'Crazy Rich Asians' cast asked to guess Singlish words

Of course, the Malaysians understood but not the Korean-American.

Kayla Wong | August 19, 2018, 01:49 PM

American romantic comedy Crazy Rich Asians is set to open here in theatres on Wednesday, Aug. 22.

The movie, set in Singapore, is touted to be the first in 25 years since the 1993 Joy Luck Club to stand up for Asian American representation.

Not representative enough of Singapore?

But Crazy Rich Asians has faced criticisms from some Singaporeans who say it is simply not a real representation of Singapore -- despite the fact that it would be hard pressed for a single film that runs for two hours to sufficiently embody everything there is in Singaporean culture and society.

And let's not forget the movie is meant to be an exaggerated satire of some very specific groups in Singapore, such as the uber-rich Chinese.

The visible lack of ethnic minorities in the main cast -- they are seen only in subservient roles such as the doormen and servers -- can also be said to be a satire on the racist attitudes seen in the top 1 percent of the Chinese community here (in the book, they are portrayed as being obsessed with purity of race in their lineage).

Asians try guessing Singlish words

But it is true that Hollywood, or rather the the mainstream American society in general, still has much to learn about representation.

In a game called "Do You Speak Singlish", American entertainment magazine and website Variety asked a number of cast members from the now extremely hyped movie to guess some Singlish terms.

They included Chinese-American actress Constance Wu, British-Malaysian TV presenter Henry Golding, Chinese-Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh, and Korean-American actor and comedian Ken Jeong.

And so, it goes without saying that not all of them would understand Singlish, or even remotely be able to guess what the words mean.

Take for instance, Chinese-American Constance Wu. She might understand Chinese, but certainly not Singlish.

The irony of asking a Korean-American person if he speaks or understands Singlish is not lost on netizens as well.

Screenshot via Variety

And it seems like Jeong is in on the joke too.

Screenshot via Variety

But kudos to him for being a sport and helping us explain Singlish to the rest of the world in such eloquent terms.

Screenshot via Variety

Film set in S'pore about group of S'poreans helping M'sians get a leg up

But not everyone bombed the quiz. Singlish is obviously a walk in the park for the cast with Malaysian background.

British-Malaysian actor Henry Golding got all the meaning of the words right.

Screenshot via Variety

As with Chinese-Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh too.

Perhaps the game is just a game -- not to be taken seriously, but using a single label to blanket over all Asians in this world is a very real problem indeed.

Nevertheless, with all the talk of the movie doing wonders for the Asian-American community but at the expense of the actual Singaporean community itself, it's nice to see the cast experience some sort of Singaporean culture, even though it's obviously not all that Singapore has to offer.

That's still cool though.

You can watch the video of the cast playing the game here:

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Top image via Variety