Embrace the Panda: Making Turning Red (2022) - full transcript

When I come up with ideas,

they'll just start from a very primal,

"I just want to see

this cute thing on screen,"

and then I'll find the meaning

and the metaphor and the themes

to justify why it should be that.

But really, it just came from a place

of "Oh, they're so cute,"

and "Wouldn't it be awesome

if they were gigantic?"

I'm excited.

-What's the panda's name again?

-RONA LIU: Tenzin.

And then the girl was

the older one, right?

Didn't realize they'd be so small.

Real red pandas are really cute.

And I think that's the main reason why

I was drawn to making a story about them.

It's got kind of a belly sometimes.

They're very tubular

and they have very long, fluffy tails,

more pointed snouts.

The tail's about 18 inches.

Oh.

They feel a little cat-like,

kind of raccoon, kind of bear.

Maybe a little splash

of monkey or something.

Look at it. Aw!

LINDSEY COLLINS: They're totally solitary.

They don't really communicate

with one another.

They're kind of like teenagers.

-I like the long...

-That one's like an old one.

SHI: I found a lot of parallels

between red pandas and Mei

and her story.

Like, red pandas

are very attached to their mom.

They sleep all day.

They eat bamboo, but they're not

supposed to eat bamboo,

bamboo doesn't give them

enough nutrients.

So I imagine

it's just like a lazy teenager,

just eating chips

and sleeping all day.

They're native to China.

And then also, it's like red and white.

It's like Chinese, but also like

the colors of the Canadian flag, too.

So it felt like the perfect animal

to tell this story about this

Chinese-Canadian teenage girl.

I'm Meilin Lee.

And ever since I turned 13,

I've been doing my own thing.

Making my own moves, 24/7, 365.

Turning Red is about Mei,

a Chinese-Canadian girl

living in Toronto in 2002.

It's very specific.

It's a mother-daughter story.

At its most base level,

this film is about growing up

and figuring out who you are

and embracing that.

MING: Mei-Mei...

MEI: Coming!

SHI: Everything changes for Mei

when she wakes up one morning

and discovers she's a giant,

eight-foot-tall furry red panda,

and she realizes

"Oh, I can control this transformation.

"If I just stay completely calm

and even for the rest of my life,

"I will stay human and it'll be A-okay."

Yes.

But that's not how life works.

Oh, crap.

(EXCLAIMING)

Mom!

So the red panda is basically

a metaphor for magical puberty.

Just seeing how this girl

who thought she had everything

under control,

suddenly big and hairy and smelly,

an emotional wreck. (LAUGHS)

4*TOWN forever?

COLLINS: This panda is incredibly cute.

It's also true to that time

in a girl's life.

In some ways, it's the worst time.

You're not a kid,

and you're not an adult.

This poor girl,

she's looking in a mirror

and seeing that

she's got hair everywhere and she stinks,

and she's big

and doesn't fit through the doorway.

FEINBERG: Panda Mei is only

half in control.

She's having a great time,

but then she's like "Auughhh."

And like, I don't know,

that feels very much like

what my teenager years were like.

Ah OOGa!

LIU: It's bodily, it's emotional.

It's all about, "Can I embrace this?

Can I grow into it?

"Can I still love who I am

"knowing that I've become someone

that I'm not used to?"

SHI: It's all going according to plan.

COLLINS: This is about right.

LIU: It's the first time in my career

where all of the key leadership

on the show are women,

and I feel like

that sets a very different vibe.

It's completely amazing

to have this all-women leadership team.

I have spent the entirety

of my career in meetings

where I was one of very few women.

Now sitting there and making plans

and it's all women in the room

has been this really crazy thing

and very different for me.

Everything's different

about this film.

I don't know how to answer that question

without starting with Domee.

-She's a good girl. Just like I was.

-(ALL LAUGHING)

I first heard of Domee

through seeing one of her

ten-second animation clips.

I was in college, and it was something

that she posted on her blog.

(UPBEAT MUSIC PLAYING)

It was this dancing, twerking hamster

to a K-pop song.

"Who is this girl?

"She's probably going to be

a really funny director one day."

When I first started this movie,

I was really determined

to make something different.

We're going to be spending

four or five years of our life on this,

we've got to go big.

I'm Domee Shi,

the director of Red,

and ever since we started

making this movie,

we've been breaking convention

and making people laugh 24/7, 365.

Ah, legally, it's nine-to-five, 261.

Whoo!

