Damien Nguyen: An Unknown No Longer

In Hans Petter Moland's film A Beautiful Country, Damien Nguyen plays the title role of Binh. He's a social outcast in Vietnam, called ugly and "bui doi" (less than dust) because of his mixed race. He travels from Vietnam to Malaysia to New York City, and eventually makes his way to Texas where he is reunited with his father, played by Nick Nolte. Through all the tragedy and suffering, Damien infuses his character with silent strength and unwavering hope.

Making the film not only gave Damien the opportunity to work with heavy-hitters such as Nick Nolte, Tim Roth, and Bai Ling, but it also allowed him to travel around the world and spend time in Vietnam, where he met with some of his extended family that he had never seen before. Although his own personal history is not nearly as tragic and gruesome as Binh's, Damien has a remarkable coming-to-America story himself. At age three, he and his family boarded a small boat for three days to get from Vietnam to the Phillippines, where they were in detention camp for a month before making it to the United States. His family, with seven siblings, were separated, and his father learned a trade and worked hard to reunite the family. Being so young, Damien's assimilation into the American culture was a natural one. Luckily, his roller-coaster ride as an actor has landed him to this point, where he is able to be part of a project that brings awareness to worldly stories and reconnects him with his Vietnamese roots. Director Hans Petter Moland describes him as "an extraordinary talent," taking on the challenges "with great bravado." Hopefully, this is just the beginning of interesting things to come. APA speaks to the affable Damien Nguyen.    -- Ada Tseng

Damien Nguyen interview, Part I: Talking about Vietnam and working on the Hans Petter Moland film.

Click here to view the video in Windows Media Player.

Click here to view the video in Windows Media Player.

Interview with Damien Nguyen

Interviewed by Chi Tung and Ada Tseng

Video Edits by Charlotte Wu

APA: Could you start by briefly introducing yourself?

Damien Nguyen: Sure, my name is Damien Nguyen, I'm the actor from A Beautiful Country.

APA: Could you describe the premise of the film a little bit?

DM: My character is a product of the Vietnam war, a child born to an American father, Vietnamese mother. Because of the events of the war, things are kind of chaotic; one day my father disappears for some unknown reason -- to punish my mother for fraternizing with the enemy. So I'm forced to live with her family who don't really want me. As I continue to grow with age, they kick me out; I have one picture that tells a story, and in this story it describes a relationship of a loving mother who once loved me, so that's kind of my motivation, to find out why this story never came to be. So I set out in search of my identity and family, eventually come to meet my mother. Of course more obstacles come my way and I'm then forced to leave her and search for my father in America and find out why he left me so many years ago.

APA: You actually have an interesting background -- you were born in Vietnam, then when you were three, your family traveled on a boat to the Phillipines, where you were in detention camp for a month before coming to America. How much of that do you remember?

DM: You know, I was so young, I was about three and a half years old. I have pictures, images in my head, and I don't know which ones are actually real and which ones my mind made up to fill in the blanks, so I have really little recollection of these events. My parents never talked to me about these events, I think at the time coming to this new land, already having a family of six children and a grandmother to take care of, I didn't have the luxury of having to sit down and work through the therapy, the recovery. Finding some means to take care of the family, especially since it was such a large family, so it wasn't like sit around and talk about the grievances they had to endure. They had to reach this level of understanding of closure, they just never did that, so instead they never talked about it. So since they never mentioned it, as a child, you're not insightful to question these things. It wasn't till later in life that I had these questions, but then I felt awkward that so much time had gone by and I hadn't asked about it, so it was just kind of left alone.

APA: Did you ever have an idealized vision of what America was? Was it a beautiful country to you?

