Jimmy Yang - How to American

Eight months and twenty-five auditions went by and I had completely forgotten about the Deep Tech audition. During that time, I booked a guest star role on It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and a small part on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ; things seemed to be going well. All of my comedian friends thought I was killing it, popping up on different TV shows, but I felt stuck doing one-off bit parts on different shows. I felt like a foster child, getting passed around to different families, except I was an adult who had to pay rent. I was getting paid SAG-AFTRA union minimum scale, which was the lowest amount you could legally pay a union actor. It was a little over nine hundred dollars per day. That might sound like a decent payday for one day of work, but an actor would be lucky to work more than two days a year. I started to panic about my stagnant career. Making nine hundred bucks twice a year wasn’t exactly the Hollywood dream I had envisioned. I’d been to more than a hundred auditions at this point, and I’d booked a total of five small guest-star roles, a couple commercials that never aired and a movie I was cut out of. I had auditioned for everything from a Chili’s commercial to Dog with a Blog. Is this going to be the rest of my life — pretending to eat buffalo wings in Chili’s and auditioning to talk to a dog on a Disney kids’ show? Here is the audition log I kept:

1.

7/20/2011

Project Network

Host, Hip slacker dude host, Ethnic looking

2.

8/2/2011

Wakey Wakey

Loud Japanese host

3.

8/9/2011

Radical

Taiwanese 20, looks like 12, computer geek

4.

8/24/2011

Us & Them

Chinese restaurant owner

5.

8/24/2011

Samsung

Journalist/ DJ

6.

9/6/2011

Eagleheart

2 lines, Hipster

7.

9/14/2011

Modern Family

young Asian guy, friend of Haley

8.

9/20/2011

Sony

Interesting real blogger

9.

10/4/2011

Baby Daddy

Series Regular, Tucker, ethnic friend

10.

10/7/2011

Walmart

Walmart employee, Speaks Mandarin

11.

10/18/2011

Community

Co-star, Glee club rapper/dancer

12.

10/19/2011

How I Met your Mother

2 lines, stoner

13.

11/1/2011

Oh Henry!

Office Worker

14.

11/2/2011

Franklin & Bash

2 lines, stoner

15.

11/8/2011

2 Broke Girls

2 lines, person in line

16.

11/9/2011

Whitney

2 lines, young hipster guy

17.

12/1/2011

Target

Attractive young Bachelor

18.

12/7/2011

Retail Energy in Texas

Bad Karaoke Singer

19.

12/9/2011

Chevy Malibu

Chinese driver, a young Tony Leung

20.

12/9/2011

Coca-Cola

Young, Attractive Chinese

21.

12/16/2011

Sprite

Chinese speaking DJ

22.

1/5/2012

McDonald’s

Asian artist, painter

23.

2/2/2012

Rocket Ship China

Hip, attractive Chinese boy

24.

2/3/2012

Banshee

Series Regular, kick ass computer hacker Tranny

25.

2/10/2012

Admissions

College Roomate, supporting, Andy Garcia indy film

26.

2/10/2012

BFF

Nerd, harry potter guy

27.

2/15/2012

Undateable

Series Regular, young pissed off guy

28.

2/21/2012

Toyota

Young Taco stand patron

29.

2/23/2012

Friend Me

Young Ethnic, poker player

30.

3/6/2012

In Living Color

Characters and Impressions

31.

3/21/2012

TW Cable

High School twilight fan

32.

3/21/2012

Modelo

All types beer commercial

33.

3/23/2012

TW Cable

High School twilight fan

34.

4/9/2012

Johnson

Young man, faithful to his girl

35.

4/11/2012

Chavez

Day Player, Filipino/Chinese workers

36.

5/4/2012

Liberty Mutual

Driver

37.

5/4/2012

Bunheads

Skinny mechanic

38.

5/10/2012

Nissan Altima

Husband

39.

5/10/2012

The Internship

computer geek

40.

5/25/2012

Bunheads

Recurring, cute high school boyfriend

41.

6/6/2012

Workaholics

2 lines, college kid

42.

6/7/2012

Go Daddy

awkward techie nerd

43.

6/13/2012

Microsoft

Young record executive, hip

44.

6/13/2012

Bunheads

Guest Star, young usher

45.

6/18/2012

Good Luck Charlie

2 lines, college kid

46.

6/20/2012

Volvo

Chinese Brothers

47.

6/20/2012

The Internship

Chinese Ping Pong Player

48.

6/21/2012

A Leading Man

Supporting, Chinese surfer guy

49.

7/6/2012

Samsung

Hip/Casual

50.

8/1/2012

Arrested Development

Recurring, Super Secretive, cold read

51.

8/20/2012

Crash And Bernstein

Recurring, Stoner Kid

52.

8/23/2012

Catonese Demo

Cantonese

53.

9/10/2012

T-Mobile

Band Guy, good comedic timing/good actor

54.

9/20/2012

Toyota

Hipster

55.

10/1/2012

Goodwin Games

2 lines

56.

10/1/2012

Western Digital

Speak Cantonese

57.

10/9/2012

Marvin Marvin

2 lines, pissed off customer

58.

10/11/2012

Ford Fusion

Physical Improv, feat. Garfunkel & Oates

59.

10/22/2012

God’s Not Dead

Lead, Speak Chinese, Accent

60.

10/31/2012

Nike

Speak Mandarin, riding a bike (hip)

61.

11/6/2012

McDonald’s

Guy eating chicken nuggets

62.

11/7/2012

Full House 2

Plays violin, full concert attire

63.

11/15/2012

Need for Speed

Supporting, Computer whiz, friendly, sincere

64.

1/5/2013

McDonald’s

Sports Fan

65.

1/14/2013

Apple

Voice of Siri, in Mandarin

66.

1/16/2013

Larry Gaye

3 lines, lab tech

67.

1/24/2013

America’s Got Talent

Private audish, 90 sec standup

68.

1/28/2013

Castle

stoner PO Box guy, 4 lines

69.

1/29/2013

Happy Endings

2 lines, nice hair guy

70.

1/30/2013

Verizon

Proud son, a lot of dialogue

71.

2/11/2013

Good Luck Charlie

Nerd, chess club

72.

2/20/2013

The Mindy Project

Asian Video Game addict

73.

2/22/2013

Revenge of Green Dragons

Movie, Chinese Gangster

74.

2/27/2013

Chilli’s

Buddy/Neighbor

75.

2/27/2013

Deep Tech

Computer Programmer

76.

3/8/2013

Infamous 3 VO

Video Game, Chinese Pedestrian

77.

4/10/2013

The Gateway

Asian nephew, soft but wanna-be gangster type

78.

4/12/2013

Verizon

Hipster intern

79.

5/8/2013

Always Sunny

Lab tech, Chinese accent, Mandarin, guest star

80.

6/5/2013

Me Him Her

Weird Korean Jogger guy

81.

6/5/2013

The Walking Dead

Jack, stoner, teenager, meets his girl

82.

6/28/2013

Hello Ladies

Camera Guy/ Ronnie, wangster street guy

83.

7/2/2013

Scion

Hipster guy

84.

7/11/2013

Wayward Pines

Assistant secret service agent, eager, comic relief

85.

7/18/2013

Two and a Half Men

Seeking a job as assistant to Walden Schmidt

86.

7/22/2013

Shlub Life

Punk ass high school kid