Transcript: A to BE Episode 2

Mimi Kwa (00:03):
People say life is a journey, not a destination. But how do you know you are on the right path?
Jo Stanley (00:10):
If only we could see the signs when they appear.
Mimi Kwa (00:13):
Well, I’m Mimi Kwa. And
Jo Stanley (00:14):
I’m Jo Stanley.
Mimi Kwa (00:15):
And on A to B, we speak to fascinating people about how they navigated their way to be here now, having profound impact on the world.
Jo Stanley (00:26):
We hope our conversations will help you reflect on everything you’ve been through to get here. The triumphs, challenges and bumps along the road.
Mimi Kwa (00:35):
And if you haven’t already, find your own map to what matters.
Amy Wang (00:41):
My boss at Netflix is married to Gwyneth Paltrow.
(00:45):
Now we had Yum cha with Gwyneth Paltrow and him. It’s so wild.
(00:50):
And to see the wealth and the glamour and going to these Oscar parties, to see all these worlds from China to Australia to LA, it’s really bizarre.
Mimi Kwa (01:02):
Today’s conversation is with incredible film writer Amy Wang. Now she used to work at a Blockbuster video store and now she’s front and center of the sequel to literally one of Hollywood’s biggest blockbusters, Crazy Rich Asians.
Jo Stanley (01:18):
She’s had some massive sliding door moments discovering where she belonged. We talk about street smarts versus book smarts, and how a woman who now has Yum cha with Gwyneth Paltrow was overlooked in male dominated film school.
Mimi Kwa (01:34):
How she kept her dream alive and how she has come to be a Chinese-Australian screenwriter and director in the world’s most influential circles, we are about to find out. And you are going to find her story, we hope, so moving and absolutely surprising.
(01:52):
Amy Wang, welcome to our little podcast. We are so excited to have you all the way from LA. So what’s the time there?
Amy Wang (02:02):
It is 6:11 PM
Mimi Kwa (02:05):
Good evening to you. And good morning to us.
Amy Wang (02:08):
Yeah, good evening.
Mimi Kwa (02:10):
So we are just so excited to know your whole story. We only have an hour, there’s so much that we want to know, but how on earth does a suburban Aussie girl end up in Hollywood and writing what was the first full Asian cast movie since the Joy Luck Club, writing the sequel to that? Where did it start? Let’s start at the beginning.
Amy Wang (02:37):
Okay. The beginning, beginning, like my birth?
Mimi Kwa (02:41):
The beginning, beginning, yeah. Why not? Why not?
Jo Stanley (02:46):
Well, this is A to B. The journey from A to B is kind of your being now. Right?
Amy Wang (02:52):
Oh my goodness. So I was born in China in a city called Hangzhou, and I didn’t actually meet my dad until I immigrated to Australia when I was seven. So my dad, when I was born, moved over to Sydney first. So it was just me and my mom for a long time, and I think it was too expensive for my dad to call. So he would sometimes send letters. And then, yeah, when I was seven, we immigrated, my mother and I, to Sydney. I didn’t know a word of English. I remember knowing ABC, that was it.
(03:32):
And I also remember my first day in primary school, kindergarten, I went to Crown Street Public School and the teacher came up to me with a sheet of animal stickers and I don’t know what she was saying to me. And so I thought she was telling me, pick what your zodiac sign is, your Chinese Zodiac sign. So I picked the snake to put on my backpack. And then I looked around and all the other kids had pictures of cute bunnies and cats and dogs. And she was asking, what was your favorite animal? And I picked the snake. And so after that I was bullied about having the snake, I was like the snake girl. And yeah, also my name was Mimi when I first immigrated over, which I told you about.
Mimi Kwa (04:27):
Which is amazing. You and I worked that out, didn’t we? That we had the same name. It’s crazy.
Amy Wang (04:30):
Yeah, I know. It’s crazy. It’s crazy. And I was teased a lot for being named Mimi, so I went to a couple of different primary schools because my parents moved around a lot when we first got Sydney. And then I eventually skipped to high school. I went to Hornsby Girls, which was very far from where I lived, but it was a good school. And I discovered I really liked acting, which was really sad because I was really bad at it. And I would go to classes and just realize how tough it was and how much concentration you’d need. So I was around 13 at the time. Then it was like, I guess acting’s not for me. So what else is out there? And really got into movies.
