Places We Need To Be

ART & CULTURE

Places We Need to Be

An interview with comedian, screenwriter, and author, Curtis Chin.

BY SEBASTIAN FORTINO PHOTOS COURTESY OF CURTIS CHIN

Last year Curtis Chin -- filmmaker, comedian, scholar, and TV writer among many other achievements -- published “All I Ever Learned, I Learned in a Chinese Restaurant.” The memoir focuses on his life growing up in his family’s restaurant in 1980s Detroit. Chin, who lives in LA with his husband, stated this isn’t necessarily a book about food.

“I was the one family member who didn’t know how to cook.”

Chin, a founding member of the Asian-American Writer’s Workshop in New York City, has been very busy since the memoir came out last October. By the end of 2023 he racked up over 60 appearances related to its publication.

Sebastian Fortino: What do you have coming up this year, what’re you looking forward to?

Curtis Chin: I’ve got a lot of touring in May, for Asian-American Heritage Month. In April there’s a ceremony happening in Michigan. My book just got selected as one of the notable books of Michigan.

SF: How often do you get back to Michigan? Is your family still there?

CC: My extended family is still there; my immediate family is all in the Bay Area. Because of the book I’ve been going back almost monthly for the last year. I’ve been getting a lot of invitations from colleges, libraries, and even organizations. My book has really been embraced by Michigan.

SF: Is there any one aspect of the book that grabbed the attention of readers?

CC: It’s different for so many people. It’s not only people in Michigan that embraced it. A lot of people [are] interested in food, too. Obviously, it’s a restaurant so I talk about food. But there’s this whole world called food studies. Not just examining food as a recipe, but food as it impacts culture. I didn’t know there was this whole eld of study.

Since then, I wrote a piece for Bon Appétit which got selected for best American food writing. There’s a TV show called America’s Test Kitchen. They hired me to produce a podcast about one of the dishes in my book.

This is one of the lessons I learned growing up. As a kid I wanted to be in the kitchen. Everybody seemed to have so much fun making food. You get to be so creative, right? But I was always sent to the dining room to set the table. I hated that growing up. So, I tried to be as good as I could as a waiter, as front of house, as I could. Sometimes we have these places we want to be but maybe there are other places we need to be.

SF: That’s a beautiful answer. You can be part of the food process without cooking.

CC: Serving food is so much a part of it, too, right? It’s about the meal, eating, you can be a great facilitator for that experience.

SF: You received your BA in Creative Writing. Was your decision to get into this major considered controversial for your family?

CC: There’s a whole story about that. When I was in college, Amy Tan’s “Joy Luck Club” had just come out. Mom got it in her head that her story was worthy of a novel too. She’d chase me around the restaurant, dropping all these stories from her childhood.

SF: On memoir writing: Some writers have been criticized for their memoirs not being 100% accurate.

CC: Memory is di cult, right? An hour from now we each could have different memories of this conversation. When writing a memoir, you try to be as truthful as possible. But there’s an asterisk to that.

SF: Do you think traditional Chinatown neighborhoods are endangered? Or do you think the vibrancy and need is still there?

CC: I hope they remain viable! Because immigrant communities are important to America. Oftentimes that’s where the immigrants will go. They bring energy, and new ideas to our country. To me, preserving these communities isn’t about being nostalgic. It’s about building America’s future. So, a Chinatown is a great place for immigrants to get assimilated. I would hope that they survive.

SF: As the novel takes place during a dark time in the city’s history, what was that like coming out to family in that era?

CC: I actually don't come out to my family in the book, just to a few friends and co-workers.

The book is centered on the 80s, during the AIDs crisis. Combined with all the murders and death I had seen in Detroit, it made for a very bleak future. Even though I was in Michigan, away from the AIDS epicenters on the East and West Coasts, it was still scary to be coming out at that age. There was a sense it was only a matter of time before it started decimating the communities in the heartland, as well.

SF: With your writing do any mentoring for young queer Asians? Or is it just you “being there,” as an out gay man of Chinese heritage that has an impact?

CC: When you write a book and put it out into the world you don’t know the impact it has. Now with touring, it’s interesting to me and it’s happened a few times, I would say its young Asians, some of them are queer. I get emails from gay readers saying, “Oh my God, I related so much to the book.” But, more importantly I get young Asians from working-class families facing a lot of the same struggles I did. You know, balancing working in a family business, having a social life, being your own person. Young Asian-Americans are sometimes the last person to come up to me, and talk to me, wanting to share they’re fighting with their parents. They’re just not happy with their lives, they might start crying, they’re just struggling. I try to be as compassionate as possible. I tell them to be compassionate to their parents. Because oftentimes we think we have struggles only we are going through, but you’d be amazed that maybe your parents are going through these same things or have gone through them.

SF: What else is going on this year? Are you doing a new memoir or follow-up or thinking about it?

CC: I’d love to! This spring I’ll be doing another 60 or 70 events. I’m already getting invitations for fall. In terms of non-publicity stu : I have a little freedom now. The writer’s guild strike did a ect me. I was in project development with one of the big entertainment companies. I’m working on a spec script, hoping to sell the book as a TV lm series.

If you haven’t yet read this wonderful memoir published by Hachette Book Group, or wish to keep up with Curtis Chin, head to CurtisFromDetroit.com for the latest updates

SEBASTIAN FORTINO has been a contributor to LGBTQ+ publications and online publications such as Philadelphia Gay News, ProudTimes. com, Metrosource. com, ProudQueer. com, SFGN.com (South Florida Gay New), Edgemedianetwork.com, and The Daily Buzz in New York City.