Back in 2014, between the first and second seasons of the HBO comedy series Silicon Valley in which he had a supporting role, Jimmy O. Yang spent his days moonlighting as an Uber driver.

The Hong Kong-born Hollywood hopeful used a pay cheque for his role in the series as Jian-Yang – he received the Screen Actors Guild minimum of US$900 a day – to buy a used Toyota Prius hybrid, which he would drive around Los Angeles to earn the money to pay his rent.

“You never know, especially as an actor, where your next pay cheque comes from,” he tells the Post. Only when he was promoted to a series regular did he finally feel he had the safety net he had long desired. “At least now all my rent will be paid for,” he recalls thinking.

Fast forward a decade and O. Yang has achieved the rarefied success that eludes many Asian actors in Hollywood. It was a long time coming.

Towards the end of Silicon Valley’s run, he appeared as the scene-stealing Bernard Tai in Crazy Rich Asians (2018). Three years later, he starred as the main love interest in Love Hard, and finally became number one on the call sheet for the action comedy series Interior Chinatown, which premiered last year on Hulu and Disney+ to rave reviews.

At the same time, his stand-up comedy tours – clips from O. Yang’s Amazon Prime specials Good Deal (2020) and Guess How Much? (2023) have gone viral – catapulted O. Yang into the social media spotlight.