Mimi Kwa (05:38):
Can I just go back to your name for a minute? Sorry to interrupt you, Amy, but you were Mimi, that was your name.
Amy Wang (05:46):
Yes. Yes.
Mimi Kwa (05:48):
You were teased. I’m presuming that it was the same way that I was teased at school. Mimi, you, you, Juju. I don’t know, stupid stuff, but you changed your name at some stage. So when did that happen?
Amy Wang (06:01):
Yes, I changed my name going into high school.
Jo Stanley (06:05):
Really?
Amy Wang (06:06):
So primary school, year six. Yeah. So that was the last year. And to this day, I cannot tell you why I decided on Amy. I think I was in my room.
Jo Stanley (06:17):
So as a 12-year-old, you had actually made that decision, which is a pretty adult decision, to leave a name behind. And do you know what? I had to change my name when I was, I guess 23, 24. Because my original name is Jo Bailey and there was already another one in the industry. So I had to choose a new name and I found that really hard and I was an adult. How does a 12-year-old, there’s a lot around your losing a part of your identity when you change your name.
Amy Wang (06:46):
Definitely. Yeah. I think at the time I had been teased a lot. I had a weird final year in primary school. I don’t know if you want to hear it, but it was a weird, because I had moved schools quite a bit and I moved schools at the beginning of year six, and I made friends with this one girl and she isolated me from the rest of the grade. And I only found that out afterwards. And it was just this weird situation. I think I was just very ready to shed that part of my life from the bullying to not really feeling like I had a lot of friends and just feeling like I didn’t really belong. I think that all contributed to me being totally okay to become Amy. Yeah, because I’m sure Jo for you, as a 20 something year old, there were definitely parts of yourself that you’d loved and you would’ve wanted to maintain. Right?
Jo Stanley (07:50):
Well, I liken it to moving countries where you don’t yet belong to the new country, but you’re sort of not from the old country anymore. You’re sort of in this liminal, no man’s land or no woman’s land, shall we say. I found myself going, well, I suppose I’m not Jo Bailey anymore, but I don’t feel like Joe Stanley and I still now go who actually am? I don’t know. But you shedding a part of yourself and then going, I start fresh at a new school with a new name. Did it feel like you were stepping into your power to a degree?
Amy Wang (08:22):
I think so. Definitely. Yeah. I was so ready to make friends and have this new start. Having only had that one friend who was creepy towards you.
Mimi Kwa (08:37):
Does that inform your writing now? It’s some of that –
Amy Wang (08:43):
Yeah. It’s funny because we will get to that soon where the things I actually enjoy writing and the films I make are actually very dark and not funny and not romantic at all. And so Crazy Rich Asians is still this outlier that’s great and amazing to be part of, but definitely not what I enjoy writing.
Mimi Kwa (09:16):
So when they approached you for Crazy Rich Asians 2, did you say, hang on, do you know that I write dark scripts? I’m not a romantic writer. Do you have the right Amy Wang?
Amy Wang (09:30):
Yes, that definitely was brought up. So what landed me that was I’d written a spec script about Wendi Deng Murdoch, who I’m obsessed with and who I think is such a fascinating character and a woman. And that script was like a Wolf of Wall Street slash a Raging Bull kind of story. And about the rise and fall of this woman and the Crazy Rich Asians 2, producers read that. And I think they saw a lot, not similarities to do with the tone, but I think regarding the world and the characters and the family relationships, I think they saw a lot of that in that script that they thought could translate well into the movie. So yeah, they gave me shot. And at the time to get the job, I had to pitch so many times to so many different people, and it was between me and another Asian male writer. So it was between the two of us, and I’m sure he also pitched many, many times and ended up going to me. So it’s a long process.
Jo Stanley (10:52):
Well, that in itself is extraordinary because you are having to really present yourself with such confidence and certainty, even at times where you might be quaking in your boots and you go back to your origin story in primary school where you’ve been bullied and teased. Then having to really define yourself going into high school at such a young age, that has to be formative to you now, being able to sit in a room and hold space.
Amy Wang (11:19):
Yeah, I’ll give so much credit to my parents in that they always valued, I guess, street smarts more than book smarts. And they always told me to be who I was and even if the best I could do is 70% in a math test, if that’s my best, then that’s good enough, which I feel like is quite rare for Asian parents, the Chinese parents. So I’m very grateful for that.
