Interview: Lily Gladstone, Kelly Marie Tran & Han Gi-chan on ‘The Wedding Banquet’
Everyone has a favorite rom-com. For Kelly Marie Tran, it’s When Harry Met Sally or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Lily Gladstone’s pick? Can’t Hardly Wait, which she loved in middle school. And Han Gi-chan? “I love The Notebook,” he offers.
Lily doesn’t miss a beat. “That’s not a comedy!”
“Well,” Han says, “I could say romance is also similar to a comedy!”
“You could say that,” Lily laughs.
It’s the kind of easy back-and-forth that feels less like a press junket and more like a group of friends catching up, which is also how much of The Wedding Banquet, the latest film from director Andrew Ahn, was made.
A remake of the 1993 classic from director Ang Lee, The Wedding Banquet follows Angela (Kelly Marie Tran) and her partner Lee (Lily Gladstone), who have been unlucky with their IVF treatments, but can’t afford to pay for another round. Meanwhile their friend Min (Han Gi-chan), the closeted scion of a multinational corporate empire, has plenty of family money but a soon-to-expire student visa. When his commitment-phobic boyfriend Chris (Bowen Yang) rejects his proposal, Min makes the offer to Angela instead: a green card marriage in exchange for funding Lee’s IVF. But their plans to quietly elope are upended when Min’s skeptical grandmother (Youn Yuh-jung) flies in from Korea unannounced, insisting on an all-out wedding extravaganza.
“We were all bonding,” Lily says of their experience making the film. “The four of us were on a residential street so there wasn’t room for all of our trailers. We weren’t hiking away and isolating between takes. It was the four of us in this carriage house next to the main house, just eating snacks, watching Couples Therapy, talking about musicals and celebrities, and just having fun with each other.”
That closeness became part of the story. “It wasn’t work on our parts, you know?” Lily says. “Away from the scenes, we inhabited and accepted each other as Lily, Kelly, Gi-chan and Bowen. And then when we’re in our specific scenes with our partner in life, Angela and Lee, it felt very different. But it was just an easy thing to walk into and trust that it was going to be lived in, trust that it was going to be honest, trust that it was going to be everything it needed to be. And yeah, Andrew chose very well.”
The atmosphere was so relaxed, it even sparked rumors on set. Specifically from Joan Chen, who was convinced the cast was high on something stronger than just snacks. “It was so fun, that Joan started a rumor that we were all high on gummies the whole time because we were just giggling,” Lily says. “From her vantage point, I get it.” The truth? Haribo gummy frogs and eggs. “Canada’s got the great gummies like the UK does. We were all just really into that, and that worked its way to the craft team, who set aside gummies to make sure that we always would have them. Joan asked for some of those and they said ‘No, those are their special gummies.’ So in her head, she’s like, ‘Oh, that’s why they’re so giggly.’”
But when it came to the more serious moments, especially those with legends Joan Chen and Youn Yuh-jung, the cast knew exactly what they were walking into.
“For me, especially me as a newcomer, you don’t always get this wonderful chance to work with legends,” Han says. “When I was cast, they gave me the casting list, right? And I saw this casting list, and it was this huge damn thing. I thought it was a total fake. I couldn’t believe that they could make this with a low budget. That’s crazy!”
Youn Yuh-jung, in particular, made an impression on Han, who plays the Oscar winner’s grandson. “Having a scene with them, we could just see the emotion just flowing on her face and we could just literally say that there’s a story right there,” Han says. “Actually, there was a funny episode of how she was testing me in this film. I had to audition one more time. Not by Andrew, but with Youn Yuh-jung, and she gave me a pass. That’s why I’m sitting here.”
As for the original Wedding Banquet, Gladstone says she had heard of it but had never seen it. Not until until she joined the project. “It came back around, obviously, with this script and seeing that James Schamus also co-wrote this adaptation. He co-wrote with both directors on either end, so it felt like it was just a really important continuation, and really foundational history,” she says. “I wish Andrew or Bowen were here. They both speak particularly about how much it meant to them… Andrew saw it at eight years old. It was the seed of his filmmaking career. And Bowen, he saw it in college, and just how much it captured the experience that he was at at that point in his life—with his queerness and with his family knowing about it. I think it’s an incredibly important film and it’s really an honor to continue the legacy of it.”
And was it as much fun to make as it is to watch?
Lily jokes: “It was horrible.”
Kelly grins. “It was like going to war! No, it was the best.”
THE WEDDING BANQUET is now playing in cinemas.