DOUBLE EXPOSURE
Second Jen, a new sitcom bound for City TV this fall, breaks new ground with two Asian women in lead roles,
Jen (Samantha Wan) is nervously sitting in a doctor’s office waiting for a gynecological exam. In the next seat engrossed in a medical pamphlet on sexual health is her best friend Mo (Amanda Joy).
“Do you remember my first pelvic exam when my mom got me to see a gynecologist Dr. Chin?” asks Jen with alarm.
Actors Wan and Joy are in the back of a former daycare centre in the west end Toronto neighbourhood of Babypoint. The studio has been mocked up to resemble a doctor’s office.
Surrounding the duo is a team of producers and assistants putting together City TV’s Second Jen, a sitcom that is revolutionary in the fact that it stars not one, but two female Asian leads.
Since ABC’s Fresh Off the Boat and Dr. Ken there has been something of a gold rush of Asian American sitcoms including CBC’s Kim’s Convenience scheduled for the fall season, and YouTube channel’s Single by
30. But Second Jen stands out because it is confidently doubling down on the Asian leads, as if we had already arrived in a post-racial world.
The fact that it is Toronto-based makes sense, since the city is touted as the most diverse in the world. Still, it wasn’t that long ago when it seemed odd to some audiences that there were two South Asian co-hosts on mainstream news channels such as CP24.
Back to the scene in the doctor’s office: at the age of 21, Joy says, her mom followed her to the doctor.
“His first question was, ‘Are you sexually active?’ And she wouldn’t leave the room!”
That experience ended up in the series, which premieres Oct. 27.
Second Jen is based on the experiences of Joy (who has Filipino ancestry) and Wan (who has Chinese ancestry) and their attempt to make it on their own outside their protective families.
The gynecological exam scene for example, was partly inspired by the fact that Asian parents rarely, if ever talk about sex to their children.
“Mainstream culture is all about go out there, have fun safe sex, and in Asian culture you just never talk about it at all,” says Joy.
The title of the show also refers to the second generation, and the cultural and technological divide between millennials and their parents.
“This isn’t a show just about being Asian, it’s about the generational shift that’s happening out there,” Wan says.
Joy says the experience is universal: “It can be someone coming from small town Ontario and being used to a different way of life.” A study at the USC Annenberg school of journalism found that of the100 top films in 2014,12.5 per cent of the casting was black, 5.3 per cent was Asian, and 4.9 per cent was Latino.
But remarkably, while Hollywood still battles over #OscarsSoWhite, television continues to push the boundaries, becoming much more reflective of the society we live in.
In some ways, it’s surprising that Canadian networks have not taken the lead on diverse casting as some U.S. producers have done, introducing quality shows such as Blackish and Master of None.
But when Wan and Joy first tried to showcase their concept for their series at a Canadian pitch competition four years ago (and before the premiere of Fresh Off the Boat) one judge said “I don’t know if I’d want to watch a show about these people,” Wan says.
“We walked off the stage, but people in the audience didn’t have the same opinion. They tugged on our shirt and said, ‘We’d watch your show,’ and that really inspired us.” The two friends, tired of competing for the same roles in Toronto, decided they needed to create their own jobs. “There was one time when we showed up for a Geisha girl casting and we just looked at each other and said, ‘What are we doing? We’re not even Japanese!’ ” laughs Joy.
The sitcom also tries to show that there is a diversity within the Asian community. One scene has the two friends hosting an “Asian” night.
“We were raised in Toronto and Vancouver, and it’s weird to me that TV doesn’t look like real life,” Wan says. “In the show we bounce between Cantonese and Tagalog. That’s something very normal you see in Toronto, but you don’t really see that on TV.”
So far the two co-creators, who have contributed to writing every episode, say they haven’t run into the kind of network interference that Margaret Cho, in her groundbreaking sitcom All American Girl, complained of more than 20 years ago. More recently, Eddie Huang, creator of Fresh off the Boat, voiced dissatisfaction that ABC had “watered down” his story.
“So far I think they’ve been really protective of our voice, that it does come through,” Joy says.
“We certainly haven’t got any notes saying make it less Asian,” says Wan.
What has changed for both actresses is the way that they look at the world through the lens of television. And they hope that they’re not the only ones seeing it through that prism.
“One of my favourite shows growing up was Friends, and I still love that show,” Wan says.
“But I look at it now and there’s so little diversity. It’s just so weird watching that now. And I hope moving forward that maybe we can change this a little, that we won’t be the only ones that think that way.”