SHI: On this show,

we wear what we want,

say what we want,

and we will not hesitate

to do spontaneous cartwheels

if we feel so moved.

Domee is a force of nature.

She is a first-time feature director.

It's been a while since I've worked

with a first-time director before,

and I'm loving it.

In conclusion, welcome to Red!

(ALL CHEERING)

SHI: Lights? Pitch.

Did that actually change anything?

Yes, it did.

-So, welcome, everyone.

-Just ignore the camera, everyone.

-It's not there.

-Don't look right here. (LAUGHS)

SHI: Making the film,

it's just been like a long marathon.

But in the first couple of years,

it was mostly me,

and Julia, our screenwriter,

head of story, Rosie Sullivan,

the story team,

and then Nick, our editor.

And we were just working

on the reels.

Yeah, it feels like

you're part of a pirate ship.

Because you're all kind of just working

and sweating for these drawings,

and you're all aiming to make

the director react or respond.

(ALL LAUGHING)

I started working with her,

and pretty quickly,

I felt like this woman

is really impressive.

Also, incredibly clear in her vision.

SHI: And then ta-da, and like,

imagine it to look

like a comic book background.

Thank you, Margaret.

Great work.

(ALL APPLAUDING)

She is so unique

in how she thinks about movies,

how she communicates her vision,

her humor, her tone.

I just thought I'd get this in front of

you to see if it lives within our world.

-Is that what we're looking for?

-Yes. Yes. Sorry.

(ALL LAUGHING)

I feel like I have to be more

of a director now for the camera.

The crew slowly grew bigger and bigger.

To give you a general sense

of the BG buildings.

This reminds me of Toronto a lot,

a lot of these old buildings.

And then last year,

it just exploded.

And that was during

the pandemic. (CHUCKLES)

It just so happens that

the busiest time on the show

was when we were all working from home.

FEINBERG: Hi, Frankie. Hi, bubba.

It may not be obvious, I don't know,

but making films is a huge team effort,

and so, the more you can collaborate

with the people around you,

the better the movie is going to be.

As we were leaving to walk out

the door for getting sent home,

Domee said, "Well, maybe I could do

like a coffee time or something

"just so we can keep

in touch with the crew.

And we all went, "Oh, what a great idea."

And in the beginning, it really was

kind of this awesome thing

of just being able to see

more than like three people in your life.

And also getting to hear from

the director weekly is pretty cool.

...Mei's struggle throughout act two...

Even if sometimes

it's just a little update,

it felt like some kind of connection.

We are starting with a couple of

nominations from our dailies team.

I've been really surprised

because we routinely get a hundred

and something people coming to it.

(SINGING A BAD RENDITION

OF HAPPY BIRTHDAY)

Oh! Thank you!

Exceptionally bad and so out of key.

But I really love it.

Here's to a better 2021.

FEINBERG: We're coming together in some of

the best way you can do during a pandemic

with a giant movie crew,

so it's been pretty cool.

(PLAYING FESTIVE MUSIC)

FEINBERG: My job is Visual Effects

Supervisor on the film.

First woman in 20 years at Pixar

to have that job.

For almost 15 years,

I was a lighting DP,

and so most of my career at Pixar

has been about lighting,

thinking about how to make

the most beautiful movie possible,

how to make a great experience

for the lighting team...

A little bit of this,

even though that would catch the light.

How to engage with the director,

how to coordinate with other departments,

how to do groundbreaking stuff.

And now I'm in this new role,

overseeing heavily tech

and some of the creative,

and I am now in the leadership group

of running the movie.

(BABY BABBLING)

And then at the same time,

I became a mother for the first time.

I have twins, a boy and a girl.

Ah!

I don't know that I ever thought

I was going to have kids.

You know, there's days where it feels

completely overwhelming, I would say.

CHILD: Yay!

FEINBERG: Yay!

But I also am now a year and a half

into being a mother.

And I'm two years into this position.

I love both things dearly, and it's hard

to imagine not having them now.

And I got married to my amazing wife.

-Hello.

-PAIGE: Hello.

You guys, it's Mommy!

Hi, guys.

FEINBERG: Paige is a battalion chief

for the Alameda County Fire Department.

She's the highest ranking woman

of that department,

which I'm neverendingly proud about.

She would not love that I'm bragging

about her, but I love to brag about her.

It's one of my favorite topics.

Are you gonna be able

to jump into the end credit?

We're moving it up to 2:30, I think.

