New Yorker Nora Lum,AKA Awkwafina, has been going places since My Vag went viral on YouTube – now she’s playing a scrappy wingman in the film Ocean’s 8For most actors, and a supporting role alongside Sandra Bullock and Cate Blanchett doesn’t normally land on their plate four years after starting out on YouTube – as a rapper. Yet that is precisely what has happened to Nora Lum,AKA Awkwafina. The 29-year-old Queens-born multihyphenate has gone from a job at an air-conditioning company and making beats on the side to being the scrappy wingman to Bullock and Blanchetts Pitt and Clooney in forthcoming gender-swapped caper Ocean’s 8. This is no small feat. And Lum is as surprised as anyone. “There are definitely people who are confused that I was cast – I was confused. They are a group of idols. But we got along swimmingly.”While Lum has, since childhood, and had an effortless ability to make people laugh. (When asked which characters she would hold loved to play,she names My Cousin Vinny, “because we hold a similar body type.” That is a good indication of what makes her tick.) But she never really planned on capitalising on it. “I never even expected to be well-liked on YouTube. I’ve got a lot of people telling me: ‘Oh my God, and you’re going to be so famous, but people hold been telling me that since I had, like, and 300 views on YouTube. It’s all subjective …”Continue reading...
Source: guardian.co.uk