DM: Actually, no, when I came to America, it wasn't by choice. It's just one of those things where my parents guide you and give you direction; for all I knew, it was just going on vacation, get on a boat, it wasn't exactly a luxury liner. You just expect your parents to take care of you, so you go along with what they say; when I came to the new land, it was like, "I guess this is how this it's supposed to be." Then I started realizing, this is a whole new element, it's like learning everything over again. I remember attending school at a public school, I realized at a very early age that I was very different from other kids. We were one of the earlier refugees that came to the U.S. so I was the only Asian kid in my class and one distinct memory that I had that rung clear that I was different was that I had this little girl come up to me and ask me what was wrong with my eyes. And I went home and asked my mom what was wrong with my eyes, and she thought maybe I hurt myself, started examining my eyes, asked me, "who told you?" I said this little girl told me, I could still see my mother's face, how she didn't have an answer for me, then I started realizing I was in a whole 'nother place, that my responsibility was to acclimate as best and as fast as I could. Because at such a young age, you have a yearning to belong, to feel like you're just one of the gang and I think I made a good go at it. The trade-off there was that when you run from something, you're also running away from something, and I was running away from part of my identity -- I wish I spoke more Vietnamese, I wish I was more connected to my culture. And one of the greatest things about this project was being able to go back to Vietnam and connect with my culture, my heritage. It's one of those things you hear about as a child -- you don't appreciate the things that make you who you are -- it's not till you become older, more educated, have more life experience when you start questionilng these things. You think it's too late now, you try to take courses, go out to Vietnamese restaurants, but is that supposed to make me more vietnamese, be more attached to my culture? Then this project came along, like, "how would you like to spend four months in Vietnam," and it was like, "wow," so it was a great opportunity.

APA: So do you feel like your character onscreen is almost the opposite of your reality?

DM: Yeah, it's just kind of like because of one event in history, it changed the course of my life forever; if that event didn't take place, there were definitely things that my life would've been more like, like my character in the movie, working on a farm, and had all these skills relating to working on a farm, as opposed to living in the states and living this kind of lifestyle. I didn't really have an understanding of these things till I went to vietnam, to see the way of life there; it kinda gives you an appreciation of the opoortunity you have now. From a Western point of view, it's one of these things you take for granted, a means to have an education, to find a better life for yourself; all you have to do is have dreams, passion, some direction, that's pretty much the formula for you. You go back to Vietnam, there's no government agency and such that helps you to find money, to go to school, to get involved in this program and that, after you invest so much time, you become a professional and from there, you move on to the top echelon of whatever you wanna do. It's not like that -- and I guess you lose sight of that being in this environment, this culture, that's not how it is everywhere else in the world.

APA: Your character in the film projected a silent strength; how do you differentiate between that and being dull?

DM: It's a development of a character, and I hate to say it because it sounds hokey, this whole artsy fartsy, internalized process, but to have the luxury to read a good script and see the potential behind a good story and to be forutnate enough to be part of that, and of course, dealing with this subject matter, it catches the audience already to see that people lived such hardships. I think I have the luxury to step outside this life and see how other people struggle, already other people are engulfed in it, when they see human tragedy, you automatically have to feel something there. So I just kinda ran with that, and because I could subtly pull out aspects of suffering with the character, people could understand it even if they haven't suffered to this degree. They can understand, it's almost universal, that we all have at one point in our lives wished we belonged, felt loved, served a purpose, that we're more than we are -- just building that, and adding little nuances here and there, I think the audience is already halfway there, you just have to meet them with the other half.

APA: Do you think there is an overriding message in the film about the immigrant experience?

DM: Definitely, there is. Specifically, it tells about one specific immigrant's passage to the United states, but in the world today, you can see many, many parts of the world are running from suffering, famine, disease, tyranny, whatever the case may be -- it's overwhelming. In our world, it's covered by the media, because they don't find it profitable, but if we search and have other means -- the Internet and such -- we can have a better understanding of these things. It just so happened for the story's sake, it involved a vietnamese man's passage to the states and an Asian passage to the U.S., so it's just one look at a huge problem that exists in the world today.

APA: How would you describe the Vietnamese immigrant situation today?

