Uh oh… This definitely puts a big fat stain on things.
Friends is one of the most culturally relevant sitcoms to ever grace the small screen… Even 30 years after its debut! But how would you feel if you found out that behind the scenes, things weren’t so friendly? Well, you unfortunately don’t have to ponder that hypothetical, because a guest star is opening up about the toxicity and blatant racism he witnessed on set.
You may or may not have heard the name Stephen Park before. But you’ve DEFINITELY seen his work! His decades-spanning career has seen him pop up in everything from In Living Color to Fargo in the ’90s (he’s the “you’re such a super lady, Marge” guy!), he’s a Wes Anderson regular, he’s in this week’s new sci-fi epic Mickey 17, which stars Robert Pattinson.
He was also on Boy Meets World once — so on Sunday, he joined Danielle Fishel, Will Friedle, and Rider Strong on their Pod Meets World rewatch podcast. But surprisingly he opened up about a very different experience… his two-episode guest appearance on Friends in 1996 and 1997.
Referencing an open letter Stephen penned in 1999 following a “disappointing” appearance on a major TV program, Danielle asked him to elaborate on the “effects” of said statement. She asked:
“You wrote way ahead of its time an incredibly brave mission statement to Hollywood about status, power and racism in Hollywood about the difficulties you faced finding work as an Asian actor — and especially work that you felt you could be proud of. Can you tell us what the effects of that letter were at the time?”
At the time, he didn’t name the “massive” sitcom, but during Sunday’s interview he immediately, without hesitation, revealed it was Friends. Oof. He claimed:
“It was at the time, I felt it was kind of a toxic environment. James Hong was the actor who was also on the episode with me, and [the assistant director] was calling him to the set and you know, essentially saying, ‘Where the f**k is the Oriental guy? Get the Oriental guy.”
Oh, s**t…
James Hong is a LEGEND, btw. In everything from Blade Runner to Everything Everywhere All At Once. “The Oriental guy” would be reductive for anyone, but JFC. Steve went on:
“This isn’t the first time that this happened, you know, but this is the environment where this is business as usual in Hollywood in 1997, I guess it was. And nobody felt the need to correct this or say anything about it. So this is normal behavior.”
That’s really awful and so degrading… We would like to imagine if fan faves Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimmer, Matt LeBlanc, and/or the late Matthew Perry were in the room, they would have corrected the behavior. Stephen didn’t specifically mention anything about the cast.
You can listen to his full podcast episode (below):
What are your thoughts here, Perezcious readers? Let us know in the comments down below.
[Images via Warner Bros. Television/Max & MEGA/WENN]
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