Gang of Five or the old, short and not as good looking as Daniel Wu guys...

South China Morning Post

Saturday, July 25, 2009

A troupe of foreign-born Chinese are hoping to carve a niche in Asia with their mixture of madcap antics and creative chaos, writes Sara Yin

Actors for hire. Willing to strip in public. The offer is among a gamut from CB Fresh, a collective formed by five thirtysomething American-born Chinese trying to clown their way into a career as a production outfit in Asia. And companies are taking them up on it.

Last year, lifestyle store G.O.D. hired the group to appear in a viral advertisement now posted on YouTube as "CB Fresh underwear". The clip features Rob Lok running through Causeway Bay in his underpants, with his hands tied behind his back and Simon Yin and Vince Chung Yuk-mun in hot pursuit.

Lok, Yin and Chung make up the public faces of CB Fresh (CB stands for China Boy) while Derrick Fong Chi-kin and Tsang Chung-chiu work mostly behind the scenes.

They sing, dance, produce and are apparently ready take on any project that might require the perspectives of five North American Chinese who describe their style as a mixture of Saturday Night Live, Jackass and Looney Tunes.

Fong is a Canadian photographer and visual effects artist, and Tsang a business analyst from New York whose passion is more for film than finance. Yin, who doubles as director and actor, also started in business. He worked in banking in Atlanta, but ventured into improvisational comedy and did a stint as VJ for MTV Chi, a now-defunct channel targeting Asian Americans. Lok, a former circus clown from New York, does most of the physical comedy and, says Yin, could be "thrown down a stairwell and still survive".

Chung, a Canadian, is perhaps best known as the winner of last year's Amazing Race Asia. He came to Hong Kong as a teacher six years ago, but has turned stand-up comedian and MC.

"We all came to Hong Kong for professional opportunities in our own fields, which were lacking for us in the States or Canada," says Lok. "Yes, there are roles for Asian American actors, but very few and they're token Asian Americans. All of us have read for the Gangster No 2 and Takeout boy No 3 roles ... here we can do more of what we want."

Meeting at arts showcase Speak Up! last year, the five decided what they wanted to do was sketch comedy - in particular skits about Hong Kong life from the perspective of recent Chinese American arrivals. They quickly shot a pilot tape for regional programmers, but the response was poor.

It had been done before, they were told. Undeterred, the group focused on having fun creating content and posted their efforts on their website and on sites such as YouTube, and Vimeo. Their goofy clips - going around the city measuring girls' trucker caps as a comment on local fads, or, in a take on beauty regimens, Lok using durian picked up at a Wan Chai street market as a face mask - were largely ignored.

But the collective scored a timely hit with a send-up of the financial meltdown based on the Street Fighter computer game - think Fannie Mae as Chun Li, and R.O.I. (return on investment) as Ryu.

Dubbed Wall Street Fighter 4, the parody "blew us out of the park", Yin says. It became one of the 20 most viewed videos on YouTube and generated enough buzz to catch some international media attention. It also caught the eye of Bill McQueen, creative director of on-air promotions at Fox International Channel Asia, who cast the CB Fresh's three frontmen in a series of commercials for the channel.

At their first meeting, the trio "proved as enthusiastic in real life as they are in their performances", McQueen recalls. "The fact that we had three spots to shoot and that there were three of them made it a perfect match. Plus Simon looks great in a butcher's outfit."

Last month, the group added another notch to their belt by winning the music video award for their entry in the I Shot Hong Kong short film festival.

With trophy in hand and a few viral hits, Yin jokes, "We've built a proven track record that shows we can produce strong stuff on a dime, maybe even a nickel".

In recent months CB Fresh have been kept busy with several projects, including a feature film being marketed at the Comi-con convention in San Diego. They're also working on an animated series about their lives commissioned by an LA-based entertainment company and serving as brand ambassadors for Shanghai White vodka.

"We're not at a point where we have to drop things, but I think we will be soon," Tsang says.

"We're trying to ride the wave and see how far it takes us," Yin says. "It's been an amazing experience and we want to do it on a bigger scale. The point is to do what we like, and we'll see where that leads us. If it's just Hong Kong, great, if it's Asia, great, if it's the world, great."

But how long will their enthusiasm last before they face the disillusionment that many Asian Americans encounter after they come to Asia for entertainment careers, thinking their American backgrounds count?

Patrick Lee Pak-ngok, CEO of artists network AliveNotDead.com, says the collective may be hampered by looks and age.

"[Good] looks are incredibly important. So is height," he says. "Age-wise, I'd say that unless you are extremely talented and speak the language fluently, you should move out by the time you're 17 to 22 for girls and 20 to 25 for guys.

"CB Fresh is an interesting case, though," he says. "None of them have [actor] Daniel Wu Yin-cho's looks, but they aren't trying to be film actors. Basically, they make really creative stuff cheap and fast, so there's value in that. Anyone looking for anything interesting or funny will go to the CB Fresh guys. There's no one else in Hong Kong like that right now."

A recent viral video for Sharkwave.com, for instance, was conceived, written, cast, shot and edited in two days.

Artist manager and advertising executive Tedman Lee Pui-ming says the crew have yet to achieve the kind of recognition that resonates with ordinary Hongkongers.

"But it could be worth getting these guys to do short skits or online promos because they're aggressively trying to appeal to the youth," he says.

Language will be CB Fresh's biggest barrier, he says. "ABCs won't make it here unless they study the culture and relate their views somehow. Hong Kong people have extremely short attention spans. If they don't understand a joke right away, they turn off. But at the same time, they constantly want to see something new, which CB Fresh seems to offer."

TV opportunities for Asian American acts are hard to come by, and talks with Star TV fell through.

A local television programmer says they would have a better chance in Singapore. "That's totally English-speaking territory. In Greater China, the guys will need fluency [in Putonghua]," he says. "It's very hard to be successful here unless you're really good looking or you do crazy things."

But they may yet surprise us.

"We've been brand-building from day one," Fong says. "A year is not that long, but we've built a lot of momentum."