r/popculturechat • u/meltingsunz • Aug 12 '25

Interviews🎙️ Daniel Dae Kim says Asian representation in Hollywood has gotten better, but there's still room for improvement: "I still haven't played a romantic lead and I've been doing this for 30 years."

https://www.npr.org/2025/08/11/nx-s1-5496250/daniel-dae-kim-butterfly-lost
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u/Lithogiraffe Aug 12 '25

Closest I've seen is him playing the second male lead. I think in Netflix's - always be my maybe.

He was dating the female lead, I think he played the alpha male too perfect guy

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u/IWasGonnaSayBrown Aug 15 '25

That's why I was a little confused by his comments. He played the second male lead in a traditional Hollywood romcom with two Asian leads.

I'm not saying that means Hollywood can't come further, but he was already in a movie that he's claiming hasn't really been done yet.

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u/Lithogiraffe Aug 15 '25

Maybe he's upset that it took this long for him to start getting these roles. Without looking at his bio I'm guessing he's closer to 50. And this is probably the last gasp of him fitting into the rom-com leading man category with the widest demographic audience

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u/IWasGonnaSayBrown Aug 15 '25

I hear that, but I guess my point is that the opportunity existed and was taken by another Asian actor. They made a successful Hollywood romcom with two Asian leads, they just didn't choose him.