This is Lindsey Collins.

She is the producer of Turning Red.

The producer is the one orchestrating

this giant circus.

-The ringmaster?

-She is the ringmaster.

When people are going "Auggghhh"

Lindsey is like, "Okay, let's make a plan.

"Let's figure out

how to make this happen."

So in the race to get this done,

we're probably just going to be working

on top of each other, which is great.

Lindsey is so smart, I think she's

always like a million steps ahead,

so that I can worry about

what's happening in the present.

I'm really good at working

within boxes and limitations

and she was really good about

drawing them out for me

to be crazy and push up against.

Just to draw the storyline together

maybe a little bit clearer...

I feel like I learned so much just by

watching her and working with her

and I see it as the partner

to the director.

So that includes being a creative partner,

but also managing the crew

and surrounding her

with all the right people.

LIU: You're in every meeting,

you always offer ways

to move story along

and you help production through,

not just by managing it,

but also just from an emotional,

creative side as well.

-You do.

-Thank you, Rona.

I kind of like it when...

COLLINS: This is Rona Liu.

She's the production designer

of Turning Red.

The production designer

is the first person brought on the show

after the producer and director.

You know, we're talking about the values

being super, super crunched.

COLLINS: And that's basically because

from the very beginning,

their job is to figure out

what the movie is going to look like.

And that is everything from characters

to sets to color to tone and style.

LIU: My role is to collaborate

closely with the director,

and make sure that her vision translates

throughout all of the department

and onto the screen.

EMMA ON COMPUTER: Welcome, everyone.

Today, we're going to kick it off

with Athena and the panda

costume shaping.

For her tail,

the lighter part

can take on some of that red.

I know I'm providing information that

other people need to get their work done.

Let's tone the two sides

where there is the star and the heart.

I feel like that's the most important

part of my job, is to just make sure

that everybody else feels good

about the work that they're doing.

Okay.

SHI: Good job, everyone. Thank you.

-Thank you. Bye.

-Thanks.

LIU: Being pregnant while we're

in the crunch of things

definitely made me have to just

trust my team a lot more.

It's the first time in my life

where I was comfortable

telling my manager, Sophia,

I need to take some time to nap.

So that does make sense.

Hey, Rona, where are we?

We're in the living room area.

This is the entrance to our house.

This is our kitty.

And this is my soon-to-be-husband.

-We're getting Zoom-married on Friday.

-Mmm-hmm.

We've been engaged for so long,

we figured now's a good time to do it.

-Yeah.

-(BOTH LAUGHING)

LIU: Being able to step away,

touch base with a loved one

and to say, "Hey, how's your day going?"

and just being really connected

in both of our lives for the first time,

that's been really comforting.

I'm an only child,

and my dad had to go away to work a lot.

So a lot of the time,

it was just me and my mom.

We'd go on Chinese bus tours.

Like she'd pick the locations.

And she would take us to Atlanta,

or Halifax,

Prince Edward Island.

Maybe not like, upfront,

the most exciting places,

but we would spend a good ton of time

just together on the bus talking.

It was good at first,

but like everybody,

you grow up and you change

and you want to have your own friends

and your own life,

and it's kind of just about

how that transition happens.

I love the lighting.

I love everything in this sequence.

Great work, you guys.

(SCHOOL BELL RINGS)

It's been a long time

since I was 13.

But I just remember it being

a lot of highs and lows.

It's such a turbulent time

in a person's life,

especially a girl's, I think.

Small things can feel

super, super important,

and you could love something

one day and hate it the other.

MEI: I didn't even like 4*TOWN last year,

but now they're literally

the greatest thing

that's ever happened to me.

This film is very personal

to me in that

it was very much inspired by my own life

growing up in Toronto

and being the only child

of my overprotective mom and dad. (LAUGHS)

We are about to hop onto

a Zoom call with my parents

and they are going to dig through

all of the artwork and things

that I've ever created in my life.

They've collected all of it.

Yeah, everything. Everything.

It's my parents!

Hi!

(SHI'S FATHER SPEAKING MANDARIN)

How's it going? Is it weird having

a whole camera crew in the house?

SHI: They live in Toronto, Canada.

Still in the same house

that I grew up in,

pretty much looks exactly the same

every time I go back.

Yeah. And then you replied as Santa Claus.

-Why would Santa Claus ever say that?

-(BOTH LAUGHING)

She wrote a table of contents,

a foreword.

Can you read some of your foreword?

