[0:00] Hello, friends. Welcome to another episode of Tell Us a Good Story. Today, we get to talk to one of the most creative people we have ever met. Among his many titles, he is an engineer, hip-hop artist, beatboxer, and film producer, Baldwin Chu. You guys, this man created an award-winning PBS documentary about his family called Far East Deep South, which is fascinating. As you will hear, growing up, Baldwin didn’t know much about his dad’s side of his family. So he traveled to Mississippi to try to find his grandfather’s grave, and he uncovered some amazing stories about his family history down south. Also, Baldwin is an actor and martial artist, which means he has been in a few blockbuster movies such as The Hulk and The Matrix. And listen in as Steph asked Baldwin to prove to her that he is actually a beatboxer. Yeah, he had to prove it, babe. You guys, we can’t wait for to hear this conversation with our new friend, Baldwin Shue. I’m Kevin. And I’m Stephanie. And during our marriage, we have dealt with an electrocution, a brain tumor, brain surgery, then doctors telling us that children were not in our future, followed by miscarriage, and then Kevin’s cancer diagnosis. However, today we live a life completely healed and restored with three healthy children who doctors said were not possible. And we’re here to tell stories that inspire, give hope, and brighten your day. Welcome to Tell Us A Good Story.

[1:21] Okay, friends, before we get to this episode, just a friendly reminder to please hit the subscribe button on YouTube and Apple Podcasts or give us a review. Five stars, please. In our world, this is super, super important because it will help with the algorithm to make it easier for people to find us. And thank you for sharing our posts across your social media. That really helps with engagement and with us getting guests. Yes. So, hey, if you want us to keep working our way up to talking to Chip and Joanna, please share us with your friends. But regardless, thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.

[1:54] Well, friends, our next guest is one of the most creative people we have ever met. He is the producer of the critically acclaimed and award-winning PBS documentary Far East, Deep South. He’s also an engineer, hip-hop artist, and beatboxer known by his MC name, Only One. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to Tell Us a Good Story, Mr. Baldwin Chu. Baldwin Chu. Hey, so good to be here, guys. We are so excited to have you. Thank you so much for saying yes to us. And we were introduced to you by a mutual friend of ours, Bishop Courtney McBath. And so I was on a Zoom call with him. This was maybe two months ago, Baldwin. And he’s like, hey, you know who you should talk to? This guy by the name of Baldwin, too. I’m like, okay, tell me about him. And he starts listing off all this stuff you do, Baldwin. And I go, there’s no way, no way he does all this. He’s like, dude, trust me. So I look you up and I’m like, oh my gosh, you do even more than what he told me about, right from the from the beatboxing to be engineer and all this so how did this all start because you started off in engineering i believe correct yeah i mean i grew up uh i grew up in california sacramento san francisco area and engineering was what i went to school for but i was really into the entertainment and the arts but you know unfortunately that wasn’t really the path that most asian americans went right towards right especially when you’re talking about, I’m going to say it 30 years ago, you know, over 30 years ago, you know, a teenager, you know, it’s not like, oh, hey, mom and dad, you know, what do you want? What do I want to be? I want to be like a rapper.

[3:24] I want to go into music and entertainment and, you know, paycheck to paycheck. And most parents don’t like that idea anyways. But, I mean, a typical Asian-American or Chinese-American parents, they’re like, yeah, probably need to think of something else. So I did the safe route, went to engineering school at Sacramento State. But the caveat was I would go to engineering school, but I would DJ a radio show. Okay. So I had a hip-hop show. It was called H to the Fourth Power. Okay. It was a little engineering, fourth power. I had to get into the math there. But it was four H’s, right? It was the Holy Hip Hop Hour. Oh, nice. So I was playing like Christian hip-hop, R&B, you know, some pop songs. But it was like really cool stuff that I could still mess with music while I was getting an engineering degree. Plus, I learned how to do sound engineering, where I was able to kind of combine both worlds together at that point. Were you performing then on the weekends going through college? Is that how you did you? Yes. On my off time, I would do shows, evenings or weekends, like youth groups, stuff like that.

