Bowen Yang is in a splashy new movie, “The Wedding Banquet,” but he also has some serious thoughts about his high-profile role playing Vice President JD Vance on “Saturday Night Live.”
While discussing the new film, in theaters Friday, about a man who gets caught up in a sham marriage between his boyfriend and his best girlfriend over a green card and in vitro fertilization, Yang reflected on his identity as a gay Asian American and how it affects his work playing Vance.
Though fans have praised his depiction of the vice president, he said it’s been difficult for him — but that he’s put forth the same effort as with any role.
“I approached it in as disciplined of a way as I think anyone could, which was I hired, I worked with this accent coach that I love, where we found the right balance between, like, Appalachian and Ohio,” Yang told NBC News. “I have a serviceable JD Vance, but I was like you know what, this is a charge that I don’t take lightly. Like, I want to make it pop as best as I can. I’ve been very lucky to play political figures on that show.”
Yang, the first Asian American and one of the few openly LGBTQ+ cast members in the 50-year history of “Saturday Night Live,” said his beliefs and identity affect his work.
In the end, Yang said he’s “checked every box,” but he thinks the role of Vance overall leaves a lot to be desired.
“I think he’s just such a tragic figure in terms of American history,” he said. “Sometimes it just doesn’t have the give that you want it to. And that’s OK.”
He said portraying major figures in a climate where identity and politics are so divisive can feel like a no-win situation.
“There’s no universal agreement on what something funny is, on what humor is,” Yang said. “I feel like it’s just going to be alienating no matter what.”
He also joked on “The Daily Show” that he asked “SNL” creator Lorne Michaels to not make him do the part.
“SNL” and NBC News share the same parent company, NBCUniversal.
In “The Wedding Banquet,” Yang plays Chris, a birdwatcher in a five-year relationship with his wealthy Korean boyfriend, Min (Han Gi-chan). As Min’s U.S. visa is set to expire, Chris reluctantly agrees to facilitate Min’s pretend-marriage with his best friend Angela (Kelly Marie Tran) so Min can stay in the country and pay for Angela and her partner Lee’s (Lily Gladstone) next round of IVF.
But then his grandma plans an over-the-top Korean wedding banquet.
The movie is a remake of Ang Lee’s 1993 film of the same name, a rare portrayal of a queer Asian American at the time. Yang said that the original film resonated with his experience in college, after his parents sent him to conversion therapy in his teens.
“I was back in the closet with my family, and the original film fades out on this uncertainty with the parents,” Yang said. “They still hug and they still embrace, but it hangs on that uncertainty, and I felt like that was where I was at in life at the time. It gave me this blueprint, or it still gives me this extrapolating point to sort of work towards that — that if I can get there, then I’ll be OK.”
“It’s gotten to a much better place," Yang said. "There are still obviously things that cannot fully be known in a mutual way. But I give them a lot of grace for just meeting me where I’m at, because that is not something I ever expected.”
Director and co-screenwriter Andrew Ahn said writing, casting Yang and filming the movie was “wish fulfillment.”
“Chris, as a character, is so much this amalgamation of my boyfriend and my group of friends, and so it just made sense,” Ahn said. “I was like, I want to cast a friend, you know?”
Ultimately, Ahn said the film was his way of creating the family he wants for himself.
“It’s kind of crazy to say that within my friend group, my desire to have children feels radical. … I don’t actually know if it’s in my future," Ahn said. "I tragically told my boyfriend, ‘It’s OK if we don’t have kids, like maybe I’ll just make movies about families.’”
