Fresh Air: Bowen Yang’s ‘Wicked’ White Lie

Date: August 18, 2025
Host: Terry Gross
Guest: Bowen Yang

Episode Overview

This engaging Fresh Air episode features Emmy-nominated Saturday Night Live (SNL) cast member and co-host of Las Culturistas, Bowen Yang. Terry Gross explores Yang’s path from pop culture-obsessed teen to comedy stardom, his immigrant family background, his experiences as a gay man on SNL, his creative partnership with Matt Rogers, and the heartfelt story behind his connection to Wicked. The conversation travels through career milestones, cultural reflections, and personal anecdotes with candor and humor.

Episode Highlights & Key Discussion Points

1. SNL: From Writer to Emmy-Nominated Star

• Early Days and Auditions

  • Bowen started at SNL as a writer (2016), before becoming a cast member.
  • Auditioned multiple times; described early tapes as “cringe,” but recognizes the “gumption” of his younger self.
  • Memorable quote:

    “I mean, they'll never hire an effeminate Asian man for that show. And I just called up my buddy ... I put on all these different wigs and hats and just ran through five minutes of characters and impressions. Michiko Kakutani was one of my impressions. It was really esoteric.” (08:12)

• Breakout Characters and Cast Dynamics

  • Known for characters like the Chinese spy balloon, George Santos, and, memorably, JD Vance.
  • Approach to roles: Hired a dialect coach and experimented with contact lenses and facial hair for authenticity in playing JD Vance.
  • Yang’s comic voice is inextricable from his own personality:

    “I can't help it. I think that's my own little wink through, like, whatever characterization ... I do.” (05:04)

2. Belonging and Identity: High School, Homecoming King, and Closeted Years

• Named “Most Likely to be on SNL” in high school— a stretch, Yang says, but he was an obsessed fan who brought SNL VHS tapes to school.
• On being elected homecoming king:

  “Either it was a very gay friendly school or you were very successful at staying in the closet.”
  —Terry Gross (06:58)

• Yang describes a common path for queer men entering public-facing roles:

  “A lot of us did the morning announcements ... a lot of us were in the homecoming court ... proud to be part of that cohort.” (07:09)

3. Navigating SNL's Pressure Cooker

• Adapting from writer to performer, building instincts for the show’s unwritten rules.

  “That instinct will sort of guide you towards how to succeed on the show on both your own terms and on the writer's and Lauren's terms and on the audience's terms, most importantly.” (11:55)

• Balancing SNL with other projects and maintaining emotional well-being:

  “I think that you just have to develop some kind of emotional regulation, and that is a very hard thing to ask comedians to do. Part of the reason why we become comedians is because we are dysregulated emotionally, right.” (13:47)

• Credits the show with teaching him how to “handle a million different stimuli from a million different directions.” (15:05)

4. Las Culturistas Podcast & The Las Culturistas Culture Awards

• Began as a “playdate” excuse with Matt Rogers; pitched higher-concept ideas, settled on a simple format— two friends deeply invested in pop culture.
• Humor captured in their “consultants” schtick:

  “Yes, we are Las Culturistas. What that means is we are your culture consultants. We are out here to improve culture. We’re here to heighten culture ... We’ve got some feedback that is constructive and sometimes destructive.” (17:29)

• The Culture Awards started as a joke segment, eventually becoming a live— and then televised— event.

5. Pop Culture Obsessions: A Refuge and Crash Course

• Pop culture as acclimation tool after immigrating to the US.

  “Pop culture was this expedited way for me to, like, get on board with what people were talking about at school ... It was the way that it gets digested, which happens to be what SNL kind of is.” (22:41)

• Early influences: SNL, MADtv, Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, The Simpsons, Seinfeld.
• On Sandra Oh inspiring a brief pursuit of medicine:

  “Sandra Oh kind of confused me occupationally, because I was like, I’m obsessed with her. I guess I’ll become a doctor.” (25:51)

6. Coming Out, Family, and Cultural Expectations

• Parents’ journey: From China (Inner Mongolia, Liaoning) to Australia, Canada, Colorado.
• The immigrant “butterfly effect”: Yang acknowledges he wouldn’t have been born if his family had stayed in China due to the one-child policy.
• First-generation pressure and gratitude for opportunities:

  “There are all these different right place, right time scenarios in my mind ... None of it would have materialized had this little Butterfly effect thing not happened.” (33:53)

