Asian representation in American media is at an inflection point. Even ten years ago, an Asian American-led TV show or movie was all but unheard of, especially one with staying power and lasting cultural influence. But the last couple of years have seen Fresh Off the Boat and Kim’s Convenience on TV as well as Crazy Rich Asians and Everything Everywhere All at Once in theaters. 2024, in particular, would mean a lot for Vietnamese Americans with the debut of the HBO miniseries The Sympathizer, created by Park Chan-wook and Don McKellar, and adapted from Viet Thanh Nguyen’s novel of the same name.*
In The Sympathizer, a North Vietnam spy (played by Hoa Xuande) infiltrates the South Vietnam Army. After the war ends, he is forced to flee to the United States, where he is tasked to continue his mission. It is, of course, the stuff of Hollywood blockbusters, but for the first time, it was ours.
But while actors are the most visible in any show’s production, there is always a cadre of support behind the scenes. While TV production, like many industries, have long been white-dominated, a change is happening there as well.
We spoke with Emmy-nominated Writer/Producer Sieu Nguyen who has been working in TV production and marketing for seven years about what this moment means and why the silver screen remains important.
(*Viet Thanh Nguyen is the co-founder of the Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network, which publishes diaCRITICS, and is its Publisher and Founding Editor.)
When did you realize you wanted to work in TV production?
Growing up in Vietnam, when I watched TV, I watched all these movies—both Vietnamese and Hollywood—and they always took me into a different world and it kind of tickled my curiosity. I just fell in love with it but I didn’t know that I wanted to work in it. I just knew that I loved TV.
So when I came to the US for college in 2013, I went to Vassar in upstate New York. I took a few film and TV classes and got a look into the medium and how people make those and the intentions behind the work, not just entertainment, and I just love that. I just love that it’s both art and entertainment in one medium and you can tell so many stories. That’s how I decided to major in media and film. I got an internship in New York, working in TV in my third year and it led me to doing this as a profession.
In your experience, how diverse is TV production? And specifically, what is it like as an Asian professional in this industry?
I’ve been working professionally in TV for seven years, if not counting the internships. I’ve been fortunate to work in environments where the leaders really cared about diversity.
My first job was at Paramount. I was there for around four years, and the people I worked with in my department were such a diverse group of people. Everybody had a different cultural background and it made brainstorm meetings or collaborative projects interesting because everybody had different ideas and brought their personal experiences to it. It felt like was a good sign for the industry, especially in 2021.
In the summer of 2021, I was leading an API month initiative for MTV, and I was able to have calls with a lot of API members of the company. It made me feel like there’s just so many of us in different departments—in creative, in marketing, in design. A lot of people who have been there for a long time felt like at first there was no way for them to raise their voices. But now we’re making different videos to promote API month and it was not just corporate virtue signaling. We talked about our experiences and I would use those real stories to write a script and record voiceovers. Through that experience, I felt like diversity has been valued and people are actively pursuing ways to have their voices heard. It also felt like a diverse environment and the leaders cared about that too.
It made me feel like it’s possible that I can make my way in this industry because years ago when I was interning in LA, it was hard to see success stories of people who look like you. Nowadays, I feel like it is better. We work on those projects together like The Sympathizer or Tokyo Vice. It feels like our voices are being heard and people getting represented more on TV.
You mentioned The Sympathizer. What was it like working on that?
I’ve always wanted to work on projects that portray the Asian experience and specifically the Vietnamese experience, which I felt like it was closer to home than most other projects in the industry. A lot of people on my team came to me for insights on Vietnamese culture and the language. We wanted to be as authentic as possible. In the promo videos, we didn’t want it to just be English because the show embraces the Vietnamese language, too. To make it accurate, I stepped into the role of somebody who advised people on how to cut these promos so that the language is represented accurately.
I myself produced a few pieces for the marketing campaign for The Sympathizer. In a recent one, I did a six-minute feature breaking down how the Vietnamese culture is represented on the show, including the Vietnamese language, how they try to get it accurately, the production design, how they try to portray buildings and architecture accurately to the period, the costume design, how they did research and put our actresses and actors in the áo dài. There’s also the casting of the actors. They went around the globe to cast Vietnamese actors or actors of Vietnamese descent. It’s something that I feel really proud of because it’s different from most things I’ve ever had a chance to create at HBO or in my career in general, putting out a piece of content that just embraces my culture and shows people that there’s just so much beauty in it.
