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A TASTE OF TASTE WITH...

Bowen Yang

Bowen Yang on Being a Closer, Popeye Magazine, The Pine Walk Collection, and more.

January 31, 2023

Bowen Yang
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Bowen Yang (aka @fayedunaway) is an Australian-born New York City-based actor, comic, writer, and podcaster best known for being a truly goated addition to the Saturday Night Live line-up. He’s been in now iconic SNL sketches such as the The Iceberg on the Sinking of the Titanic, played Fran Lebowitz on Weekend Update, and last year he starred in Andrew Ahn’s modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice, Fire Island. Bowen also co-hosts the great podcast Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers where they bring on guests like Keke Palmer and Jenny Slate to talk about everything pop culture. Lucky for us, Bowen is here to tell us what he’s been into.

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Notion
the best app for sundry notetaking. meta as i’m typing this on notion and as perfectly imperfect seems to format with it, but i was forcing myself into proficiency or daily use with evernote or the notes app and they never really stuck. then notion showed up and it all clicked. i use it for journaling, reading lists, sketch ideas for work, and therapy notes, which leads me to…
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Popeye Magazine
a magazine that is purely meant for calm, empty-mind flipping. i have no real awareness of my own aesthetic/sartorial choices but the “city boy” muse popeye has kept almost exactly the same for decades is a good mental model. every page is gorgeous and skimming it feels like eating a warm stew.
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Grether’s pastilles
apparently everyone uses these for their voice and singing? cynthia erivo gave me these during rehearsal and i mostly just love them because they’re stiff gummies. they coat your glottis or some such but they also make you have something in common with cynthia erivo.
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Hotel notepads
i’m getting old by m. night shyamalan because i’m collecting stuff like notepads from hotels now. but they really are a lovely little memento, and in this time-collapsed era it’s nice to look at stationery and think “oh right, i stayed at the ace hotel when my heater broke last winter.”
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The Pine Walk Collection
there was this new york times story on a couple buying a fire island house and discovering 200 tapes of dj sets between 1979 and 1999, and a sound engineer has been digitizing them and more are still uploading. it’s a lovely time portal and does more to set a mood for me than any ambient pop usually can, plus it tickles my crown chakra or whatever to feel some sort of connection to generations past.
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Being a closer
my therapist has pointed out that i almost never “lead” in courtship and i should try being a closer for a goddamn change. and i must say… it’s fun. and it usually works as long as you’re not a fucking dweeb about it. so just let that stare linger a hair longer because you neeeever know.
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