Mimi Kwa (11:51):
Yes. Can I say, you must be a doctor, you must be a lawyer.
Amy Wang (11:55):
Yeah. Yeah. And both my parents back in China were art professors. So my dad taught ceramics and my mother taught fashion design.
Mimi Kwa (12:07):
Amazing.
Amy Wang (12:08):
So I think that really helped with them being supportive of what I eventually chose to do. But I would also say, my mom tells me, I don’t remember this, but even from a young age, I really liked public speaking and I really liked performing in front of people as a child. So I think those qualities are very important in the writing world, which is strange because when you imagine a writer, you imagine them in a small room and then a nerdy dude with glasses and then just typing. Whereas I would say 50% of this job is pitching and being somebody who people like to be in a room or space with, especially when you’re writing a television show. And yeah, just being a social-
(13:03):
social human.
PART 1 OF 4 ENDS [00:13:04]
Mimi Kwa (13:05):
So if you had that tendency to enjoy the spotlight and to take to the stage from a young age, and you were encouraged by your parents, was there any moment throughout I guess your high school or whatever you went on to straight after high school, was there a moment or a person that was pivotal in you actually taking that next step into film? Because it’s one thing enjoying the limelight and enjoying performing, but it’s another thing actually doing something with it, particularly when society and families tend to encourage us into more traditional jobs.
Amy Wang (13:43):
Totally. Totally. I mean, I would say, so I got a job, I was desperate to work at a video store, so-
Jo Stanley (13:53):
So did I. It was the coolest job in the nineties. That is the best job you could ever get.
Amy Wang (14:02):
Totally. Totally. So I remember every Christmas, during the Christmas break during high school, I would have my resume and I would take it to Video Ezy and Blockbuster and try and get a job. And it didn’t happen for a long time.
(14:17):
But late in my teens, I want to say when I was 17, maybe like 16, 17, I got a job at Blockbuster in Ashfield, and that really changed my life. So having a job there, getting access to all types of movies, and also the guys I worked with, a lot of them were kind of older-ish, older in terms of they’re in the twenties guys who were really into a lot of dark stuff like David Cronenberg and David Fincher and all sorts of those types of movies, and I would listen to the recommendations and watch those movies and really kind of got into it.
(15:03):
And I will say, I think this is a very film school kind of example, but for me I think Fight Club was the quintessential movie. When I watched it, I was like, man, the twists. I won’t spoil it, but the movie being about something, about consumerism, that really spoke to me. And just the characters, just everything about it. I was like, man, if I could make an audience or a person feel the way that I feel having just watched that movie, because I was like, oh my God. I remember when I watched it, I ran downstairs, my parents, I was like, “Oh my God, Fight Club, it’s like a masterpiece.” And yeah.
Jo Stanley (15:54):
That is one of my all time favorite films too, Amy. And I just recently watched it again with my husband. Because we watched it, I’m a lot older than you, right? So we were 28-ish and we were the same, just going, what is that? How do you absorb even how this film has unfolded? And so we watched it again recently, hoping that it was still that, and it is. It is, right?
Amy Wang (16:16):
Oh my God, that’s amazing. That’s so good to hear. Yeah.
Jo Stanley (16:20):
It really is. Apart from the fact that Brad Pitt is like… I mean, God, he’s in his prime there. And I love this because I think we all have movies that have… When you’re on your path to who you are now, it is sometimes those random, like a movie that can change your life.
Amy Wang (16:37):
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I will say also that kind of really just kicked my butt into gear. This is what I want to do. My dad, he got me this little camcorder for me to start making things in high school. Oh my God, I still have nightmares about the things I made my friends do. I did this alien video, I made them just pretend to be aliens. It’s just really horrible stuff. But it was exciting and fun at the time.
Jo Stanley (17:15):
You got to start somewhere.
Mimi Kwa (17:16):
Yeah, that’s like the Steven Spielberg trajectory, tomato sauce in the kitchen. You do got to start somewhere. It’s amazing.
Amy Wang (17:23):
Oh my God. Yeah.
Mimi Kwa (17:26):
So what then was that sliding door moment? You had the dream. You clearly had the dream and the drive, and I get goosebumps just listening to you and listening to your amazing story. Lots of people have dreams, lots of people have passions, but what was that moment? What was that sliding door? What was that big break that actually led you into the industry?
