As I got closer, my heart started pounding because I didn’t know if he was going to recognise me. He had been relaxing in the green room when someone told him that Ford was outside. Ford was promoting the fifth Indiana Jones film, while Quan was appearing at a Marvel presentation. Quan recently reunited with his former co-star at Disney’s D23 fan expo in Anaheim, California. For many years after that, we were back to square one.” Short Round is funny, he’s courageous, he saves Indy’s ass.” The role, Quan argues, represented a huge step forward for Asian representation. “Spielberg was the first person to put an Asian face in a Hollywood blockbuster. I really don’t have anything negative to say about it.”Īnd Short Round was a groundbreaking character, he says.
It’s so hard to judge something so many years later. “We’re talking about something that was done almost 40 years ago.
Photograph: ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Imagesīut Quan rebuts any suggestions that the film is problematic. Tony O’Dell, Ke Huy Quan and Brian Robbins in Head of the Class in 1990. Then there’s the sexism, with Ford’s love interest Willie, played by Kate Capshaw, constantly fretting about breaking a nail. The plot, after all, involves intrepid archaeologist Jones helping Indian villagers retrieve a sacred stone and includes an infamous scene where he is served chilled monkey brains as a local delicacy. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was a huge hit, but since its release in 1984 it’s been accused of racism and perpetuating the white saviour trope.
That was the kind of set that George and Steven would run. One day Ford realised Quan didn’t know how to swim and offered to teach him. Quan would splash around in the water, watching Ford swim back and forth. “It was one of the happiest times of my life,” he smiles.Įvery day after filming, the cast and crew would have dinner together and hang out by the swimming pool at their hotel. He said: ‘Ke, I would love for you to come back the next day, but wear something comfortable.’” Three weeks later, Quan was on a plane to Sri Lanka for the shoot. My mum thought it was a really fancy meeting and put me in this ridiculous three-piece suit. “The next day, we got a call from Spielberg’s office. “I remember doing a really bad job because my English comprehension was very minimal at that time,” says Quan. George Lucas, Kate Capshaw, Quan and Steven Spielberg in London in 1984.
0 kommentar(er)
