Justin Hakuta is a Japanese-Filipino entrepreneur, who attracted public attention for being the husband of American actress-comedian and writer Ali Wong, from the 2019 film ‘Always Be My Maybe’ and Netflix’s popular stand-up comedies,’ Hard Knock Wife’ and ‘Baby Cobra’.
Early life and family
Justin Hakuta was born on October 18, 1981 in Los Angeles, California, USA, to Japanese-American Ken Hakuta and Filipino Marilou Cantiller. His father was the TV host of a popular children’s game show.Dr. Fad”, in the 1980s, and was also part of the writing team for “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” in 1992, as well as for “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” in 1993.
His father also created the Wacky Wall Walker, which became one of the most popular toys in 1983, with over 240 million units sold. Justin and his brothers grew up in a relatively wealthy household.
His father was born in Korean with the name Paik Kun, and his family was a successful textile entrepreneur in South Korea until 2002, when Justin’s grandfather was accused of being a collaborator with the Japanese during the Japanese occupation from 1910 to 1945. mainly based on the fact that the family business was the largest and most successful textile company in those turbulent times. To avoid conflict, his family moved permanently to Japan where they changed their name; Paik Jun became Ken Hakuta based on the Chinese translation of their Korean surname.
In the late 1970s, Justin’s parents met when they both worked at the World Bank in Washington DC. They married in 1977 and after four years they had Justin and later two more boys, Kenzo and Aki.
Education
Justin graduated from Sidwell Friends School in Washington DC in 2000 and graduated from Carnegie Mellon University in 2004 with a bachelor’s degree in Decision Science. In 2002, he spent a year at Tecnologico de Monterrey in Mexico to continue his studies in economics, sciences and Mexican history. In 2011, Justin received a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Harvard University Business School in Boston, Massachusetts – he was a Fulbright Scholar and served as Vice President of Young Alumni at Harvard Business School.
American stand-up comedian Ali Wong’s marital relationship with husband Justin Hakuta; The couple share a daughterhttps://goo.gl/Ag5v4D#Comedian #AliWong #JustinHakuta
Posted by married wiki on Sunday September 2, 2018
Career
After college, he worked at Honest Tea, an organic beverage company in Bethesda, Maryland, part-owned by the Coca-Cola Company, and was responsible for partnering with another beverage company, Canada Dry, in 2004. Around the same year, he along with founded All Day Buffet, an event organizer and marketing company. After two years, he joined the Center for Court Innovation, where he worked as a research assistant creating programs for the New York State Unified Court System and Fund for the City of New York. He also worked with Avacara, which he co-founded, and was the product lead of a team of designers and engineers creating technology platforms.
Justin then moved to Los Angeles, California and joined Direct TV DLab as a lead developer of new digital products and services. In 2016, he joined GoodRx as a vice president, a company that provides the latest cost, discount, and advancements in prescription drugs.
After parting ways with GoodRx in 2019, he began accompanying his wife on her stand-up comedy shows across the country, while also establishing an online yoga and wellness resource site, YogaStart.
Private life
He married Ali Wong on November 27, 2014. They met at a wedding in 2010 – in an interview she said that she was in love and impressed by him. She invited him to one of her stand-up comedy shows and they started dating from then on.
When he decided to marry her after four years of dating, his parents weren’t too keen on it. Being from a wealthy family, his parents felt they had to protect Justin as Ali was not yet successful at that time. His parents were apparently ambushed Ali to sign a marriage contract agreement for the wedding.
Fast forward to 2020, they have two daughters, Justin is in between jobs, Ali is quite successful with her career and the family currently lives in Los Angeles, California.
What do you know about Ali Wong?
Alexandra “Ali” Wong was born on April 19, 1982 in Pacific Heights, San Francisco, California, USA, to parents Adolphus Wong, a Chinese-American anesthesiologist, and Tammy Wong, a Vietnamese social worker.
She grew up in a middle-class household, as her father worked at the Kaiser Permanente health care facility for 30 years, while her mother, who emigrated to the US in 1960, worked in social services.
Ali graduated from San Francisco University High School in 2000, where she served as student body president, and then graduated Summa Cum Laude with a bachelor’s degree in Asian American Studies in 2005 from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). When she was in college, she realized she had an interest in performing in public. She was a member of the country’s oldest and largest Asian-American theater group, LCC Theater Company.
Some summers she worked at the University of California, the Berkeley family summer camp, The Lair of the Golden Bear, and other times she vacationed in her mother’s home country of Hanoi, Vietnam.
After college, Ali started doing stand-up comedy at the BrainWash Laundry Café, but decided to move to New York City to pursue professional comedy and acting in the Big Apple. Fame did not come to her easily; she started out as a struggling stand-up comedian doing nine performances a night and moving from one bar to the next. She lived in a loft with six other people and didn’t want to go out for dinner the first year she was in New York, but that didn’t stop her from pursuing her dreams.
Her parents were initially not supportive of her career choice, but in the end they were fine with it. It wasn’t that big of a deal to them anyway since her older siblings had already exposed her parents to the idea of chasing your own dreams on your own terms.
In 2011, her hard work paid off, when Variety magazine included her in the top 10 comics to watch out for. She was invited as a guest on several popular TV shows, including ‘David Attell’s Comedy Underground Show’, ‘The Tonight Show’ and ‘John Oliver’s New York Stand Up Show’. In 2012, she appeared in nine episodes in “Chelsea Lately”, an American talk comedy show starring Chelsea Handler, and also in “Best Week Ever”, in 16 episodes in 2013.
For the first time I perform in EUROPE! Presale has started for my shows in London, Paris, Amsterdam and Dublin. Tap on https://t.co/baXKigYRkv pic.twitter.com/Q2K12iSxrg
— Ali Wong (@aliwong) January 28, 2020
Her acting career also took off and she appeared in several TV series and movies. Most notable were ‘Savages’, a film adaptation of a thriller novel written by Don Winslow and directed by Oliver Stone, released in 2012; ‘Black Box’, an American medical drama where she played a doctor with Vanessa Redgrave and Kelly Reilly for 13 episodes. which aired in 2014; and “Always Be My Maybe,” an American romantic comedy, in which she acted and co-wrote with Randall Park, and was released in select theaters. the first four weeks of broadcast.
Ali’s popularity had risen and her stand-up comedy specials on Netflix, “Ali Wong: Baby Cobra” and “Ali Wong: Hard Knock Wife” were big hits. She also wrote for the hit TV show ‘Fresh Off the Boat’ for all six seasons from 2014 to 2020. She recently wrote a book, ‘Dear Girls: Intimate Tales, Untold Secrets and Advice for Living Your Best Life’. in which she shared her experiences and offered her wisdom on how to live a happy life. Ali calls it a guide for her two daughters as they begin to navigate their adult lives.
Interesting facts
- Justin’s mother-in-law was uncomfortable and worried about his often-between job status, but his wife just brushed it off and preferred Justin not be part of a toxic work environment.
- His wife was mentored by the popular American comedian, actor and producer, Chris Rock.
- He wrote a series of healthy lifestyle articles for Huffpost.com.
- His wife always played her pranks on him and made sure it wouldn’t be offensive to him or the family. In an interview, she said, “Marriage takes precedence over material. I can always make new jokes, but I can’t marry another man. I do not want.’
Appearance
Justin is 1.73 m tall and weighs about 65 kg. He is Asian with black hair, black eyes and wears size 8 shoes.
Wealth and salary
As of June 2020, sources have estimated his net worth at over $1 million.
