Huang Family is That Chinese Guy on TV, in Fresh Off The Boat
If 2015 has undeniably set landmarks for better representations of Asian American communities, that’s also because of the production and broadcasting of Fresh Off the Boat. It was indeed the very first tv show since 1994 All-American Girl, starring Margaret Cho, to cast a whole Asian American family as leading roles.
For its earliest article, That Chinese Guy on TV tries to analyse Fresh Off the Boat ethnic sitcom, that is currently broadcasting its fourth season on ABC. Though no one can deny it constitutes a step forward in terms of visibility, is that Cosby Show East-Asian version falling into the same trap in terms of representations ?
Based on a true story : a moral career telling
Set on the 1990s, Fresh Off the Boat deals with a fresh off immigrated taiwanese family new daily life in most white city of Orlando. The Huangs left Washington DC Chinatown to allow the father, Louis Huang, to fully fulfill his American Dream in Florida : he recently opened a steakhouse in Orlando, the Cattleman’s Ranch Restaurant. Huang family is composed by the parents Jessica (Constance Wu) and Louis (Randall Park), Jenny Huang (Louis’ mother) et their three kids, Eddie, Emery and Evan Huang.
The show is an adaptation from chef, restaurant owner, author and advocate Eddie Huang’s memoirs, called Fresh Off the Boat : A Memoir, published in 2013. For the 13 first episodes, Fresh Off the Boat featured real-life Eddie Huang as voice-over but then he just kept his producer position.
Eddie Huang has indeed real quick expressed via his Twitter account his deep discontent towards the adaptation made about his own life, in which he sees an obvious case of yellowfacing : though there might be a whole Asian ascent casting, still the story they tell is not his personal experience as a racialized man.
If I explain later in this article why I (sadly enough) globally agree with real-life Eddie’s point of view, still the first season appeared to me at first sight as a most exciting project, as it depicts a moral career in an original way : that same painful experience of the stigma, acquired by racialized people, is not often shown on the screen as far as asian ascent characters are concerned.
The pilot is thus devoted to Eddie first day in his new school in Orlando : during lunch, some kids make fun of Eddie’s Chinese name in the cafeteria. He ends up his first week of school grounded in the head teacher’s office for having been fighting with the boy who called him a « chink ».
Even if he eventually finds a place at school, Eddie will be constantly judged and categorized by other people because of his racial stigma, the « normal » reflecting a distorted identity of what it is to be like him. Fervent admirer of African-American culture, he is for instance the only character that never speak a word of mandarin. When it’s World Culture Day at school and every child must embody a country, Eddie cheerfully chooses Jamaica, to his mother great dismay.
Generally speaking, Fresh Off the Boat tries to make visible how hard it is to live with the stigma, including for supposedly privileged communities : if Eddie struggles against the Model Minority Stereotype and racism, his parents question their own lifestyle choices. Jessica Huang, fighting against actual integration issues (during a trip back in Taiwan, she says how soothing it is not « to feel like a stranger »), will experience a real identity crisis at the end of Season 1. Dressed « like Chun Li », she is worried about her own children americanisation and does not manage to make them being interested in their culture of origin.
The great value of the TV series is also to illustrate in a most striking way that ghost normalcy situation Asian American communities experience living in the USA : during a trip in Taiwan during season 3, Jessica and Louis suddenly realize they are like « Patrick Swayze in Ghost. Stuck between two worlds », a foot in both camps, without belonging to any of it. This observation is thus the one of an everlasting Ghost normalcy, the different characters feeling like being constantly sent off to their immigrant status.
Dear White People : a bold satire
In so many ways, Fresh Off the Boat does not bother with complacency : it damages the White average American image, pinned for his conformism. For instance, when the Huang move in, Jessica meets some of her female neighbours, that much similar to each other that she asks if they are all sisters, before comparing them to a swar of bees. Later, in order that Eddie gets a seat in the cafetaria, Jessica agrees to buy an already-prepared lunchbox but cannot help being irritated against his son : « You want to fit inside a box ? It’s so American, why are you so American ? » she says.
Similarly, some of the characters may appear like there was a real massive inbreeding in their family. Mitch, Louis’ favorite employee thus claims he is from Orlando « born and raised ». Lot of scenes show how stupid Mitch can be : at the restaurant, he tears the addition in two when he is asked to « split the bill ».
The average American religiousness and right-thinking is also something Fresh Off the Boat jokes about : one may note how ridiculous the head teacher is when relating the fight at the cafeteria to Eddie’s parents : « : « [He] unleashed a stream of obscenities I can’t repeat because (pointing the ceiling with his index) God is listening. There were some words he used that I never heard before… And I grew up in Boston ! ».
White people treatment on screen thus has knowingly recourse to stereotypes. But what about representations bound to the main characters ? Though Fresh Off the Boat is widely considered as a renewal in Asian American representations, some characters are constructed upon stereotypes that are potentially reactivated.
Fighting stereotypes with stereotypes ?
To my mind, the most stereotyped character in the sitcom is Jessica Huang. As a mother, Jessica is the archetype of the notorious Tiger Mother concept : she is bossy and demanding toward her children. They have to be the best students and demonstrate the best behavior, both at school and in their extracurricular activities, conceived not as an enjoyment but as a way to be more competitive in the long run.
She thinks that children are « never too old to be controled ». Jessica is also most greedy : she wants to save money in every way she can and bargains everywhere, including places where the prices are set. The kind of mother that gives her children the pizza crust they did not eat during their last diner for breakfast. Jessica is also strongly superstitious. As Eddie described, his mother is so crazy-superstitious that she thinks Stevie Wonder went blind singing his song « Superstition ».
