From Singapore stage to Hollywood: Actor Yao brings the South-east Asian experience to Sinners

Malaysian actor Yao plays grocer Bo Chow in his Hollywood movie debut Sinners. PHOTO: WBEI

John Lui

UPDATED Apr 16, 2025, 04:22 PM

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SINGAPORE – In the horror thriller Sinners, in a dream-like musical sequence set in a 1930s music hall, the cultures of the American South, both past and present, swirl about on the dance floor, moving to the same beat.

Among the African musicians, dancers and blues players of the 1930s, moviegoers will see figures from Chinese opera. In the troupe is a dancer in costume as Sun Wukong, the mythological Monkey King.

Malaysian actor Yao, who plays grocer Bo Chow in his Hollywood movie debut, was asked by the creative team to propose iconic figures that the Asian diaspora would recognise.

“I wanted to name someone who would be known by people from Vietnam and the Philippines, the whole region, not just China. So it had to be Sun Wukong,” says Yao, speaking to The Straits Times on a Zoom call from his home in Brooklyn, New York.