Anthony Kirwan never intended to be a beacon of queer representation for Iranian and Filipino Americans. But with his recent roles as the romantic lead of a gay protagonist in Hulu's "Love, Victor" and as an All-American athlete at an international Korean school in Netflix's "XO, Kitty," Keyvan, 24, has become Part of the next cast. A generation of actors wants to make television representation more widespread.
"I feel like I won the lottery in a lot of ways," Kevan, who has been acting for the better part of the past two decades, said of the audience's response to his diverse roles. “This is a responsibility I will take on again and again because I know it affects people in such a positive way.”
"XO, Kitty," a spinoff of author Jenny Han's acclaimed "To All the Boys" film trilogy, returns for a second season on Netflix on Thursday. The series follows Covey's youngest sister, teenage matchmaker Katie (Anna Cathcart), who attends the fictional Korean International School in Seoul and attempts to reconnect with her late mother's roots. Keyvan plays Quincy "Q" Shabazian, an openly gay star track athlete and American exchange student who becomes Kitty's best friend and closest confidant.
Like the original "To All the Boys" movie, "XO, Kitty" centers on a young Asian-American woman. But in expanding her fictional universe, Han hopes to further enrich the spin-off series by introducing characters of different races and genders. At the end of season one, Kitty finds herself developing feelings for her ex-boyfriend and two classmates, and realizes she's bisexual. In the second installment, Katie navigates an increasingly complicated love life at school—mostly with the help of Q—while searching for her estranged extended family in South Korea.
Other coming-of-age dramas starring LGBTQ characters may focus on the anxieties inherent in coming out, but Keevan said he believes "XO, Kitty"'s emphasis on queerness as a non-issue "gives young queer people hope or question". People think their lives don't have to be a certain way. "
"We're so used to the fact that the queer experience is a very traumatic thing for people, and that coming out stories are also extremely painful, confusing and difficult to navigate. While this is true for many people, seeing it differently It’s a refreshing perspective,” said Kevan, whose character falls in love with an athletic rival in the new season. “In ‘XO, Kitty,’ queerness is normalized and it’s no longer something that’s looked down upon or something that you feel you need to suppress with our characters.”
Around the time he landed the role in early 2022, Kiwan sat down with then-showrunners Han Rothchild and Sascha Rothchild to discuss his character's trajectory . It was during that meeting that Kiwan asked the writers to make Q half-Filipino and half-Iranian like himself — an idea he says was immediately embraced. But two seasons in, Keevan said, Q, despite being considered one of the main characters, is still very much "a superficial character" who "helps move the plot forward" in addition to almost any other character. There isn't any backstory. Some family references — a pointed criticism he said he'd be keen to discuss with the writers in a potential third season.
Still, "XO, Kitty" feels like a natural continuation of Keyvan's mission to bring parts of his own identity to his work. He rose to prominence in 2021 for his role as Raheem, a high school student who struggles to come out to his devout Muslim parents and to protagonist Victor Salazar (Michael Simi) in Love, Victor. (Nuo) for advice. (Kevan was cast after the producers decided to make his character Iranian-American.) Kevan said that while casting a new potential love interest for the title character, he also received his fair share of critics, playing Rashi. Mu marks the first time in his career that his work "directly affects how people see themselves and how they move through the world."
"To hear that people from a Middle Eastern background or a Muslim background feel like they're being seen by a queer person who looks like them on TV, I can't even describe to you what an honor it is," Kiwan said, adding, and Like anyone his age, he enjoys following his fans' messages, comments, and video edits. "In a lot of these countries, it's illegal to be gay or part of the queer community, so they have to keep repressing themselves. To see a character like Raheem in 'Love, Victor' be so outward, It’s so unapologetic and will definitely resonate with a lot of people.”
For Kiwan, the growing interest in more diverse stories is a sign of changing times. As a "racially ambiguous" young actor, Keevan was often cast to play Latino or Hispanic characters - "I'm not," he reiterated - but he "hardly" got any auditions for mixed-race roles, often instead Obtain parts labeled "Open Race".
Kiwan said having a creative team that's deeply committed to "creating a world full of diversity and inclusion" and creating characters authentically will ultimately go a long way in bridging that gap.
"There are a lot of biracial people in the world, and I think it's more and more common now, but at least when I was auditioning, there were almost no biracial people on television," he said. "So it's nice to see that our main character, Anna, is not only a mixed person playing a mixed person, but that I can also do that on the same show and have it be normalized and celebrated."
Although he longs to one day be able to tell his and his immigrant parents’ stories, Kevan is acutely aware of the realities of the industry. While the Asian community has made significant progress in recent years, Keevan noted that other minority groups still lag in visibility in Hollywood, in large part because studios are unwilling to fully commit to having diverse groups.
"It almost feels like a lot of times the industry does this for a few years and they're like, 'Okay, we represent you, we give you this,' and then they move on to the next marginalized community," he said, noting Latino-dominated shows like "Love, Victor" and "One Day at a Time" have yet to be replaced by new shows. “I worry that sometimes it’s just a hiccup or a little bit of time for us Asians to make a mark in the industry, and then they move on to the next (group).
"I do think there's still a lot of work to be done," he added. "I feel like with the new generation of creatives coming in, I'm more hopeful that we can get the equality we deserve in the industry. I see a lot of things that give me hope, but I guess we just have to keep working on it and keep talking about it. "