Charlieâs Angels star Chris Pang says a media publication mixing him up with Kimâs Convenience actor Simu Liu âtrivialises hard-won progressâ for Asian actors in the industry.
The Australian actor, whose parents are of Chinese and Taiwanese descent, said Asian representation in Hollywood has improved, however itâs scenarios like this that take away from that.
âThe exposure we are finally receiving is progress towards normalising the image of groups that we represent â and repeated mistakes like this, while unintentional, are still emblematic of the systemic disrespect we face,â Chris told HuffPost Australia on Friday. âIt trivialises hard won progress.â
Simu Liu, who is set to star in Marvelâs Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, called out CNET on Thursday for referencing him in an article about the new Charlieâs Angels film instead of Crazy Rich Asians actor Chris.
âHey @CNET, either you got the wrong Asian or Iâm misreading the sentence and youâre actually referring to @pangerz as MY Australian thug. If it is the latter... carry on,â he wrote on Twitter.
Chris had also replied to Simuâs Twitter thread, writing, â@SimuLiuâs misogynistic Australian thug here - sup? Whatâd I miss?â
Simu was referring to a Charlieâs Angels review published by the website, in which a paragraph described Kristen Stewartâs character, Sabina Wilson, and Chris Pangâs villainous character, Jonny Smith.
âFrom the outset, Stewartâs Sabina tackles the previous filmsâ baggage when it comes to women being exploited for their sexuality. Wearing a wavy blond wig and tight dress, she discusses female independence and how being underestimated is an advantage in the spy profession, before flipping Simu Liuâs misogynistic Australian thug onto his head,â it read.
The publication responded to Simuâs tweet and rectified the error, tweeting, âThanks for the catch! Our review has now been updated. (Also, we canât wait to see you in Shang-Chi)â.
Earlier this year People magazine was slammed for misidentifying several stars from Crazy Rich Asians.
The publication initially identified Ronny Chieng and his wife, Hannah Pham, as Randall Park and Jae W. Suh, both of whom were not in Crazy Rich Asians at all. People also mistook Tan Kheng Hua as Michelle Yeoh, who was not in the picture.
Meanwhile Chris recently opened up about his Charlieâs Angels character, saying it is far from the âAsian villainâ that Hollywood has portrayed in the past.
âFirstly I wasnât supposed to be Australian,â the 34-year-old told HuffPost Australia. âThe original role was for a 40-year-old Russian so they changed it up a fair bit once I came in.
âI was supposed to come in with maybe a bit of an Asian accent and speaking Chinese,â he said, explaining that after the production team âheard the Australian accent, they just loved it so much that we completely changed the character to be Australianâ.
âObviously Iâve done some action films, Iâve played a bad guy with an Asian accent before and so we wanted to change it up.â