Even if Ke Huy Quan fails to win a Bafta, his joyful Instagram account and own personal Hollywood happy ending have already secured him the unofficial accolade of “2023 awards season breakout star”.
Quan – up for a British Academy award for his role as affable laundromat owner Waymond Wang in Everything, Everywhere, All At Once – arrived in America as a refugee from Vietnam in 1979. Aged 10, he tagged along with his brother to an open audition for a film and ended up winning the role that turned him into one of the most recognisable child stars of the 1980s. He played Chinese orphan Short Round in 1984’s Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom – Harrison Ford taught him to swim during the shoot in Sri Lanka. A year later, he starred as Data in The Goonies, the seventh highest-grossing US film of 1985.
After a fantastic start, Quan quickly found that good roles for Asian actors were few and far between. “When there was one,” he has said, “the role was very stereotypical, and you had every Asian in Hollywood fighting for it.” In his 20s, he pivoted to work as a stunt choreographer and was sure his acting career was over.
Watching the hit 2018 romcom Crazy Rich Asians made Quan want to give it one last shot, and his first audition led to Everything, Everywhere. But production finished in March 2020, just as Covid lockdowns hit the world, and Quan didn’t work until after the film finally made it into cinemas last year. By then, he was so broke he had lost his medical insurance. Now the film has turned out to be a massive hit, and Quan has been nominated for every major acting award for his comeback role.
In an interview on American TV, Quan said: “I thought everybody had forgotten me, but since the movie came out, there’s been so much positivity and kindness.”
Understandably, it has been a lot to take in. He told W Magazine: “I grew up in a very traditional Chinese family so I worked hard to keep a lot of my emotions within. I’ve cried more in the last six months than I cried in the previous 20 years. Hearing all these wonderful comments from people about how much they’ve missed me on the screen has made me very emotional.”
Rebecca Sun, senior editor for diversity and inclusion at the Hollywood Reporter, said: “Comeback stories don’t get much more perfect than Quan potentially becoming an Oscar winner with his first major role in 40 years. But it’s infuriating that his talent was riding the bench for four decades – it’s an indictment on Hollywood’s imagination and creativity that no one gave him an opportunity to show what he could do.”
Nowhere is Quan’s kid-in-a-candy-shop delight more apparent than on his Instagram account. There he records the events, dinners and ceremonies he once dreamed of attending. Now he is a guest of honour. If you have ever wondered what it would be like if Indiana Jones and Short Round reunited after 38 years, that photo is now out there. And at a gala in December, actors Sean Astin and Jeff Cohen climbed on stage for a mini-Goonies reunion and to present him with an award.
Quan has also proved a master at selfies, posting snaps with everyone from Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise to activist Malala Yousafzai, all looking as delighted to be with him as he clearly is to be with them. He has even developed a signature accessory: a googly eye lapel badge – a nod to his Everything, Everywhere’s character’s love for stickers with the same design.
With upcoming roles in the Disney+ show Loki and the TV adaptation of graphic novel American Born Chinese, this could be only the first of many award seasons spent on the red carpet.