In Fresh Off the Boat, stereotypes are thus reactivated as a comic effect. One may notice that Huang Family is somehow embedding the Model Minority stereotype in several points : the parents has created et maintained some kind of family mythology, a way to teach their children they need to work to deserve what they want to have. Definitely workaholic, Louis and Jessica say they do not « believe » in weekends, in holiday or vacations and are glad to work on Saturday. Not inclined to show theirs feelings, great competitors, socially unsuitable… In reality, every dimension of the Model Minority stereotypes are explored.
However Huang family shows many forms of resistance to stereotypes and constitutes a real challenge for common representations. First, Jessica and Louis are a non-mixed couple and that’s a fact that Asian American characters are — both in movies and TV series — most of the time presented in interracial relations. Is that a form of multiculturalism or the expression of an umpteenth bias about Asian American sexuality ?
Moreover, Huang couple feels free to claim they have a most satisfying sexuality. Jessica and Louis are thus challenging ordinary representations convey by the medias, in which asian ascent individuals are presented as asexual or deviant people.
In many ways, they also challenge the passivity idea embedded in Model Minority stereotype : Eddie fights with a boy that has insulted him in cafeteria and when his parents are called by the head teacher, they surprisingly enough come to his defense : « That boy called our son a chink ! Do you think that’s okay ? ». Later, Jessica and Louis threaten the head teacher to sue him : « That’s the American way, right ? ». Huang family, on several occasions demonstratse strengh and even agressiveness to defend their rights, which highly contradicts Model Minority stereotype.
Fresh Off the Boat breaks some popular misconceptions on Asian American communities depicting a perfectly integrated family, far from living recluse on the family unit. The Huangs are part to every big festivities : Halloween, Thanksgiving or Christmas are indeed celebrated at home or with the neighbors. Though money and work are a great concern, the Huangs are capable of having fun, as we see in the many scenes in which they play basket-ball or just start dancing in the living-room to celebrate a happy time.
In the same way, even the character that seems to be the least assimilated as she speaks english only to quote her favorite TV show’s name is instilling a new relation to language, in which language is no longer a barrier to comprehension and togetherness. Jenny Huang is not in any way disconnected from the reality she is surrounded by : she keeps up with OJ Simpson’s trial and fully supports him. While everyone talks to Jenny Huang in english, the old lady keeps on answering strictly in mandarin, including to the neighbors, though she is aware of the fact they do not understand it. When Honey expresses her condolences for the loss of Jenny’s boyfriend, Jenny does answer in chinese, but while one is expecting some kind of social situation dropout from either interlocutor, nothing happens. The dialogue is not broken, as Honey answers : « I don’t speak chinese but I can hear from the tone of your voice that you are doing well ». What a proof that empathy can easily fill the gap between cultures…
The Problem with Fresh Off the Boat : when tolerance has boundaries
While I was watching FOTB and just could not point out what was annoying me came the episode in which Jessica refuses to celebrate Thanksgiving. She wants to capitalize on that day, opening the restaurant : she stakes on a typically white « thirst for community spirit ».
She makes everyone pay the price (including her closest friends) and fakes the lottery results to win the turkey and bring it back to the supermarket. Louis ends up really upset about her behaviour : Jessica suddenly comes to her senses. Touched by grace and Thanksgiving values, she changes her mind and offers the meal to all the customers. What a schizophrenic happy end.
Generally speaking, Jessica and Louis are such a binary couple : Jessica, as the mother, embodies the will to transmit their Asian cultural heritage, while Louis is very open-minded and tolerant. Yet, Jessica is the only character that seems to be punished inside the narrative when she lacks of tolerance : in the case of FOTB, one may notice a bias that supports a natural good and necessary conformity to sacrosanct american values… then, what about the right to be culturally different ?
That’s precisely the point where my opinion meets real-life Eddie Huang opinion : it is most disappointing to see that in a TV series that advocates for togetherness and right to cultural difference, the Huangs are in the end prayed to conform the typical American criteria…
The cultural difference is thus strictly supervised. The Huangs eventually ends up meeting the main criteria that traditionally defines a true American citizen, according to Thomas Sugrue : to be born in the United States/having the American citizenship, believing in economic liberalism values and of course, in God.
Those criteria are easy to validate : the three Huang kids are born in the USA and their parents have been naturalized. Then, the Huang couple believes real hard in American Dream. Finally, thanks to a magic trick in the scripts, Huang family get linked to protestantism via Evan Huang, that suddenly develops the habit of attending the mass on Sundays.
Lastly, I was seriously disturbed they first qualified Huang family as taiwanese immigrant in pilot and then, they are claimed to be Chinese. Who cares about geopolitical issue, right ?
As a conclusion, Fresh Off the Boat is the perfect picture of the notion of stigma. It relates a young boy moral career : Eddie Huang uses rap music to stop the leak he perceives in his own identity. Eddie is not the « good little Chinese boy » his mother wants him to be and either the average American to fit in the society. With no moralization, the TV series brings the viewers to think about the racial question, in order to prove it is a meaningless category. However, it is not the revolution the Asian American communities expected. Nevertheless, it is certain that Fresh Off the Boat will one day be part of the struggle for better representations history and that a kid called Eddie Huang would have contributed to pull those cracks on the jade ceiling.
References :
- Stigma, Erving Goffman
- Missing Romance, Minjeong Kim
Ps : English is not my mother tongue. Please feel free to tell me if some points require a better translation !