Kelly Marie Tran recently reflected on the hate she and her character Rose Tico received when “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” was released in 2017, calling the bullying that drove her off social media “a microcosm for the social climate that we’re living in.”
Tran, who co-stars in Andrew Ahn’s “The Wedding Banquet” remake, said what she and co-star John Boyega experienced after joining the franchise happens “pretty consistently to actors of color who find themselves in these spaces,” she told Variety in an interview published on Wednesday.
“I think these occurrences are a microcosm for the social climate that we’re living in. And it’s really unfortunate,” the actress shared.
When asked what she hopes changes in Hollywood for actors of color, she replied, “The world?!””
She added, “The hope is that people who are not afforded the ability, maybe, to have access to these communities of queer people or people of color, are able to see through the art that people of color and queer people are also human, and they have hopes and dreams.”
Tran herself came out as queer in November ahead of “The Wedding Banquet’s” release: The film is about a faux “lavender” marriage and features fellow LGBTQ stars Lily Gladstone and Bowen Yang.
“We live in a world where those identities have been weaponized so that people are not able to see the bigger picture,” she explained. “I really just want people to recognize, it’s the system that’s the problem. Stop scapegoating people of color or queer people or anyone who’s different.”
Tran concluded, “I hope that [through] the exposure and the creation of making more things about these populations, people are able to recognize humanity and maybe ask questions about the things that they’ve been socialized to believe.”
“The Wedding Banquet” opens theatrically on Friday.
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