The actor and comic, star of the brand new Netflix stand-up particular 'Ronny Chieng: Speakeasy,' talks about his cherished Seiko 6139 Lee timepieces: "That is the way in which I can categorical my fandom."
Ronny Chieng is having a second, from his Netflix specials (2019’s Asian Comic Destroys America! and the just-released Ronny Chieng: Speakeasy) to his ongoing The Hope You Get Wealthy comedy tour and roles in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (as flossed-out struggle membership proprietor Jon Jon), Younger Rock and Doogie Kamealoha, M.D.
In reality, it’s going so nicely, it may be seen on Chieng’s wrist. When he joined The Day by day Present With Trevor Noah in 2015 as a correspondent, he celebrated by getting himself an Omega Speedmaster “First Omega in House” watch, a 2012 mannequin based mostly on an Omega worn on the Mercury-Atlas 8 mission in 1962.
“I didn’t notice it on the time, [but] it marked my transferring to America and becoming a member of the American establishment that's The Day by day Present. It additionally marked me form of changing into a bit extra skilled, by way of how I view my function in present enterprise. On the time, I used to be nonetheless within the very frugal mindset of, ‘I’m simply going to purchase one watch and that’s it.’ My dad had one watch, so I’m going to simply have one watch too. However with the Speedmaster, I beloved they used the watch in a human endeavor — going to the moon — and it appears stylish and it’s understated.” And, provides the comedian with a smile, “Face it, nobody goes to homicide you on your Speedmaster.”
As he’s grown his assortment (a mixture of classic and new items), the New York-based Chieng, 36, has taken inspiration from different collectors in Hollywood, together with actor-producer Daniel Dae Kim. “Like all hobbies, you take a look at what different established persons are doing and also you get impressed by them. Clearly, you don’t go all out and replica them for numerous causes — both monetary or the very fact all of us have completely different tastes — however I like to take a look at different guys who're within the watch-collecting interest and see what they're into. Daniel Dae Kim was somebody who, once I bought to know him, would present me watches. He was a watch man earlier than I used to be into it, and I'd ask him hey, ‘What you do take into consideration this watch?’ He’d be like, ‘sure, sure, no, no,'” says Chieng.
A few of Chieng’s most prized items are two Seiko 6139 Bruce Lees, a reputation that collectors have given to classic examples of the automated chronograph worn prominently by the motion star beginning within the late Sixties. Rising up in Malaysia, Chieng recollects being conscious of Bruce Lee as “an Asian film star. I used to be all the time a fan of Bruce Lee,” he says.
But it surely was solely when Chieng moved to the U.S. that he realized “how a lot white folks beloved him or how Asian People seen him as an icon. We didn’t absolutely perceive that in Asia. I simply knew him as a badass film star who was superior. It’s solely once I got here to America did I notice, ‘Oh, man, this dude was combating all these battles to inform an genuine story again within the day — the ’60s and ’70s.’ And it’s a battle that we nonetheless struggle. I imply, I’ve personally fought these battles many instances to attempt to inform an genuine story in America, so I can solely think about what this man was going by years in the past, in order that made me respect him much more. I noticed the documentary Be Water by Bao Nguyen and it actually spoke to me, after which I grew to become a good greater fan,” explains Chieng,
“From there,” continues Chieng, “I noticed that Daniel Dae Kim had a Bruce Lee watch, and I assumed to myself, ‘Now it’s on, that is the way in which I can categorical my fandom.’ It’s only a stylish watch. It doesn’t say ‘Bruce Lee’ on it, it’s a Seiko, so once more, that’s extra Asian pleasure in there,” says Chieng, who sourced his Seikos by Los Angeles-based DC Classic Watches. He additionally works with seller Eric Wind of Palm Seaside, Florida’s Wind Classic to accumulate items. (It was Kim who first launched Chieng to Wind.)
“Ronny and I've an extended esoteric and dorky textual content thread on [the Seiko] 6139, he has an actual ardour for watches,” says Nicholas Ferrell of Los Angeles-based DC Classic Watches, who additionally has sourced Bruce Lee Seiko fashions for Kim and for The Good Physician star Will Yun Lee.
Chieng’s timepiece assortment features a Rolex Submariner generally known as the “Hulk” for its inexperienced bezel, a classic “Root Beer” two-tone Rolex GMT-Grasp I and some items from his late father, together with a surprising late-Fifties Omega Seamaster, a two-tone Omega Constellation and a two-tone Rolex Datejust.
Chieng admits, although, that the two-tone Rolex isn’t a method he would have gravitated to on his personal. “In Asia, everybody may be very Rolex heavy. There’s numerous gold and two-tone watches, which I are likely to keep away from,” he says. “I want I might say romantically that my dad handed his design aesthetic to me, however the fact is, we now have very completely different tastes. I'd by no means pick a two-tone Rolex Datejust in a retailer, however the truth that he gave it to me makes me put on it proudly. It’s an homage to him.”
Requested if he's going to buy one thing new to have fun his newest Netflix particular, Chieng laughs. “We will discover all kinds of excuses to purchase watches, and you may mark any event, a lot so that you that may join it to something — it’s nearly just like the Kevin Bacon quantity, six levels of watch amassing — for those who really need that watch, you’ll discover a option to join it to your life.”
He provides that he’s not nervous about his watch assortment dropping worth over time: “The good factor about present enterprise is that we now have a hack to make issues rather more invaluable. All I've to do is put on the watch whereas I’m performing and it immediately features some worth.”
A model of this story first appeared within the April 13 situation of The Hollywood Reporter journal. Click on right here to subscribe.