So my dad would be like my art tutor,

but my mom would encourage

my writing.

(SHI'S FATHER SPEAKING)

Aw, the Wi-Fi sucks.

He's saying nice things about me,

and I can't hear it.

He's never this generous with his praise.

Come on!

(SHI'S MOTHER SPEAKING)

Yeah. Why is it... It's so big.

In the living room,

there's like an ever-growing shrine

dedicated to me.

It looks like they really love me

and that I'm dead or something. (CHUCKLES)

Yeah, I remember the judge.

I heard you guys collected

all of my sketchbooks.

Let's look through them together.

-Pokémon.

-Yeah, Pokémon.

That's middle school.

And then high school is when I started

drawing a lot of beautiful people.

It's boys. If there's boys,

then it's close to high school.

-(SHI'S MOTHER SPEAKING)

-Oh, my God. (LAUGHS)

This is so embarrassing.

There was this fan art contest

that I entered,

where it's like

draw Draco's children.

Okay, maybe we can look

at another sketchbook.

(LAUGHS)

Mmm. Devon.

Ugh! May I remind you

what real men look like?

4*TOWN!

SHI: There's just so much comedy

in female adolescence

that I don't see a lot of,

and I just can't wait to show people

just how weird girls can be,

because I was totally that as a teen

and a young adult and now. (LAUGHS)

I love how Mei is just a confident dork,

(LAUGHS) and she's unapologetic about it.

I feel like she was the girl

that I wanted to be.

There's so many elements of me in Mei.

Spunky, loud,

doesn't care what anyone thinks.

I accept and embrace all labels.

Even though I was a total nerd.

I was so oblivious to that,

and I think that helped me.

LIU: She herself

never questions who she is,

and I think she fights

what is expected of her.

But deep down,

she always knew who she was,

and she was always

so accepting of herself.

I remember being that at some point,

and then, you know, hitting that age

and then suddenly turning very, very shy

when I got acne. And then I was

very aware of my body and all that stuff,

and that's what I wanted to explore,

with Mei turning into a red panda.

She's this girl

that has her life together,

and then all of a sudden,

magical puberty hits.

It's going to be okay.

No, it's not! Will you just get out?

Excuse me?

Are you serious?

SHI: For Mei, I really wanted her

to sound unique.

I wanted her to feel like a real girl.

Oh, my gosh, that was the best thing ever.

SHI: And so we found Rosalie Chiang.

It's like you feel bad about

turning her down because she's your mom.

She just had this really great voice.

There was just like

a charming imperfection to it.

LIU: For Mei, it was important to

design her the way that we saw ourselves.

Her face is round, her ankles are thick.

We definitely embraced her chunky cute.

It's kind of our design aesthetic

for our characters and for our sets.

We were looking at each other's faces

and were like, "We got moles.

"She should have moles."

-Then you're like, "Rona, you have..."

-"You have funny lips."

"You have that dip in your lip.

Let's put that in.

BOTH: "Hey, Rona,

you have really patchy eyebrows."

When that part of myself gets celebrated

and the director's like,

"Hey, I like that.

Let's put it in our main character,"

you're like,

"Hey, why did I hate that for so long?"

Jin. Jin! It's happening!

What are you doing?

COLLINS: For me, this story is so much

my day-to-day life.

I hate to admit, I'm much more the mom

than the main character because I actually

have three kids who are teens.

I am surrounded by teenagers

and hormones and puberty at work.

And then I go home,

and I am equally, if not more,

surrounded by puberty

and hormones at home.

Are you guys going to walk the dog?

Will you take them together

or are you gonna take them separate?

Bye. Thank you.

They've been very well-behaved.

(LAUGHS) It does not normally

go that smoothly.

MEI: The number one rule in my family?

Honor your parents.

They're the supreme beings

who gave you life...

The least you can do in return is...

every single thing they ask.

I think both of us probably grew up

under a lot of pressure

-to, you know, make our parents proud.

-Yeah.

I had that pressure on myself.

Like, I was very high-strung.

I was really into good grades.

I was into the image of the perfect girl.

I never ask for anything.

My whole life I've been her perfect

little Mei-Mei. Temple duties, grades...

-Violin!

-Tap dancing.

Yeah. We've been so good.

If they don't trust us anyway,

then what's the point?

SHI: Mei's struggle in this film is

she's torn between being her mom's

good little daughter,

and embracing her wild inner beast.