Amy Wang (17:54):
Yeah, yeah. So I graduated high school. I do my undergrad at UTS in Media Arts Production, which is a film-ish kind of undergrad degree. And I made more short films there. But I definitely was not the most talented in my school, my year, I was definitely not the teacher’s favorite. And that’s something that I still to this day want to spread to people. Because even after I graduated that school and I eventually got into the American Film Institute in LA for directing, I was not the favorite there either.
(18:35):
And it’s frustrating because my thesis film that I made there ended up being the film that was the most successful in festivals and obviously helped boost my career at that time. But I think when you think about a director, even now, it’s always mostly men, and it was no different.
(18:58):
And AFI, the teachers definitely favored… There were three men in particular who the teachers loved and thought they were going to be the next big thing, and gave them anything they wanted and didn’t really pay much attention to me. And I remember in second year at AFI, I had a conversation with my professor who had us for two years by that point, and our directing class is tiny, there’s maybe 20 directors in our year. And he had a 10 minute conversation with me. And then that night he emailed another Asian girl about my conversation with him.
Jo Stanley (19:42):
Oh my God.
Amy Wang (19:43):
On top of that, I am Australian and most of my class are American. So it was just this… And I look nothing like a… Let me make that clear.
Mimi Kwa (19:57):
And it’s a tiny class of 20 people, presumably quite a difficult process to get through to get into that room in the first place at that table. So that is just insult upon insult. And I was going to ask you about that, because you talk about the inequity between men and women in the industry, as with every industry, but it’s magnified, I think, in your industry. What about being Chinese in the room and being Asian or being of color?
Amy Wang (20:27):
Yeah.
Mimi Kwa (20:28):
How did that play out both from your high school years, even growing up in Australia as an Asian, and who was backing you to jump through all of these hoops? Because you’re saying that you weren’t the best, you weren’t the favorite, but you still kept pushing through. So was there someone backing you, or were you just backing yourself? Did you just have that confidence?
Amy Wang (20:50):
Yeah, God, really great questions, because I haven’t actually thought about what did keep me going. I always say this industry is so hard, and unless within yourself there is just that desperation to express yourself no matter what. And I think it’s important to have a great team behind you and loving parents and great friends, siblings, but at the end of the day, it’s really just you.
(21:22):
It’s you who experiences the heartbreaks, the success. It’s you who has to keep yourself in check and push yourself eight hours a day, 10 hours a day when nobody else is scolding you and making you do something, especially with this industry. So I would say, yeah, I think my drive does come from within, and I have thought about this as well. I believe another reason why or where my drive comes from is because both my parents, since they’ve been in Australia, they never really learned to speak English very well. And my dad to this day, he works at a factory that makes signages for companies and he operates machinery. Whereas back in China, he used to teach ceramics or was an artist.
(22:19):
And so seeing their trajectory and knowing how creative they are, but seeing them kind of give up on their dreams and not put in the hard work I think made me go, as sad as it sounds, I don’t want to end up like them. And seeing the frustrations they’ve had financially and psychologically, I think, have kind of made me go, okay, this is a life I don’t want.
Jo Stanley (22:56):
Do you think if you weren’t Amy Wang, currently very successful screenwriter, director, doing the thing that was your dream, but this creative drive would still be in you, would you have found another way? You just don’t stop, if you aren’t aware that this is your purpose on this planet, is to be creative and to tell stories?
Amy Wang (23:17):
Yeah, I don’t think I would be doing something else. I think I would still be pushing as much as I can. And even now, I feel like, and maybe it’s just me, but I feel like it doesn’t matter how successful you are in the industry. And again, I don’t think I’m successful, which is crazy, but there’s such a huge part of me that is always prepared for the entire industry to blacklist me. And I’m going to have to start over and start writing my own things and grinding and trying to convince everyone that I’m still a good writer and you can still trust in me. But that drive I don’t think will ever go away. And I don’t think I would ever do anything else. It’s this or nothing.
Mimi Kwa (24:11):
So what does it do to your heart and soul seeing and witnessing and being part of the global embracing of Asian film and writing now?
(24:24):
I mean, this is so current, it’s so real. You must just be able to cut it with a knife in Hollywood. I mean, the Oscars, you were in tears, I would imagine. We were messaging. It was big.
