EXCLUSIVE: Sung Kang is swapping the Fast & Furious franchise for a doc series on car cultures around the world.
The actor is co-producing and starring in The Ride Life with Sung Kang, a multi-country car culture show that’s set to hit Mipcom Cannes next week.
Kang’s Raison D’Etre Stories is making the show with Singapore-based Beach House Pictures, Bros Studios and Insight TV, the international action and adventure network.
Kang will be in Cannes next week promoting the six-part show, at a presentation held Tuesday, October 17 at 4pm at the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA)’s ‘Singapore Hour,’ which will showcase new productions with ties to Singaporean companies.
The series went ahead after SAG-AFTRA gave him permission to participate in the unscripted project and after he’d gotten full signatory clearance to film. “I’m in support and respectful of the SAG-AFTRA strike and grateful for their permission the participate in The Ride Life,” he told Deadline from Warsaw in Poland, where he is currently shooting the series.
The series is filming across locations and will be ready for delivery mid-2024. The show will see Kang revving up cool and rare vehicles, while attempting to deepen the understanding about the relationship between man and machine.
“I’ve been thinking about this series for over a decade now,” he said. “The privilege and blessing that comes with working on the Fast & Furious franchise is the character I play is so beloved that I have the garage key to everyone’s story. Everyone wants to invite me in crack open a beer.
“I’ve met some amazing human beings through that. These are people who inspire me on many levels. I felt it was selfish to keep this knowledge and experience to myself.”
His journey takes him into the bustling car capitals of the world such as London, Tokyo, LA and Seoul, and into the heart of lesser-known car communities in Chicago and Warsaw. Along the way, the people he meets make him question decisions he has made in his life, such as whether his hobbies have made him selfish and how he could become a better husband.
“When you look at the landscape of car shows, they follow a certain build: how fast the cars go or how they are built,” said Kang. “You don’t see the person behind them. The car is the front, but the person is the inspiration.”
“Many of the motoring shows that we love showcase beautiful, powerful, and one-of-a-kind cars,” added Michael O’Connor, VP of Production and Content, Insight TV. “The Ride Life will definitely not disappoint there, but we’re also very fortunate to have Sung introduce our global audience to his lifetime passion for cars, his interactions with the communities that revere them, and his unique view of the world.”
O’Connor is executive producer for Insight TV, Donovan Chan and Jocelyn Little the same for Beach House Pictures and Joseph Jang is executive producer for Bros Studio, and Kang’s business partner at Raison D’Etre Stories, Brian Yang, is producer. The series will air on Insight TV’s global channels, which are in 56 countries worldwide across 12 languages, and be available for license in other territories.
You can watch a trailer here.
‘Full dimensionality’
Kang, who starred as the Fifth Brother in Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi and recently shot an indie film, has been keen to expand his portfolio into production. Best known as Han Rue in Universal’s Fast & Furious movies and Justin Lin’s 2002 film Better Luck Tomorrow, he said working Beach House, Bros and Insight represents “an important next phase of his career.”
His indie, Raison D’Etre, launched two years ago and The Ride Life is its first unscripted production. Kang launched the business to take more artistic control and freedom to both star in and produce his own content. This year, he made his directorial debut with horror-comedy Shaky Shivers and launched his podcast, Car Stories with Sung Kang and Emelia Hartford with iHeartRadio.
The actor-producer added co-producing with international companies meant he could showcase the “full dimensionality” of his repertoire beyond the acting roles he’s known for in the UK. Kang said being an Asian lead had “not been an issue or even a discussion point when working with companies like Insight TV and Beach House,” which are international in both structure and the audiences they serve.
On Friday, we reported on how Beach House has been at the forefront of an “Asian true crime wave” and will be in Cannes with new doc Lost.
“Far more than just awesome cars, The Ride Life is a new, and exciting way of investigating the impact of cars on humanity since it first entered our lives over 130 years ago,” said Donovan Chan, Creative Director and co-founder of Beach House. “We literally can’t live without it today, but what does it really mean to us and our communities and what does the future hold?
“Sung and I connected immediately on the timeliness of this story and its potential to inspire so we look forward to sharing it with audiences worldwide.”
“Fast cars, classic cars, supercars, even every day cars— the show will feature them all,” added Bros Studio co-founder Joseph Jang. “But it is the stories of the cars’ owners that will make it so compelling and entertaining. Fasten your seat belts and get ready.”
Kang’s TV and film career has spanned three decades. Besides playing the iconic Han, he had had roles in Starz drama Power, Fox’s Gang Related, MADtv’s Korean drama parody Tae Do (Attitudes and Feelings, Both Desirable and Sometimes Secretive) and Walter Hill’s 2013 film Bullet to the Head, opposite Sylvester Stallone.