DM: Today, it's a whole different ballpark. Things have changed so much, at one time, the country was at war with itself, I think that time has passed -- it's well overdue, the introduction to the Western world, tourism, big business moving in, the people, their quality of life has definitely reached a new level, they aren't suffering like they used to be, like, say, 15 years ago. They've had access to a lot of things they didn't have access to; when I was there, it was one of the fastest growing economies in the world, and I know it's still not there, but at one time, there was so much suffering, people wanted to flee so badly. Now it's gotten better, it's more promising, there will be new opportunities; the one thing I felt when I was there was that the people envied me for getting out, to not have to go through all the struggles. I had an opportunity in the new world to have a life, where they probably didn't.

APA: Do you think film as a medium, though it can be instructional, can do enough to teach the world at large, which still seems ignorant about these kinds of issues? Did you always see the film as a means to teach people about the situation?

DM: Absolutely, and I'll be honest, I had no idea that Amerasians were treated so poorly and just how things were. I think a lot of times, people get caught up in their own lives, we have so many problems, we get stuck on the 405 for an hour and it's just devastating -- little things like that. We're so overwhelmed by millions of issues in our lives, we become blindsided by them -- we don't see a lot of harrowing, real issues that exist in the world. I'll throw on example out there, from Danny Boyle's The Beach, with Leonardo DiCaprio, where they find this little slice of paradise and everything's going great and they have this utopian existence. So everything's running smoothly, and one day the fisherman come home and he's been attacked by a shark, and he's in the village and everybody's caught by the fact that he's bleeding and yelling. So what do they do? They pitch a tent in the forest so they don't have to see his pain and suffering -- we don't wanna see the pain, the suffering, the atrocities that take place because it makes us responsible. It's fine and dandy to sit through a movie for two hours, it resonates for you for awhile, but then it's time to get a frappucino, it's time to cool off. It's human nature, we want to see pleasant things, we want to be bombarded by beautiful things, blissful things; this movie does showcase a lot of the things that take place in the world -- it's just a small smidgen of things, but it does make people aware. I'm not gonna say be a missionary, be a saint, spend all the waking days of your life being a philanthropist because I know I'm not that way, but if anything, we can have a better appreciation for the little things. You're not gonna see, god forbid, your little brother die from famine or disease; you're not gonna see the locusts eat your crops and leave you with no way to provide for your family. We have so many things to be grateful for -- at least be grateful for those things and through that, maybe we can do some good outside of our own lives. And maybe that's enough.

APA: As you've been promoting the movie, have you gotten any personal responses?

DM: Oh yeah, there was one experience that really rings out: we did this Q&A screening at Minneapolis and this Amerasian young man, he was the last one to comment, he said, "I don't have a question, just a comment." He was kind of a gruff fellow, bigger build, looked like a jock, and he said: "I really didn't wanna see this movie and I never cry, but man, I cried. And this movie's like the perfect movie and I'm just so glad that this movie's there and I just felt so touched." And I'm like, "Wow, this movie touched people," and especially people that you wouldn't think. And after the Q&A he came up to me, wanted to talk to me. I just didn't know it would affect so many different people from so many walks of life, I always thought only people who were into arthouse films or had a profound appreciation for film, and here's this guy who was dragged out by his friends and watched the movie only because he felt like he was obligated to because of his mixed heritage. But he was so touched by it, voluntarily admitted that he cried; he was so moved that he had to share that. That was just one incident, but that was the one that impressed me the most.

APA: You guys actually shot in a bunch of different locations. Were you guys actually out on
the ocean?

DM: Some of it was, yeah. Texas, New York, Vietnam were the three major locations but sometimes the conditions out on the ocean weren't agreeable for shooting, but definitely agreeable for the movie to showcase that this was an ordeal that they had to go through. And we had problems like most productions do, and because our budget was so minimal, we didn't have the option to wait it out, so it was like, "let's trudge forward." With some of the extras and such, who loved to be a part of it, we tried to screen some of them, saying that it's important that you have some experience on boats and that you can swim. Well, apparently, they didn't think it was important to be truthful about, so seasickness was a huge problem. And it's the most contagious, it makes you wanna crawl up into a ball and hide into the smallest crack you can; you don't wanna see it. I've been seasick before and it's definitely not pleasant. But on the flipside, beautiful, beautiful locations, so scenic and serenity I've never experienced before -- being out in the middle of some village in Vietnam and walking home from the set to the base camp, in the middle of the dark, not one street light, car light, no radios, nothing. Just walking in the dark, using whatever ambient light was available was just amazing.