[4:25] And eventually got my engineering degree. And I started rapping about, you know, because I’m a hip-hop artist, so you got to be real, right? So my friends that are rappers, they were like, man, you ain’t ghetto. You ain’t you know you’re not from the streets you’re like an engineer right so i started, i started rapping about engineering stuff uh i started just geeking out my songs kept it all positive i never used profanity never cussed uh because i wanted to make sure it was clean and for all audiences especially you know youth and stuff like that and then so somebody in my engineering company was like dude you’re like the lyrical engineer i’m just like oh i like that i think that’s my next song. So that was the name of my next album is called the lyrical engineer. Yeah, that was that was fun to be able to just rap about geeky things like thermodynamics, fluids, engineering. And then also just having fun about other topics, you know, God, eating dim sum, because that’s who I am. I love eating dim sum. And just just having a great time with music. But at the same time, you know, paying the bills with my engineering degree. Okay, I got a question for you. If I were to give you like three or four words, could you rap about them right now? Are you one of those artists?

[5:39] I am not a freestyler. Freestyler, that’s what I was trying to think. Yeah, I mean, I’ll do it every once in a while, but that’s not… That’s not my gifting yeah um i could but what i really like to do is like just sit down and really think about stuff i’m always a thinker so i would spend a lot of time writing my rhymes i would have all my notes and then i would compile them so i was very thoughtful in how i would write but i can beatbox on the fly can you oh yeah prove it awesome okay let’s see let’s see how hopefully the mic’s set up okay here okay.

[6:26] Oh my gosh that was amazing well done well done oh that was awesome i was just thinking based on your background baldwin you talked about your friends right saying hey you’re not ghetto you’re like probably Probably the smartest dude out here. When you’re rapping, were people like lost? Like, oh my God, like I have no idea what this guy’s rapping about. Okay. I did this one interview and then I think the hostess was like, you must be the smartest rapper in the world or something like that. Okay. So I think I did something like this. I said, I did one of my geeked out ones. I said, well, you know, it’s tough being an engineer, designing gears and calculating elasticity of sheer. Can’t go on dates because my design project’s late. Be working on site till quarter past eight, nine, sometimes even past midnight. Technicians be tripping, telling me that my beat’s tight. Got to put on that bunny suit in that clean room environment. Class one fab, no particulates or allergens. Working on servos in the motors and robotics with encoders. Got body odor, need a shower. Got no time for freeloaders.

[7:26] Oh, I love it. Have you ever had the opportunity to perform at like an engineering conference or something? Because I’m assuming you are probably everybody’s hero, right? When you get up on stage. We can be cool. Look, this guy can do it. We can do it. So I did graduate with honors. So yes, I am a nerd. Shocker. So Tau Beta Pi is the Engineering National Honor Society. And so I’m a member of the National Honor Society. And so I have spoken at their conference. I’ve rapped. We brought our DJ out. I was rapping about engineering. We had this one song that went viral. There was a song called I Want to Be a Billionaire. Yes. I changed it to I Want to Be an Engineer. And all the geeks loved it.

[8:09] And in fact the dean of engineering at my school went to the white house when obama was the president and he and a bunch of other deans of engineering they went there and he’s like hey we got a problem with our engineering students they’re quitting after their first year and so obama had this engineering initiative called stay with it it’s like hey don’t quit engineering stay with it right and then the dean of my school was like hey you know there’s this guy who just did like I want to be an engineer. He’s like the lyrical engineer, one of our graduates. You should check out his stuff. And then so I guess his team looked at it and they’re like, oh, we should get you to be a spokesperson for Stay With It’s engineering program. So I got to do that for a couple of years and, you know, just shoot some videos for them, you know, the day in the life of a mechanical engineer. And I would rap about engineering stuff and geek it out a little bit. Then I used hip hop and music and videos to kind of encourage that to the students.

[9:01] Okay, so your MC name is only one. Right. Where does that come from? Yeah, so so when I was rapping people would always say like man, you’re like the only one that’s Chinese and you’re rapping You’re the only one that’s a rapper and you’re not like a gang member You’re the only one that’s rapping and you think you could rap about God and not cuss You’re the only rapper that’s going to school and you’re gonna be an engineer. You’re the only one doing this You are so outside the box That you will surely fail, And I was hearing this from family, friends, just, you know, the community members. But I felt like God wouldn’t give me this desire, this passion, this gifting just to throw it away. Right. And not just to bury my talents.

