“Toxic Environment”: Park reveals Hollywood’s racial bias in the ’90s

Actor Stephen Park, who appeared in two episodes of the iconic sitcom Friends, has opened up about experiencing racism on set in the 1990s, a time when discussions about racial discrimination were far less prominent in Hollywood.

In a recent appearance on the Pod Meets World podcast, Park recounted the unsettling experience, calling the atmosphere on set “toxic.”

“Where the F*** is the oriental guy?”: Racism behind the scenes

Park, who appeared in The One with the Chicken Pox in Season 2 and The One with the Ultimate Fighting Champion in Season 3, recalled a deeply offensive moment involving a production assistant.

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“It was at the time, I felt it was kind of a toxic environment,” Park said. He recounted how a crew member referred to his co-star, veteran Asian-American actor James Hong, using a racial slur. “[The AD] was calling him to the set and essentially saying, ‘Where the f*** is the Oriental guy? Get the Oriental guy.’”

Park emphasized that the incident was not isolated but part of a larger issue embedded in Hollywood culture at the time. “This isn’t the first time that this happened, you know, but this is the environment where this is business as usual in Hollywood in 1997, I guess it was. And nobody felt the need to correct this or say anything about it. So this is normal behavior.”

Fighting for change—and facing silence

Determined to expose the racism he experienced, Park sought support from the Screen Actors Guild. However, instead of action, he was advised to “write an article for the L.A. Times.”

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“I started writing this mission statement and I sent it to the L.A. Times. They sent a couple of reporters and interviewed me, and then they never printed it,” he revealed. Frustrated by the lack of response, Park took matters into his own hands, publishing an open letter.

“The letter went viral before ‘viral’ was even a word,” he recalled.

The emotional toll of constantly confronting racial discrimination ultimately led Park to step away from acting. “I had become so race-conscious and so angry that I was looking at everything through the lens of race. I felt like there was no freedom. I didn’t feel any freedom,” he admitted. “So, I didn’t have any idea what I was going to do, but I just decided to drop out. I told everybody, ‘I’m not acting anymore.’”

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Park’s return to the screen

Despite his departure from Hollywood, Park has recently returned to acting. He was most recently seen in Mickey 17, a sci-fi film starring Robert Pattinson.

As for Friends, the beloved sitcom ran for 10 seasons from 1994 to 2004, featuring Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, David Schwimmer, and Matthew Perry. While the show remains a cultural phenomenon, Park’s revelations highlight the troubling racial biases that persisted behind the scenes in the industry at the time.

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