I wanted to tour the United States because I feel I owe it to the community that I grew up in. When I was growing up, the only people I saw on TV were Jackie Chan, Lucy Liu and Jet Li. Our representation as Asians wasn't big, but I wanted to be like Lucy Liu and then Maggie Q.
I never grew up thinking, 'Why aren't there any Asians?' But then Lucy Liu came on, and I was like, 'Oh my God, she is my favorite.' I was nothing like her, but I just loved her because she was the only Asian I saw.
I grew up thinking Margaret Cho and Lucy Liu were my idols because that's it.
We didn't grow up in any sort of meaningful representation in media apart from, you know, Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Bruce Lee. But, of course, that was different still, because it always played to this narrative of the foreigner from the East.
I grew up loving Jackie Chan and Jet Li and certainly Bruce Lee. But as I got older, I started to question: Is that all we have?
It was 'Shaolin Temple,' Jet Li's first movie. That was the movie that got me to want to learn martial arts. Then I became a huge Jet Li/Jackie Chan fan after that.
Jackie Chan is a very good comedy/martial arts star. He does one kind of martial arts that Jet Li doesn't know how to do and Jet Li does a martial art that Jackie Chan doesn't know how to do. You can both go to two Chinese restaurants, but both can have different kinds of food.
Jackie Chan is a very good comedy/martial arts star. He does one kind of martial arts that Jet Li doesn't know how to do, and Jet Li does a martial art that Jackie Chan doesn't know how to do.
When I was growing up, I wanted to be my half-sister Lucy. She was 14 years older than me and was impossibly glamorous. I grew up in awe of her.
Jackie Chan, Jet Li and Bruce Lee are my masters; they're the inspiration for my work. Bruce Lee was a heavy fighter who threw hard punches. Jackie moves very fast and uses a lot of comedy, and Jet Li is very fluid. I've tried to combine all of their styles and added some things of my own.
At AFI, you make three cycle films your first year, and then you make a thesis film your second year, and I watched Darren Aronofsky's cycle films and was blown away - there was a young Lucy Liu, who was just part of that generation. And I just wanted to be part of that tradition.
I have so many girl crushes, it changes all the time. I love Catherine Zeta Jones, she's so beautiful, Lucy Liu, Jennifer Aniston and Zooey Deschanel; she's adorable.
There have been, in recent years, many Asian American pioneers in the public eye who've defied the condescendingly complimentary 'model minority' stereotype: actors like Lucy Liu, artists like Maya Lin, moguls like Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh. They are known, often admired.
I have two sons in America, and all they care about in Chinese culture is Jackie Chan and Jet Li.
The more important question, of course, was what the new Lucy would do, and even though I was pretty sure the old Lucy wouldn't be around much anymore, I was a little bit afraid the new Lucy hadn't yet shown up.
Growing up, my inspirations were Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, all these martial arts legends. I wanted to express my talent on screen in a certain way. I felt that it made me a little different.
TV has eaten up everything else, and Warhol films are all that are left, which is fabulous. Pork could become the next I Love Lucy, the great American domestic comedy. It's about how people really live, not like Lucy, who never touched dishwater. It's about people living and hustling to survive.