Jonathan Kos-Read is ‘the token white guy’ in Chinese cinema1 min read
Reading Time: < 1 minuteThe rich, arrogant foreigner comes to China for business, but he ends up falling in love with what the script invariably calls an “Oriental beauty.”
He pursues and tempts her for a few episodes, but in the end the virtuous lady makes the proper choice of staying true to her Chinese love interest.
Kos-Read, 37, is a self-described “token white guy.” In this booming land where ambitious aliens scramble for fortune, he has used a telegenic face and unusually dexterous Mandarin skills to carve out a niche in Chinese television and films: the foreigner, in all his various incarnations.
His self-started acting career spans more than a decade, spinning across some of the headiest years of China’s rapid economic growth and social evolution. He is famous now, particularly, he says, among the grandmother set, who know him by his Chinese name, Cao Cao.
