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KATE RIGG - July, 2003
GUY MACPHERSON: So, you're from Toronto. Let's get the
facts.
KATE RIGG: The stats. Yeah, I'm from Toronto.
GM: And I know you went to Julliard. Is that a school
of music?
KR: No, Julliard is like, remember the movie 'Fame'?
GM: Yes, I do.
KR: That's Julliard.
GM: There is a Julliard School of Music, though, isn't
there?
KR: There is. But there's a music division, a dance
division, they have a really good opera division, and
a pretty famous acting division. And I was in the
acting division.
GM: And when was that?
KR: That was in 1993.
GM: So you're an actor.
KR: I am.
GM: Or an actress.
KR: When they let me, I am.
GM: So you were on set today?
KR: I was doing a PBS thing called 'Race is the
Place'.
GM: What is that?
KR: They're doing a special with, um... It's sort of
related to my comedy. I have a lot of crossover with a
lot of what I do. It's not one thing, do you know what
I mean? It's funny, but it's political, you know. It's
a poem, but it's funny. It's hip-hop, but it's a
comedy. We used to call 'Birth of a nAsian', which is
a show that I'm bringing out to you guys, 'hip-hop
comedy' because it's straight-up character comedy,
like a Whoopi Goldberg show or a Lily Tomlin show,
right, but also have this very urban beat kinda thing
going on as well, which is a part of being in New York
and a part of being a minority performer. And a lot of
other minority performers, at least in this city and
other cities, have chosen rap, spoken word, hip hop,
as a really quick way of getting a message out. So I'm
combining those two forms in the show but with a sort
of Asian slant. Heh-heh, get it? And my partner, the
person on stage with me, is a funky violin player who
I met when I was at Julliard. She was in the
traditional violin program there doing her Masters
there. When she graduated, she's been doing projects
with, like, Bono, Bryan Adams, the Absolute Ensemble,
some new composers as well as the classical stuff. So
it was a good fit. We're both classically-trained, but
we both have an ear for what's happening right now.
GM: Is she doing hip hop on her violin?
KR: It's trip-hop violin. She has an electronic violin
that's plugged into a bunch of pedals and samples and
stuff so she creates like a really big wall of sound.
It's sort of like Laurie Anderson but more hip hop
than Laurie Anderson. It's less ambient and more like
the beats. And because it's 'Birth of a nAsian', she's
parodying things from 'Miss Saigon' and things like
that.
GM: Her parents must be so proud.
KR: Her parents are dead. (laughs) Anyways...
GM: Oh, geez.
KR: Nice one, eh? (laughs)
GM: Well, so are mine.
KR: Nice going! No, her parents are dead, but you know
they are proud because she's sort of taking [mimics a
classical exercise] into something that's relevant and
something contemporary. Her dad used to go to all the
rock concerts. We talk about it in the play how she
was this good Asian daugher; now she's like tattoo
woman with samples and pedals and stuff. But I think a
good artist now is able to mix old and new, and for us
east and west. So that's what we're about.
GM: You're not co-opting the black culture here?
KR: Oh God, no.
GM: I don't know. I thought that sounded smart.
Because hip hop isn't [just black], is it?
KR: Hell, no!
GM: But a lot of people think that.
KR: The strict definition of hip hop, if you look up
the pundits of hip hop, what they always talk about is
voices from the street. Now, what the hell does that
mean? It means voices of the people who don't feel
like they have a voice in mainstream media, speaking
of their experience in a mainstream way. It's people
sort of asserting their way to be part of pop culture
and part of, you know, contemporary culture in an
aggressive way. And they have kind of a reactionary
voice at the moment it's been marginalized. So it is
hip hop. It's just Asian hip hop.
GM: How old is this show, 'Birth of a nAsian'?
KR: In its present form, it's a year old. But we've
been workshopping it and stuff, you know. Taking it to
colleges and seeing what the college students think of
it. And when we don't do the play, sometimes we tour
as 'Slanty-Eyed Mama' and we just do the spoken word
trip-hop. We went to Australia recently and went to
really tiny little towns and did this really Asian
stuff, like radical political stuff. It was great. And
actually, I did comedy there, too.
GM: I don't understand. When you're 'Slanty-Eyed
Mama', you're just doing the music?
KR: That's the name, like, if I were to have a band,
it's 'Slanty-Eyed Mama'. But the play is 'Birth of a
nAsian'.
GM: And the play is various characters. Is it one plot
running through it all? Or is it separate sketches?