APA: What was it like working with Bai Ling, Nick Nolte, Tim Roth?

DM: It was an overwhelming sense of anxiety. You've probably never seen me before, and
if you have, you've watched lots of stuff, because my resume definitely doesn't speak for me. I've done various small projects: infomercials, guest spots on TV here and there -- nothing of this magnitude. So I was very fortunate to be chosen for this part, having little experience and never working with many recognizable actors prior to this, I was completely burdened by this anxiety, like, "how am I gonna pull this off," but I was very fortunate to work with these actors. Nick, Tim, Bai Ling -- very generous individuals who were patient, open, very warm and genuine, and if it was anyone else, I maybe would've been in a different place.

The first person I was able to meet was Bai Ling and I remember we were in Hanoi and she had just flown in, gotten off the plane. They picked her up and dropped her off at the production office. I'd seen her in The Crow and Anna and the King, a few other things, so we did a rehearsal. If you know anything about Bai Ling, she's a glamorous, sensual actress; she was wearing this denim tube top, this very small denim shirt. We're in Vietnam, everyone's really dressy, she was just KAPOW! I was like, "I'm so outta my league." So we're doing rehearsals and I'm just trying to be the consummate professional, like, "let's do that," and she's like, "I've never been to Vietnam, it's so pretty, so quaint. And I'm like, "Alright, I guess so." After the rehearsal, we take her back to the hotel, she hadn't eaten yet, so I ask if she wants to get a bite, and she says "Yeah," and I'm like, "Wow, I'm going out on a date with Bai Ling." I had no idea this was gonna happen so I had no money, so I went to Hans the director, and asked to borrow some money, and he gave me 50 bucks, and we went to this great restaurant called Bobby Chen in Hanoi. She's a very normal person, very sweet. So we're having dinner, all of a sudden I felt this overwhelming need to lay it on, spill my beans; I'm like, "I'm so scared shitless, I'm so nervous." She's like, "Why?" and I say, "I don't know if I"m doing it right." She's like, "Oh, I think most actors don't have any idea what they're gonna do. Like I don't have any idea until I'm on the set." I"m like, "Wow, that's great." And after that, we had casual conversation, and if anything, I realized that I overrehearsed and overpracticed and overanalyzed because it was my first shot and a great shot and the last thing I wanted to do was mess it up. But for most people, it's human nature, no matter how much you prepare, you can do more, but with those few comforting words, it was great.

From there, being able to work with Tim, who was so sincere and genuine and giving with his time, and Nick, who was so sweet -- I'd even go so far as to say sweet -- he has this gruff voice, most people know, but when he talks to you, there's this sweet communication that he has. He has this incredible knack for being engulfed in the moment -- Nick loves living life in the moment. Whenever he's around, he loves to make people laugh, he's just like an encyclopedia of trivial information, he throws things out -- whatever the conversation is, he's just so in tune with everything. And Hans, the director, this was his fifth feature, the movie he did prior was called Aberdeen, this road trip movie about this father and his daughter. I actually hadn't seen it until I met him and he gave me a copy. And just working with him, you get an understanding of the vision he has; he's just such a thorough individual, so well calculated, what he does is no accident, there's a picture in his mind and before he does it, he thinks it through and thinks it through again before he puts it out in the world. He always had an open door policy; if I had qualms, problems, I could go to him and say, "I'm not sure about this or that" -- he'd take the time out to talk about it and find some resolution. And also for him to allow me as an actor without a lot of experience to allow me to create a character and take chances and make choices and run with it was a great opportunity. And one of the great things he said to me was...before we started shooting, we had a moment to talk about our character. He pauses and says: "You were chosen for a reason." And I'm like, "Thanks, man." I really needed to hear that; it was one of those hallmark moments that touched me and encouraged me to believe in my abilities, my talents, allowed me to fly through it all and produce this project and go through with it. Hopefully, it's a project that's well received and that people appreciate.

