It is a comeback story so improbable, it could only happen in Hollywood.
At age 12, Ke Huy Quan went to a casting call with his brother, who was auditioning for the role of Short Round in “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.” Quan himself was chosen to star in the 1984 blockbuster sequel alongside Harrison Ford.
The following year, he again struck big screen gold in the action adventure classic “The Goonies.” And then the casting calls dried up and — unable to capitalize on his childhood fame — he built a career behind the cameras as a stunt coordinator.
Cut to Sunday, when the 51-year-old Quan came full circle, winning an Oscar for playing Waymond Wang, the downtrodden husband of a Chinese American laundromat owner swept into an infinity of multiverses in “Everything Everywhere All at Once.”
“Dreams are something you have to believe in. I almost gave up on mine,” Quan told the audience through tears of joy.
“To all of you out there, please keep your dreams alive.”
Quan was the odds-on favorite for best supporting actor over his fellow nominees — Brendan Gleeson and Barry Keoghan (“The Banshees of Inisherin”), Brian Tyree Henry (“Causeway”) and Judd Hirsch (“The Fabelmans”) — after an awards season sweep.
He won a Golden Globe, a BAFTA, a Critics Choice award and a Screen Actors Guild statuette, among other industry prizes.
His triumph is a watershed moment for Asian actors who feel they are finally seeing progress in on-screen representation.
“When I stepped away from acting, it was because there were so few opportunities,” he said two weeks ago in an emotional acceptance speech at the SAG Awards.
“The landscape looks so different now than before.”
Indeed, “Everything Everywhere All at Once” primarily features a cast of Asian descent — fellow Oscar nominees Michelle Yeoh and Stephanie Hsu star in the film, alongside Harry Shum Jr. and veteran character actor James Hong. English, Cantonese and Mandarin are spoken.
The film tells the story of Evelyn (Yeoh) and Waymond (Quan), who are undergoing a tax audit and moving towards divorce when they are swept into an epic multiverse battle to save humanity from a powerful villain — who is also their daughter (Hsu).
The genre-defying film, which features Yeoh and Quan in fight scenes, allows the characters a way to reassess their lives — and decide what is important.
“I was so famished for a role like this,” Quan told The New York Times late last year.
The cast of the film, which has grossed more than $100 million worldwide, won the best ensemble award at the SAGs, the night’s top honor.
– Back in front of the camera –
Born in Vietnam to parents of ethnic Chinese descent, Quan came to the United States in the late 1970s after they fled their home country.
Fame came quickly in those early films, which both allowed Quan to work with industry legend Steven Spielberg.
“He is the reason why I fell in love with acting,” Quan wrote on Instagram after the…