[9:41] So I thought about it for a while and I was praying. And then finally, this revelation came and I was like, I’m going to change the number one, only one to one W-O-N. Meaning that though I’m only one person, I haven’t lost to the pressures of the world, but I’ve won because of the only one. and I felt like God was just my reason. He was my source of wanting to be different, not like everyone else. I’m gonna keep pressing.

[10:05] Steph, did you know that Tell Us A Good Story has a YouTube channel? Wait, seriously? So apparently you don’t watch it. Absolutely not. That’s what I thought. But it’s because you know I don’t like to watch myself. That’s true. That is true. But friends, we have a YouTube channel we would love for you to check out. So if you would like to see video clips of us with prior guests. Or some entire episodes. Or videos of my wife here scaring guests with her excitement. Oh, that too. You can see all of that by going to YouTube and searching Tell Us a Good Story. And don’t forget to hit the subscribe button. Yes. But as always, you guys, thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.

[10:41] So one of the things you’re known for is the PBS documentary that you did called Far East, Deep South. Right. And so it’s about the segregation that took place down south. Now, when I think of Mississippi, I don’t think of this large Chinese population down there, but can you share with listeners and us what you found, right? Because I believe you were looking to your family history because you didn’t know a lot about your dad’s side of the family. And can you share what happened after you kind of went down that rabbit hole? Yeah, I mean, we grew up not having grandparents really around. I didn’t have any grandparents that I knew of other than my mom’s stepmom. But my father never talked about his family. And, you know, it was just something we never talked about. But we heard at one point that he said that his father or my grandfather was in Mississippi and he was buried there. But never wanted to talk about it whenever we asked. And so, I want to say 10 years ago or so, my brother says, hey, let’s go to Mississippi for my parents’ 40th anniversary. Let’s just see what’s in Mississippi, maybe lay some flowers out. And if we find the stone, then great. Then we’ll pay our respects and we’ll go home.

[11:50] Little did we know that all these things started happening when we showed up in Mississippi. We would meet these people who would be like, we know your grandfather. Oh, you should talk to so-and-so. And then the community was just so tight-knit that they started calling everybody. And as we were meeting people, more people would come out and they would send us back to this museum. And there was a Chinese museum in Cleveland, Mississippi. And so as this is all happening, my wife was looking around. She starts filming. She tells me and my brother to start filming. And we had a camera ready that we were filming just for ourselves anyways. But now she’s more intentional. And eventually we find my grandfather and great-grandfather’s grave. We meet all these people. We find this amazing story.

[12:34] Spoiler alert. we find this very incredible book that’s in Mississippi. I’ll just say it, but it’s called, it’s the Bible. We found a Chinese Bible in Mississippi. So if you watch the film, it’s actually, it’s on PBS, it’s on Tubi, it’s on Canopy, it’s on Xfinity, several platforms and more. But that’s just one of the revelations that we discovered. We learned about the interconnected history between the Chinese and the black communities. We learned that segregation and Jim Crow laws also applied to the Chinese during that time. They couldn’t go to the white school. schools either. But then we also learned about the Chinese Exclusion Act, which was this other part of this dark history in our country, which we never learned about, which prevented Chinese from becoming citizens, did not allow them to own land, did not allow them to have labor jobs. So they found this little niche to stay in the U.S.

[13:23] By running grocery stores. And those grocery stores ended up being a very important asset to the black community because they couldn’t really shop or be treated well in the white stores, unfortunately. And when they were buying stuff back from the commissaries on the plantations, now that slavery had been abolished, they would just rip off the black community. And so all of a sudden this whole weird law that was meant to kick Chinese people out of the country, allowed them to find this loophole of working grocery stores, which then the black community was like, oh it’s safer to go to Chinese stores and then they started having this bond in this community and together they go through this dark time in our country’s history and you know we meet all these people that are you know not just Chinese but they’re black they’re white they’re Italian they’re Jewish and Lebanese people all in Mississippi and we’re like wow how did this diverse group of people like what are they or what were they doing in Mississippi so um so we decided to document the film. My wife directed it. We eventually made Far East Deep South. We tested it in the market with a short film called Finding Cleveland at first, but, and that did super well. So then we did this film Far East Deep South that came out during, unfortunately, COVID.