APA: Was there an auditioning process?

DM: Yes. The character's such a unique character, it's not one you see traditionally in a lot of movies, especially by Hollywood standards -- it's usually the harrowing, good-looking guy who's rippled with muscles from head to toe, with this really great haircut. This character was definitely not that, so the director searched high and low: Europe, Asia, the United States. I was based in Los Angeles, a struggling actor; being one, you don't have the luxury to pick and choose. It's not like I was getting 20 different scripts from Burton, Spielberg, Cameron. It's like, "Oh, there's a liquor store clerk or a gangster -- I'm on it." I was getting whatever I could, and this movie came around and I got the audition piece, but unfortunately it was cast out of New York and so I had to send in a video audition. So a buddy of mine set up a video camera in my living room and I sent in the audition piece. I gave it a week and a half, heard nothing, a month goes by, I get a phone call from the agent. My agent says the director from A Beautiful Country wants to meet with you, so I dig out my audition piece from my portfolio and refresh it. So I go to the producer's office in Los Angeles, and it was a terrible meeting. I thought I was going in and reauditioning with the same audition piece so I got dressed up like a FOB, did my hair all fobby, and wore the flip flops. And the first thing he says to me is, "You're kind of tall." I'm like, "Am I?" And then he goes, "You've kinda got a big build." I'm like, "I'm pretty average." He goes, "Can you take off your shirt?" I'm like, "I've read about this and I don't have a problem with it." And he looks at my face and is like, "Your face is kind of symmetrical." And then it clicks -- he's the director, he's got a picture of what the guy's supposed to look like, the guy's weak, quiet and everyone calls him ugly: I don't quite fit the bill.

We start talking for awhile and he starts asking me about my life. After awhile, he asks, "Do you mind if we play around a little bit? Do you mind if we shove tissue in your mouth?" This is a first, but I'm like, "Alright." So he grabs a kleenex and shoves some into my mouth, my bottom lip, my nose. I'm like, "I feel so compromised right now," but then he thanks me for coming in -- I feel like it's one of those casting stories you never hear about. Then I walk out, I write it off, a month and a half goes by, I get a call from my agent, she's like, "the director wants to meet you." I'm like, "which director?" She goes, "The Beautiful Country director, he wants to meet you, he wants to fly you up to New York. So they're flying me to New York, I've got a layover in Las Vegas for a few hours, it's a redeye overnight, I can't sleep, I'm completely rambled with nerves. I'm working on my sales pitch the entire time because I'm thinking he's narrowed it down to me and a couple other guys -- we're like the final candidates for American Idol; I've got to put on my best show. I finally get to New York -- I've never been to New York before -- I get to New York at five in the morning, to the hotel roughly around six; the director tells me to call him as soon as I get to the hotel. I'm like, "Does he  know that I'm getting in at six in the morning?" I'm up all night; I'm going crazy; I don't know a soul; I'm sitting in the lobby of this nice hotel; security's staring at me; I'm sweaty, glistening; I feel like I've been smoking crack all night; my eyes are all bugged out and red. So I get on the phone, call him and sure enough, I wake him up. I'm like, "We're never gonna have a good footing, me and this director guy, it always seems like there's some awkwardness about our meetings."

