Chloe Bennet in INTERIOR CHINATOWN – Season 1 – “Chinatown Expert” | ©2026 Hulu/Mike Taing

In the ten-episode series INTERIOR CHINATOWN, now streaming in its entirety on Hulu. Chinatown waiter Willis Wu (Jimmy O. Yang) is a big fan of the police procedural TV show BLACK & WHITE. This is even though the series sidelines Willis’s favorite character, Asian-American detective Lana Lee, played by Chloe Bennet. To his astonishment, Willis discovers that he is somehow a background character in BLACK & WHITE, and winds up helping Lana solve a case.

INTERIOR CHINATOWN is based on the National Book Award-winning 2020 novel by Charles Yu, who also serves as the series’ showrunner. The miniseries is meta and twisty, combining comedy and commentary.

Originally from Chicago, Bennet was born Chloe Wang to a Han Chinese father and a white American mother. She moved to China at age fifteen to pursue a singing career, then came to Los Angeles for acting work. Bennet adopted her father’s first name as her professional surname to circumvent industry prejudice against her birth surname while still honoring her dad.

Bennet spent seven seasons as series regular superhero Daisy “Quake” Johnson on MARVEL’S AGENTS OF SHIELD. Some of her other credits include INTERCEPT, NASHVILLE, ABOMINABLE, the feature remake of VALLEY GIRL, ABOMINABLE AND THE INVISIBLE CITY, DAVE, and A VERY JONAS CHRISTMAS MOVIE.

At a Q&A panel for INTERIOR CHINATOWN at the Television Critics Association (TCA) press tour, Bennet participates with Yu and other colleagues, then remains for some follow-up discussion. This interview combines comments from both.

While not exactly in the same genre, Bennet says her experience with surreal storylines on AGENTS OF SHIELD came in handy on INTERIOR CHINATOWN.

“For something like this, where this show is so cerebral, and every single day required every department and every actor and Charlie [Yu] and every director to be on the same page exactly in what we’re doing, because it’s so nuanced with each storyline. So, to have the foundation of SHIELD to go into something this heady was super-useful to have.”

INTERIOR CHINATOWN has its share of visual effects and fight choreography, albeit not as much as AGENTS OF SHIELD, Bennet notes.

“SHIELD was a lot more physical. I was doing a lot more of the stunts on that. Because we were dragged through it twenty times a season, we had more time. [INTERIOR CHINATOWN] felt like every single scene, every single thing, I really wanted – there was a lot of symbolism in a lot of different things, especially with Lana being mixed-race. You just have to be on the same page all the time, where SHIELD felt like you had a little bit more room – the characters moved through certain emotions a little slower than we do on this show.”

In both AGENTS OF SHIELD and INTERIOR CHINATOWN, Bennet plays government operatives. Can she cite a particular quality she has that causes her to be cast that way?

She doesn’t. “I have a GED from a parking lot in Santa Monica.”

Yang quips, “You look like a narc.”

Bennet laughs. “What is that? I was thinking about that today. Honestly, it was really nice to sit back and not do any stunts. I was like, ‘Amazing, you [stunt doubles] can do that, I’m not going to get bruised.’”

More broadly, “I think generally my journey through the industry is so meta for Lana. I literally was told at the beginning of my career, I was in an audition room and the casting director [said], ‘You’re just not white enough to be the lead, but you’re not Asian enough to be the Asian.’ And I was like, ‘She’s right!’ I remember thinking that this was true, and let the way I absorbed that projection as a young girl in the industry and the way that’s extremely confusing, as someone who’s mixed-race and identifies as something and looks different to other people.

“That intersection of what race means is a really interesting concept to me. It’s something that I’ve talked about openly in my career very often and have struggled with decisions – I ended up changing my last name to my dad’s first name rather than his last name, not legally, just for one audition I happened to get, and I’ve been Chloe Bennet ever since. Really, I’m still Chloe Wang, so I have a lot of emotions attached to what my identity is and who I am and how much I get to speak about it or how much I don’t, based off of what other people think of me.”

Bennet identified with Lana so strongly that, obtaining and beginning to read the INTERIOR CHINATOWN novel, “I actually had to stop reading the book – this is way before the show was going to be made – because when I got to the part that [Lana] was in, I was like, ‘Oh, my God, they’re going to make this into a show or a movie, and if I don’t play this character, I’m going to quit!’” she laughs.

“I literally was like, ‘I actually can’t finish this book, because if I don’t get that [role], then I shouldn’t be doing this job. And so, when I saw that you guys were doing it, I was a huge loser and just stalked Charlie to get the part.”

Her colleagues on the panel laugh appreciatively.

We at first see Lana entirely through Willis’s eyes. Is it difficult to play scenes when the character is more a concept than a person?

“I think being a woman in the industry, for most of my career, you are actually a concept,” Bennet observes wryly. “I think for a lot of things, that’s what women are often reduced to. I think we’re in a different place now. So, being a part of a show that is hyper-aware of that, and is flipping that narrative on its head, and is doing that in a satirical way, is extremely satisfying.

“There is such a self-awareness of the way that TV in particular portrays women, but also a mixed-race woman like myself, so it was super-satisfying to get to play a character seen through the lens of this idolization, being put on a pedestal through Willis Wu. It takes an understanding of that happening to have to do that in a way where it’s satire. So, that was just such a psychological [satisfaction] for me to be understood. Because there are a lot of things still being made right now that are not aware of the fact that that is how women are viewed.”

Taika Waititi directed the pilot for INTERIOR CHINATOWN. “Taika’s amazing,” Bennet offers. “He is one of the best directors in the world for that exact reason. You can really feel it when you’re on set. The dichotomy between his extreme, clear vision and tone that we all know Taika for, and also the freedom he gives you as an actor is extremely rare.

“He’s the type of director who’s right there when we’re shooting, and he’s right there [next to the] camera, and he can get extremely specific with what he wants you to do, and then he can also be like, ‘Go to town.’

“I’ve been friends with Taika for a while through Marvel and various things, so to get to work with him, and really play around, it was such a genuine safe space. I’ve never been on a set that diverse, and where the story meant so much to everyone involved. And when you have that psychological freedom and safety, it breeds such a fun environment. Honestly, working with him was incredible.

Bennet says that Yu’s INTERIOR CHINATOWN novel was a touchstone for artisans on both sides of the camera. “It was unbelievable. The production design was incredible, and everything across the board – not only is it obviously a diverse show, but all the department heads were so motivated, and the book meant so much to them. So there are details across the show, the food that we eat, every single element, we all were going through our own kind of [experiences] on the show, and we brought it.

“There’s so much heart behind every department, and there’s so much intention with every shot. The lighting for everything is different. The camera movement is different for different worlds. It gives so much, there are so many Easter eggs hidden throughout the show that you will be rewarded for watching it over and over and over again.

What does Bennet most hope viewers get out of INTERIOR CHINATOWN?

“Oh, man.” Bennet considers her response. “I think people who will get it will immediately be satiated by it, and it will be something like a color they’ve never seen before that they’ve always known existed. So, I think for the people who have craved and looked for a story like this, it will be immediately noticeable. And then, for the people who don’t immediately identify with the themes of the show, I hope that it’s entertaining and interesting and dramatic enough and funny enough to draw them in, and then they learn through the show. I just think it’s a great show.”

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Article: Interview: Actress Chloe Bennet on new meta Hulu procedural series  INTERIOR CHINATOWN

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