Jean Yoon Speaks Out About 'Kim's Convenience's Final Season; Reveals Racist Storylines & Tension Behind The Scenes
Jean Yoon is revealing more of the behind-the-scenes drama of Kim’s Convenience.
The 59-year-old actress starred as Umma Kim in the popular CBC series, which also aired on Netflix.
Following Simu Liu‘s eye-opening post about how the show came crumbling down after the writer’s room was replaced with an all-white one, Jean also revealed her own negative experience.
Click inside to read it all…
Jean was responding to an article about co-star Simu‘s claims about what went on behind the scenes of show, and full heartedly agreed with her co-star.
“The lack of Asian female, especially Korean writers in the writers room of Kims made my life VERY DIFFICULT & the experience of working on the show painful,” she wrote in a reply.
Jean went on, saying that some of the storylines in the final season were “OVERTLY RACIST, and so extremely culturally inaccurate that the cast came together and expressed concerns collectively.”
She highlighted on “joke” that was ultimately cut from the show.
“Pastor Nina comes to the [store] to pick up Mrs. Kim for a Zumba class. Mrs. Kim is wearing NUDE shorts, and Pastor Nina is [too] embarrassed to tell her she looks naked from the waist down. Mr. Kim enters, and the joke is that if you’re married you can say anything…No one, esp. Mrs. Kim, would be unaware that a garment makes her look naked,” Jean wrote. “Unless she is suddenly cognitively impaired. Or STUPID. Stripping someone naked is the first act before public humiliation or rape. So what was so funny about that? At my request, [Ins] Choi cut [the] scene.”
She noted that particular scene” would have aired hours after 8 people, 6 Asian women, were shot in Atlanta, GA in a hate crime spree that shocked the nation. THIS IS WHY IT MATTERS. If an Asian actor says, ‘Hey this isn’t cool,’ then maybe should just fix it, and say THANK YOU.”
Jean also spoke out about Umma’s multiple sclerosis diagnosis, which is very rare in Koreans.
“I’m sick of holding this back — Koreans hardly ever get MS: 0.1/100,000 or one in a million,” she wrote, and implied that she did raise the issue and concern about it, but it was dismissed, claiming she “doesn’t understand comedy.”
See what else she wrote below:
Dear sir, as an Asian Canadian woman, a Korean-Canadian woman w more experience and knowledge of the world of my characters, the lack of Asian female, especially Korean writers in the writers room of Kims made my life VERY DIFFICULT & the experience of working on the show painful
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
The cast received drafts of all S5 scripts in advance of shooting BECAUSE of Covid, at which time we discovered storylines that were OVERTLY RACIST, and so extremely culturally inaccurate that the cast came together and expressed concerns collectively.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
No one, esp. Mrs. Kim, would be unaware that a garment makes her look naked. Unless she is suddenly cognitively impaired. or STUPID. Stripping someone naked is the first act before public humiliation or rape. So what was so funny about that? At my request, Mr. Choi cut he scene.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
And I'm sick of holding this back-Koreans hardly ever get MS: 0.1/100,000 or one in a million. You are 5x more likely to get a blood clot from the AZ vaccine than you are to get MS if you're Korean. The producers: "But why does it matter?"And "Jean doesn't understand comedy."
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
And hey, if I hadn't spoken up all the Korean food in the show would have been WRONG. Ins doesn't know how to cook or how things are cooked, no one else in the writers room were Korean, and THEY HAD NO KOREAN CULTURAL RESOURCES IN THE WRITERS ROOM AT ALL.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
But S3 & S4 in particular had many moments of dismissal & disrespect as an actor, where it mattered, with the writers. And the more successfully I advocated for my character, the more resistance and suspicion I earned from the Writers/Producers.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
In the final bedroom scene in S5, Mrs. Kim weeps because she believes that God has abandoned her. The more she prays for something, the more certain it will get worse. That's what it felt like. The love died. 사랑 없으면 소용이 없고 아무것 도 안입니다.
— Jean Yoon (윤 진 희 or 尹真姬) (@jean_yoon) June 6, 2021
Kim’s Convenience was cancelled after five seasons just a few months ago.