Prestige Exclusive: Ronny Chieng and Chloe Bennet Talk Interior Chinatown and Representation

Last week, prior to the release of Interior Chinatown on Disney+ Hotstar, Prestige sat down with Ronny Chieng and Chloe Bennet in this exclusive interview to talk representation, a killer script, and the role of a lifetime. 

It’s 7 in the morning and I’m fiddling on the computer, Zoom lobby prepared, requisite morning coffee surreptitiously located outside the frame, and questions meticulously typed out and ready to go. On the other end of the screen: Johor-born Ronny Chieng, whip-smart comedian, political commentator, senior correspondent on The Daily Show, actor, and overall funny guy with a reputation for unapologetic sarcasm. His co-star: trailblazing actress, model, and musician Chloe Bennet, whose notable performances include appearances in TV series Nashville (2012 — 2013), Valley Girl (2020), and Married by Mistake (2023). 

Despite what must have been a busy day filled with media engagements and mind-numbingly repetitive interviews, the actors are convivial — Chieng takes the opportunity to greet me with a Malaysian flourish, calling out ‘Apa khabar!’ (how do you do?) with the comforting cadence of an undeniable ‘anak Malaysia’. 

The ice broken, we get down to the details. There’s just so much to talk about, and not quite enough time to get through it all.  

Both Chieng and Bennet have long assimilated into Hollywood, rocking up acting credits spanning television and the silver screen alike. They’re both Marvel alumni — Chieng notably appeared as Jon Jon in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), while Bennet held a long-term role as Daisy ‘Skye’ Johnson in Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. from 2013 to 2020. 

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Ronny Chieng and Chloe Bennet of Interior Chinatown talk representation and performative tokenism in Prestige exclusive interview 

Having now assumed places of pride among Hollywood’s top Asian stars, both Chieng and Bennet — who came from vastly different backgrounds — nonetheless tread the subject of representation with refreshing candour. 

Speaking on how casting decisions have trended in the post representation era, Bennet jokes, “For me personally, it was like ‘hmm you’re too Asian’ [before], and now ‘You are not Asian enough’.” And it’s true. In the earliest days of her career, the actress — whose birth surname is Wang — faced difficulty booking roles. It wasn’t until she changed her name from Wang to Bennet that her prospects improved. “Now, people are like, we want to see the diversity and have it be obvious. It feels more performative in a way.” 

In 2017, Bennet co-founded Represent Us Now (RUN) — not to be confused with American anti-corruption organisation Represent.Us — alongside producer Brad Jenkins, managing director and executive producer of Funny or Die DC and former Associate Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement. Focused on building Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) citizen power, the civic platform strives to give these often-sidelined communities a voice and better representation in Hollywood and Politics.  

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Bennet, whose fierce activism has clearly bore fruit today, acknowledges the progress without diminishing the need to push for more. “Obviously, there’s been huge strides forward, because you just have to chip away, right? It’s not a fight that will be fixed overnight, but any means, but it is interesting to see the progress that we’ve made.” 

While his experience in comedy has differed from Bennet’s, Chieng heartily agrees, recalling some of Hollywood’s top Asian-led hits — many of which he appeared in. “I think over the last five years, I think there’s been proven original IP with non-white people that’s really helped. You know, proof of concept commercially and creatively.” 

Like Bennet, Chieng holds no love for the performative aspect of representation. “I think there’s also been a lot of like, tokenism and shoving people into things, and tail wagging a dog a bit, in terms of diversity, but [then] forgetting about [also] telling a great story.” Notably, Chieng is of the belief that the story should always come first — and for good reason.  

In the aftermath of the writer’s strike, there is an undeniable imPetus in Hollywood to produce less, but also, to improve on the quality of the productions making it through the door. 

Where Interior Chinatown is concerned, Chieng is hopeful. “This is a very cool story! It doesn’t matter about the race thing — it’s almost, in my opinion, kind of irrelevant, you know? It’s a cool story, it’s about TV, it’s about society, and it’s very cleverly written. It’s very mind-bending and genre crossing. That’s what I’m most proud about, about this project.” 

Bennet concurs. “It does feel like real change has happened when we don’t have to talk about the change anymore, or we don’t have to talk about how it’s Asian or something like that.” That’s not to say she isn’t celebrating the wins. “I think the biggest takeaway is that this is, at the end of the day, a really high-quality commentary on TV, on media, on society, and yes, on Asians and it happens to be through the lens of that. But aside from that, we’re really proud of the work.” 

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Gritty realism meets satirical comedy 

Interior Chinatown has its roots in the eponymous 2000 novel by author Charles Yu, who also adapted the novel for screen as its showrunner and lead. Yu likewise serves as an executive producer alongside several others, including hit Hollywood director Taika Waititi from which we received The Mandalorian (2019 — present), Thor: Ragnarok (2019), Thor: Love and Thunder (2022), and Jojo Rabbit (2017) among others. Notably, Waititi brought his directorial expertise, comedic timing, and penchant for dark and quirky humour to the helm for the series’ explosive pilot episode.

At its core, Interior Chinatown is sparkling commentary on the ‘generic Asian man’, forever doomed to exist in the background of greater things. Often relegated to the role of the ‘Background Oriental Male’, ‘Delivery Guy’, or other such stereotypically Asian parts, this generic Asian man, Willis Wu (portrayed by comedian and actor Jimmy O. Yang) nevertheless harbours grand aspirations to become ‘Kung Fu Guy’. Across ten action-packed episodes, Willis embarks on a journey of self-discovery, unravelling mysteries surrounding his personal life and family, and finally arriving at who he was always meant to be: himself. 

For Bennet, portraying Detective Lana Lee in Interior Chinatown has proven both familiar and unfamiliar — particularly surrounding its procedural aspects, or lack thereof. To wit: she’s spent much of her career on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which boasted numerous elements typical of procedural shows. While she initially has difficulty expressing the quandary, she nonetheless manages, “It was like a satire.” 

It is at this point that Chieng jumps in. “She has experience doing, essentially, a procedural show — in Chinatown, you’re playing a character who’s kinda in a procedural, but also understands that she is in a procedural.” 

Bennet expands on that. “To be able to make this satirical think piece, and really comment on this genre… I think it was helpful that I have spent over ten thousand hours on a procedural show. I lived and breathed that for most of my career, so to get to do that in a way where, all of a sudden, I’m stepped away from it, was really, really therapeutic for me.” 

Chieng, however, drew on his years of performing to bring his character, Fatty Choi, to life. In portraying Choi, who appears to be the requisite sidekick, Chieng leaned into his iconic blend of sardonicism, sarcasm, and unfailingly Asian caring. “I think Fatty has a certain amount of cynicism in him. [In] his character arc, he becomes a bit of a performer on the show.” To Bennet’s amusement (and to my own), Chieng adds, “That’s probably what I brought to the project, you know, it’s experience with life performing and being a super cynical piece of sh–t, and so… That helped a lot.” 

In spite of his self-proclaimed cynicism, Chieng’s career has unfurled with a great flourish. While he’s worked with numerous high-profile personalities across the years, he nonetheless chomped at the bit when it came to accepting the role. “When you get an offer on a dream project, you take it, you know? The people attached to it, Taika… When you look at the source material, how cool it is, the book, and the people involved in it, the company behind it — Disney, Hulu — you know it’s going to be ambitious. It’s a no brainer.”

Watch the full interview with Ronny Chieng and Chloe Bennet below.

Interior Chinatown is now streaming on Disney+ Hotstar.

(Main and featured images: Valerie Macon/AFP, Disney+)