Amy Wang (24:40):
Yeah, a hundred percent. And going back to your previous question was to do with my experience as a Chinese Australian person, woman growing up there. It’s kind of sad to say, but I think part of the reason why I left Australia was because I felt like I couldn’t fully be myself. And I felt like I couldn’t truly tell the stories I wanted to tell because Australian film and television, I mean, I don’t quite know where it is at now, but definitely when I was there in the 2010s, it felt like you had to tell either quintessential Australian white stories that were about drugged out suburbia or something very culturally relevant, which I don’t think I would’ve been able to tell, like an aboriginal story or something that needed that specific voice.
(25:44):
I know things have changed a bit now, but back then I didn’t think there would be stories. Because I wanted to tell a cool thriller horror movie, or I don’t know, a drama with a cool science fiction twist or whatever. And I know for example, Saw-
(26:03):
.. Saw, which was done by James Wan, an Asian Aussie, he left and went to America. Saw was one of the biggest horror movies in the entire world back then, but you wouldn’t call it an Australian film, Saw.
PART 2 OF 4 ENDS [00:26:04]
Jo Stanley (26:21):
And I’m actually mates with Leigh Whannell, who made that film with James, and I know that they tried very hard to make it in Australia-
Amy Wang (26:31):
Yeah.
Jo Stanley (26:31):
… and just no one was interested.
Amy Wang (26:34):
Exactly. Yeah, exactly. So I think part of the reason why I left was because, yeah, it just didn’t feel like there was space for me in Australia. I wasn’t one of the Edgerton brothers and making those types of movies, so I left. And I feel like maybe just a space, but being in LA and being in America, I think I haven’t felt more Australian than I’ve ever felt. And the types of stories I feel are very personal to me and accepted here, which is crazy.
Jo Stanley (27:12):
Well, I think there’s extraordinary courage too, though, in carving your own path, right? And this is about the journey from A to B, and you have had the courage to go, “Well, Australia’s not going to be it for me. I have to go and literally geographically create a path.” Was it hard moving there?
Amy Wang (27:31):
I’d say yes and no. I would say it was probably harder for my now husband because right before we left, I was working at Channel 7, he was working at Foxtel. We’d been dating for about four years, and I told him, “So I’m applying to film school and if I get in, I’m going to move.” And he was like, “Okay, well I guess I’m moving with you,” which is very sweet. So it was hard for him because I had school and I was gone 14, 16 hours a day, seven days a week, making my films and being a film student, whereas he had to find a job and he didn’t know a single person. And it was incredibly lonely being by himself, not having work and being in a new country. And I think that period of time, the first probably six months to a year, was really hard for him. Hard for me in different ways, but I was making friends, I was making films together with like-minded people, so I would say it was harder for him.
Mimi Kwa (28:40):
So the US has been so instrumental in your journey and has allowed you to actually step into your power and to be who you truly are. You were born in China, didn’t come to Australia until you were seven years old. Do you still call Australia home or a home of sorts, or do you feel like you’re at home now? Or do you feel like just a citizen of the world and the world is your home?
Amy Wang (29:06):
That’s a good question too. Oh, man. Because when I go back to Sydney, things have changed a lot, but at the same time, it only takes me a couple of days to really recenter myself. And my family’s still there. All of my really close friends are still there, so it does feel like home to some degree. I think I’ll always be Australian. I would never call myself American. That just feels really far-fetched. No offense to Americans.
Mimi Kwa (29:36):
We’ve made that clear now.
Amy Wang (29:41):
But home? Probably LA. I would probably say LA feels like home now, which is sad, but joyful, I guess.
Jo Stanley (29:52):
Why sad? I think that’s awesome. If you’ve found a place where you feel belonging, belonging is so key to our sense of safety, right? So I think that’s beautiful that you found a home there in LA. So Amy, I read that you said, it was an interview where you were, I think, advice to other younger filmmakers. And you mentioned that life experience is so important to your work, that you bring lived experience to everything you do. So taking this conversation away from the industry and your actual job, let’s say, what kinds of life experience have you had that really contributes to you being here now? Because we’ve heard that you were bullied, we’ve heard that you changed schools. There’s a real tale of resilience in you. Is there a life experience, a life moment, a story of one particular moment that contributes to you being here now?