[14:34] But, but the good thing about that was that we were able to just jump onto the virtual screenings. We were able to meet with a lot more people from across the country, from the comforts of our own home, without traveling. And it just opened up this great story about how even in our darkest moments in our country’s past, we would find ways to come together. What’s one of the craziest things you learned while doing this documentary? Wow. I mean, we learned so many things. When we were in Mississippi, what we discovered was that there were black, white, and Chinese all living together. Italians and Jews weren’t considered white back then but they are white today right they can be white passing today but back then you had different looking people all together, oddly enough, united under segregation, right? Isn’t that kind of strange? It is. But then understanding that we have a shared history, I think that was the part that was fascinating to us is that we found that our history is more shared. We have more in common than we have different. And if we just allow those commonalities to unite us, then those differences really just make us all more beautiful and it gives us more opportunities to learn more things about each other. Mm-hmm. So that first trip to Mississippi, how long did it end up being then? Like you started getting passed along to a bunch of different people. How long were you actually there? Well, the first time we were there, I think we were only there for just for a few days, less than a week.

[15:57] And then we just started making multiple trips. We made about six or seven more trips out to Mississippi. Then we went to different parts of the country to meet people from Mississippi that now live elsewhere other than Mississippi. And so it took us about six years to finally finish the film where we made multiple trips and met with different people and historians, and just got greater context of that area and the people. What did you learn about your ancestors? Any stories from them? Yeah, man, major spoiler alerts, but you still got to watch the movies. We absolutely will. Yes, absolutely.

[16:29] So what I thought growing up my entire life was that I was the first one born here. My entire life growing up, I was the first one in my family to be born in the United States. I was so proud of that. And so the spoiler is that we found out that my great grandfather was actually born here in the US in the 1800s. And so I went from being a first generation born in the United States to now my family has been in this country for five or six generations.

[16:59] Wow. And those stories hit our family hard and it really redefined our identity about who I am, what my place is in this world and in this country. And how am I going to raise my daughter up where she can identify her ethnic heritage of Chinese, but also embrace who she fully is as an American and be so proud of that. Now, once this was released, right, during COVID, it became an award-winning documentary. So what are some of the cool stories, I guess, or experiences that you heard from people that actually watched it after it was released? Yeah. So we would do Zoom calls for like Q&A sessions after film festivals that were virtual. And people would pop onto these virtual film festivals and say, oh my gosh, I’m from Mississippi. Oh, I have family from Mississippi. You’d have people that were Chinese saying that. And then you’d have people that were white or black also coming on these calls saying, like, I remember the Chinese family in your film. Or I remember other Chinese families. And then people would contact us and say, do you know so-and-so? Do you know so-and-so? And they would just bring, it would just be this, almost like this Mississippi reunion at every single film festival, every single screening we’d go to. People would just come out and be like, I’m from Mississippi. I knew that person. It was those amazing stories that we would get that are testimonials. Testimonials and then people would say thank you for finally telling our story you know telling the story that hasn’t been told before and it was just really eye-opening to know that our story which we thought.

[18:25] Maybe it wouldn’t even impact anybody. Maybe it would only impact our family. But to see the millions of people that have watched our film and thousands of people that are emailing us and contacting us, it’s been very rewarding. And it feels like, you know, we’re doing some good. All right, Baldwin, for all of our guests, I like to give a list of fun facts to let listeners know what you’ve done, what you’ve accomplished. And you’ve already stolen multiple of the fun facts that I had here. All right. So thank you for doing that in the opening of this. Let’s find more. Let’s find more. Yeah. All right. Okay. And Steph is not aware of any of these. Okay. So you’re going to see her genuine reaction to these. And if I’m wrong, please keep me honest. Okay. Okay. Feel free to correct me. All right, Steph. Fun fact. Basically number five of my list here that I had.

[19:11] Baldwin and his wife have made some very funny music videos that have attracted the attention of fans plus CNN in the Discovery Channel. Okay. The video that he mentioned earlier, I want to be an engineer, is a parody of the song Billionaire. It became a viral hit on YouTube and currently has over 1.2 million views. Oh, my goodness. That’s just on YouTube, too. Yes. Okay, so what was that like, that experience going viral? And all of a sudden, you’ve got media companies reaching out to you to do interviews. Because if this was happening to us, I would be like, okay, this is a prank. So what was that experience like, Baldwin?

