'This Moment No Longer Belongs to Just Me'

Ke Huy Quan is first Asian male to win SAG award for supporting actor
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 27, 2023 12:20 PM CST
He Left Acting for Decades, Gives Emotional Speech After Win
This image released by A24 Films shows Ke Huy Quan in a scene from "Everything Everywhere All at Once."   (Allyson Riggs/A24 via AP)

At the Screen Actors Guild awards Sunday night, Ke Huy Quan made some history. The 51-year-old Vietnamese-American became the first Asian male to win a SAG award for best supporting actor. If Quan's name isn't familiar, it's because he's been out of show business since the 1990s, reports CNN. And that's after a promising start as a child actor—remember "Short Round" from Indiana Jones or "Data" from The Goonies? That was Quan. But as he explained in his emotional acceptance speech Sunday night—watch it here—roles for Asian actors were few and far between as he grew older.

"When I stepped away from acting, it was because there were so few opportunities, and now tonight here we are, celebrating," he said, ticking off his Asian co-stars, per People. Quan won for his role in Everything Everywhere All at Once, whose main character, played by Michelle Yeoh, is Chinese-American. "The landscape looks so different now than before," said Quan, who cried as he acknowledged the moment. He recalled being told ahead of the awards ceremony that if he won, he would be the first Asian actor to do so in the category. "When I heard this, I quickly realized that this moment no longer belongs to just me," he said. "It also belongs to everyone who has asked for change." (More Screen Actors Guild stories.)

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