KR: It's like a Whoopi Goldberg show or a John
Leguizamo show. What they do is they do a bunch of
different characters, and of course the theme here is
defining what is Asian-ness. And there are some
surprising characters in there because I do, like, an
old Trinidadian Creole woman, you know what I mean?
But who's got some Asian in her. I love Whoopi
Goldberg's show, like, her first show that went on
Broadway. And part of what's so rad about that is she
was like a Valley Girl, she was a Jamaican woman, she
was someone from the hood. She was all these different
things where you'd be like, 'Hey, a black person's not
supposed to sound like, "Oh, my gawd, how are you?"'
Right? She would just do it. And she's a stupid
character and it was so radical just because that a
message, you know what I mean? So there's still shades
of that in 'Birth of a nAsian'. There are some
surprising characters, like 'Tina Latina'.
GM: Hey, that's not Asian!
KR: She's part everything, including Asian. In
'Chink-o-rama', which is a whole different show, I
have a Can-Asian.
GM: A what?
KR: A Canadian character, because it's me playing it,
right? People love it because they're always waiting
for Asian people to be playing martial artists or
masseuses or whatever, and then you have some garage
sale lady going, 'Holy fuckin' geez, eh?' I thought,
'Why can't an Asian person sound like that?' Why not?
GM: And you do.
KR: And I do!
GM: But a lot of the characters are the stereotypes
that you're trying to fight, aren't they?
KR: Well, in this play, actually, it's more like we're
addressing the inner life of a North American Asian
person as opposed to fighting stereotypes. It's more
like these surprising mongrel characters. Because I'm
bi-racial; I'm half-Asian, half-white. I'm a rice
cracker. And so a lot these characters are mixed race.
You don't know what race they are exactly. And the
'Tina Latina', for instance, is talking about an
unemployment office. She's going, like, 'I have to
tick all these boxes, like African-American: Yes.
Latina: Yes. Asian: Yes. Native American: Yes.' And
then she gets to Caucasian, she goes, 'Why can't I
tick that one, too? I'm part white.' Somehow when you
say you're all these other things, you're not allowed
to say you're white, too. I mean, what the fuck is up
with that? And so it becomes this whole diatribe on
that. There's a token Asian newscaster with a
non-ethnic-sounding name who has kind of like a
mini-breakdown. The funny is in the surprising. The
reactions that I get from the audience, Asians, is...
check out these freaky-assed characters from this very
multi-cultural world. You know, we hear about them, we
sort of know they're out there, but there's nothing on
TV unless it's sort of a smack you over the head
karate guy, you know what I mean?
GM: There's Connie Chung!
KR: Is Connie Chung mixed race?
GM: Oh, I see.
KR: People who are between the margins, people who are
sort of in between people. Connie Chung is an
interesting one because she's had to fight so hard
just to be an American journalist and to not be a
Chinese-American journalist. Who gives a crap that
she's Chinese because she's talking about the news.
You know what I'm saying?
GM; Kind of. But I just think of her as a journalist,
though.
KR: That's because you're Canadian, as well.
GM: Oh, is it? Ah!
KR: The multi-cultural mosaic is a different model
than the melting pot, for sure. But the reason 'Birth
of a nAsian' works so well in Canada -- we actually
workshopped it in Canada at Buddy's and Bad Times in
Toronto -- and what's so cool is that it's got the
classic, fun sketch comedy aspect of it, which are the
characters, telling jokes -- and I'm pretty edgy. Not
dirty, but edgy and challenging. There's no hack jokes
about, 'The difference between men and women are that
women like to shop and guys like to watch TV. Ha, ha,
ha!' It's none of that. It's sort of purposely
slamming pop culture and taking a whole new take on
what it is to be an ethnic person. ... There's the
World Trade Center lady. You get this woman who is
working selling souvenirs in front of the World Trade
Center and ends up telling her whole story. She's like
a street hawker selling World Trade Center t-shirts.
GM: How does that play in New York?