[19:46] Yeah, well, first of all, the first one, we went sort of like we did a parody of American Boy, which we’d made into Cantonese Boy. That was the first time me and my wife did like a little duet thing because we were both we were both solo artists when we met she was a singer songwriter and i was just hip-hop right and so that was the first thing we did was cantonese boy which we switched from american boy that kanye west song and that did pretty well as well and then so we said oh let’s do the skin so when billionaire came out we did that and then i remember i was still doing my engineering job i did i want to be an engineer i had a guy working for us he said okay we’re going to launch on this day but i know you’re gonna be at a client’s location. So I’m doing my engineering job consulting. My clients know what I’m doing. They’ve heard my music before. So I was in a meeting, in a client meeting, an engineering meeting. This is a big client. This client is huge. And in the meeting, I started getting text messages saying like, oh my gosh, we released. It’s at 200 views. I’ll go, oh, 200 views, that’s good. And then I get another text. They’re like, it’s at 500. I’m like, what? And then I get another, I’m in the meeting, 1,000. 2,000, right? I’m getting all these text messages and finally it said like 10,000 views. I’m like, what? And then people in the room were like, what’s going on? What’s going on? I was like, then they said they started watching it on their phone or on their computers. At that time, the phones weren’t super prevalent for that, but they were watching it on their computers at their desks on the cubicles.

[21:08] And it started going up and then all of a sudden it froze. And then I get this text saying like, it stopped. Like no one’s watching it anymore. And I’m like, what’s going on? So we’re texting and then we’re going online checking my account and then they said they froze your account what youtube froze your account and then they said um someone the guy was working for me said like they’re trying to verify that you’re not a bot like you’re not just like getting fake views right but i’m getting yeah so but i’m getting text messages from other engineering saying oh i love the video the video was still going but the count wasn’t going anymore, and then all of a sudden it jumps to like a hundred thousand views they’re like oh they reactivated it and it was just going crazy crazy and then then i get a call or i get an email from someone from cnn and they’re just talking about like how all these engineers were coming together and they’re just like oh this is so fun and then let’s do an interview tomorrow and that’s okay great let’s do this interview and then i get a call the next day it’s like hey we gotta postpone this interview there’s some war going on in israel right now and i gotta jump on that right oh okay and then they jumped i don’t remember i don’t i mean israel’s always in war right right right so so they jumped on that one and then they never came back oh no they’re like oh okay that’s that was like two weeks ago we’ve moved on to the next story you’ve already hit your million, oh no i was like oh shoot.

[22:36] All right, next fun fact. In addition to being a performer, he’s also a professional actor and advanced level martial artist. Of course he is. Who has appeared in films such as The Pursuit of Happiness. Oh! The Hulk. And The Matrix. What? Okay, Baldwin, you have to have some stories about being in one of those films. What has been your experience in any of those films? You’ve got to have some good stories. Oh, man. Just one story? As many as you want. As many as you want. Oh, okay. You have our attention. Well, Matrix really started it off because that was, I mean, it’s a big name blockbuster thing. Everyone knew Matrix. And all I did was, just to be honest, all I did was background extra. Okay. But that started it all off, and that was an unbelievable experience because we had all these extras, and we come on set. And my thought at that point was, I’m a martial artist. Maybe they’ll, like, upgrade me to, like, a stunt role. I didn’t know how that all worked, right? I just thought you’d just show up and maybe that’s how you get discovered.

[23:37] So there’s all us extras out there. And surprisingly enough, I wasn’t the only one that had that idea. There was a lot of martial artists that were just extras. And so there would be people just doing like kicks and flips and stuff like that. And they’d be like play sparring, fighting, right, during the breaks and stuff like that. And I remember I went on set with a couple of my students from my school. And they were really gung-ho about martial arts. and I was one of the teachers at that point. He was like, hey, you should go. Go show him what’s up, right? I was like, no, no, it’s okay. I’m just going to do my thing. I’m going to watch and observe. And then he goes out and he tells these other extras, oh, you really want to see a martial arts? You should go check him. Go fight him. I’m like, dude, don’t say that. We’re like. Go fight that guy over there. We’re filming on a military base, right? Out for the scene. I’m like, yeah, I don’t want to get. And so these guys, like, just in a serious but playful kind of a way, were like, okay, let’s see what he can do. And I was really focused on Tai Chi at that time. And then these guys all of a sudden jumped me and, like, throwing punches. But they’re not like they’re trying to really beat me up, but they’re just trying to see my reaction. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I remember my student in the background was like, oh.