So he come downstairs, invites me downstairs to the hotel lobby restaurant, and I'm working on my sales pitch and he says: "Can I be frank with you?" And I'm like, "Sure, be frank." And he says, "I want you for the part." I've got this sales pitch, my head's spinning, the whole sleep deprivation thing finally catches up to me -- I don't remember what we had for breakfast; I don't remember any of the other details of the restaurant at that point. But after that, he says, "Do you wanna go for a walk?" and I'm like, "Sure." So we get up and go outside -- this is one day after the one year anniversay of 9-11, so George W Bush is in town, staying at the Waldorf Hotel. So he says, "Let's see if we can see W." So we start walking, we get outta the hotel around nine o'clock, and it's about the time the whole city starts to wake up, and there's just thousands of people on the street, walking everywhere, honking their horns. I've never been to New York, I'm looking around like an alien in some new planet. And I'm trying to keep conversation and be funny and insightful with the director and still be caught up with everything that's going on. And by the time we get to the hotel, there's a bazillion people; I'm so bombarded by a million things, I feel like I'm gonna crawl outta my skin at any time.

So eventually we get away from there and he gives me a tour of New York. Then he says, "what do you wanna do?" I say, "Honestly, I could use a nap." So he gets me a room, asks if a few hours is ok, I'm like, "That'd be great." I'm on the 23rd floor, I lay down, all I hear is traffic from the street, I'm flopping around, I swear it's ten minutes -- he says it was two hours -- the phone rings: "Damien, are you ready?" I take a quick shower, he takes me to this fancy Italian restaurant, I'm siting there like, "This has gotta end soon." Then he starts talking and says, "When you're working with Nick and Harvey -- at the time it was gonna be Nick and Harvey Keitel -- don't let them push you around. I'm thinking, "You must have really brutish assistant directors." But he keeps throwing around Nick and Harvey and so I'm like, "Excuse me, but Nick? Harvey?" He's like, "Yeah, Nick Nolte, Harvey Keitel." I'm like, "No way, this is not for real." He tells me later that the look on my face made him second guess if he got the right guy. I'm like, "this day can't be anymore weird," and so after that, I'm completely outta my brain, zombie state at this point. He says, "Do you mind if you catch a car back to the airport?" He just wanted to meet me one last time, because he was flying to Vietnam for preproduction because he had spent so much time looking for this guy, and he hadn't seen me for a month and a half -- he just wanted to make sure I was the guy for the part.

So he gives me some money -- craziest taxi cab ride in my life -- I get back to JFK, only to find out I'm flying outta La Guardia. The guy tells me that I'm not gonna make it, that my flight leaves in an hour and a half and that I"m looking at at least two hours to get there. So I had to dish out another 150 dollars; I eventually get back to LA, land in my bed around three in the morning, wake up the next morning thinking that could not have just happened. A few hours later, I get a call from the director's assistant saying, "You need to get ready to come to Vietnam." And that's pretty much the ride that's continued to go and go and go, and here I am, and it's been a wild ride and I've been very thankful for it, both the good and bad. It hasn't been all the fun and frills, it's been time taxing and overwhelming, there's been uncertainties, dark moments, good moments and everything in between. And I'm rambling again.

APA: So what can we expect from you now?

DM: I wish that my plate was full but honestly, until this movie's out there and has been seen, it's really hard to say that I'm a commodity, especially a commodity that this industry finds valuable. And I hope that once the movie is out there, I hope it showcases me in a posotive light and provide future opportunities; this industry is a tough racket, I had no illusions about that from the get go and it continues to prove itself. And i feel really strongly about this project, I've loved it for a very long time, before i even saw it on the big screen and see it come to life, because of the amazing million and one intimate moments i've had with it in the course of making it and working with the people I've come to call friends. So now seeing it come to life, I also realize that even great movies get swept under the rug -- that's just the reality of it, no matter how hard you try and plan and think it through, there's no formula for it, it is what it is. Hopefully, all the elements and all the right things will come together and it will be well received and be seen by as many people as it can possibly be seen by.

For more L.A. Film festival coverage, please click on the links below:

A Beautiful Country review

Spying Cam, R-Point review

Before Anime review

Cavite review

Before the Flood review

Tony Takitani review

L.A. Film festival preview