Steven Yeun on the Honesty of 'Minari' and His Eclec...
More than 50 years later, “Minari” will tell a pioneer story of a Korean immigrant family who travels to Arkansas in search of a farming business and manifest destiny. Yeun is an executive producer and the ensemble’s lead, and Chung’s very own version of Dean.
“After I left, the things Hollywood would give back to me were more of the same. That’s obvious and happens to everybody, but I wanted to reject that. I wanted to see the other side, to understand who I was and what I wanted to say,” Yeun says.
Like his character in “Minari,” Yeun felt caught between two worlds — stuck juggling the everyday pangs of American youth and the immigrant experience he and his family carried with them.
The actor says his experience was one of many examples of “code switching,” where people in marginalized communities assimilated into white culture often pivot between personas in their public and private lives.
That ingrained in him, however, a deep understanding of Midwestern values, which Yeun says fueled empathy and offered a deeper understanding of his “Minari” character.
好矛盾