U.S.A.
August 20, 2018
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 7
Wu’s fight for Crazy Rich Asians part of a bigger crusade
By Lindsey Bahr
AP Film Writer
B
EVERLY HILLS, Calif. —
Constance Wu had resigned
herself to the fact that Crazy Rich
Asians was not going to work out for her.
She was under contract for her sitcom
“Fresh Off the Boat,” both were filming in
the fall, and that was that. Crazy Rich
Asians would be the first studio-made
Asian-American movie in 25 years, and
Wu, who has established herself as a
crusader for Asian-American representa-
tion in Hollywood, would have to sit this
historic moment out.
But then, feeling “kind of dramatic,” and
thinking about the significance of the
project to her and an untold number of
Asian Americans who make it a point to
tell her their stories because of her tweets
and “Fresh Off the Boat,” Wu decided to
give it one last shot and composed an
e-mail to Crazy Rich Asians director Jon
M. Chu.
“I said, I know the dates don’t work out
and whoever you cast, I will be the first in
line and I will be their No. 1 fan and
supporter, but I did want to let you know
that I would put 110 percent of my heart
into this project and I know what to do with
it and how to carry a movie and if you can
just wait for me, I don’t think you’ll regret
it,” Wu, 36, said. “I did NOT think this
e-mail would work. I did it more for me so
that I felt that I had told my truth. But
then he read it and said, ‘You guys, we’ve
got to push the production.’”
Sitting in a restaurant at the Beverly
Wilshire — a hotel famous for co-starring
in another Cinderella story, Pretty Woman
— and sipping on a “cocktail” of grapefruit
juice and sparkling water, Wu describes
how Crazy Rich Asians is also a kind of
Cinderella story. Based on the first book in
author Kevin Kwan’s popular trilogy, Wu’s
character, Rachel Chu, is a middle-class
economics professor from the U.S. who
finds herself navigating the upper
echelons of Singapore’s wealthy classes
when her boyfriend, Nick Young, takes her
home for a wedding and to meet his
disapproving family and all the jealous
women also vying for the attention of the
“prince.”
“It’s a fairytale, it really is,” Wu said.
“And there are a lot of different shoes in
the movie!”
A native of Richmond, Virginia, and a
classically-trained theater actress with a
passion for musicals, Wu has been working
toward a moment like this her whole life,
and taking it very seriously. During the
shoot, she wouldn’t go out with her co-stars
for karaoke nights or have a drink after a
long day of work. She wanted to be clear of
mind and she’d already promised her
director that she was going to give it her
all.
My Turn: The trouble with The Mikado
Continued from page 6
the Japanese-American community in the
Portland metropolitan area to inform
them of the production.
At the end of the tense but mostly
courteous dialogue, Smith agreed to talk
with Marleen Wallingford, the president of
the Portland chapter of the Japanese
American Citizens League, and meet
with
Yokoyama,
who
graciously
volunteered to help them alter the script to
remove Japanese words, phrases, and
gibberish.
Yokoyama spent time with LOoP going
through the script and musical score to
reinvent some of the orientalist phrases
and musical tones. After that meeting, she
concluded that “even with the changing of
names, location, music, or wording in the
libretto, the orientalist history and
harmful nature of the piece can simply not
be erased.” In short, she, like many
Asian-American performers, would rather
not ever have to deal with a work that is
the epitome of orientalism again, nor the
same tired arguments and history that
accompanies it. As of this writing, the
production is still set for September 20
through 30 at the Alpenrose Dairy Opera
House.
It’s important to note that this type of
cultural work and difficult dialogue with
artistic groups is common in Portland arts.
Working in a majority white state can be
tiring for artists of color. We carry not only
the responsibility as artists who just want
to do good work, but often have to be
cultural consultants, the latter of which is
usually unpaid, not acknowledged, and
readily exploited.
Newest SpaceX booster flies
again with Indonesia satellite
By Marcia Dunn
AP Aerospace Writer
C
APE CANAVERAL, Fla. —
SpaceX used its newest style
booster for a second time to put a
communications satellite into orbit for
Indonesia.
The Falcon 9 rocket blasted off early in
the morning August 7 from Cape
Canaveral, Florida.
The first-stage booster previously
soared in May, the first time out the gate
for the upgraded rocket. After performing
its latest job, the booster landed upright on
a floating platform in the pitch-black
Atlantic.
Each rocket in the new and improved
line is intended for dozens of repeat flights.