[24:53] And I remember, like, the guy comes out, and I block him, and I lock his arms together. And then I see the other guy coming so he comes out. I have his arms here The other guy comes out with my other arm I block his other arm and I lock them both and I bring them together and I got both of these guys together And I push them out of the way and I got these two guys and then everyone’s watching and they’re just like oh, Okay, can I get back to my like craft services because the food is like really good.

[25:26] That was pretty fun, but that was just the beginning. So that kicked things off. The Hulk was fun because, this is a great story. Do you have time for this story? Oh, yes, absolutely. Please. Okay, this is a great story. So, Ang Lee was directing the Hulk movie. That was the first Hulk movie with Jennifer Connelly, Eric Bana. And I get a call from my agent saying, like, hey, we got a problem. We’re shooting the Hulk. We don’t have any Asian people that are in our film. And Ang Lee is saying, you can’t make an authentic, accurate movie in San Francisco with no Asian people. So yeah so they said like do you have any weapons experience or training and fighting or anything i was like yeah of course i do right i at that point i had actually um i did basic training with the army okay and so i had military weapons training so i said yeah that’s on my resume they’re like great let’s uh let’s bring you on to be on the fbi and on the swat team you’re gonna hunt down the hulk we just need more asian people i was like awesome right yes so they trained me i I remember they brought me on to like me and a bunch of other people. Like we had a SWAT team, about like 15 guys. And actually an actual SWAT sergeant from LAPD came, an ex-Navy SEAL came up. Oh, wow. And we get this intense one-week training of how to clear rooms, how to hold weapons correctly, how to like line up. And we ran drills as if we were actual SWAT and FBI teams.

[26:51] And that was just amazing, like being able to do all that work. And then it’s like, okay, now we’re going to go on set and we’re going to do this with the Hulk. Okay, so then you did it with, how long’s the scene then within the film? We had a few scenes. We had one scene where we were FBI. So that was maybe like a minute and a half or something like that. And then we had the other scene with the Hulk. And that was the big scene where the Hulk is in San Francisco, jumps out of the water, lands at the top of the hill by the Lombard Street, the crookedest street in the world, right? Yeah. He’s there. And then we’re running up the hill trying to take him down. Then we have all these other, like, army people and cops. But then the SWAT team was the one to, like, close in on him. So that scene was about, I’d say, like a minute and a half. Oh, it was? Just running. Okay. And that was fun because there was no Hulk. He’s CGI. Right. Yes. Right? So we had to pretend he was there, and the guy was standing with a stick with a cardboard cutout with a Hulk head. And they were like, just aim at his head or aim high, right? And just don’t aim at the little guy that’s holding the stick.

[27:58] So you had to act. You barely had to act. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when that comes out, how do you watch it? Do they give you a rough cut? Do you go to like a red carpet event? Or you have to go to the theater yourself to actually see if you’re even in the movie or it’s been cut? Yeah. For that one, I mean, I’m not big time enough for that at that point, right? So I’m just like bonus people, right? So I had to go pay my own ticket. A bunch of friends went into the theater. We watched it on the first day. I’m just like, did I get cut? Did I get cut? There I am. There I am. And like all my friends are like, there you are.

[28:31] So that was fun. So every time you saw your face, was everyone, like all of your friends cheering? Oh, I bet. Had to be. There he is. Here’s the bad part. I was wearing a SWAT mask. So you couldn’t really see my face. But people that knew me knew the way I walked. They could kind of tell. And then if I pointed out, later on I got the DVD and I freeze-framed it. They’re like, oh, we could totally tell that’s you. But in the heat of the action, you probably couldn’t tell. I could tell because I knew where I was. That’s interesting, though. They’re looking specifically for an Asian-American. And then they cover you up so you can’t tell. But then they cover you up, yeah. Exactly. They totally cover you up so it defeats the purpose. Exactly. Well, there was this one scene where, actually, I didn’t do that scene because I had to travel down to LA. There was another scene where the same team came and then they had their helmets off. So the SWAT team did go into another scene in that movie where they did not have the face mask. And there were several other Asians on there, too. So you could see them. And there were some people were like, hey, I think I saw you. No, we just all look alike. That woman was not me. That was the other Asian guy. but yeah.

