, focusing and really trying to

Trying to connect with organizations that have a global reach. So I do a lot of work with UNICEF, UNICEF Canada, for example. I love talking about mental health because mental health is something that my community in particular doesn't have a lot of familiarity with. When you look at our parents, a lot of whom came from extremely traumatic situations, didn't feel like...

they had any of the tools available to, like, really process what was happening to them. And so a lot of it became, you know, they took it out on their kids, on us. And so we carried a lot of that generational trauma. And we, in turn, became really fucked up. And so, you know, without...

without really hitting on the head too much. It's like, you know, my journey into therapy has been really awesome. I want to share that as much as I can so that people really, people like me feel like those conversations are normalized. And so, yeah,

You know, I've been doing a lot of work with with an organization called Culture City, for example, which is all about invisible illness. Right. All about the the diseases that afflict us that you would not know walking down the street. And and, you know, what what I really, you know.

what I think is true is that everyone's dealing with their stuff. You know, we all put on a brave face to step out into the world, you know, but we're all in to some degree broken in our own way and trying to heal and that's okay.

and um and wanting to share that message with the world too so among other things you are you are you really are you're a rock you really are should we should we talk about barbie oh man what's that ride been like it's uh it's i've never worked with a director like greta and i think you know you know in in all the and every director teaches you something different i think greta

Taught me so much. And not just Greta, but being on set with Margot and Ryan. It was just like aces. It was an all-star cast. And everyone, you know, Will Ferrell, Kate McKinnon, these SNL pros that are just so fucking funny. And every take is completely different, but so usable. And I think I take a lot of those memories with me. And I feel like it just made me so much of a better actor. Greta is so...

So amazingly collaborative in how, you know, she... Like, the script was... The movie was in the page right from day one. It was like, we read that script and we were like, holy shit. This is one of the... This movie is going to be huge. Like, you could tell. But then...

The fact that she could have that distinctive a vision and still be so wonderful and so collaborative on the day and so receptive to ideas, I think, made me realize you don't have to be an asshole in Hollywood.

Like, there's no, like, you know, just because you're an auteur or, like, you know, just because you're, yeah, like, a director's director of a certain caliber, like, that somehow entitles you to be a terrible person. Yeah, listen to this advice. You know, great.

I, I'm, I'm, I'm, well, nevermind. He's the nicest guy. Yeah. I mean, I, I know it. I know it. I mean, we, again, we knew it would be big. We didn't realize. I mean, I think what has been just so incredible is like seeing the Barbenheimer of it. These two movies could exist simultaneously and could just like energize the

the industry in such a way that like you know we're coming off of a of a summer where like a lot of movies where I feel like on the page or in the room felt like this is an ace this is an ace in the hole this is like gonna get us our 500 million whatever

um, we're failing. And so I feel like there's a lot of uncertainty in the industry about, okay, what works now? What, what will get people out? And as it turns out, it's just two really great original movies from like solid filmmakers, you know? And so when you say original, you mean not created by AI? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I feel like Barbie was, is, is the one movie. And Ryan Gosling said this at one point, it was, he was like,

Barbie is proof that AI could never write that. It's so weird. Because it's new and original. And original and Greta's storytelling is just so unique that like,

Just a movie like that could not exist unless there was a weird eccentric person behind it just writing the page. You can rip it off. AI can rip it off and then make a less good one. A less good. You can make a lot of copies. Totally emotionally empty version of it. Which, you know, some people do value emotional emptiness. No, it's okay to live that way. Just...

Just, you know, art should make you feel. You don't want to over emotion. I feel stupid, slightly embarrassed, you know, saying, so how are you paying back? How are you going to use all of this attention coming your way? Because the truth is, after sitting here for a while, it feels like you walk in the door, you just walk in the door and you're giving back because you're

You are all, you know, you are, shit, now I'm going to get it over my head. But you are an example to so many people who have been cut out of this industry for so long. You're an example of grace as you walk in the door. You're all these examples that are changing people's lives just by you being you walking in the door.

