HBO’s ‘The A List’ celebrates Asian and Pacific Islander voices

DA: How did you approach curating the list of people featured in the film?
EY: We had a list of more than 500 people on it in the end. Then we also had lists of themes we wanted to focus on. What was fundamental was recognizing that every list is going to leave someone out—and then recognizing what past lists have left out. Because especially in an American context, when you talk about Asian people, a lot of times you’re not talking about people from India, Pakistan, or Bangladesh necessarily. If you’re talking about Pacific Islanders at all, sometimes it’s just lip service, and their stories aren’t fully embraced or presented in a way that captures the full complexity of that experience.

So we got a little—to use an annoying term—model minority about it and got very mathy. We were like, “Okay, East Asians get four, Southeast Asians get four, South Asians get four, Pacific Islanders get two, and then we’ll have a wildcard spot.” From there, it became a question of, “We want each region to have at least one person who’s extremely well known, but the unsung heroes are just as important—the people who are stars in their field or heroes in their community.” That’s the point we started from, knowing that by making a list, we will inevitably be making omissions and erasures of our own just by virtue of the act itself.

DA: Schuyler, what did it mean to you to be asked to participate in this film?
Schuyler Bailar: I am very honored to be a part of this. It’s been an interesting journey as an Asian American person. I am mixed race. I think my identity as an Asian American has always been a little bit contentious, and with my added identities as a queer person and as a trans person, there are a lot of overlapping layers.

At times, I’ve preemptively assumed that those identities might preclude me from fully participating in the Asian American community. And I’ve also experienced different kinds of pushback over the years. That’s not specific to Asian American communities, by the way—it’s just that people, in general, have a lot of opinions about different identities. I was very honored and very excited to be asked to be a part of this. Especially given my intersections, I think a lot about how multicultural and intersecting identities need to be platformed and shown to the world. Particularly within Asian American communities, it’s important to recognize just how diverse we are—we contain so many different identities.

DA: Eugene, what kind of approach did you take during the interviews to get to the core of each person’s story?
EY: We wanted to make sure it felt like a family conversation. That was really important. So often, we feel like we have to explain basic things about our identity in a way that isn’t for us. I give a lot of credit to Jada Yuan, our main interviewer, and to our whole crew. Because we had a primarily AA+PI crew, it created a sense of, “Okay, this is a space where we can really chop it up and get into some of these questions.”

Identity is always a slippery slope—we all have different degrees of intersectional identities—but we wanted to create a space where people could delve into that as much as they wanted.

DA: Schuyler, how was the process for you being interviewed?
SB: It’s probably one of the most memorable interview-type shoots I’ve done. First of all, if I remember correctly, it was in a pretty old home, and there was just something really interesting about the space itself. They also had this really old Deardorff camera that they were using for headshots, which I found fascinating—it was this massive camera that basically took up half the room.

I also remember that many of the people on set were Asian American, and it’s pretty unique to be in a space where I’m being filmed and everyone shares that identity with me. That felt really special.

I don’t remember exactly how long the interview was, but I do remember really enjoying it. I felt like we got to talk about a lot of different aspects of my identity. I think you’ll see—or maybe you’ve already seen in the film—that we talked quite a bit about my Korean family and my Asian American identity, and how that intersects with my trans identity. That’s something that’s really important to me.

DA: Schuyler, in the documentary you share the moving story of how your grandparents came to support you in your trans identity. How was the support from your parents?
SB: My parents have always been very supportive of me as a person. I think they struggled with my transition early on, but they got on board fairly quickly. By the time I was ready to tell my grandparents, they were very supportive.

I think what was hard for them was the change—and that’s true for a lot of people. In the beginning, they weren’t sure what the best way to support me was. And to their credit, and to the credit of everyone who was trying to support me at the time, I had just come out of a treatment center for an eating disorder. I was really struggling with my mental health, but I was also very certain about my identity. I knew this was what I needed—that I needed to pursue my transition, and to do it as soon as possible.

For people around me, there was some nervousness. It was like, you’ve just healed from—or are still healing from—this mental health issue. Do you really want to jump straight into something else? But for me, the two were connected. Pursuing my transition was part of my healing. It was about finding myself and expressing who I am.

The point is, my parents’ struggle wasn’t about whether to support me—it was about how to support me. And I think, overall, they did a really great job of listening to me. It also helped that I was 18, so ultimately my decisions were my own. I could say, “This is what I’m going to do,” regardless—but I never really had to push it that far because they were there for me.

DA: Schuyler, the tattoo story you share was also very meaningful. How supportive was your family to get the tattoo with the words from your grandmother?
SB: I was actually really surprised by how supportive everyone was. I wouldn’t necessarily call my family pro tattoo, but I also wouldn’t say they’re anti tattoo either. That specific tattoo, though, was very well supported. I think everyone understood that it had a deep meaning behind it. 

It’s funny, I asked my grandmother recently, “I think I’m going to get another tattoo,” and she said, “No, the one you have is enough.” And I was like, “I have five, but if you think I have one, that’s fine.”

I actually came up with the idea over a single weekend and got it done that same weekend, so it was a very quick turnaround. What I didn’t realize until later, though, was that there was this whole backstory behind it. My grandmother had written the sentence out, then sent it to my uncle to make sure it was perfectly scripted. He edited it, and then that version was sent to me so I could use it for the tattoo. From my perspective, I had just asked, “Hey, can you write this sentence for me?” and a few hours later I got the photo. But really, it turned out to be this full family effort.

DA: Eugene, were there any stories from the participants that really surprised you?
EY: One moment that stood out to me was talking with Sandra Oh. She’s always been very open to working with community media. I used to write for a magazine called KoreAm Journal back in the day, and while I didn’t interview her myself, I remember her being featured there early in her career. What was really interesting in our conversation was hearing her reflect on what’s changed from when she first started to now. She pointed out her glam squad—she has an all-AA+PI glam squad—and said that would never have happened earlier in her career.