SpaceX is striving to lower launch costs
through rocket recycling. SpaceX founder
Elon Musk’s goal is for swift launch
turnarounds using the same rocket, even
twice within 24 hours. He says that could
happen as early as next year.
She knew how unlikely it was that she’d
ever get an opportunity as an Asian-
American woman to lead a studio movie.
“Even a terrific actress like Sandra Oh
was always No. 2 or No. 3 in the movie, she
was never No. 1 unless it was an inde-
pendent movie,” said Wu, who is not shy
about saying that she only wants to go out
for roles where she is the No. 1 star. It’s a
drive that has made some uncomfortable.
“People are like, ‘Who do you think you
are?’ And it’s like, I guess I think I’m a
talented actor and I guess I’m not a person
CRAZY RICH CRUSADE. Constance Wu (top
photo) plays Rachel in the Warner Bros. Pictures, SK
Global Entertainment, and Starlight Culture contempo-
rary romantic comedy Crazy Rich Asians, which
opened in theaters last week. Wu, a native of Rich-
mond, Virginia, knew how unlikely it was that she’d
ever get an opportunity as an Asian-American woman
to lead a studio movie, so she found a way to work in
both Crazy Rich Asians and her sitcom, “Fresh Off the
Boat.” Pictured in the bottom photo are (L-R) Henry
Golding as Nick, Wu, and Sonoya Mizuno as Araminta.
(Photos/Sanja Bucko, courtesy of Warner Bros. Enter-
tainment Inc. and Kimmel Distribution, LLC)
who is going to let you make me feel small
anymore,” she said.
But Wu isn’t interested in making
people feel comfortable at the expense of
her truth, which is why at least part of her
time is spent amplifying underrepre-
sented voices on twitter, even knowing
that it’s affected her employment
opportunities.
Wu once heard from a friend that her
liberal boyfriend said he didn’t like Wu’s
politics.
“I’m like, ‘Does he not like my politics or
does he not like that I have politics?’ And
she asked him and he was like, ‘Oh I guess
it’s that,’” Wu said.
Fame, she said, is silly in that regard.
She thinks it’s “dumb” that she has a
bigger voice than other people, like
journalists or academics who are more
studied in discourse on race and
intersectionality. But, she also realized
that while she has this platform, she can at
least do some good with it.
Henry Golding, who plays Nick, is in
awe of Wu’s fortitude.
“She’s such a role model for so many
people. She has a backbone, which a lot of
people don’t. She’s not afraid of saying
what’s on her mind and really driving
home what she thinks should be done, or
what’s not happening in the industry that
should be happening,” said Golding. “She’s
going to go down as a real fighter and
someone who can act the socks off
anything. She is Rachel Chu.”
As for what’s next, Wu said she thinks
she’s going to have a lot of choices in the
coming years.
“I’m very privileged and lucky and I’m at
a point where I can sort of get to decide
where I want to go with my career,” Wu
said.
And first up on her wishlist? A musical.
U.S. students turn grief into tech startup after France attack
By Olga R. Rodriguez
The Associated Press
ERKELEY, Calif. — A group of
California college students who
were in France during a 2016
terrorist attack are turning their grief into
tech tools to fight terrorism.
Anjali Banerjee and several University
of California, Berkeley classmates were in
Nice two years ago when a man plowed a
truck through a crowd, killing 86 people.
They’ve built a startup called Archer
that creates digital tools to help
B
investigators, human-rights workers, and
others
tackle
sanctions
evasion,
corruption, terrorism, and other global
violence.
Amnesty International is using one of
their tools to verify the authenticity of
photographs documenting the massacre of
Rohingya in Myanmar.
The students hope to turn their data
analysis tool into a for-profit company.
Banerjee says they were inspired to act
after having to rely on each other and the
people of Nice during the chaotic hours
after the attack.
Korean War dog tag belonged to Army medic
By Robert Burns
AP National
Security Writer
W
ASHINGTON —
The lone military
identification tag
that North Korea provided
with 55 boxes of human
remains
belonged
to
Master Sgt. Charles H.
McDaniel, an Army medic
from Indiana who was
killed in combat with
Chinese
soldiers
in
November 1950.
The
Army
handed
McDaniel’s
slightly
corroded dog tag to his
sons, Charles Jr. and
Larry, who were so young
at the time that they have
little memory of their
father.
The dog tag is the first
tangible touchstone of hope
that some or all of the
remains in the 55 boxes
will be identifiable by the
team of forensic experts,
anthropologists, and other
specialists who are already
sorting out the bones and
preparing to send some of
them to a laboratory in
Dover, Delaware, for DNA
analysis.
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