Worlds Collide for Sam Song Li in Netflix’s “The Brothers Sun”

Photo by Ziyang Wang


The first day Sam Song Li was on the set of Netflix’s newest gangster dramedy, “The Brothers Sun,” he admits he was slightly intimidated by his Academy Award winner co-star. But her energy, which he calls “the Michelle Yeoh” effect, made him feel like he’d known her for years. 

Li’s character, Bruce Sun, is an improv comedian who has been sheltered from the truth about his criminal gang family. “The Brothers Sun,” released today on Netflix, begins when Bruce’s infamous and respected criminal brother, Charles, shows up at Bruce’s door to protect Bruce and their mother, Eileen (played by Michelle Yeoh), from a mysterious assassin. 

Yeoh plays the powerful matriarch of the Jade Dragons triad, a Chinese transnational organized crime syndicate. The family needs Bruce to step up and become part of The Jade Dragons, although it conflicts with Bruce’s dream of being a comedian. 

“It's like we [Asian Americans] get our own Kill Bill meets 21 Jump Street meets Ozark with dashes of John Wick,” Li said. “I feel like it's just a little bit of everything. In that way, I think that there’s just nothing quite like it on TV.” 

Bruce is an extension of Li in ways that felt like a sign he could succeed in the role. Like Bruce, the L.A.-based 27-year-old Chinese American actor was raised by a single mom in Southern California, and pursuing acting and comedy were at odds with what his mother wanted when he first started. 

In 2013, Asian and Asian American audiences would, for the first time, see themselves in ABC’s “Fresh Off the Boat,” a story about a Chinese family in America. Back then, Li was an acting major at U.C. Berkeley; he sent the article about the show being greenlit to his mom, who wasn’t entirely on board with his decision to be an actor at the time, to show her that he had a chance at making it in the industry. 

“I'm just glad that now I'm able to be a part of a show like that,” Li laughs. “And I think my mom feels a lot better now.” 

Li auditioned for “The Brothers Sun” in June 2022, where he met producer Brad Falchuk, best known for co-creating “Glee”, “American Horror Story” and “Pose.” Falchuk’s directing skills and exceptional acting notes made it easier for Li to be vulnerable during his audition. 

“The first time I saw the breakdown for Bruce [in February 2022], I read it, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, this guy sounds just like me,’” Li says. “I think there was just a lot that I saw that I really related to, and I think that process made it really easy for me to access Bruce.”

Shortly after he got the part, Li discovered that Yeoh had joined the project. “I was so blown away by it. I’d watched ‘Everything, Everywhere All at Once’ twice by the time I heard Michelle was going to sign on to be Eileen Sun,” Li said. “I was very starstruck.” 

During the first take, Li was nervous, but Yeoh’s openness and warmth helped Li’s job feel effortless. Li could pull from his own experience and felt like that combination of authenticity for himself, along with Yeoh's remarkable ability to connect, expedited the bonding process.

 

“It’s like, when you play basketball with Steph Curry, you’re gonna win four championships. Every throw that Tom Brady throws at you, you're gonna catch,” Li said. 

The show creates a nuanced representation of Chinese American identity and the different worlds one must navigate to stay true to themselves. The crossover between Bruce’s world in improv comedy and the underworld of Taiwanese triad gangsters, melded into a martial arts dramedy, is what attracted Li to join the project in the first place. 

One second, audiences are put in a dark gangster underworld with ruthless killers, where no one is safe. Next, they’re back to a college campus with kids whose only problem is pursuing a career in improv, and other regular, real-world problems, Li explains. 

“The first time that I ever read the script, I was blown away by it because it felt like such a badass portrayal of Asian Americans,” Li said. “Those two worlds collide, and that's really cool to see.”

Along with acting, Li posts comedy skits for his 231k followers on Instagram. Some of his skits, a couple of which have gotten over 2 million views, place the viewer in a POV situation, where Li parodies real life dating archetypes or Asian stereotypes. Content creation, he says, is a way for him to practice the sheer repetition of being in front of the camera. 

Li says he aims to redefine what being an actor can mean for people. As an actor, opportunities are out of his control, but with writing, producing, and directing his own projects for social media, he gets to have a sense of creative control that challenges him.

From social media, most people know Li as a comedic actor. However, Li comes from a traditional acting background where most of his experience is in drama. He’s drawn to melancholy, and emotions like frustration and anger are ones that feel more real and vivid to him, he says. 

“I think doing ‘The Brothers Sun’ was a perfect combination of all of it. As an actor, if I never do another role in my life, I'll be fully content because I truly feel like I got to do all of it,” Li says. “It’s truly everything I can ever dream of as an actor.” 

Anushka DakshitComment