Amy Wang (30:47):
Gosh. I don’t know if there’s one moment, but again, great question. I say the life experience is important because what it is to be in the film industry and what sets you apart is your voice, and I define your voice as your lived experiences and what makes you unique, how you view the world, what you think of the world. I think filmmaking in particular, you have to have a stance. So I don’t want people to think that it’s like you need to do something crazy and go to Antarctic and live there for 10 years. I think it’s about knowing what you’ve lived and remembering working through, in a therapeutic kind of way, what has happened in your life to lead you to where you are now. And for me, I used to think my life was so boring, and I grew up in suburban Sydney and had two parents with an early child and grew up watching movies. That was my story.
(31:59):
And then the more I thought about it, the more I realized the things with my parents and their inability to communicate in English. And from a really young age, I had to be their translator. And to this day, my mother will text me and say, “Can you write up this email for me that I need to send to the RTA or the NRMA?” Or, “We have a leak in our tap. Can you call up this plumber for us?” So that still happens. And I think that experience has been such a huge influence on my work, because what I like to do is I like to write morally ambiguous characters, and I’d like stories about people who society likes to see or judge in a particular way and show you a different side.
Mimi Kwa (32:54):
Now, we have this funny, quirky thing that we do on our podcast where we tell a little story, a story about an A to B in history or in storytelling, an A to B about something that’s been invented or how something came about. So I have researched one with you in mind, Amy.
Jo Stanley (33:19):
And Amy, we call this surprise and delight, because we bring it to the other person. Well, I call it that because we like to surprise each other. I don’t know what she’s bringing here. It’s like a little gift.
Mimi Kwa (33:32):
Yes. An origin story for something well known that you, Amy Wang, may or may not already know. We will see, but just picture this. Imagine you’re in Tokyo around 1603 to 1868, which is a pretty broad, non-price time, but this is what my research threw up. And there’s this ruler in no one particular region called Lee Nowtucker. And Nowtucker is wandering around and he’s looking up at the sky with his bow and arrow, and he’s hunting falcons. Now, there happens to be a cat watching Nowtucker with great curiosity. Now, this cat was Auspiciously born at a local temple. So Nowtucker’s hunting away and suddenly a storm begins to brew. Now, this cat, for those of us who love cats, and I know Amy does.
Amy Wang (34:32):
I love cats.
Mimi Kwa (34:32):
Not sure about Jo.
Jo Stanley (34:32):
I love cats.
Mimi Kwa (34:33):
Okay, we all love cats. Oh, you love cats? All right, I should know that. So this is a very cute cat. And just as the storm’s brewing and Nowtucker is hunting, he looks over at this very cute cat, and the cat raises its paw and beckons Nowtucker over. So now Tucker puts down his weapon, steps towards the cat to give the kitty cat a little pet, and bam, lightning strikes exactly where Nowtucker was standing just a moment ago, the cat has saved his life. Nowtucker proclaims the cat a hero, makes the cat the patron of the temple in the area, and a shrine to the feline who has saved his skin. Today, the waving, beckoning cat can be seen in its thousands at the same temple and in its thousands across the world in Chinese stores and supermarkets.
Jo Stanley (35:39):
That is the best.
Amy Wang (35:39):
Yeah, that’s awesome.
Mimi Kwa (35:39):
The Chinese waving cat welcomes you into Asian shops everywhere, but it’s actually not Chinese, it’s Japanese, according to this research.
Jo Stanley (35:49):
Oh, Mimi, that is the best one we’ve had so far-
Amy Wang (35:52):
That’s cool.
Jo Stanley (35:52):
… because they are everywhere. And let me tell you, not being Chinese, but growing up where all the shared households in inner city Melbourne, for some reason, everyone had one of those cats. I actually just got rid of one that my husband has held on to since I met him when he was 25. Oh my god, I love it.
Amy Wang (36:13):
Oh my God, that’s awesome.
Mimi Kwa (36:14):
They’re lucky cats. So this is the lucky cat, and apparently it’s not waving, it’s beckoning. So that’s a beckoning symbol in Japanese. It’s saying, “Come over, bring me money, and good luck, whereas we call it the waving cat. Anyway, I thought that was a great story.
