Joan Chen, is a Chinese actress who has had a career that is unlike any other.
Chen was taken from a classroom and thrown into the movies about fifty years ago while still a teenager in Shanghai. She became an award-winning mega-star in spite of all odds, but she abandoned her career and relocated to the United States in 1981. She came at a time when almost no Asian characters were given meaningful roles in American movies. Nevertheless, she broke through that glass ceiling after practically starting from scratch, landing leading roles in high-profile films, including one that brought her back to China: Bernardo Bertolucci's epic The Last Emperor (1987), which was nominated for and won nine Oscars, including best picture.
In the 37 years that have followed, Chen has gone through many highs and lows in his career. Ang Lee's 2007 film Lust, Caution, Oliver Stone's 1993 film Heaven and Earth, David Lynch's iconic 1990–1991 TV series Twin Peaks, and the epic 2014–2016 Netflix series Marco Polo are just a few of the noteworthy projects in which she has acted. At one point, persons magazine labeled her one of the 50 most attractive persons in the world, while the San Francisco Examiner called her "Hollywood's leading Chinese actress." At one time, though, she was on the verge of leaving the industry since the best offers she was receiving were for straight-to-video B films.Rather, by pure happenstance, she ended herself directing two movies before returning to front of the camera: a $50 million studio picture starring Richard Gere and Winona Ryder (Autumn in New York, 2000) and a $1 million independent film (the semi-autobiographical Xiu Xiu: The Sent Down Girl, 1998).
The fact that Chen, who is currently a young 63, may yet have the best years ahead of him is maybe the most astounding of all. She received some of the best reviews of her career at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year for her performance in Sean Wang's feature directorial debut, Dìdi, as a Taiwanese immigrant who aspired to be an artist but ended up raising her two unappreciative American children.The festival's U.S. Dramatic Audience Award went to the heartwarming dramedy. After acquiring it, Focus Features put it in theaters on July 26. And it now appears quite likely that Chen will receive her first Oscar nod for best supporting actress for her work. (In addition, she just filmed the Christmas movie Oh. What and a version of The Wedding Banquet. Fun., and she will receive many more offers.)
In this chat, she talks about all of the aforementioned topics as well as, in a very moving way, what it has been like to see and contribute to the advancement of Asians in Hollywood, which she describes as "unimaginable" when she first came to the United States forty-three years ago.