That is the universal struggle

that a lot of kids go through,

especially, I think, immigrant kids,

there's definitely more of this obligation

to carry on your family's legacy

and make sure that their sacrifices

in coming to a new country aren't in vain.

But also, you're in a new country,

you're experiencing all of this

crazy, awesome stuff

that maybe your parents

didn't get to grow up with.

You're caught between two worlds,

and that's kind of

what I wanted to explore in Mei

and also, like, literally caught between

being like a human girl and a panda.

LIU: I immigrated to the U.S.

when I was 10,

and my mom

is very much in her Eastern roots.

And when I came here, you know,

I was the good little Chinese girl

that I knew how to be,

and then as I get more and more exposed

to the Western culture

and what it means

to be an American teenager,

my mom and I started to butt heads.

I had to discover

how to bridge the gap

between being a dutiful daughter,

faithful to myself, and a good friend.

In eighth grade,

I met my best friend, Aya Alaadel.

She really taught me

-that girls can burp the alphabet.

-(BURPING)

Girls can want to play video games.

If you trip and you fall on your face,

you can learn to laugh at yourself.

You don't have to be embarrassed

for your decisions,

for your mistakes, for who you are.

She really opened my eyes to all of that.

This is Bao.

-This is...

-Your first baby.

-Our first baby.

-Our first.

Our first baby.

Rona designed

this cute little nose for him.

Used our own noses.

-You look like your mother.

-(LAUGHS)

SHI: I had this short film

that I was developing, that became Bao,

and Rona was one of the first people

that I roped into the story.

I was like, "Dang, she can really paint

and she has really good taste

"and she seems really cool."

"I really need an art person

to like take this to the next level."

To be honest, I will follow you

to the ends of the Earth.

I think Domee is just

a brilliant, brilliant mind.

I just feel like we click

and we can be so open

in communicating with each other.

We're different enough

in certain areas of our tastes

that we can collaborate and create

something even better together

than if we worked on something separately.

Hey, Bart. Hey, Lisa.

LIU: In the movie, Mei and her family

own and take care of a family temple.

We took several trips

to different historic temples

around California

that were built by early Chinese settlers

just to get a feeling

of what these grassroots temples are like.

SHI: I also spent time living behind

a temple with my grandma in China,

and I just remember

it being just a really lovely memory.

I'd make candles, and we would sell them

to visitors of the temples.

And I'd learned how to pray properly

with my grandma.

When we got to building the set

of the temple and dressing it,

it was really cool seeing those details

that we saw at the temples

kind of pop up in the background.

Like, there's just a bottle

of vegetable oil.

Like, cleaning supplies

tucked away in the corner.

They've been around

since the Gold Rush era.

All these immigrants

who came with so little

were able to cobble together

a little piece of home.

That kind of felt like

the immigrant spirit.

That kind of felt like me and Rona,

and how we, in our art,

we are inspired

by Eastern and Western stuff.

Should we try to match their face shapes?

You know, like a bell shape?

I remember you saying,

"Rona, this is not a Chinese film.

"This is a coming of age film,

"but it just happens to be

about a Chinese girl."

We need to really tap into the mind

of a 13-year-old growing up in 2002,

growing up in Toronto.

-What did we like when we were 13.

-Yeah.

And we liked Sailor Moon.

We liked anime.

The fandoms are what got me

really into anime.

I was drawing fan art passionately.

I had a secret sketchbook.

You join an online community,

you draw fan art,

and other people

would comment on it,

and that would encourage you

to draw more, produce more.

And that's kind of just what

encouraged me to keep drawing.

I think, as a kid,

it was such an escape.

I know I'm Asian,

but I'm in a very white school.

It kind of was nice to be connected

to that Asian side of myself.

I didn't have a boyfriend,

so then it's nice to read

about boyfriends.

Yeah, and a lot of them are drawn

and written by women too.

There was a lot of stories told

from a girl's point of view,

and they're the heroes,

they save the day

or they change the hearts of all the boys

-and make them fall for her.

-(BOTH LAUGH)

This is my house.

This is my boyfriend, Darren.

My many game consoles.

I've been using these

to de-stress over quarantine.

This is this awesome

Miyazaki art book I got

about the Ghibli Museum.

I got this rug over quarantine.

Diane really likes this rug.

Where's Diane? Diane?

Don't be scared, don't be scared.

Don't be scared. Come over here.

I got you!

She'll come out, she's shy.

I think I'm craving even more speed

as she poofs into a panda

and shoots forward.