KR: Great! It plays great because everybody sees them
all the time. And also in New York City, Asian people
sell batteries on the subway for a dollar. They walk
up and down the aisles with, like, Hello Kitty
keychains, little keys that make noise, little
flashlights and stuff, and batteries. So they walk up
and down, like, 'One dolla, one dolla, one dolla' and
nobody really pays attention or looks at them. And
then there's the ones at the World Trade Center
selling ... I come out on stage and I've got the World
Trade Center t-shirt on and all my stuff, and I'm
like, 'Ground Zero t-shirts, small, medium, large,
extra-large. Ten dollas. For you, special price, eight
dollas.' And I go, um, 'Hey, Twin Tower salt 'n'
pepper shaker, hey, Ground Zero ashtray, get it right
here. Hey, America lost its citizens, and you can buy
a t-shirt!' And then I start telling a story about
this white lady coming up to me and asking me where
Ground Zero was, like it's some big tourist
attraction. And we go into the whole commercialization
of this terrible tragedy and then it goes into her
story about how she ended up here selling these things
in the first place, selling her soul to sell these
things. And it gets kinda dark, but it's hilarious,
too, because it's stuff people don't want to talk
about.
GM: Would it be fair to say you're a message comic?
KR: No.
GM: No?
KR: Well...
GM: I mean, there is a message.
KR: I'm a message artist; I'm a funny comic. We've
been talking politics, and that's all very well, but I
chose comedy as my medium, and I'm committed to it.
I've spent a lot of time in the clubs. I started all
these projects in comedy clubs because ... 'Birth of a
nAsian' is funny because it fits in the place between
comedy and smart people theatre. It's right in
between. And the way the smart people theatre is
delivered, though, is in this hip hop way with a
soundtrack and beats. So it's not just like sort of a
preachy kinda thing. It's not the right vehicle to
talk about these things, I don't think. Because like I
said, hip hop is minorities and marginalized people
who have something to say who aren't traditionally
heard in mainstream media speaking loud and speaking
strong and speaking with a different heartbeat than
what's normally out there. So it's a really cool way
of performing this stuff. We love it. And so combining
with regular, traditional comedy with Gilda Radner
type of comedy... Like, the first sketch is really
Gilda Radnery, kind of. I come out in a helmet and
crazy wedding dress and combat boots. It's pretty
insane. And to also have the sort of urban poet doing
the transitions, it's cool. It's a really cool
experience.
GM: In this balance between message and comedy, is it
an equal balance, or do you weigh it more to it's
gotta be funny first.
KR: If you're doing comedy, yeah. (laughs) If you're
doing a play, no. It's funny, but it's
funny-surprising, it's funny-challenging, it's
funny-scary, it's funny-dark, it's funny like it makes
you question your own values, it's funny-interesting,
it's funny-bizarre. It's not, like, funny-and now I
just forgot everything you just said because I've
heard the same joke a million times. It's not like
funny-boring. It's not like funny-recognition stuff.
It's observational comedy, but from the point of view,
perhaps, of someone who doesn't traditionally get to
make observations about the world.
GM: When you went to Julliard, did you have an inkling
that you might do comedy one day?
KR: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. When I was in Toronto, I
used to do Whoopi Goldberg sketches. I cut my teeth
on... At the time when I was reading, like in high
school and stuff, there wasn't a whole lot of this
kind of stuff available that spoke to me specifically,
so I was reading a lot of black comic stuff, I was
reading stuff about, just the voice of the people,
like George Wolf [?] or, like I said before, Whoopi
Goldberg, Lenny Bruce. Even Eddie Murphy kind of stuff
on Saturday Night Live. I was looking at that stuff
that talked about race and sort of trying to relate to
it as best I could as a half-Asian, half-white
Canadian. And so when I started writing my own
monologues, I was actually in Australia when I did my
undergrad and that's when I started to write in that
style.
GM: When did you move to Australia?
KR: When I was 17 I moved to Australia.
GM: Are there any white comics that you admire?
KR: Oh, hell yeah. Tracey Ullman, Lily Tomlin, Gilda
Radner, I like Danny Hopps' work, although he's a
little more serious.
GM: I don't know him.
KR: He's like a white guy that talks like a black guy.
He's in the PBS special. He does characters. When I
was in Toronto, at a lot of comedy festivals, there's
a lot of comics, like Shawna Sperling and people like
that doing characters, which I just love. Because it's
not as big a passion in America. Standup is king here.
Character comics are not king. People do it, but it's
sort of like an afterthought. Whereas in Canada,
there's no shortage.
GM: What do you think of stereotypes?
KR: What do I think of stereotypes?
GM: Yeah, because obviously stereotypes are evil, but
...
