Child star from ‘Indiana Jones’ resurfaces: “I kept waiting for the phone to ring” | showbiz

As Indiana Jones’ adorable sidekick, Short Round, Ke Huy Quan captured all hearts in 1984. However, the boy, barely 13 when the film came out, had no real ambition to make it in the film world. Quan had fled the Vietnam War with his family a few years earlier. His brother wanted to audition for the new Indiana Jones movie, and Quan went along to support him. But a casting director overheard him rehearsing the script with his brother, and asked the boy not to audition himself. And the rest is history. “Even in my wildest dreams I never thought I would become an actor,” Quan admitted in an interview with People. “But I fell in love with it. That movie changed my life – and that of my family.”

For that first role, Quan was immediately allowed to work with big names such as Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford. “They were so kind, humble and humble,” he recalls. “Just very nice people, who treated each other kindly. I have such fond memories of my time on set. We spent three weeks in Sri Lanka. Lazing by the pool. Harrison even taught me to swim.” According to the actor, he had no idea at the time how famous they were. “When I did ‘Indiana Jones’ I had never seen a Spielberg or George Lucas movie. I didn’t even know who they were. I remember we were filming in London one afternoon. George Lucas was there as a producer, Steven as a director, and then there was Harrison Ford. And then brought Carrie Fisher – Princess Leia! – pay us a visit. I had a great afternoon without knowing what all those people meant to the world.”

After ‘Indiana Jones’ followed a leading role in cult film ‘The Goonies’. “That’s why I thought I would have a great career,” Quan said. But after that, the actor could only land a few small roles, and the offers dried up quickly. What also didn’t help was that there were very few roles for Asian actors back then. “It was really difficult,” Quan admits. “I kept waiting for the phone to ring, but it rarely happened.” In the end, he made the “very difficult” decision to quit acting. “In Hollywood, very few child actors make a successful transition into adult acting. That is already very difficult for a lot of child stars, but I think it is a hundred or a thousand times more difficult when you are an Asian actor.” He attended film school and went behind the scenes as an assistant director and stunt coordinator.

But when he watched ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ in 2018, something started to itch again. “I was happy with my work behind the camera, but I did have serious FOMO (fear of missing out, ed.)”, Quan laughs. “I wanted to be there too, along with those other Asian actors.” And so he auditioned for “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” in which he stars alongside Michelle Yeoh, playing three different versions of the same character. “When I read the screenplay, I thought it was written for me. Because they are me. I understood them all. I don’t think I could have played Waymond ten or fifteen years ago. Now I have been able to draw from my life, from all the highs and lows.”

Still, it was not easy to get back on set, Quan admits. “In the first scene I have to play, I was in a booth with Jamie Lee Curtis in front of me, Michelle Yeoh behind me and James Hong on the left. I had a panic attack. I thought, ‘What the hell am I doing here? I haven’t done this in so long, and these people have been doing this constantly, for decades.” After that first shot, I felt very nervous and insecure. But we just kept filming. And then came a shot that I did all by myself. Jamie Lee Curtis stood by the monitors and then came over to me. “Ke, that was fucking awesome,” she said. She gave me a long hug, and that was what I needed. The next day I confidently walked onto the set and that’s how I finished the film.”

“For years, people only recognized me as a child actor because that was about the last time they saw me on the silver screen. I hope when people see me now, they’ll say, ‘Oh, you’re Waymond from ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’, and you were also in ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘Goonies’!” he said. Speaking of which, Jeff Cohen, who starred in ‘The Goonies’ alongside Quan, is now Quan’s attorney. “We will remain friends for life”, it sounds delighted. “He’s my ‘Goonies’ brother.”

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