We're paying homage to anime

throughout the entire movie.

You can see it in the expressions

and the acting,

the starry eyes in Mei

when she sees a boy

that she really, really loves.

Uh, Mei?

Why are you staring

at Carter Murphy-Mayhew?

We definitely have a lot of expertise

on the movie

about being 13-year-old girls,

for sure.

There is definitely

a lived experience there

that we get to bring

to the movie-making,

maybe in a different way

than I would have been able to,

say on a movie like WALL•E. (LAUGHS)

That scene with Mei

going under the bed,

and all of a sudden

she's sort of gripped by things,

and she's drawing these sexy pictures

and the conflict there

and "Why did I draw those things?"

I mean, I wasn't

under my bed drawing things,

but when I was 11,

I had a little wooden clothes pin,

and I had this mad crush on this woman

that was older than me,

but I did not know

that I was gay at the time.

And I remember drawing her name

on the clothes pin

and then flipping it over.

And she played a sport

so I put her number down,

and that sat on my desk

and I would look at it sometimes.

You know, these things,

these silly things you do.

I definitely get what Mei is doing.

(LAUGHS)

From the side, would it look like this?

Did you know that I was like,

"Oh, my God, am I ready?"

-To be a production designer?

-Yeah. "Will I be good?"

We both did it on a short.

But you're a first time feature...

I will be a first-time

feature production designer.

I figured because I was nervous

about directing for the first time

that you would be nervous

about production designing,

but I naively thought,

"How much harder could it be

directing a feature?"

I was really scared, honestly,

at the beginning.

I mean, you know,

Domee was intimidating, right?

I mean, she's... Seriously, you were,

like, super talented and...

I'm gonna be a diva.

-No, I was never worried about that.

-(LAUGHS)

It was good, too,

because you also made me,

kind of having done this for a while,

you questioned things

that I hadn't questioned in a while.

So I started in May of '97

at Pixar on A Bug's Life.

I had worked in traditional animation,

but at the time, CG animation

was a completely different ball game.

I just remember I would have this notepad

and I would just write down questions.

I was like, "Is the render farm a zoo?

"What's a cookie?

Can I have a cookie?"

They're like, "No. You cannot."

A cookie is not a cookie.

It was kind of like,

"Here we go, welcome to my questions."

Danielle was definitely

somebody that I sought out,

as she would not judge you and give you

a nice, clear and concise answer.

When we export act three,

is there a way to do one

that just has music...

One of the things

I love most about Pixar

is that I'm still asking questions

with the same amount of freedom and safety

as I did on the first day I got here.

It's just a philosophy that I've kept.

It's something I encourage other people

to do as they're starting on something.

If you don't know,

you're probably not the only one

in the room who doesn't know, so ask.

We basically started these this morning.

So be gentle.

A little bit before I was asked

to be the DP on WALL•E,

I thought, "I don't know

if I could ever be a DP,

"maybe like in 10 or 15 years."

MAN: Wow, that's great.

This one we lit in five minutes. (LAUGHS)

And then Andrew Stanton

asked me to be the DP on WALL•E,

and I was terrified because I didn't think

I knew how to do that at all.

COLLINS: I think we both

credit Andrew to a big degree, frankly.

We both had this encouragement

neither one of us would have asked for

until he kind of said,

"No, I want you to come do this."

It was an amazing experience.

It was also, half the time, terrifying

of just trying to figure out

how to hang on to who I was

and make it through,

even though a lot of times I felt like

I didn't know what I was doing.

But what we then decided to do

is some look stuff that's sort of like,

"How do we get out of the Pixar look?

How do we get into some new thing?"

We were trying to push

the boundaries of style

in both storytelling, in the camera,

the look of things,

using some hand-drawn elements,

but then you sprinkle in

Asian art influences.

It's been so interesting

to take those pieces

and figure out how you can apply them

to a 3D computer-animated film.

For me, I really wanted to be

a VFX supervisor

that was making sure

that people had the room

to bring their very best.

Not telling people what to do

but making space for them to shine.

And I have to say, honestly,

a lot of that has started with Rona

because she is the most

collaborative production designer

I have ever worked with, far and away.

I think it's made

a huge difference to the movie

and to people's enjoyment

of making the movie.

And this is the trust

and the confidence I gain.

(BOTH LAUGH)

This isn't just our first concert.

This is our first step into womanhood.

And we have to do it together.

