‘Kim’s Convenience’ Stars Blast Show for ‘Lack of Diversity’ and ‘Racist Storylines’
Stars of the Canadian sitcom Kim’s Convenience are speaking out following the series’ cancellation, detailing the show’s “painful” lack of diversity and “overtly racist” storylines.
Actor Simu Liu, who is about to star in Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, was the first to open up about the CBC/Netflix comedy, which revolves around a Korean Canadian family that runs a convenience store in Toronto. In a now-deleted Facebook post, Liu claimed that there was chaos behind the scenes, that the actors’ creative input was ignored, the cast was underpaid, and that the production and writing team lacked diversity.
“It was always my understanding that the lead actors were the stewards of character and would grow to have more creative insight as the show went on,” Liu wrote. “This was not the case on our show, which was doubly confusing because our producers were overwhelmingly white and we were a cast of Asian Canadians who had a plethora of lived experiences to draw from and offer to writers.”
Kim’s Convenience was created by Ins Choi and Kevin White and based on Choi’s stage play. However, Liu claimed that Choi did not offer proper support. “Aside from Ins [Choi], there were no other Korean voices in the room,” he stated. “And personally, I do not think he did enough to be a champion for those voices (including ours). When he left (without so much as a goodbye note to the cast), he left no protégé, no padawan learner, no Korean talent that could have replaced him.”
Following an article that blasted Liu for being “bitter,” actress Jean Yoon, who also starred in the sitcom, shared her experiences on the show. “As an Asian Canadian woman, a Korean-Canadian woman w more experience and knowledge of the world of my characters, the lack of Asian female, especially Korean writers in the writers room of Kims made my life VERY DIFFICULT & the experience of working on the show painful,” she tweeted.
Yoon went on to claim that White “set the parameters” for the show and that many of the storylines in the draft scripts for Season 5 were “overtly racist” and “extremely culturally inaccurate.”
Your attack on my cast mate @SimuLiu, in the defense of my fellow Korean artist Ins Choi is neither helpful nor merited. Mr. Choi wrote the play, I was in in. He created the TV show, but his co-creator Mr. Kevin White was the showrunner, and clearly set the parameters.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
The cast received drafts of all S5 scripts in advance of shooting BECAUSE of Covid, at which time we discovered storylines that were OVERTLY RACIST, and so extremely culturally inaccurate that the cast came together and expressed concerns collectively.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
Under Mr. Choi’s leadership, S5 restored many of the core values of the original show, and most offensive “jokes” were removed. To give you an idea of what we are talking about, here is one scene from the original S5 drafted under Mr. White’s leadership.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
No one, esp. Mrs. Kim, would be unaware that a garment makes her look naked. Unless she is suddenly cognitively impaired. or STUPID. Stripping someone naked is the first act before public humiliation or rape. So what was so funny about that? At my request, Mr. Choi cut he scene.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
And I’m sick of holding this back-Koreans hardly ever get MS: 0.1/100,000 or one in a million. You are 5x more likely to get a blood clot from the AZ vaccine than you are to get MS if you’re Korean. The producers: “But why does it matter?”And “Jean doesn’t understand comedy.”
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
What I find tragic about this situation was the refusal to believe the urgency with which we advocated for inclusion in the writers room. The failure to send us treatments, outlines, the resistance to cultural corrections & feedback. There is so much I am proud of. But
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
Kim’s Convenience was canceled back in March following Choi and White’s departure. The fifth and final season is currently airing on Netflix.
Conversation13 Comments
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I'm really sad we will never see Jung reunite with Appa or see Janet experience her dreams come to fruition. Umma getting MS was really weird. I've never heard of any Korean getting MS (I'm Korean!).
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I am so sorry to read of the cast unhappiness with the scripts and the showrunners.
The joy that I experienced from watching this series while not being aware of the
cast's problems with the above is a testament to the talent of this great group of performers.
How producing a show about the life and and idiosyncrasies of different generations of Koreans navigating life in western culture while remaining true to their own -- without Korean
people in positions of power to ensure respect and authenticity is frankly beyond all
common sense.
I thank every member of this cast for the 5 years of enjoyment you brought to me,
and I wish all of you many years of success and happiness in the future.
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Dude the more series you make, the more popular the show becomes, the actors become as important as the script. Replacing them doesn’t work. Working with them does.
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It's great that these actors stood up for themselves and for their roots. To heck with anyone that believes any differently. I really liked all the actors and roles in Kim's Convenience. Hope to see you both in more roles soon, you're both great actors!!! By the way, I don't like racist classification at all, but I am a white American that believes we are all 1 race....human!!!
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Saying we are all 1 race erases our individual struggles and experiences as a POC. You can’t erase color without erasing us.
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Racism everywhere. Waaaaah.
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Who actually cares? Not me. This show was putrid. The actors are complaining now, after lining their pockets and the show getting canceled. Get bent.
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Since when is it the expectation of the actors to dictate the creative course of a show? That’s not their job. If they’re not happy with the creative, they’re free to leave the project. But the creative is the job of the writers/show runners.
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Typical white guy response.
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Must be white....
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O
What a gnarly set of tweets by this women. Indeed she had deep disagreements with management of the show and, given her privileged position as a minority in a country with a white majority, just got away with behaving akin to a child. She could have quit at any time. This is the reality about working on a project you don’t own - you can either deal remain employed and find coping mechanism or leave. The audacity that she considered management severely careless, deliberately reckless, or something like “criminal,” to avoid acting on her suggestions. Who has suggested something to management? 9 times out of ten management chooses a different way than I suggest especially in an work environment that is not working out,
All told, or, rather, another way to gauge the success or failure of western culture in the future is to catch up with this women in ten years. If she remains ideologically committed to these ideas and without regret for acting out like a child, then the west is likely doomed. On the other hand, if she laughs while reminiscing about the absurd views she held once upon a time. If a bunch of Canadians cannot handle themselves with civility and dignity dispite disparate racial backgrounds then multi racial societies do not appear to have
Much hope. While Islamic countries such as afghniston felt disaster to the tune of a school for girls destroyed along with the girls, these Canadian want to be set apart because they are Korean
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Did you just say she should be appreciative of her privileged (NOT EARNED) position as a minority in a country with a white majority? Should we all say; "thank you Masta for your kindness?" Yikes.
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To address your point about workplace management, there’s more than one kind of workplace. I’ve been grateful to have worked with management that actually care about their employees’ input and make an effort to hear what they have to say, because they want to do better. That’s how you retain people who are intrinsically motivated to do the work and represent the organization. Just because that’s how things are, doesn’t mean that it has to stay that way. Change happens on any level.
Next, if this show is supposed to be depicting the Korean-Canadian experience, it makes logical sense to actually listen to and incorporate the lived experiences of Korean-Canadians. They have every right to speak up about demeaning depictions of their characters, especially in light of everything that has happened to Asian Americans.
Things are never resolved if they aren’t discussed, so there should room for these discussions especially with the shifting demographics. I see no problems in making things more culturally inclusive so that people feel represented.
The question is, where do you stand?
P.S. Not really sure what Afghanistan has to do with this conversation whatsoever, so reconsider why you’re bringing this into the conversation.
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