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The Making of an Asian American Television Family

Meet the Hahns
 
By Takuma Okada
AsAmNews Intern

Another Asian American family comedy is in the works, but this show shouldn’t be mistaken for Fresh Off the Boat or even Doctor Ken.

In the upcoming show The Hahns, a hardworking gearhead dad and a mom that used to sing in heavy metal bands are raising two brilliant daughters . The family also happens to be Asian American.

I talked about The Hahns with LA based actor Sun Hong, who has been working on the show for almost five years now and is currently in post-production for the first episode. He continues to shop his TV family to television and streaming outlets. Originally from Chicago, Hong has struggled to find well-written characters available to him as an Asian actor and decided to create these much-needed roles on his own. Along the way, he hopes to change people’s perceptions of Asian Americans with a diverse cast of characters that aims to have a little something for everyone to enjoy and relate to.

Sun Hong is intimately familiar with both family and comedy. A former member of Chicago comedy groups like Stir-Friday Night and Taco Flavored Eggrolls, Hong first came up with The Hahns when he found out he was going to be a father.

 

The Hahn family is a diverse group, and Hong has written them “to be both relatable and aspirational,” he said. The parents, Jonathan and Sarah, “are Asian parents, but really they have all the qualities to be everyone’s parents.” Qualities they need to raise 10-year-old Landa and 6-year-old Marley. In the show, Landa and Harley are Korean Chinese American as Jonathan is Korean and Sarah is Chinese.

Landa is a critical thinker, interested in philosophy and debate, created, “to inspire children (really, adults as well) to think freely for themselves, that true knowledge comes from a combination of facts and real life experiences of people.”

Marley is an engineering whiz written, “to inspire girls (all children, really) to be curious about the machinery and technology around them, that it can be really interesting and fun to build things and fix things.”

Meet the Hahns

But as smart as they are, the two sisters are still naive. Their parents have their hands full trying to protect their tech-savvy kids from learning too much about the world too fast, something many parents today can surely relate to.

Meet the Hahns stars Hong as the father Jonathan; Cindy Chiu as his wife Sarah; and Hong’s real-life daughters Marley and Landa Hong as daughters Landa and Marley.

When I hear Asian American family comedy, I have a hard time not thinking of Fresh Off the Boat. Sun Hong has heard that many times before, and he explained how The Hahns’ approach to Asian stereotypes is different. Fresh Off the Boat tends to take Asian stereotypes and cultural norms that others might see as strange, and shows how they’re really just part of being a family. Asian American viewers get to see those parts of their lives on-screen in a way many really haven’t before. While the Hahns are a loving and hilarious family like the Huangs, they will focus on Asianness much less. It will still be present, but the focus instead will be more on how the Hahns are just another, “average, not-so-average American family.” By ignoring stereotypes or simply accepting them without making a big deal out of them, Hong hopes that their viewers will be able to relate to the show no matter their race.

Together, Hong hopes The Hahns,”will make Asians and non-Asians see past what they look like and connect on a deeper level. And have a laugh or two. Or twenty.”

Listen to the interview on SoundCloud

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