Joan Chen
Joan Chen
Joan Chenis a Chinese-American actress, film director, screenwriter, and film producer. In China she performed in the 1979 film Little Flower and came to international attention for her performance in the 1987 Academy Award-winning film The Last Emperor. She is also known for her roles in Twin Peaks, Red Rose, White Rose, Saving Face and The Home Song Stories, and for directing the feature film Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl...
NationalityChinese
ProfessionActress
Date of Birth26 April 1961
CountryChina
My brother is a brilliant artist. His oil paintings are really beautiful. And he was the one that taught me what to see - how to see. Colors, lights. And how lights can be so musical.
In China we use the word baptism a lot, it's a very revolutionary word.
Now I have a family. I have a real home, a place I really want to come back to. I get really homesick before because there wasn't much to be missed.
Dailies means every day you have 20 rolls, and here I was with 200 rolls of film.
I went on auditions for a movie called Year of the Dragon. I was pretty much fresh off the boat, and I had a little baby fat on me. I was a cute - really cute 22-year-old.
You want actors to give you the essence of drama-not only the gift of their instincts and knowledge but the greater gift of themselves. When that happens, it's gold-and when you want to catch that, you don't go through all sorts of fancy camera movements to play director.
The mainstream welcomes kung fu films - martial art films, right? So that's one type of Chinese-ness that's welcome.
The lowest budget U.S. films are ten times times better than shooting in Tibet.
Having been an actress was also good because I know how to talk to the actors. I know what comes through and what doesn't and often times I've worked with a director whose directions I knew I'd just better not try to listen to because it messes you up. So, having had an acting background really helped.
I went to California to study drama and study film, still with the goal of going back to China. I stayed for at least four years and then I visited China. I was a little lost. I was very homesick. I took a risk, I went back to China and realized that I have actually changed, that China as a whole wasn't what I imagined it to be.
I was always so anxious to do the right thing, politically righteous, socially acceptable. It wouldn't have been good. It wouldn't have suited my personality because there is so much complication I didn't understand as a kid.
I did somehow manage to get into a college in China that trains diplomats when I was 17, one year before my peers could go, which is very very difficult. I was very proud I did.
All my girlfriends were learning musical instruments - forced to learn musical instruments because if they knew a musical instrument, they would be in the performance troupe. Even if they were sent down. Then they wouldn't be in the fields. Then they'd probably be treated a little better. That was the hope.
I'm angry about stereotypes about Asians, but I'm not bitter about not getting enough roles. I do see myself as being very fortunate, and see the change in the industry.