Taking Comedy to the Very Edge
Frank Lin chronicles crazy family adventures and Pat Morita's last role in 'American Fusion.'
Frank Lin's ridiculously entertaining first feature film "American Fusion" has collected a lot of accolades and may soon be headed to a big screen near you, but the real story lies in the making of the film.
After Lin, 32, (no relation to the author of this article that we know of) wrote the script, he went through a filmmaker's right of passage - trying to raise money. After a year of power lunches, and with $200,000 mortgaged from his mother's house, he was still short. So on an idyllic Los Angeles day, Lin trudged back to his apartment with the weight of the world on his shoulders. His landlady Esther Chao was outside watering the yard and noticed Lin's look of consternation.
She asked what was wrong.
"Looking for money," he answered forlornly. Specifically, he needed $300,000.
"Do you want the check now or later?" she asked. And when he determined Chao was serious, he took the money and made her executive producer.
It's a true story.
"She came from a crazy family too," said Lin.
Gotta Love Our Crazy Families
"American Fusion" is an irreverent romantic comedy about a controlling grandmother (Lang Yun), her warring adult children and their gangsta-rap loving offspring - three generations trapped in a dysfunctional mess that is partially inspired by Lin's own family.
He was penning an action/thriller script with Harvey Keitel when Lin's 80-year-old grandmother cracked her back and needed spinal fusion surgery. He spent six months in the hospital with his family, who turned the waiting room into a boxing ring.
"My family went nuts. They were screaming at the top of their lungs. They were so angry. I remember thinking, 'this is horrible. I don't know how I could live like this.' But then I started understanding that it was all about love. All the emotions were there because they were so stressed out and worried about grandma."
He knew he had to make a film about this and he knew he had to make it a comedy.
The resulting "American Fusion" is an uproarious personal story about all things taboo in Asian American culture, including blatant racism and characters that (gulp) actually have a love affair.
In casting the grandmother character, Lin told Yun, a veteran television actress and standup com
edian, that his real-life grandma used to hit him.
"You mean like this?" she said and then hit him.
The reason why they hit you is because they love you, she explained. Needless to say, she got the job and steals each scene.
Morita's Last Role
"American Fusion" is also Pat Morita's last role before his death in November 2005. He's virtually unrecognizable as an over-the-top newspaper editor with an eye for the ladies. Morita got a hold of the script and called Lin asking how far he could take the character. The answer was: limitless, no boundaries.
So while Morita was preparing to board a plane in Las Vegas, he called and said, "Get me some really bad toupees and suspenders. I'll meet you at the hotel."
At the hotel, the crew laid out a selection of toupees and Morita, dressed only in his boxers, tried them on one at a time until he came across the one - a page boy mop that ridiculously contrasted with his white mane. He tossed on coke-bottle thick glasses and began bossing people around.
"We were just all laughing," said Lin.
The racial overtones made Lin a little nervous. It made Morita very comfortable.
"He said being on the edge is where you want to be. I learned so much from him," said Lin. "Uncomfortable means funny. Comedy works the best when the guy telling the joke is nervous."
After filming, Morita would tell Lin about how he liked to spend every birthday trying to eke out laughter at the children's hospital.
"He loved to hear laughter. What a great man," said Lin. "He joked about how he wasn't going to last very long, so he had to get in as much as he could. We thought it was a joke."
A year and a half after filming for "American Fusion" wrapped, Morita passed away. Lin was working with Morita on an Asian Pacific American version of "Grumpy Old Men."
"He had a great ability to create happiness."
Looking at the Intentions Behind Racism
"My family can get very racist," said Lin, who poured his own experiences with racism growing up in Concord, Calif. into the film.
In grade school, he was the exotic Asian.
"I would go to grade school dances and the girls would all want to dance with me like it's 'The King and I.' But in high school no girls would ever date me."
Racism was also the reason why he left acting. Lin graduated from the UCLA Film School in 1997, but he had always been in the entertainment business. His uncle is a film producer in Taiwan, so at six, Lin starred in a Taiwanese soap opera called "Challenge the Sun." It sowed the seed. At UC Santa Cruz, he was in the throes of delivering a Shakespearean monologue when an instructor advised him not to do Shakespeare - not because he was bad, but because he was Asian.
Some people are racist because they just don't know the other side.
When he went to visit his girlfriend's family in the farm town of Walla Walla, Washington her uncle proudly told Lin about the town's past where cowboys would tie a "Chinaman" to the back of a horse and ride away.
"What it turned out to be was they didn't know how to talk to me," said Lin. "They went to the library to research. It wasn't to scare me. They were trying to reach out and communicate with me. I feel like we need to see the intention behind racism. That's what America needs."
For his second film, Lin is working with former Los Angeles Lakers star Rick Fox on a horror film called "Hysteria."
"I like films that evoke some kind of response from the audience," said Lin.
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