The Diplomat

Daniel Dae Kim built a career by picking his battles, walking away from a job only when the inequities got too big to ignore. He still believes Hollywood can be reformed.

- E. Alex Jung

DANIEL DAE KIM’S CAREER is a study in the steady accumulation of power. His dream role, as a budding actor in NYU’s theater program, was to play Henry V, Shakespeare’s sure-footed military king. Instead, he made his way in the ’90s with small TV jobs and meatier parts with Asian American theater groups before becoming sexiest-man-alive famous through ABC’s blockbuster show Lost. He confirmed his status as a TV staple with a role on the CBS reboot of Hawaii Five-0, which he left after seven seasons when the network wouldn’t raise his salary to match his white co-stars’. Still, he was able to use that time to start his own production company, 3AD, which is responsible for the ABC hit The Good Doctor. (Kim developed it from a Korean drama.) Now, at age 52, he has his first lead role, on The Hot Zone: Anthrax, an anthology thriller on the National Geographic Channel, and has evolved into a Hollywood spokesman, testifying in front of Congress on Asian American issues during an acutely violent year. “If you’re not aware of politics in any industry, you’re missing all of the ways to navigate it,” Kim says.

Do I have it right that the show you’re currently shooting, The Hot Zone, is the first time you’ve been at the top of the call sheet?