• Coming out was never fully on his terms—his mother discovering chat logs, and later social media outing him to family in China.
• Parental acceptance grew with his career stability and external validation:

  “I think once they saw me sort of becoming famous ... once they saw certain dreams come to light, I think that's when they were a little bit more relieved.” (38:39)

7. Public vs Private: Sharing on Air

• On self-disclosure and drawing the line with personal stories:

  “I have these light red lines, these, like, pink lines on, like, what I don't want to talk about ... I don’t ever want to be on a loop ... it calcifies around me.” (29:30)

• Value in honesty and sharing vulnerabilities—Gross notes, “It’s like, ‘Oh God, I have company.’” (31:13)

8. ‘Wicked’ and the White Lie

• Despite being a “tiny” role in the film, Wicked holds personal significance for Yang.
• He never saw Wicked onstage until adulthood, but for years pretended he had, out of a desire to belong:

  “It was just this thing that I felt the pressure to, like, have some sort of social proof ... Like, yeah, I did see it, but we were just not a theater-going family ... thank goodness for public libraries.” (46:04)

• His delight now is being honest about not catching every cultural phenomenon:

  “I love that now ... I didn’t get a chance to see it and there's too much stuff, you know what I mean? That is just ... something we can all agree on.” (46:57)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments (with Timestamps)

• On Playing J.D. Vance
  “I hired a dialect coach and I requested a screen test where I tried out different contact lenses because I felt like so much of J.D. Vance's sort of visual eeriness was in his eyes.”
  —Bowen Yang (03:44)

• On Queer Childhoods:
  “A lot of us did the morning announcements and a lot of us were in the homecoming court. And so I don't know what that says. About a certain type of, like, gregarious gay male growing up in the aughts. But I feel proud to be in that cohort of people. This is a thing I'm telling you, Terry.”
  —Bowen Yang (07:09)

• High School SNL Fandom:
  “I would bring VHS tapes to school ... When there was like a substitute teacher ... I brought like this past weekend's SNL if people want to watch it. And somehow these teachers let me play it.”
  —Bowen Yang (05:57)

• Yang on the Overwhelm of SNL:
  “No matter what, no matter if you're succeeding or if you are struggling in some way, which is the universal SNL experience ... you just have to develop some kind of emotional regulation, and that is a very hard thing to ask comedians to do.”
  —Bowen Yang (13:39)

• Pop Culture’s Role in Assimilation:
  “Pop culture was this expedited way for me to, like, get on board with what people were talking about at school ... the thing that made me love culture was the way that it gets digested, which happens to be what SNL kind of is.”
  —Bowen Yang (22:41)

• ‘Wicked’ White Lie:
  “If you didn't see Wicked, then, like, you have no business being ... a theater kid ... I just made up this lie because it felt like the right thing to say in order to, like, justify this passion that I had for, like, musical theater.”
  —Bowen Yang (44:04)

• On Honesty and Fitting In:
  “It felt like there was this syllabus growing up in terms of pop culture. And now with all of the options ... you can just sort of chart your own path.”
  —Bowen Yang (47:22)

Key Timestamps for Important Segments

• [03:44] — On playing JD Vance and method acting for SNL
• [05:57] — On being “Most Likely to be on SNL,” fandom, and comedy obsession
• [07:09] — High school queerness, homecoming king, and experiences in visibility
• [13:39] — The grind of SNL and handling the stress
• [17:29] — Early Las Culturistas podcast banter
• [22:41] — Pop culture as identity and survival for a young immigrant
• [29:30] — Examining the limits between private and public storytelling
• [33:53] — Family immigration journey and “Butterfly Effect” moments
• [39:57] — On coming out and family acceptance (never fully on his own terms)
• [44:04] — The ‘Wicked’ white lie and pressures of cultural literacy
• [47:22] — Growing up with a “pop culture syllabus” and finding freedom now

Episode Tone & Final Thoughts

The conversation is warm, witty, and self-aware. Yang’s humor—dry, precise, and infused with hard-won honesty—plays beautifully off Gross’s curiosity and empathy. The episode moves nimbly from laughter (Wicked white lies, SNL sketch tales) to genuine vulnerability (queer identity, immigrant family pressures, pop culture as sanctuary).

Bowen Yang’s story is both particular and universal: about wanting to fit in, finding your tribe through culture, and finally standing in your own truth—whether or not you’ve actually seen Wicked.