KR: I think they're based on truth. I think that the
problem with stereotypes is that when people don't
look any further they tend to dehumanize the person
who's the object of their stereotype. But stereotypes
are also great comic fodder because we can all
recognize a stereotype and if you have a sense of
humour about them, they can become super jokes, really
good jokes. Great comics like Chris Rock take great
pleasure in doing, like, watermelon commercials and
shit, right, because it's fucking funny when you show
the absurdity of stereotypes. It makes everybody feel
smarter, it makes everybody feel better, and it makes
the world better because you're not running away from
them or ignoring them or pretending they don't exist.
You're smacking them around in the comedy boxing ring
a little bit. And everybody's made better by it: the
comic's made better, the audience is made better, and
the world is a little better.
GM: You're half Indonesian and you have the
'Chink-o-rama'.
KR: The actual title of it is 'Kate's Chink-o-rama
Featuring the Chink-o-rama Dancers'.
GM: Is any Asian a chink?
KR: You wanna talk about that? I could talk about
that. Chink is a nonsense word because I've been
called a chink, I know Japanese people have been
called a chink, I know Thai people have been called
chinks. Almost any Asian heritage in major urban
centres have been or have known people who have been
called chinks. Only a percentage of those people were
actually related to Chinese people. And I'm assuming
that 'chink' is a diminutive for Chinese. I'm making
that assumption because I didn't coin that term. My
theory is, there's two ways to deal with racist
language. One, you can be of the school of thought
that says any time you use it, you're keeping it in
the culture and therefore bringing us all down. Or
two, my school of thought, that it is in the culture
and 'chink' takes its meaning because of what I just
said. There is no real meaning for the word 'chink'
other than that which is assigned by the user, you
know what I mean? Like, I become a chink if someone
calls me a chink. Otherwise, how can a chink be a
Japanese person? Chink takes its meaning from the
intent of the user. They're giving it its meaning.
It's based on the assumption that all Asian people are
the same and look the same, which is racist, and
that's where it gets its meaning from. So I, as a
conscious person and a thinking person, feel that,
such as gay people co-opting the word 'fag' or black
people co-opting the word 'nigger', re-possessing it
and throwing it back, in a way, by using it within the
community, you can change the meaning of a word,
especially when it's a racist word. You can't change
the history of the word but you can re-package it and
you can deconstruct it and you can expose it in all
its ridiculousness. You can take this word and say it
so many times it becomes a nonsense word. You can show
how absurd it is. When I did 'Chink-o-rama', that show
is about stereotypes of Asian people in the media.
That show is about Charlie Chan, Susie Wong, Asian
hookers, chefs, martial artists, we sort of touch on
all those things. The reason it's called
'Chink-o-rama', is going, "Is this a chink? Is this a
chink? Is this Japanese girl dancing on stage with me
a chink? Is this Korean guy next to me a chink? Am I a
chink?" It makes you ask it over and over again. By
doing that, it takes the hush-hush power away from the
word. I think that not saying it allows it to fester
in the minds of the bigots who want to use it
incorrectly -- or if there's a correct way to use it.
GM: I don't think there's a correct way to use it!
(laughs)
KR: It takes the power away from people who use it to
hurt because you're saying that this word a) is a
bullshit word, b) I'm going to say it a lot so how are
you going to hurt me? It's sort of that we reclaim it;
you can't have it.
GM: But if somebody called you that on the street
right now, it would still hurt even though you've
reclaimed it.
KR: It would hurt, because of the intent of the user.
But just like if you said 'you fucking faggot' to some
gay guy, that would hurt because someone's throwing a
hate at you. Is the word the thing that hurts? No.
It's their homophobia and hatred of the person; it's
the racism of the person. That's basically my point,
is that the word is just a bunch of letters on a piece
of paper. The word is a sound that you make with your
mouth. The hurtful thing is the assumption that all
Asian people are the same or the assumption that all
bullshit images of Asians that we see in mass media
are true. So we debunk them all.
GM: I've been called a fag, and I'm not a homosexual.
So does that make me a fag? Or a homosexual?
KR: It means that someone's trying to put you down.
You can take that however you want. Does it make you a
homo? No.
GM; What did you think of the brouhaha a year or so
ago with Sarah Silverman and Guy Aoki.
KR: That's what it was, it was a brouhaha. I think
that, first of all, the context of that joke, what she
was saying, "I want to write something really racist
on my piece of paper, so I'm gonna write 'I hate
chinks.'" I don't see what the problem is, you know
what I mean? She said, "I want to write something
really racist on my paper!" But you see, Guy, who has
never been able to speak out in media about
Asian-American issues, took this as his moment to
speak about that word and its hurtful history and the
way Asian-Americans are sort of neglected and
mistreated. And even though I think that basically he
was violating her right as a comic to tell a joke that
was actually politically correct, I'm glad it happened
because what did it do? It made NBC and all the other
networks sit up and start actively recruiting and
looking for Asian-American talent because they were
basically pointed to and said "hey, what's going on?
