Alice Wu

Alice Wu (Chinese: 伍思薇; born April 21, 1970)[1] is an American film director and screenwriter.

Alice Wu
Wu in 2005
Born (1970-04-21) April 21, 1970
San Jose, California, U.S.
Alma materStanford University (BS, MS)
OccupationFilmmaker, screenwriter
Known forSaving Face
The Half of It
Winner, Founders Award for Best Narrative Feature, 2020 Tribeca Film Festival

In both of her films, the main characters are Chinese American. For the film Saving Face, a number of production companies offered to buy the script for the film, but Wu opted not to sell it in order to uphold an authentic portrayal of the Taiwanese-American community.[2] Aside from Asian protagonists, her films also often explore the lives of intellectual, LGBT female characters.

Early life

Alice Wu was born in San Jose, California[1] to parents who were immigrants from Taiwan.[3] Her family eventually moved to Los Altos, California, where she graduated from Los Altos High School in 1986.[4] She enrolled in Massachusetts Institute of Technology at the age of 16.[5] She later transferred to Stanford University, where she earned her B.S. in Computer Science in 1990 and her master's degree in Computer Science in 1992. Before becoming a filmmaker, Wu worked as a software engineer for Microsoft in Seattle.

Career

While working at Microsoft, Wu began writing a novel. Deciding the story would work better as a film, she signed up for a 12-week screenwriting class at the University of Washington in which she penned the script for her first feature film. She then left the corporate world and eventually moved to New York City to pursue a filmmaking career full-time.[3]

Saving Face (2005)

Encouraged by her screenwriting teacher, she left Microsoft in the late 1990s to try to turn the script for her first feature film Saving Face into a film, giving herself a five-year window. Production had begun when she reached the fifth year.[3] In 2001, the script for Saving Face won the Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment screenwriting award.

Saving Face was released in 2005. The film was inspired by her own experiences coming out as a lesbian in the Taiwanese American community. She has said that she would like the audience to come away from it "with this feeling that, no matter who they are, whether they are gay or straight, or whatever their cultural make-up is, that if there is something that they secretly wanted, whether it's this feeling that they could actually have that great love or whatever it is, that it's never too late to have that. I want them to leave the theater feeling a sense of hope and possibility."[6] Alice struggled with her sexual identity and when she came out as a lesbian she had a difference of opinions with her mother which led to a fall out between the two. In an interview with Jan Lisa Huttner, Wu noted that not all of her audience was female, Asian, or lesbian. She found it "highly unusual" that "you can take a group that seems so specific, and make them universally human".[7]

The film has been influential within both lesbian and Chinese communities. It heavily focuses on the challenges faced within the Chinese-American community, dealing with issues of the role of women and lesbian identity.[8] Wu also explores relationships between mothers and daughters in the Chinese-American community through her portrayal of the relationship between the film's main character and her mother.[9] Although she claims that the film's main character is not an autobiographical portrayal of her real life, it was partially a way to provide positive representation for her own mother.[10]

The film had its world premiere at the 2004 Toronto International Film Festival, and its U.S. premiere at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. Sony Pictures Classics released the film in May 2005.

Interim

After working on her first feature film, Wu subsequently worked on a film based on Rachel DeWoskin's memoir, Foreign Babes in Beijing: Behind the Scenes of a New China.[11] The movie, however, did not make it past pre-production.

In 2008, she sold a pitch to ABC called "Foobar" based on her experiences working as a woman in the tech world.[12]

The Half of It (2020)

Wu is the writer, director, and producer of the Netflix film The Half of It. The feature script appeared on The Black List (survey) in 2018.[13] The film is a romantic comedy which follows a Chinese-American teenager as she helps a boy win over his crush, who she also has a romantic interest in. The film stars Charmed actress Leah Lewis, Daniel Diemer, and Alexxis Lemire in the leading roles. It is Wu's first major film since the release of Saving Face in 2005.[14] The film was announced in April 2020 as the winner of the Founders Award for Best Narrative Feature at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival.[15]

Awards and honors

In March 2005, Wu's film Saving Face was the opening film at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.[16] Later that year, she received the Visionary award at the San Diego Asian Film Festival to celebrate her directorial debut for Saving Face,[17] and was nominated in the breakthrough director category at the Gotham Independent Film Awards, although she did not win.[18] In 2006, Saving Face received a nomination at the GLAAD Media Awards.[19]

In April 2020, Wu's film The Half of It won the Founders Award for Best Narrative Feature (in the U.S. Narrative Competition category) at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival.[20]

