By Ada Tseng
Camille Chen went from commercials and guest roles to landing a coveted re-occuring spot on Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, where she plays a featured player on the show-within-a-show and gets to share screentime with such TV veterans as Matthew Perry, Bradley Whitford, and DL Hughley.
While NBC's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip may focus more on the behind-the-scenes production of a sketch comedy show and the politics of the network-studio struggle, even a fake television show must be cast with some believably talented stars. In the more prominent roles, we have Sarah Paulson as Harriet Hayes, the devout and pouty object of Matt Albie's bitter affection, DL Hughley as Simon Stiles, the frustrated Yale School of Drama graduate turned comedian, and Nate Corddry as Tom Jeter, a sweet-faced up-and-comer often found in inconvenient costumes. To round out the cast, there is also Jeannie Whatley (Ayda Field), Dylan Killington (Nate Torrence), and Alex Dwyer (Simon Helberg).
And last but not least, there is Camille Chen's Samantha Li, the cute Asian girl we've seen in various sketches and rehearsals -- playing a judgmental customer service operator, acting as one of the girls from a Bachelor spoof, and being exasperated by Harriet's inability to tell a simple knock-knock joke -- but who we have yet to get to know fully on-screen. But we will, assures actress Camille Chen, as Aaron Sorkin continues to develop more and more stories involving the cast.
About half a year ago, Chen was another LA actress, struggling with auditions, juggling hostessing jobs, and debating going back to school for her Masters in Theater because she was bored out of her mind with the lapses between the jobs. But then she had one of those lucky days when stars align and the world tells you not to give up hope because great changes can happen in a short period of time and send unexpected opportunities snowballing your way.
When the pilot of Studio 60 was shot, Sarah Paulson was the only female character on the cast for the show-within-a-show. Aaron Sorkin -- writer/producer/creator of Studio 60, former writer/producer/creator of The West Wing and Sports Night -- wanted to add two more female characters. One ended up being Ayda Field's character, Jeannie. And one was more open and ambiguous.
"When I showed up for the audition, I actually read from Ayda's script," says Chen, "because Aaron hadn't written anything for the character. No description, ethnicity, age range, anything."
After Camille got the call from her agent, she showed up to audition at 10:30am. By 4:30 pm, Chen was called back for a second time. By the callback, it was clear from the contenders that they had decided the character was going to be an Asian girl. The casting directors had asked the actresses to come in prepared with some examples of sketch characters. One of the characters Chen had created involved her changing into a little schoolgirl skirt with kneehigh socks in the middle of her audition and doing her bit: "I love playing up the Asian stereotypes, cause I think it's hilarious. Some people get really offended by it, but I think, if you can't make fun of yourself, then....[shrugs]."
"They [executive producing team Aaron Sorkin and Tommy Schlamme] were so welcoming from the beginning," she says. "So dry and sarcastic. And the banter between us was great because Tommy Schamme went to my high school, and he also went to UT [where Camille graduated], so we had a lot to talk about."
So, after some comedy, some bonding, and some playfully daring trash talk to Syracuse-alum Sorkin's face ("What's your mascot again? The Orangemen??"), Chen walked away with a recurring role on one of the most anticipated, high-profile shows of the season. That same day, she was messengered her first script. Three days later, she had a photo shoot, and the day after that, she started shooting with the likes of Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford.
"It was crazy," says Chen. "This business is so up and down. You get so excited and then you get really low. It took me a year after I moved to LA to book a job. And that was just a commercial. Everyone gets frustrated and quits so quickly. But you can't do that. You can't give up if this is what you really love to do."
Born in Taipei, Taiwan and raised in Houston, Texas, Chen began perfoming since she was very young, a love which began with a passion for singing. In fact, she admits she used to in an Asian girl group called At Last -- "Destiny's Child-wannabes," she jokes -- prior to moving out to LA to pursue acting full-time. In college at the University of Texas at Austin, she enrolled as a Business major but changed to Theater her sophomore year without telling her mother.
"She was not having me," Chen recalls, mildly amused. "She freaked out. But then, the money that I was making made her feel a little more secure when she realized I could get paid for this. My first job was a featured extra. I was Miss New Hampshire in Miss Congeniality. And then, I booked an Old Navy holiday commercial. And national commercials you get paid a lot for. So gradually she became more accepting.
"Now, she's like 'Oh, yea. I told her to pursue acting from the start.'" Chen laughs.
"Or she says: 'Can you tell Aaron Sorkin to make the characters talk slower?'
'Yes, Mom, I'll just call him up and tell him.'"
After some mixed reactions and a worrisome audience drop-off rate, Studio 60 had recently been in danger of cancellation. But NBC decided to give Sorkin and the cast a chance to grow. "It's so great that NBC picked up the back 9 episodes," says Chen. "Because I think if they didn't, it would have not given Aaron the opportunity to develop my character because he added me so late."
APA talks to Camille Chen about how she landed this gig, what we can look forward to on the show, and why acting is its own reward.
Interview with Camille Chen
November 20, 2006
APA: Were you a fan of Aaron Sorkin before you got the show?
Camille Chen: Yes. I loved The West Wing. Bradley Whitford is awesome. And now I'm also obsessed with this show Brothers and Sisters, which I started watching because Rob Lowe was on it. But Aaron's writing is so good. It's very specific, down to every beat, every 'and' or 'the.'
APA: Did you watch Saturday Night Live or Mad TV or any other sketch comedy shows to prepare for the role?
