Wong Fu Spring Tour at Columbia University

Last night, I went to a Wong Fu Productions presentation at Columbia University, where the company shared stories of how they got started in the film-making industry, showed recently completed new videos, and answered some Q&A from the sold out audience. I’ve been a huge fan of Wong Fu since my college days, and was excited to finally meet them in person!
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A little background on the company: Phil, Wes, and Ted are the guys behind Wong Fu Productions, and they met during a film class in UC San Diego. They decided to turn their hobby into a long-term career, choosing to start an independent film productions company after graduation. Highly prolific and diverse, the trio now creates music videos for up and coming new artists, collaborates with YouTube personalities on entertaining webisodes, and produces their own written feature films – all this, and they also design and sell graphic tshirts and Awkward Animals stuffed animals! They have an ever broadening fan base (particularly with young Asian Americans who identify with the characters portrayed in their videos), and have garnered recognition from the likes of CNN and the Cannes International Film Festival.

Their video content range from the funny and quirky to sentimental and touching. It just shows how versatile they can be, making videos on funny topics like “What’s it really like to brush your teeth with a bottle of Jack?” (a la Ke$ha) as well as touching storylines about friendship, relationships, and home.

Below are links to some of my favorite Wong Fu videos. These give just a flavor of the variety of videos these guys create.

- “A Peace of Home”
- “Dance like Michael Jackson” by Far East Movement and "Drift Away" by Magnetic North music videos
- And the one that started it all “Yellow Fever”

Much more than just random videos to pass the time online, Wong Fu videos are inspirational, not only due to their content but because of the drive and motivation of the people behind them. Demonstrating that Asian Americans can supercede and break past the stereotypes stuck onto us (kungfu-fighting, socially inept math nerds), Wong Fu encourages others to veer off traditional career paths and strive for something more creative. The routes to these occupations may be rockier, but ultimately will be more fulfilling than taking on a job just to please your parents or because it’s what everyone else is going into.

I have a lot of admiration for Asian Americans in the creative industry – whether it’s following your life dream of being a singer, dancer, artist, actor, media mogul, etc. As someone who’s still struggling to find my “calling" in life, it’s exciting to know that there are more ways to make a living than the customary paths we learn about through school and growing up. We don't have to be stuck if we don't choose to.

I’ll leave you with some pictures of the event. We were in the front row, about 6 feet away from the table!

Wes, Phil, Ted. Oops, Ted is blinking!