Amy Wang (36:32):
That’s really cool. That’s really cool. Yeah, I knew it was Japanese, but I did not know of the story at all, that that’s what happened. Wow. And it is so fascinating how something that was Japanese moved its way into China.
Mimi Kwa (36:51):
Yeah, and it’s interesting as well, origin stories, how different people, different cultures, religions take credit for certain things. And I remember at the Chinese Beijing Olympics how the Chinese were very clear on who invented pasta, who invented writing, who invented paper. They made sure-
Amy Wang (37:11):
So funny.
Mimi Kwa (37:12):
… that it was unequivocal.
Jo Stanley (37:14):
It leads me to ask you the question, though, Amy, now that you have moved countries, did you take anything with you? I don’t know if you took a beckoning cat, but did you take something that was perhaps a part of your identity that you just couldn’t leave behind?
Amy Wang (37:30):
Gosh. I will say, I think another reason why I’ve been pretty good with moving around so much, and in a way I don’t really miss a lot of people, is because back in China, because my dad was in Australia and my mother was working, she actually put me through a lot of boarding schools as a three-year-old, four year old. So I would be at those boarding schools for-
Mimi Kwa (37:59):
Oh, sweetheart. You were just a baby.
Amy Wang (38:01):
Yeah. I do actually still remember this memory of my mother picking me up. And I’d been at the boarding school for six months, eight months, hadn’t seen her. And she was picking me up, and I remember seeing this image of this lady with really horrible teeth. And I was like, “Who is this woman with this horrible set of teeth who was trying to pick me up?” And she was like, “I’m your mother,” and I had no recollection of who she was. She’s told me a story, this is sad, about how when she first came me in a boarding school, she gave me this doll and she was like, “Whenever you miss me, you hug this doll. This doll is me.” And when I went into the boarding school, apparently the teachers told my mother afterwards that I would not let go of the doll ever. I would sleep with it, I would shower with it, and-
(39:03):
I would sleep with it, I would shower with it. And after a couple of months, my mother came to pick me up. She said I took out this dirty, ragged doll that I kept with me for all those months. She used to then take it or wash it, and I gave it to my mom, and it just broke her heart, seeing that. Yeah, it’s a sad story. I still get emotional talking about it.
PART 3 OF 4 ENDS [00:39:04]
Mimi Kwa (39:29):
Oh, broken our hearts. How old were you?
Amy Wang (39:32):
About three. Three to four. Definitely, I think during those early years, not having parents and having that kind of stability, I think… I mean, this is how I reason with it, the reason why I don’t miss people as much, or I’m not as, I guess, sentimental with things, is because I’ve moved around so much, and in this early years, I didn’t really have a lot. I protected myself, I guess, by not missing my parents.
Mimi Kwa (40:13):
What would you say to the little three-year-old Amy who’s clinging on to her little doll and in that… I know that you call it a boarding school, but it sounds like an orphanage to me, in a way, because you’re there without parents.
Amy Wang (40:27):
Yeah. I mean, I would say you’re going to find a great way to talk about that pain and to express yourself, which I think is a huge reason… I mean, it’s the biggest reason why I can’t stop creating and I can’t stop writing. And I guess things change and things get better, and things also get worse in different ways, but keep going and never stop loving your family and stop putting yourself out there, even if there is pain and you are rejected, to never stop doing that, which I feel like I haven’t stopped. Yeah.
Jo Stanley (41:19):
And one other question. The fact that you had dreamed of this career when you were so young and now you’re here, right? And it’s a question that often people are asked, but what would you say to your teen self, who had suddenly discovered Fight Club and discovered that filmmaking was your dream? What would you say to that teen self, now that you’ve lived that journey and you’re in your Be?
Amy Wang (41:43):
Yeah. I would say, relax, because I think when you’re early on in your career and especially when you’re a teenager… I think I was worrying about all sorts of things, and scared that this wasn’t going to happen or that wasn’t going to happen. Just a lot of worry, I think. And even now, it’s still there. I’m sure if there is an A to B to C, when I’m in my C, in 10 years, I’m going to look back and be like, “You need to chill. Be Amy.”
Jo Stanley (42:17):
Yeah. Isn’t it extraordinary, Mimi, how those formative years, which you just live through, don’t even think about, but then as an adult it just creates all of your coping mechanisms. It creates all of your relationships with the external world. And I’m sure it really informed your creativity, as well, Amy, because when you are a solo child, you are creative, because it’s your only company.