So I felt like my question was an implication of, hey, you need to give back kind of thing. And that's so full of shit. So please accept my apology and know that I do see you.

But first of all, Ted, you're welcome. And thank you. And you're welcome, everybody. Could you do me a favor and walk in one more time? Because it wears off once you sit down. Strut in. No, I just want to ask you one question before we wrap this up about your debut single. Don't. I didn't know about this. Oh, yeah. You never told me. I didn't know. I didn't want to. I didn't want you to make fun of me.

No, I would never. But what about it? What about it? Yeah, I guess I fancy myself a singer sometimes. I know you do too. Okay. I know, you know. I don't know about that. I don't know.

This guy's a good Elvis impersonator. I'm sure he's regaled you with many Elvis impersonations over the years. And what was the music? What was the music like? It was, you know, I had an opportunity to be in the Shang-Chi soundtrack. So I have a song on the Shang-Chi soundtrack with a record label called 88 Rising, which is like an Asian-American focused record label.

And I don't know how I weaseled my way out of the soundtrack, but I was like, I kind of was just hanging around the studio being like, hey, what you guys doing? Do you mind if I step in there? And then somehow it came out with a song called Hot Soup, which was, you know, it's like a cool little thing, but it had like a couple million streams on Spotify. And then again, weaseled my way more and was like, so we should probably keep doing this, right? Like you want to make an album maybe? And then

you know, the people at the label were kind enough to say, yeah, sure, you know, fuck around, learn your sound. And, and that's kind of what I've been doing for the last year. Just on my spare time. And, and in, in with the, with the single that came out was just, you know, now that it's out in the world, I kind of feel like I want to make more and,

It's that thing of like growing up, I would just like see people acting and performing and I just want to do it. You know, there was, whenever I saw something, someone doing something interesting, I was like, I want, I'd be like, I want to do it somehow. And, and just watching people perform live is just such a,

There's such a magic around it, and I'm dying to do it, and I need songs in order to do it. So I'm going to keep making music as long as the label will let me, and

And I haven't been booted off yet. And hopefully at some point I'll play something for you and everyone. That'd be cool. Great, man. That's so cool. I can't wait to listen to it. I didn't even know about it until I read this thing. Read the brief. What a pleasure. Thank you so much for coming, buddy. Thank you, man. Thank you.

That was Simu Liu, everybody. I am so happy that I got to spend an hour and a half or whatever it was with him. He's an amazing man and a kind of an effortless ambassador, even if he didn't want to become one. He is that and he's remarkable. And I really chuffed is a great word, chuffed that I got to hang out with him. So anyway, thank you, Simu. Special thanks to our friends at Team Coco and to you for listening.

I truly love getting to share these episodes with you every week. So it means a lot that you're here. Once again, tell a friend about us and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. If you're on Apple Podcasts, maybe give us a, oh, I don't know, great rating and review. We would appreciate it. If you prefer to watch me and Woody in high definition, oh, see,

Just reading this, I think that's a bad idea. But, you know, go for it. You can watch full episodes of this podcast on Team Coco's YouTube channel. So check us out sometime. Maybe put a little Vaseline over the part of the TV that my face is on. It helps. It helps. I will see you next time where everybody knows your name. Thank you.

You've been listening to Where Everybody Knows Your Name with Ted Danson and Woody Harrelson, sometimes. The show is produced by me, Nick Liao. Executive producers are Adam Sachs, Colin Anderson, Jeff Ross, and myself. Sarah Federovich is our supervising producer. Our senior producer is Matt Apodaca. Engineering and mixing by Joanna Samuel with support from Eduardo Perez. Research by Alyssa Grahl.

talent booking by Paula Davis and Gina Batista. Our theme music is by Woody Harrelson, Anthony Gann, Barry Steenburgen, and John Osborne. Special thanks to Willie Navarie. We'll have more for you next time for Everybody Knows Your Name. ♪

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