Moving away from more of behind the scenes to the bigger picture, you could say. There’s always been this fear that TV is bad for people. It’s viewed as entertainment, something that doesn’t make you think. What do you make of that assumption?
I personally think that TV makes you think a lot because it is not just one thing. You can be entertained and be challenged to think at the same time. Nowadays, we see so many TV shows that is actually commentary on society that makes you think beyond the surface of just entertainment. At HBO, there’s The White Lotus. It’s so entertaining to watch Jennifer Coolidge, but at the same time, the show challenges you to think about different social classes and how that determines the way people act in society. The Sympathizer challenges people to think through a different lens of culture, not through a white American-centric perspective beyond the entertainment layer of a spy thriller.
In general, TV nowadays has so many layers and the stories are so complex and they reflect society as a whole. And personally, when I watch TV, I feel like I think more than I’m entertained sometimes. It is stressful, but I enjoy that stress of “this is the world that we are living in.” It’s a little messy, but there’s still hope. TV gives you that hope that cuts through all of this messiness, there’s still hope that we can fix it and we can do better. And because TV is so self-aware, it challenges people to also change the way that they approach life and their actions to make this place a better place. If you see yourself as a character on a TV show that’s satirized and criticized, maybe hopefully it will challenge you to be a better person.
Should we take entertainment seriously?
You can take it as seriously as you want to. If you’re tuning into entertainment for just entertainment, if you just need an escape, I think that’s a totally fair need. In that case, you don’t need to take it that seriously. But then if you want to think, you can also dig deeper and there’s always room to take it seriously.
It depends on the audience, but for me personally, it’s my line of work, so I have to take it seriously and I have to see all the layers that exist there and just see through the popcorn stuff.
I’m not in the position to tell people how to take it, but there’s that nuance for the audience to take it seriously or not. Also, I feel like when you even don’t take it seriously, it can still produce its positive values on your life. I watch RuPaul’s Drag Race and a lot of reality TV and I think the message is always “Don’t take life too seriously, just have fun and maybe be silly and you will discover yourself through not taking things seriously.” Something like that is something I embrace as well. Sometimes you might not need to approach something as is a critical text and you just enjoy yourself. And even through joy, even through being entertained, there’s still some value in it.
What is your advice for people who want to get into this industry?
One of the things that I tell a lot of people who ask me for advice is you just got to do it. This industry is very product-driven. It’s not like you submit a resume and then you go through a perfect interview and immediately you get the job. It’s more like if you have a portfolio of things that you have done, if you have love for creativity, go out there and do it. Nowadays, I feel like you can do it with an iPhone and make a movie from an iPhone then when you have a product, you can tell your story to people in that medium. And if it affects somebody who’s hiring, then it gives you a better chance to get a job in this industry.
Another thing is, I guess to work hard. It sounds really cliche, but that has been my story so far. When I started my first year working at Paramount, I did not even take a day off and I asked for more stuff because it’s the reality that people who are not white men have to prove themselves a little harder just historically. So I just tried to prove myself and prove that I can do it. Even if I don’t look like the people out there who’s the face of these productions that get praised, I still have my own way of doing my thing. I can still make stuff and I can still tell stories, and I worked a little harder, but I think it was worth it because then people see that I have a work ethic and they give my stories a chance to be seen.
Sieu Nguyen is an Emmy-nominated Writer/Producer at HBO. He has seven years of experience writing, producing, art-directing and editing on-air promos, behind-the-scenes featurettes and social content. As a critical member of HBO Marketing A/V, Sieu has led successful marketing efforts for Euphoria, Hacks, The Idol, Selena + Chef, Perry Mason, The Flight Attendant and The Girls on the Bus, to name a few. His creative work has broken new ground in the television industry, significantly strengthened HBO’s viewership and promoted its brand, and been featured on prestigious media outlets such as Teen Vogue, E! News, Entertainment Tonight, AsAmNews, Pop Sugar, and Nylon. His production helped Euphoria become the second most watched HBO show in history at the time season two premiered, and earned him and his colleagues a Clio Entertainment Award for “Original Content: Behind the Scenes.” He has personally interviewed stars such as Robert Downey Jr., Hoa Xuande, Nico Tortorella, and more.
Before HBO, Sieu honed his craft at Paramount, MTV, Disney and Blumhouse. His autobiography I Credit the Lonely (Vietnamese title: Cô Đơn Để Trưởng Thành) was a best-seller in Vietnam, where he grew up.
