‘Fresh Off The Boat’ Six-Words Project Tells Immigrant Stories From Across U.S.

ABC’s Fresh Off The Boat is a family comedy that tells the quintessential story of immigrant parents who are pursuing the American dream while raising a family in their new country.  Now 20th Century Fox TV, which produces the single-camera series, has teamed with Six-Word Memoirs and Kingswell, an imprint of Disney Book Group, on Six Words Fresh Off the Boat: Stories of Immigration, Identity, and Coming to America, a book of six-word memoirs about the immigrant experience, set to be published September 5.

The book begins with a foreword by Fresh Off the Boat executive producers Nanatchka Khan and Melvin Mar, both of whom were born to immigrant parents, and includes six words from their cast and creative team, many of whom are immigrants or also the children of immigrants. Here are the write-ups by Khan — “We exist because these stories exist.”, Mar — “I owe it to my father.”, and FOTB star Randall Park — “Mom’s recipes get ruined by me.”

The book contains six-word stories from notable actors and filmmakers, along with athletes, artists, as well as everyday immigration stories of people from across the country.

Here’s a sampling of stories featured in the book: M. Night Shyamalan: “My accent has become my voice”; Aziz Ansari: “Every immigrant’s journey is truly incredible”; George Takei: “Even after internment, still love America”, Gabourey Sidibe: “We all have traditional Muslim names”, and Madeleine Albright: “In 1948, I was a refugee”

Advance copies of the book will be handed out to those attending ABC’s presentation at the Television Critics Association summer press tour on Sunday.

Journalist Larry Smith is the creator the Six Word Memoir project, a series of books, board games, and live-event series. Fresh Off the Boat, created by Khan and inspired by the memoir of Eddie Huang, returns for a fourth season on Oct 1.