In June 2020, in honor of the 50th anniversary of the first LGBTQ Pride parade, Queerty named her among the fifty heroes “leading the nation toward equality, acceptance, and dignity for all people”.[21][22]

Personal life

Wu is gay, and came to this realization while taking a feminist studies class at Stanford. Wu came out to her mother during a conversation with her (in Mandarin Chinese) about the class.[23]

Filmography
Year Title Position
2005 Saving Face Writer and director
2020 The Half of It Writer, director, producer
2020 Over the Moon Writer

See also

References
  1. Pettis, Ruth M. (2006). "Wu, Alice" (PDF). glbtq.com. Retrieved March 23, 2019.
  2. Hill, Logan. "Debut Director: Alice Wu". nymag.com. New York Magazine. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  3. Leibowitz, Ed (May 29, 2005). "Kissing Vivian Shing". The New York Times. Archived from the original on November 26, 2011. Retrieved July 6, 2008.
  4. Wang, Cathy. "Los Altos Alum Alice Wu's Film to Hit Netflix — but that's not even "The Half of It"". The Talon. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  5. Masters, Kim (May 18, 2020). "Alice Wu's 'The Half of It'". The Business (Podcast). KCRW.
  6. Warn, Sarah (May 26, 2005). "Interview with Alice Wu and Joan Chen of "Saving Face"". AfterEllen. Archived from the original on November 21, 2015. Retrieved August 31, 2017.
  7. Huttner, Jan Lisa (May 28, 2005). "Jan Chats with Alice Wu & Joan Chen about their new film SAVING FACE". ff2media.com. Retrieved April 18, 2020.
  8. Wong, Alvin Ka Hin (June 15, 2012). "From the Transnational to the Sinophone: Lesbian Representations in Chinese-Language Films". Journal of Lesbian Studies. 16 (3): 307–32. doi:10.1080/10894160.2012.673930. PMID 22702380.
  9. Hengshan, Jin (2019). "The Meaning of Liberation: From The Joy Luck Club to Face and Saving Face". Partial Answers: Journal of Literature and the History of Ideas. 17 (1): 65–80. doi:10.1353/pan.2019.0003.
  10. Hill, Logan. "Debut Director: Alice Wu". nymag.com. New York Magazine. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  11. Brian B. (December 16, 2005). "Paramount Taps Alice Wu for Foreign Babes in Beijing". MovieWeb. Retrieved October 12, 2018.
  12. Adalian, Josef (September 20, 2007). "Alice Wu, Neil Moritz team on 'Foobar'". Variety. Retrieved October 12, 2018.
  13. Vlessing, Etan (April 22, 2019). "Leah Lewis, Alexxis Lemire to Star in Alice Wu's 'The Half of It' Teen Romance for Netflix". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved April 22, 2019.
  14. Evans, Greg. "Netflix Launches Production On 'The Half Of It', Alice Wu's Movie Follow-Up To 'Saving Face'". deadline.com. Deadline. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  15. Jordan Moreau, Variety, ‘The Half of It,’ Steve Zahn, Assol Abdullina Win Awards at 2020 Tribeca Film Festival, https://variety.com/2020/film/news/tribeca-film-festival-winners-steve-zahn-the-half-of-it-1234593660/
  16. Brooks, Brian (March 10, 2005). "Alice Wu's "Saving Face" Opens San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival Tonight". indiewire.com. Indiewire. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  17. Wagner, Holly J. (November 20–26, 2005). "'Saving Face' Explores Personal Identity". Home Media Retailing.
  18. "Gotham Independent Film Awards". gotham.ifp.org. Gotham Independent Film Awards. Archived from the original on February 19, 2017. Retrieved October 29, 2019.
  19. Marcus, Lawrence (January 25, 2006). "GLAAD Hands Out Noms". variety.com. Variety. Retrieved October 30, 2019.
  20. Brian Welk, The Wrap, Tribeca Film Festival Gives Jury Awards to ‘The Half of It,’ Steve Zahn Despite Cancellation, https://www.thewrap.com/tribeca-film-festival-gives-jury-awards-to-the-half-of-it-steve-zahn-despite-cancellation/
  21. "Queerty Pride50 2020 Honorees". Queerty. Retrieved June 30, 2020.
  22. Reddish, David (June 15, 2020). "Meet the entertainment creators fighting the good fight this year". Queerty. Retrieved June 30, 2020.
  23. Johnson, G. Allen. "Alice Wu saved up her own doubts and struggles and turned them into the new comedy 'Saving Face'". Retrieved March 5, 2020.
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