Camille: No, because Aaron wanted us to know that it was more about the behind-the-scenes aspect. So, not really. I don't have a sketch background. Simon Helberg -- he does the Nicolas Cage impression -- and Nate Torrance, the Capital One guy, they both did Second City together. But they didn't make it a requirement to have a sketch background because they emphasized: This is a one-hour drama. This isn't a sketch show.
APA: What is the atmosphere like on set?
Camille: It's such a tight knit crew. Everyone is so friendly. The very first scene I shot was when we were in the white dresses. And we were in a huddle about to go on to do our musical theater number, and they called us to set for lighting and camera rehearsal. I walked on the set and Bradley and Matthew looked at me and said, "Hey new cast member!" And Matthew was like, "OK we have to make up a secret handshake." And I was like, "Oh my God, you're Matthew Perry."
But yea, it's great. It's long hours, but the atmosphere is never tense. No one's a diva. Sarah and Matt and Brad all have tons of dialogue. Brad has some practice from The West Wing, but Matthew came from a half-hour sitcom, so he gets frustrated sometimes. [laughs] But Matthew is a huge ball-buster. Cause for me, sometimes if I only have one line or one word, I obsess about it in my head. Should I say it like this? Or like this. And one time, Matthew was just like, "Camille! You have one line!"
APA: The sketch characters that you play on the show -- do they use stuff from the characters you brought in for your audition?
Camille. Yes. Well, he will incorporate it.
APA: Has it not aired yet? The one I've seen so far is the one where you play the telephone operator.
Camille: Oh, Tim Busfield was directing that episode, and he told me to add something to the character. He said, "Give her a speech impediment, or give her an accent." And I did the Asian accent, and they were cracking up. And they said, "Oh that's good." But it sucks cause Aaron likes the acting so real, so he never wants a sketch to be overacted. He never wants it to be compared to SNL. Because I wanted to do so much more with that. And also, I had to downplay it because that scene was just a lighting rehearsal within the show.
APA: Yea, it's an interesting dynamic of the show. Because you see these comedy sketches being rehearsed, but when you see the reactions of the characters to the sketches, instead of laughing at what you guys do, they're so serious because they're studying it.
Camille: Yes, which is why I think it hasn't appealed to many people who aren't in the industry or who don't live here, because they don't understand what's going on. Aaron likes to write paralleling true life, so a lot of the stuff that has been written in has actually happened, or they're based off real people that he knows. And in a script that I just got, he wrote this exchange between DL Hughley and I on the show, and it was almost exactly a conversation that Aaron and I had. About the difference between being Chinese and Taiwanese. And it was awesome. I just thought that was hilarious.
Because a lot of my friends are like, "Wait, are you Chinese?" But a lot of times when I say I'm Taiwanese, the person could be super smart, but they'll say, "Oh, Thailand?" Or, "What is that?" Or "Where is that?" And I'll think, "Really?" So when I'm too lazy to explain the whole thing -- which, I should never be too lazy -- I just say Chinese.
APA: Also, sometimes when you say Taiwanese, people take it as a very politically charged statement.
Camille: Oh, totally. My grandma would totally say Taiwanese. My mom says Chinese. When I asked my mom when I was younger what I should say, she said "Just say Chinese." But then again, she also didn't go through what my grandma went through. But it was funny, so Aaron and I had a conversation about it. Because, at the audition, he pretty much said, "I'm developing this character as the show goes along, so I don't know anything about her yet. I'm pretty much going to base the character off of you as Camille."
So when he finally decided what to name my character, he asked me if it was OK to spell my last name L-I. Because that's the mainland spelling. It's funny, cause he asked, "Would your family be offended? Because NBC didn't OK it for it to be spelled L-E-E."
APA: Really? Because Lee is the Taiwanese spelling? I wonder who these studio executives are who had a meeting and said, "We want her name to be spelled Li, not Lee." Because they have Chinese affiliates?
Camille: Yea, I don't know. So when he asked me that... I mean, I've played a Korean girl. So I said, "No, she won't be offended, but thank you for asking." But then we had the talk, which ends up in one of the episodes that comes up.
APA: Which you can't tell me about... But, it's cool because the world of sketch comedy has been known as kind of a male arena. Except for recently on SNL, with Tina Fey and all of them. And in terms of Asians, we've had Bobby Lee. But Asian women doing sketch comedy? We've never seen that.
Camille: Right. Ever. I think Lucy Liu was on SNL as a guest host.
APA: Yes. But she was the first Asian woman to host. She said that in her monologue, and spoofed all the Asian stereotypes. But she's the only one, because there haven't been any since then.
Camille: Crazy... Well on our show, we did the telephone sketch, and we've done a couple other sketches, but Aaron hasn't really written ethnicity into the show yet. It's just the whole political, religious stuff.
APA: As an Asian actress in Hollywood, do you have any interesting audition stories?
Camille: It's so weird. I see all the same girls at all the auditions. It's gotten to the point where -- there can be up to 10 steps for an audition -- but now it's come to the point where I always see this girl named Julia Ling [who had a guest role on Studio 60, playing a powerful Macao businessman's daughter for two episodes], and I always see this girl named Moon Bloodgood, who's actually on this show, Daybreak with Taye Diggs. The casting directors know us now.
But actually, I auditioned for Lost recently. And they wanted me to speak Thai! And, I mean, my last name is Chen! I was like.. all Asians are not the same!
APA: That's ridiculous. What did you do?
Camille: Nothing. I said I couldn't speak it. I don't know. It's frustrating. You can complain, but ultimately, what my acting coach says is -- do you want to work? And it's true. We have to work. My biggest accomplishment is not having to wait tables anymore.
Official Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip site: http://www.nbc.com/Studio_60_on_the_Sunset_Strip/
Published: Wednesday, December 6, 2006