My goal is, no matter what genre or story, I'll find a personal angle. It doesn't have to be autobiographical, or specifically Asian-American. It has to explore a burning question that I have.
Lulu Wang
There's so little representation of people who look like me behind the camera that it makes you want to say yes to any opportunity out of desperation. It puts you in a situation where you can't make your best work. Diversity for cheap.
My father's a diplomat. He speaks Russian.
Because if Asian American content is seen as a trend, the way that like leggings are in, then that's not true representation or inclusion. The mainstream doesn't have to worry about that.
I made 'The Farewell' for me, for my family, and for other immigrant children, or children of immigrants, who feel caught in-between two worlds.
I didn't grow up making coffee. I'm not good at it.
I actually am terrified of horror movies. I'm very sensitive. But for me, I get so scared of horror movies that if I know something is coming I'll actually pause the movie and fast forward.
My mother always wanted to play an instrument. Her parents never gave her that. Then it got to a point where I'd been playing for 18 years, and to give it up would make me feel guilty. But my parents also knew that realistically, I wasn't going to become a concert pianist.
In some ways, every character we write, especially the protagonist, is some version of ourselves, as a writer/director, even if they aren't the same gender.
As long as I'm making something from my voice, from my perspective there will be Asian American content because I am the storyteller.
Sometimes America is so great because it brings all of us together, but sometimes it can be so limiting because it puts labels on things.
I can't speak for everybody, and I don't want to say it for an entire culture, but for me, coming from an immigrant family, it's very difficult to go find your voice, which requires a lot of failure.
We all have different aspects of ourselves, and who we are to different people in our lives, at different stages of our lives.
If you think about feudal China during times of the emperors, food was a very elevated art form and you had to be really skilled.
My grandma, Nai Nai, has had the clothes she wants to be buried prepared since she was like 60. I guess there is an openness to discussing. It's part of life. It's part of the every day.
I grew up in Beijing and Beijing roast duck is my favorite. My mom makes it every year for Christmas Eve. How crispy the skin is is how good a duck restaurant is.
Writing is a type of therapy for me. I'm always trying to break down what happened, and why I felt a certain way.
When people finance a movie, they have their own ideas and have things they want to change.
Whereas in America we are so fearful of mortality, we don't want to talk about it, we don't think about it, and in many ways we treat elderly people as invisible because they are a constant reminder of our own mortality. We put them away and put them in retirement homes so we don't want to deal with that.
My mother and my father are both very funny people, and they're both artistic in their own right. Oftentimes, we get very dramatic about things, but we also laugh really hard.
That's what I love - on 'The Farewell,' we played with a lot of silence and a lot of negative space, and I really worked with the composer to create those juxtapositions of like, those awkward silences and when something comes in.
I drew influence from Mike Leigh, Ruben Ostlund, a lot of Scandinavian filmmakers, Lukas Moodysson. I also drew influence from horror films and thrillers, which is something I would never think to do earlier in my career.
So whatever decision you make, you're going to be able to find stories or signs to say 'I did the right thing,' because we have to believe we did the right thing in order to survive.
I immigrated when I was six so I had to learn English and I was always an outsider from a young age, and so I think my drive was that I wanted to fit in.
But I can definitely say that when I go back to China, I feel very foreign there.
There have been moments where I laughed at my own family's culture, though it's hard to separate out whether something funny is cultural, or just my grandma specifically.
But you just don't know where any film is going to go, or how it's going to end up. Films so often don't get the love and attention needed to get to the right festival, or find the right distributor, or get seen by the world.
In China there is a holiday around the death of your ancestors where everyone goes to the cemetery. It's a celebratory thing. It's very colorful.
And that meant so much to me to have my parents' support. I don't think I could have continued to push through with the first feature and the many shorts that I did without their support.
Americans always talk about family love being unconditional, and I realized that I didn't feel that way.
I'm comfortable, culturally I'm American, my perspectives are American, but from an aesthetic perspective do other people look at me and think that I'm American?
I don't think there's ever an inappropriate time to laugh! I'm a curious person. So if someone laughs, I want to know why.
Who does get to claim Americanness? You know, my brother was born in this country. And is he seen as American? So, I mean, it brings up a lot of interesting questions.
I didn't see myself in Jia Jhangke or Wong Kar-Wai films. Those are Asian filmmakers, and I very much am an American filmmaker.
There's a reason why the cultures of so many Chinatowns around the world in some ways are more Chinese. They've held onto older Chinese rituals, traditions, and symbols in ways that, if you go back to China today, they're not holding on to. They're getting married in white dresses and in churches.
My grandmother was sick and I was told that we could not tell her, and that my cousin was gonna have this wedding as an excuse for us to all go and see her. And I think that I was just so frustrated by the situation.
And that is something I've heard from many people who immigrate is that when they go back to their home countries, in a way, they think they're going to be embraced and completely feel like they've come home. This disconcerting thing is when you go back there and you feel more foreign than you ever have.
In America especially, if you're Chinese and you work at a restaurant, there's a certain connotation among the Chinese immigrant community: It's the first generation that opens restaurants as a way to survive. You open to support your family so your kids can become doctors and lawyers.
My brother is working to change the perception of Chinese food in America.
If I'd been traveling, I come home, my mom makes noodles.
As the Chinese girl, you don't fit in with anybody. It wasn't a large Chinese-American population, so I didn't grow up having a community of Asian friends. Even when there were Asian people, we sort of existed on our own.
I grew up in a household that really encouraged reading and writing. My mother loves philosophy and is constantly reading philosophy and talking to me about different philosophers and different ways of life.
For a while I had a little company and made corporate videos, did some little documentaries, almost, for court cases and mediations.
Protagonists traditionally are active characters.
I never want to tell a story where I'm lecturing to the audience.
The questions I want to ask will revolve around humans, connection, relationships, family, and stories - what are the stories we tell ourselves and each other?
In my family, and especially when I go back to China, it's always like, prepare your stomach, because it's the way that they express love.
But when you're grieving, when you're going through something difficult, you lose your appetite. You don't want to eat. People are also always commenting on your weight, while at the same time forcing you to eat, so it's very complicated.
