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Casting ethnic characters is a very hard thing to do, but it's important. It's also interesting.

I've always gotten a positive reaction to doing African-American characters.

I think when I first started out making music here in Los Angeles, a lot of people were really curious about my ethnicity, and you know, whatever questions they had, I'd be more than happy to answer them.

I grew up accepting that my nationality was not depicted on TV or film. To be honest, it was something I didn't acknowledge as a kid. But once I realized my love for acting and the possibility of pursuing a career in it, I quickly noticed the absence of Asians in general and thought, 'Well, I'm gonna try to change that.'

I like to consider myself an actor who just happens to be Hispanic.

If I'm racist, don't think I would have directed shows like 'The Parkers' and 'The Wayans Brothers' or worked 41 episodes with Victoria Rowell on 'Diagnosis: Murder.'

I think ethnic and regional labels are insulting to writers and really put restrictions on them. People don't think your work is quite as universal.

I enjoy having the ability to play a variety of ethnicities. Being ethnically ambiguous allows me to explore many roles, and I enjoy being free to be whoever I want to be.

The great joy of doing 'The Daily Show' for me is that I get to sit on the fence between cultures. I am commenting on the absurdity of both sides as an outsider and insider. Sometimes I'm playing the brown guy, and sometimes I'm not, but the best stuff I do always goes back to being a brown kid in a white world.