Growing up, my dad was 'get a real job, don't go pursuing your dreams, that's how you become homeless.' So, do I pick my family or do I pick my own happiness, and how much does my own happiness depend on my family?

When I was on the playground, people were calling me Jackie Chan.

My job is to go into that audition and be good enough of an Asian actor - or an actor in general - to land that role so they don't have to go out and hire a white guy. My job is to make sure I capitalize on these opportunities that other people created.

Maybe my job on this planet is to make the Asian accent sexy.

When I was growing up, I had more comedy albums than musical ones. George Carlin, Cheech and Chong, Steve Martin, Richard Pryor - those were my main men.

I was very serene, and I still am, until I start talking in another voice, then suddenly I have a lot of volume and I'm frantic. But I didn't want to be one of those people who's always talking in accents in real life, so I started doing sketch comedy.

I never thought I'd do comedy, ever, in a million years. I always thought comedy was just for fun - to me, the real stuff was the real dramatic stuff. Now I know it's all valuable. There's a real excitement, a good feeling when you can make people laugh.

Humor is so important to the American scene throughout history.