Bowen Yang Thinks This Artist Nails What It’s Like Living in New York

Bowen Yang had just played an overcompensating straight guy opposite Sydney Sweeney on “Saturday Night Live.” But in a video call from his Brooklyn apartment, he was all about “Hot White Heist,” his queer action-comedy audio series on Audible.

Last season, he was the voice of the fortune teller Judy Fink, who with his squad of misfits went after a government sperm bank.

In Season 2, Judy and his coalition are living in bliss on their private island, Lesbos 2. That is, until a true-crime podcaster comes nosing around. Series veterans including Cynthia Nixon, Jane Lynch, Cheyenne Jackson and Tony Kushner are joined by Raúl Esparza, Sara Ramirez, Ian McKellen and Trixie Mattel.

“It revolves around these really poignant themes about community and the smallest unit of queerness being two people,” said Yang, who also hosts the pop-culture podcast “Las Culturistas” with Matt Rogers.

Then Yang unfurled a must-have list centered on life as a unit of one. “I feel like a lonely person who always has a consistent desire to reach out,” he said.

These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

1

Popeye

It’s a Japanese magazine “for city boys.” I can’t read a single character of Japanese, but I just do it for the visuals. It’s like eating a warm stew while I’m flipping through it. Every page is so beautifully laid out.