SHI: Mei's friends are

Miriam, Abby, and Priya.

And they're her dork squad.

They accept her no matter what.

Red panda or no panda.

I always saw that as a metaphor

for when I found my squad.

4*TOWN, here we come!

I love that Mei

has these key friendships.

I very much am that person myself.

I always was the kid who had

two or three best friends.

Those kind of quirky, dorky people

who made you laugh,

equally insecure

about what was going on.

And in high school,

we'd get invited to the party

and we'd be like, "Okay, cool."

And then we drive over to the party

and we'd sit outside for a minute,

and then we were like,

"Let's go get a cake."

Then we'd eat a cake, like a whole cake,

in the car, and then go home.

It was about friends

that listen to that moment

when you were like,

"I'm not comfortable going in.

"I'm not confident enough

to do this,

"and all I really want to do

is go hang out with you guys."

SHI: Hi. Sorry I'm late.

Figuring out

how to be comfortable in the room

and finding my voice took a while.

When I first started,

I was definitely more nervous.

I was one of the few women

in the story department.

What helped a lot for me

was a female story artists support group

called the Story Artistas,

led by Mary Coleman,

and Nicole Grindle.

They were like,

"I want you guys to get comfortable,"

like, stating out loud

what your goals are.

And I think there was one lunch

where I meekly said out loud,

"I want to be a director." Oh!

Cool. Yeah, really feeling that anger.

She's like launching herself up,

"Sorry, I'm not..."

You could play Ming

a little bit more in slo-mo as well.

-Yeah.

-Otherwise it's looking good.

Anyone else have thoughts? Notes?

Mei-Mei, there you are.

-Hey, Mom...

-You're ten minutes late.

What happened? Are you hurt?

Are you hungry?

-Um...

-Ming is a force to be reckoned with.

She's just a sweet innocent child.

How dare you take advantage of her!

When Sandra Oh became the voice of Ming,

it just felt like her character

was starting to flesh out.

I knew you were trouble.

SHI: Sandra's so funny,

but she also has so much range.

She added that missing piece

to the puzzle of Ming.

I have a double-jointed elbow!

Look! I can make a perfect circle!

That was great.

I think in terms of design,

you wanted her to have

the really powerful shoulders

with these thin eyebrows,

kind of like Chinese ladies

from like the '60s,

-with the qipao and stuff.

-I wanted traditional Chinese

-mixed with Working Girl.

-LIU: Yeah.

We definitely couldn't have written Ming

without input from Lindsey

and other moms on the show.

I came at it purely from the point of view

of the oppressed teenage daughter.

So it was really helpful

hearing that other side.

You don't know everything,

you're making it up as you go along.

What I love about Ming is that she's not

one sided, cookie cutter character

and certainly not as a mom.

And as a mom myself,

I can appreciate those moments.

Hey, Sloane?

So will you remind me before we sit down

to dinner to RSVP for your...

-Fall festival?

-COLLINS: Yeah.

You're having conversations

that you are like,

"Is this even the right conversation

to be having?

"Am I supposed to be playing

more of a mom role?

"I don't even know what that is."

You're talking about heartbreak and dating

and insecurity and body image.

I know how I feel about all those things,

yet I don't know what I'm supposed

to say about any of them.

I don't know if I'm supposed

to pretend I don't have those issues

or if I'm supposed to say

I had all of them.

We always joke that your poor oldest kid

is like the first pancake.

You're like "Oof.

"Sorry, dude, I'm pretty sure

we're messing this up."

The third one we should be good.

She's gonna have

nothing to complain about

You guys...

The RSVP thing is closed.

Mom!

-Okay.

-BOY: Is it too late?

Yeah, apparently. But that's okay.

BOY: Ready?

GIRL: Yeah.

In a way, parenting overwhelms me

much more than my job does.

And I think it's just because I feel like

the stakes are so much higher.

(GIRL SINGING INDISTINCTLY)

Every choice you make as a parent

has equal chances

of being this great memory

and a success

in your relationship with them,

or alternatively, this huge disaster

that they will talk about

for the rest of their lives

as the most embarrassing thing

that ever happened to them.

(SINGING CONTINUES)

FEINBERG: Okay. Who wants to get dressed?

GIRL: Me!

(EXCLAIMING)

FEINBERG: We both have worked

very hard at our careers,

and we are late mommies.

And so I think both of us

have a huge amount of regard

for how important our work and career is,

and so we try to protect

that for one another.