[29:42] If you like what you hear please tell someone about us as soon as this episode is over go tell your spouse your closest friend a parent a co-worker or share one of our posts on social media however if you don’t like what you’re hearing please do not don’t tell anyone don’t tell anyone don’t tell anybody just disregard this message don’t worry about it forget about us go on with your merry day and to get more information about us or our entire catalog of episodes Be sure to check us out at kevinandsteph.com. Thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.

[30:12] Well, basically, all the other fun facts I had, he already took earlier when he was talking about things. But the final one I have is Baldwin co-founded Giant Flashlight Media with his wife and favorite duet partner, which focuses on shining a light on important stories through film, digital media, and music. So can you tell us more about your company and some of the projects that you’re currently working on? Yeah. So, I mean, you basically described the company very well. Good job. Thank you.

[30:42] We do have another project that we’re working on right now. Obviously, Fars Deep South is still keeping us really busy. The film is about my father and our discovery, and unfortunately, my father did pass away last month. So we’re kind of working through how we do these upcoming screenings in order to just do them in his honor. So we’re still doing that because there’s still a lot of attention on the film. And, of course, we don’t want this film to ever get old. We think until everybody sees a film, you know, the film’s going to, we’re going to keep on moving with the film. But in additional to Faris Deep South, we have another film right now that’s on a Chinese American Mississippian. She’s in her late 80s. Her name is Virginia Wing. This next project is a documentary on her because she’s been working in entertainment for like over 60 something years. And she’s this Chinese American with a deep southern accent from the south, from Mississippi, who’s worked, you know, from L.A., Hollywood TV to New York, Broadway, stuff like theater, live theater and commercials and everything.

[31:42] And she’s got this amazing story of this journey of being the first person of color to ever enter the miss mississippi pageant oh wow um yeah being on johnny carson the tonight show right the original og yes night show right being on the twice but a lot of us don’t know who she is uh again it’s it’s shining a light on an important story that has never been seen before it’s it’s someone that has significance someone that can really encourage future generations you know like my little daughter for her to see like oh wow someone’s been doing this for a long time um that’s that’s incredible and if she you know let’s say little little girls want to you know little asian girls might want to go into the entertainment industry some point and maybe they’ll they’ll they’ll see that oh well this is a person that i can kind of be like but also understand the struggles that she had being a chinese american um so we’re excited about this new story we’re excited to go out to new york and film and just meet all these people in industry so So that’s our newest film that’s coming out that we’re working on right now. Well, listeners, for more information about Baldwin, you can go to his Facebook. It’s at Only One. Now, one is spelled W-O-N. His Instagram is Only One M-C. And his website, which I got a lot of this information from, is OnlyOne.com. And we’ll put links in our show notes and on our website so you can go right to those pages.

[33:03] Well, Baldwin. Go ahead. Oh, I was going to say, and definitely also just go to GiantFlashlight.com. that not only has my music stuff, but it has what we’re doing in film and consulting and speaking. It gives people an opportunity to dive deeper into what we’re doing with our company and all the different things that we’re attacking.

[33:19] Well, Baldwin, I’m so thankful we were introduced to you. And again, the 50 things that you’re involved with, I knew you were going to have some good stories. So thank you for saying yes to us. Oh, thank you guys for having me. I had a great time.

[33:33] Friends, we want to encourage you to please follow us wherever you listen to this, whether it’s on the Apple Podcast app, iHeartRadio, Spotify, or one of the other platforms. You guys, it’s completely free. And while you’re there, feel free to give us a rating or a nice review. Thank you for listening, too. Tell us a good story. There’s nothing that our country needs more than learning our history and who came to our shores. The first Asians came to this land in 1587, broke their backs working with their hands indentured servants and even slaves. But quietly this country was paved Exclusion laws tried to suppress and kick us We fought for you America All we did was What? What?

[34:12] Music.

[35:08] There’s nothing like sweating in the city Except no one ever stopped or paused to call us pretty Excuse me miss, I know about the railroads Left out of the.

[35:15] Music. saying all that And they thought it was funny Took all of their money, blew up our daddies and mines Goodbye sonny I’ve been reading Common Sense by Thomas Paine So men say that I’m intense or I’m insane.

[35:16] Pictures, now where did we all go? They said we ate rats, today they say bats They aiming to be blaming when they

[35:32] Music.