Jenny Kwak

Daniel K. Isaac is best known for his ensemble role on the Showtime series Billions where he plays portfolio manager Ben Kim. But 2022 was a pivotal year for the actor and playwright, whose passion is the stage. He starred in The Chinese Lady at the Public Theater; he made his playwriting debut with Once Upon a (korean) Time for the Ma-Yi Theater Company; and he’s currently starring opposite Linda Lavin in You Will Get Sick at the Roundabout Theater. Daniel was born in Southern California, the only child of a single mother active in her evangelical Korean church. As a gay teenager, he struggled against his sexual orientation and even underwent conversion therapy. (Spoiler alert: It did not work.) In a candid, funny and yes, raunchy, conversation he opens up about his early sexual experiences, his estrangement from his father and his ongoing conflict with his mother, who disowned him when he was in college and is still “in the closet” about being the mom of a gay son — despite the fact that Isaac has turned many of her remarks into the viral hashtag #accordingtomymother. Prepare to laugh, cry and cover your young children’s ears.

Marie Myung-Ok Lee is the author of the acclaimed novel The Evening Hero, a darkly comic story about a Korean American doctor in rural Minnesota facing retirement and the resurgence of long-buried secrets from his past. A professor of creative writing at Columbia, Marie grew up in the rural town of Hibbing, MN, in a community very much like the one in her novel, where her father was the area’s only anesthesiologist. In a lively conversation with Juliana and Catherine at her home on the Upper West Side, Marie shares stories about her parents (who were among the earliest Korean immigrants to the States, arriving in 1953) and their determination to raise their four children to be as assimilated as possible, not even revealing their Korean names. Juliana and Catherine hear about Marie’s short-lived days as a pre-med student at Brown, her post-grad years at Goldman Sachs while working on her first book (the YA novel Finding My Voice) and the origins of the influential Asian American Writers’ Workshop, which she co-founded with three friends at a downtown diner 31 years ago. They also discuss Marie’s lively social media profile and her now-famous advocacy for cannabis treatment to treat severe autism, inspired by her son, Jason.

Kathleen Kim is the talented puppeteer behind Ji-Young, the electric guitar-playing, ddukbokki-eating seven-year-old Muppet character who made her debut on Sesame Street last fall. Kathy was born in Flushing, Queens to parents who immigrated to the States in the 1970s. Puppeteering was just a hobby until 2014, when Kathy — who had been working as a reality TV producer — was accepted into a program at Sesame Workshop and found herself fast-tracked into the niche world of professional puppetry. Kathy tells Juliana and Catherine how she first fell in love with the craft; what it’s like working on set alongside Cookie Monster, the Honkers and Abby Cadabby; and her experience hearing from so many Asian Americans about what the existence of a character like Ji-Young has meant to them.