Amy Wang (42:45):
Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah. And it is wild to think, like, my husband and son… is white, and he grew up in suburban Sydney, in Drummoyne. And when I was in China, up until I was seven, I, I don’t know, showered maybe once a week, because I didn’t have access to showers and bathrooms the way he did. Like my grandmother would wash me in like a little pot, bowl thing. There wasn’t free-running water, there wasn’t even like a shower in our house. Yeah, it’s kind of trippy to go from that to Sydney, and then now here to LA, where my boss at Netflix, my showrunner is married to Gwyneth Paltrow. And we had yum cha
Mimi Kwa (43:48):
And you were bathing in a little bucket when you were a baby.
Amy Wang (43:51):
Yeah. Now we had yum cha with Gwyneth Paltrow and him. It’s so wild and bizarre. And to see the wealth and the glamour and everything. Like going to these parties. Like during Oscar season, going to these Oscar parties, seeing all these famous people and incredibly wealthy people. It’s really bizarre to see all these worlds, from China to Australia to LA. And fascinating, yeah.
Mimi Kwa (44:30):
It is amazing. And I think you have really painted for us just a brilliant picture of where you have come from and who you are, because it doesn’t matter where we go in life, geographically, or metaphorically, career-wise or otherwise, we always take with us our past and our past experiences, whether we recognize that or not. So your past experiences is so rich and so interesting. To think that there was a time in your life where you thought, it was boring, is so extraordinary. But I really relate to that too, because I thought that my upbringing was boring too, until I wrote a book and realized maybe it wasn’t that boring.
Amy Wang (45:12):
Yeah, not at all.
Mimi Kwa (45:14):
This is kind of the part in our discussion where we really like to just ask a couple of questions for just some succinct answers, whatever springs to mind. And this is about, really, what, Amy Wang, is your Be? What is it for you to be in your being now, in life and what you’re experiencing?
Amy Wang (45:39):
God. I mean, what is it to be Amy Wang? To be me, I think being truthful, both to yourself and in your work, I think is something I am and strive to be. Right now with the writers’ strike, I feel very passionate about my position as a writer and the importance of being a writer and being somebody who tells stories.
Mimi Kwa (46:18):
Is there something that you do that connects you to yourself? Some activity that you do. Is it the writing when you get into flow, is it walking, is it doing yoga, is it singing? Is there something that you do that really helps you connect to the source of who you are?
Amy Wang (46:35):
Definitely writing is a huge one. The movie that I am directing, it’s going to be my first movie that I’m going to be directing, that I wrote. That is all about my teenage years growing up in Sydney, except it’s set in America. But dealing with the same themes and the same kind of pains and painful memories that I kind of grew up with. So that’s been very cathartic to write that and to talk about it and to think about it. So that’s been definitely something that connects me to who I am. I would also say, I don’t know, talking to my husband, talking to my friends, I think is a really huge thing, because I’m very neurotic, and I can have lots of ups and lots of downs in a day. I think what really grounds me and reminds me of my self-worth and what I’m capable of is my husband a lot of the time, and my family and my friends. So I think that also helps me be me.
Mimi Kwa (47:52):
Oh, Amy. I just want to give you a hug. I want to give that little girl Amy a hug, the teenage girl Amy a hug, all of the machinations and versions of you. We are so grateful that you have joined us today.
Amy Wang (48:06):
Thank you guys. This was really lovely.
Jo Stanley (48:08):
Oh look, I can’t wait to see your C. That’s going to be amazing.
Jo Stanley (48:16):
Thank you for listening. We love you joining us for our A to Be chats.
Mimi Kwa (48:19):
Yes, we do. Please see our show notes for our acknowledgement of Country and all the people who help us put this podcast together, as well as interesting links to our guests’ work and other references we’ve mentioned.
Jo Stanley (48:31):
Such as your frequently unverified quotes.
Mimi Kwa (48:34):
Yes. I may still need to check a few of those. Thank you.
Jo Stanley (48:38):
We’re Jo…
Mimi Kwa (48:39):
… and Mimi from A to Be. Rate, follow and get in touch on our website.
Jo Stanley (48:44):
And let us know whose A to Be you’d like to find out about.
Mimi Kwa (48:48):
We can’t wait for you to hear our next conversation.