Michelle Yeoh on the roller coaster ride of Everything Everywhere All At Once

With the arrival of A24’s Everything Everywhere All At Once, moviegoers have collectively realized what’s been missing from modern cinema: an infinite number of Michelle Yeohs. As Evelyn Wang, the frazzled matriarch of an immigrant family discovering her un-lived parallel lives, Hollywood-by-way-of-Hong Kong screen legend Yeoh gets to showcase her myriad skills at once in Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert’s acclaimed new film, delivering physical comedy and timing even her diehard fans haven’t seen.

Yeoh’s latest star vehicle also arrives at a time when Asian stories and storytellers are increasing their presence in Hollywood, from Turning Red to After Yang to Pachinko. In a lively conversation with The A.V. Club, Yeoh reflected on the career moves that led her to Everything Everywhere All At Once, the methods to the madness in Daniels’ filmmaking, and why “what the heck” makes for a great artistic philosophy.

AVC: Congratulations on this amazing film!

Michelle Yeoh: Thank you, thank you. OK, did you watch it in the cinema?

AVC: Yes, I did.

MY: All right, OK, then I will continue to talk to you. Otherwise it would be a very short conversation! And you must promise me, you have to go back and watch it again and enjoy it even more.

AVC: And in IMAX, for sure.

MY: Oh, I am dying to go back and watch it on IMAX, too.

AVC: How many times have you seen it?

MY: Three times, but only one time in the cinema. That was at the opening at South by Southwest. And that’s why I keep saying, you guys have to watch it in the cinema. Because the first time, I just watched it in a screening room with two other people—you know when you go on a roller coaster ride? You don’t go by yourself, right? You want to be with the whole train of people where you are all strapped in and like, “Ah!” You know, looking around and having a really great time. And this is one of those unique movies that does that for you. It’s like we just want to feel and feel good and be able to laugh and cry. And we do it together.

AVC: What do you remember about first reading this script? What were your first impressions of your character, Evelyn?

MY: Well, actually, the first time I read the script, she was called Michelle. If you ask the Daniels, when they started on this draft, they focused on, “Well, we are doing this for Michelle Yeoh.” So they draw on all the things that I’ve done. And of course, one of the multiverses—they were so excited—was the fact that she was a movie star, right? And after reading the script and being blown away by it and meeting them and thinking, All right, I am going to meet two seriously evil geniuses, as I now call them, a certifiably insane couple—let’s see if they have the passion and the vision. If they can, in our first meeting together, show me that, then I’m in for the ride of my life. They were intensely serious about it, you could see. They’d spent the last two years putting down on paper all the craziness. I mean, if you look at it, it’s like five genres of films in one, right?

So when you’re embarking on something like this, you’re like, This is truly collaborative. I mean, all movies are collaborative. But this one, yes, it’s about Evelyn Wang. But Evelyn does not exist without Joy, without the amazing talent of Stephanie Hsu, who is able to bring the conflict of what young people are going through, their identity, trying to help their parents accept them for exactly who they are. And of course, there’s Ke Huy Quan. Thank God this actor decided, after 20 years, to grace us with his incredible presence again. And him playing the three different Waymonds! And the insane, most amazing Jamie Lee Curtis, who plays Deirdre [Beaubeirdra]. I mean, she is unrecognizable, but that talent just explodes on the screen and she’s hysterically funny. And then you have James Hong, in his awesomeness… So the Daniels have presented us in this sci-fi movie, but its very, very core message is about love. It’s about family. It’s about not giving up on who you are and the people who are most important to you.

AVC: You’ve talked about how this role required more physical comedy than you’ve ever done before. Did you have to learn how to perform martial arts badly?

MY: [Laughs]. No, it’s not that I had to do them badly. So Evelyn Wang, obviously, is an aging Asian woman and her most physical [exercise] is like getting her stupid drying machines to work. And if you look at the posture of Evelyn, she is bent over because she carries the weight of responsibility on her. And her back has suffered over the years of carrying and lugging all this heavy laundry. So she sort of waddles, she doesn’t stand up straight. She shuffles along in life, and it weighs down on her, and she’s unable to stand up straight and tall and proud anymore. So when she goes into the universe and she is learning—like the pinky universe where she’s training [her pinky fingers] and that’s an homage to the kung fu movies that we know so well—but every time she comes back, remember, she’s not that character. When she comes back, she comes back with their skills. So the hand and body and legs are going like she’s got these incredible skills. But the face of Evelyn is like, What the hell am I doing? So she’s registering shock, and then “whoa!” And then, fun! So it was very interesting because, you know, I’ve done all the action movies where I play the top-notch swords person, the martial artist. And it’s always done with extreme grace and the face is always very serene while you’re doing all these incredible moves.

So the first action sequence was actually with Jamie. It was love at first fight for us. She was so up for doing her own thing; we were like, “Jamie, do not jump down the staircase,” and she’s like, “Why not? I’m in a frigging martial arts scene with Michelle Yeoh, of course I want to do that!” I’m like, All right, we have a crazy-ass woman just like me. So then, I’m used to fighting like I know what I’m doing, right? Then the Daniels were like, “No, no, no. Remember, your face doesn’t know what it’s doing. Your body knows what it’s doing. So we have to see that.” So that was the brain fracturing. Oh my God, that was so fun.

AVC: What have you learned about yourself as an artist, or as a person, making this movie?

MY: I learned to be more courageous. I really learned that.

AVC: But you’re plenty courageous—you’ve motorcycled onto a moving train!

MY: That’s different, that was stupidity! [Laughs.] It’s very different. I think the thing with [acting] is you get very protective and you start thinking, Oh, I don’t want to look like a fool, I might come across as being silly. And then you go, Eh, what the heck? This is fun. That’s the joy of being an actor. It’s not you. You are playing a character who has the freedom to do all these kinds of things. So do not limit her. Stop tying your own hands up. The Daniels and I would look at each other, or Jamie and I would look at each other with our hot dog hands, and go, “Baby, let’s go for it.” So it is very empowering to say, “You know what? What the heck.” And that was the only way we all made this movie that we did. Because all of us had no reservations, we had trust in each other. We believed in this story that we were telling. That’s why every emotion was so sincere and real. And in any of the universes, no matter how silly or raunchy or whatever it is, that big, beating heart was real. So as an audience, you believed us because we believed in ourselves.

AVC: At the screening I attended, the Daniels pointed out that between this film, Turning Red, After Yang, and a lot of other projects coming out in 2022, Asian stories and storytellers are having a significant moment in Hollywood.

MY: I hope this is not just a moment! We are here to stay.

AVC: Right? Hopefully it’s not just a phase!

MY: Definitely not. And we should not allow it to be just a phase. We are amazing storytellers and we have so many stories like [Everything Everywhere All At Once] to tell. I mean, if you look at this story, it’s so relatable to any immigrant family. And America is filled with immigrant families! And Asians have been part of this community and society for a very, very long time. So why is it such a surprise that you see more Asian faces up on the screen or on your TV? It should be part of it because we are part of this community. And yes, we will continue to make better films—more fun, more dramatic, more martial arts, more everything!—because we’re not going anywhere.

Editor’s Note: A question in this interview was rephrased after publication to provide additional context and clarity.