There's a huge population of these people watching
your shows and how come none of them are being
represented on TV?" Entertainment's like casting a
vote. You put your money in there and you want some of
the products to reflect your experience.
GM: But are there as many Asian comics as Jewish
comics or black comics?
KR: Well, not yet, but here it comes. Is it because
there aren't any or is it because they won't let them
have a fucking job? I think it's both.
GM: I saw that Fox was going to have their Charlie
Chan festival of movies...
KR: Are they really?!
GM: No, it was taken off because I guess an Asian
watchdog group said no, you can't have that.
KR: That's hilarious! Well, I mean, I don't know. Are
we going to deny that he existed? No. I mean, do they
have festivals of Al Jolson things? They do, probably,
right? So go for it.
GM: What would somebody like Guy Aoki say about your
show?
KR: Oh, he likes it.
GM: Oh, he's seen it.
KR: Oh, yeah.
GM: And the other shows, like 'Chink-o-rama'?
KR: That's what I'm talking about. He hasn't seen
'Birth of a nAsian' because it's too new. I mean,
literally, we performed it in New York once in
November, once just recently, and this will be our
first official outing with the show, ready to rock.
But he saw 'Chink-o-rama', which in a way is much more
incendiary because of the title, right? They were
digging it. His group, MANAA, they gave it the big
thumbs up. Because really, we're talking about
debunking Asian stereotypes. What's wrong with that?
And I don't mind it when people go, 'I'm so offended'.
I actually don't mind it because what it's doing is
starting dialogue about that notion and about that
idea, even if they're using me as a whipping girl.
That's all right. Who gives a crap? (laughs)
GM: Do you ever foresee doing comedy bits not about
race?
KR: Oh, I do do comedy not about race. I talk about my
pussy all the time on stage.
GM: Excellent. We didn't talk about that.
KR: We didn't talk about pussy. I don't talk about it
in the show so much. When I package the shows, I'm
trying to do things that are interesting, cohesive,
and that people will say, 'Hey, that's something that
I haven't seen and I want to check that out.' Or
'That's something in the festival that catches my eye
because I'm an Asian person.' I feel responsible
certainly to the Asian-American and Asian-Canadian
community. I definitely feel responsible to them after
touring with 'Chink-o-rama' for a year and having all
these really wild encounters with people backstage.
Remember the Abercrombie & Fitch thing? Remember that?
GM: Uh, no.
KR: They printed all these really racist t-shirts that
had pictures of Asian people doing laundry and
pictures of Asian people being delivery boys and
stuff. And people picketed in San Francisco to get
them taken off the racks pretty quickly. College
students mobilized. So we printed these t-shirts that
said Abercrombie & Chink. And when we went to San
Francisco, people were coming up to us and telling us
their stories of being on the front lines or whatever.
Like, I don't think it's a problem to portray
stereotypes as long as there's other representations
of Asians out there as well to counterbalance them.
But when all you got is girls shooting Ping-Pong balls
out of the cootch and stuff, then it becomes a little
more hurtful because people are like, "Oh, great, once
again people are telling me, computer programmer with
a college degree, that I'm actually a concubine
shooting a Ping-Pong ball out of my cootch." It's
insulting, right?
GM: But you do shoot a Ping-Pong ball out of your
cootch, don't you?
KR: I do, for about half an hour. We both do it. We do
it to music.
GM: Excellent... What do you think of Margaret Cho?
KR: I love Margaret Cho. She's a brilliant standup.
What I do is completely different, though.
GM: Because yours is sketch.
KR: Because its character. I do do standup. Actually,
we're friends. I totally admire her. It's a really
wild skill that she has in standup.
GM: Similar sensibilities to your shows.
KR: Kind of! We're both kind of freaky girls like
that. I'm heavily influenced by drag. Like, I got
really into drag. I'm a drag-hag. I'm a voyeur and a
drag-hag. Because when I was a teenager looking at
drag queens, I was like, "This is so cool. What he's
saying is, 'I'm not what you see on the outside.'"
GM: Now everyone's going to think all Asian women are
drag-hags.
KR: Crazy drag-hags who like to talk about sex. That's okay.