It turns out Spielberg had seen his Netflix special Jo Koy: Coming In Hot, and wanted to bring the actor’s story to the big screen. 

While the comic was naturally overjoyed, he was less enamoured of the filming process, as it took place at the height of the pandemic. “I couldn’t do a simple chemistry test with actors … I didn’t even know what my chemistry would be like until the day we met each other … and it sucked because the last day of shooting was when they lifted all the restrictions. It was the weirdest thing. We all looked at each other, like, ‘Really, the last day where half the cast already flew home?’”

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That’s not to say there weren’t opportunities to bond. “We all lived in the same hotel, so we had the whole floor to ourselves,” he says. “And so, there were rooms filled with all the actors, and we would celebrate, laugh, cry together and tell stories. It was hard, but it was amazing.”

Not all his projects have been as easy to get off the ground as Easter Sunday. There is a perception that his success has come easily, but Jo Koy is quick to dismiss that. People “don’t understand how hard it is to open the door,” he says. “I don’t want anyone to think I just walked in one day, and they were like, ‘Oh my God, we love it. Let’s give him a movie’. No, that’s not what happened.”

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Now with the world watching—and an unforgiving cancel culture—following his steady progress, it’s easy to reduce the actor’s work to mere projects, disregarding his effort to bridge racial gaps.

The comedian, who started doing stand-up in 1989 and had appeared on shows such as The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, The Late Late Show with James Corden, and Jimmy Kimmel Live, describes having to fight to have his 2017 special, Jo Koy: Live from Seattle, streamed on Netflix; it had been turned down multiple times for being “too specific”, forcing him to produce the show himself while taking care of his son, Joseph.

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He says, “I was talking about [being turned down] on the road, but I still wasn’t in a position where I could feel confident and not lose a relationship with Netflix. But after I shot my third special and I started hitting all these arenas, that’s when I was like, ‘All right, you guys, I got to tell the story.’”

While the comic was still working on his story about his relationship with Netflix while on tour in Malaysia, he shared the story without knowing someone from Netflix was in the audience. Instead of getting into hot water, he was shown support.

“He was in the audience and I had no idea he was there. He was just like, ‘It’s fine. You [have] to tell that story,’” shares the actor.

Jo Koy’s efforts paid off. As well as the movie, he has two more specials on Netflix; he has built a diverse fanbase; his social media inboxes are filled with love from people from Asia and around the globe, and October 7 was proclaimed Jo Koy Day in Los Angeles. But while it may be his name up in lights, he is adamant that the spotlight is shifted away from himself and onto his community, ensuring he does his part for representation, and ensuring people hear familiar stories and see performers who look like them.

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“My son was there when Netflix said no; I shot Live from Seattle; I had to pay for it. He knows what his dad went through, so he knows it was more than just about me,” says the comedian. “I have nurses in my family who have been working[in the US] for over 45 years. As you know, there are other Filipinos that are Americans. They go to the hospital; they get paychecks, help save lives, and take care of people who are injured, hurt or dying. And then they go home and watch a TV show about a hospital, and not one Filipino nurse is cast in that TV show … You say you’re tired of hearing [about representation] but imagine how tired they feel.”

He adds, “You’re not a visitor; you pay taxes, watch TV, and support. You live here; you’re part of the community; you’re an American. But for some reason, you’re invisible. So that’s what that day [Jo Koy Day] meant to me. It gets people talking, and it gets people to be proud.”

Jo Koy, who was born Joseph Herbert to a Filipina mother and white father, has always been an open book. His stand-up material has always been about his life experiences, and his performance style is akin to welcoming his viewers into one big Filipino family regardless of where they’re from. He also realises that his platform offers him the chance to be a vocal advocate for minorities.

He refers to one of the stories featured in his book, Mixed Plate: Chronicles of an All-American Combo about the racism he and his mother endured when he was a child. “We were going up the escalators, and this little kid pulled his eyes back, and all my mum could say was ‘It’s okay, Joseph, he’s just trying to be funny.’ Because she knows if she would’ve said something, the parents would have been like, ‘Shut up, don’t you talk to that kid like that,’ or ‘He’s a kid, he doesn’t know any better.’”

“I noticed when I was coming up that I was dealing with a completely different racism that’s happening now. At least now that my son has the internet, he has a community to go to for support … Whereas my mum didn’t have that community. I made that joke on my special where my mum walked up to people that looked Filipino or had the same skin colour as her just because she was trying to meet a Filipino. That’s really what she had to go through.” 

See also: How Are Overseas Asians Fighting Racism Through Food?

Through his comedy, Jo Koy also hopes to highlight the similarities between people, not just the differences.

“I want people to understand that a mum story is a mum story. It doesn’t matter that my mum’s Filipino. She’s a mum first,” he says. “In Hollywood, when you talk about your mum being other than white or black, they think it’s too specific. And it’s, well, dumb because it’s not clear. I’m just telling you my mum’s story. And if you’ve just listened to it, you’ll realise that we all have the same story. My mum’s not the only one who uses cool whip containers for Tupperware. Everyone does it.”

Family means everything to the actor, and he works hard to bring this together in any way he can. Long-time fans of the comic know of the healthy relationship he has with his son and even his former wife, Filipino American artist Angie King, who also goes by the name Nura Luca.

“My ex-wife lives right here. I got her a house right next to mine; we share the same driveway,” he says. “It [having a close relationship with family] is so important. It’s not hard to make something work, even with something as traumatic as divorce … You can still be great parents, and that’s what Angie and I have done. We did the complete opposite of what my parents did. I never want my son to feel the way I felt when I was a kid.”

And he is keen that his extended family benefits from his success, too. “I have a lot of family in Vegas. I have a house in Vegas, too—that’s where it all started. I take care of everybody in my family,” he says. “My nieces and nephews are my everything; that’s all I work for. Every summer, I take nothing but kids with me, and it’s one month of whatever they want. They don’t have to worry about a thing, and I do the same for Christmas.”

This year, Jo Koy plans not only to celebrate the holidays, but get back to his roots and knowledge of the place he can always call home.

“This year’s going to be special because we’re going to do Christmas together in Vegas, and the next day we’re getting on a plane, and I’m taking all of them to the Philippines,” he says. “We’re going to be there for a while. I can’t wait. The Philippines is everything to me.”

Originally published in Tatler Philippines December 2022 issue. Download a copy on your digital device via Pressreader.

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