Nico Santos

I'm portraying out characters, I'm portraying femme characters, characters that are really outside of the box. I never thought I would get that opportunity to portray those characters at all, much less have a career that I have.

When I moved to L.A., I had no intention of really pursuing acting. I wanted to focus on stand-up. It's crazy to me that my acting career took off much faster than my stand-up career.

I didn't want to do Chekhov or Shakespeare. So I switched my major from acting to costume design. Eventually, I got a job working as a wardrobe assistant for a theater company. I would dress the actors, fix their costumes, do the quick changes for them and all that stuff.

I had a rough start when I moved to L.A. I couldn't find a job, so I couch-surfed for the first two years.

In high school the very first job I got was I worked as a cashier in Burgerville, which is this fast food place in Oregon. I kind of grew up to be a spoiled little kid so my dad was like, 'You're going to get a job for the summer!' I was this clueless immigrant like, 'May I take your order? Sorry sir, I don't know what I'm doing!'

Superstore' is, like, my fifth acting job.

What I've come to find out is it doesn't matter if you're selling a $10,000 gown or toilet paper: The everyday sort of humdrum of customer service and retail is the same.

I was in the closet up until I moved to the U.S. But I was always one of those kids who couldn't really hide being gay. Some queer kids are just more straight-passing than others. I was not one of those kids.

Pinoy Pride, always!

I never thought in a million years I'd be involved in a project that celebrated the fullness of my identity of being queer and Asian.

Especially when you're queer and you're a person of color, you're so used to being the token on set. Inevitably you have to answer dumb questions from someone. You're the 'other.'

I never thought an opportunity like 'Crazy Rich Asians' would ever come my way.