On Fridays, Paige is here with the kids.

We don't have the nanny.

And, you know, I sort of have this like,

any spare moment I have

I should be running out to help,

and she has zero expectation of that.

That's made it so much more doable

to be able to balance the two things.

Not that it's always easy or something

but it, that makes a huge difference.

Boy, you guys really destroyed

the house this morning.

You know, it's really amazing

those kids right now,

they're almost 17 months.

Maybe you can hear Jack

crying in the other room.

That's a little heartbreaking

because I want to go run and help.

It is a massive luxury

to be able to see my kids

as much as I have

during this last year-plus.

I never ever would have

been able to see them as much.

I would have been racing home from work

just to catch them going to bed.

Sometimes I get to catch them for dinner.

I always get to put them to bed.

You know, it's not like

you can ever get that time back.

Yeah, I think it's working really well.

-MAN: Okay.

-Final!

(ALL CLAPPING)

SHI: I think it took until screening six

for us to finally have an ending.

And that, I think, was because

it took a long time for me

to process my own relationship

with my mother,

and just trying to figure out

how to be a good daughter for them.

I also don't know

what the solution is in real life.

Is it about being true to yourself,

or is it about honoring your parents?

I don't know.

It's some messy mix of both.

There's no clear answer.

LIU: Before I was a mom,

it just didn't occur to me

how hard it would be.

I don't know how people do it, and I don't

even know how I'm doing it right now.

My mom has been such a huge supporter

of what I want to do,

and she just always believed

that I know what's best.

That gave me so much freedom

to be the artist that I am today.

WOMAN: Happy baby.

LIU: Growing up, my parents separated,

and striving for perfection

came from this feeling of like,

I just want to be good enough

to keep my dad and my mom.

And maybe...

Maybe if I was a perfect little girl,

my parents would be together.

Yeah.

And... Hmm!

It worked out

in the best possible way for me.

I feel like it made me ambitious.

Ever since I had a baby, my worth,

who I am, is no longer

so much tied to others.

I just feel like I am a whole being

and I'm solid.

FEINBERG: I think anyone being able

to tell kids as they're

growing up and going through

this sort of chaos,

of emotion or feeling out of control

or "Do my parents love me?"

or "Can I be who I want to be

and they'll still love me?"

or "Who am I and what do the other kids

want me to be?"

We need art in general,

especially things that go on a screen

that kids can see

that tell them that it is okay.

And I think it's also for parents,

it's okay to see all of that craziness,

and that's a natural part of life

you've got to wade through

to form who you really are.

Meilin says she's not like her mom,

and that's okay.

And then she realizes,

"I am my own person.

"I want to embrace this thing

"that every other member of my family

has tried to lock away."

COLLINS: When she becomes this red panda,

it at first glance, represents everything

she doesn't want to be,

her being different and standing out

and feeling like she can't control herself

or the situation

the way she used to be able to.

You can't go through life and become the

amazing person you're supposed to become

if things don't conspire to rock

that sense of stability.

When you say to embrace the red panda,

I think that represents

being okay with that part of yourself.

It's okay not to be

in control all the time.

It's okay to be messy.

It's okay to be loud.

It's okay to be noticed.

If you don't accept it, it's a curse.

And then if you embrace it,

then it's a gift that keeps on giving.

I mean, for Mei, once she embraced it,

her whole life opened up to her.

FEINBERG: The last year-plus

with the pandemic

has been unlike anything

any of us have experienced.

It's been incredibly difficult,

it's been very stressful,

and for me, this is the funniest movie

I've ever worked on,

and so, if even at just that level

people get to have some laughs,

I think that would be amazing.

But it also has this much deeper thing

of really being able to reach out

and say, "It's okay."

If you're confused and feeling crazy

and you don't know who you are

and you might let your parents

or yourself down,

that's a natural part of growing up.

And if that could be what we provide for,

I think even one kid out there,

that would be really amazing.

-(BABY COOS)

-(LAUGHS)

SHI: Come on. Good Cornflake.

Darren made a quiche yesterday.

Look, your quiche is on camera.

So cool. I like how you guys designed it.

-In there?

-WOMAN: Yes.

COLLINS: When these dogs come in here

and start snoring so loudly,

to the point where they're like...

(SNORES)

WOMAN: Do you, Rona, take Dylan

to be your lawfully wedded spouse?

I do.

Congratulations, you may kiss.

Good boy. Got it?

Great job.

(SINGING) Final!