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Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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From The New York Times, this is The Interview. I'm David Marchese. Chloe Zhao is an anomaly. At only 43, with just five feature films under her belt, she's already established herself as one of cinema's most distinctive and distinguished directors. And she's done it at a time when the movie business is increasingly averse to artistic risk and originality, qualities on display in all her work.
She started with independent film, including the sparsely poetic neo-Western Nomadland, which won Academy Awards for Best Picture and for Zhao Best Director. She then tried her hand at an ambitious mega-budget Marvel movie, Eternals.
And her latest is last fall's heart-wrenching drama Hamnet, an adaptation of Maggie O'Farrell's historical novel about the death of Shakespeare's young son from the plague and the grief his parents experienced after. It won two Golden Globes and is up for several Academy Awards, including Best Director. So how has she done it?
Because as I learned firsthand, Zhao is an enigmatic, even somewhat mystical presence in person. Not exactly the sort of hotshot personality we often associate with big-time Hollywood directors. But as it turns out, Zhao isn't much interested in simple or straightforward answers. Here's my conversation with Chloe Zhao. Chloe, thank you for taking the time to come speak with us today.
I appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
an award season question.
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Chapter 2: What unique qualities does Chloe Zhao bring to her filmmaking?
So when your work, right, which is the only way that you can see connection and validation since you're a little child is being compared and judged. You could go as far as feeling a rejection of that is a rejection of who you are and what your ability to belong to a tribe or be safe, or be loved. You could go that far. And it does go that far to me at times.
But what I like about it, I don't know if people know, is that filmmaking is quite of a lonely process. At least speaking as director, you're like a Ronin, you know, you're like a samurai.
A wandering samurai.
Yeah, you're getting hired to do jobs and jobs and jobs. And then You create this family and then you have to leave again. So a worse season, especially if someone like me who came up from independent films and having to go festivals and labs after labs to even get money to grants and to make my first film, I was exposed to a lot of my fellow filmmakers over a decade ago.
So to be paid, to be brought together and to see each other, And to hang out at these events and roundtables and stuff is actually really nice. I try to ask them to let me come to their set and just shadow people. I think there should be a system where directors get to be on each other's set. Otherwise, how do we keep learning?
What do you think someone could learn from watching you work?
How to embrace chaos. I mean, pretty much Hamnet was created that way. For example, when Hamnet died, spoiler alert, I don't think you can spoil this film.
It's a historical fact.
Yeah. Someone died. Someone wrote a play. Hamlet died. And on that day, Jessie and I would not talk about, we don't really talk about the scene coming in. She would, in the morning, she would do a lot of fever writing about her dreams. And then she would pick some music. And so as soon as I get to set, I will just put the music on repeat. So the whole set sort of got...
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Chapter 3: How does Chloe Zhao navigate the pressures of award season?
And because I've been so afraid, I haven't been able to live fully. I haven't been able to love with my heart open because I'm so scared of losing love, which is a form of death. So when you're in your 40s, which is great, by the way, midlife crisis is the best thing that can happen to you because what it does is you're on your way to a rebirth, right? You can't run from this feeling.
Your body is changing and you can feel death. And because I'm so scared of it, I have no choice but to start to develop a healthier relationship with it or I'm not going to make it. The second half of life would be too hard.
So it's a way of facing your fear.
It's a way of understanding because making Hamnet helped me understand that I just know there is another way. I just have a feeling that whoever designed this have decided that you will be born and then die. You will love deeply, but then lose love. It's almost like a cosmic joke. We're the only one in nature that have a problem with that process.
Yeah.
We must be designed to know how to die. It shouldn't be this terrifying that I can't even live. That must be not the intention. It's not this terrifying to everyone. I hope not. But I just, I do know that a lot of the issues we have in the world comes from ultimately that deep fear of death.
Are you afraid of your own non-existence? Are you afraid of the pain of death?
I think it's impermanence.
Yeah.
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Chapter 4: What emotions does Chloe Zhao associate with her creative process?
And at best, it's like, that person must have had an easier childhood. At worst, it's like, I don't belong. They reject me. I might as well just die.
Do you think people sitting around the tables at award shows are having that feeling?
I think there's a few probably, and probably more than that.
Yeah.
Because then, you know, what if work is your sense of belonging? You know, what if you feel like you don't belong anywhere but with your family? And then what if your family is gone?
Yeah.
It makes me realize any kind of belonging has a risk of being cast out. And then you have to ask this question. You know, people might roll their eyes when I say this, but that kind of home, the one that cannot be taken away, is the one within. And it's the one that you connect with the divine, with this great mystery that we have different culture of different word for it.
And if you do an ayahuasca ceremony or plant medicine, you feel that. That wellness. And you have no fear in those moments, right? That's why, you know, warriors would take medicine before they go into- Have you done ayahuasca ceremonies? No comment. No, I have not done ayahuasca ceremony. I have experienced facilitated plant medicine healing journeys by my therapist, right?
And I've experienced that kind of wellness experience. That when all the stuff goes away, you really do feel like you're one with everything and truly no fear, you know? And so to answer your question about did it happen when I left China to go to school, you know, or did it happen when a film of mine didn't work out?
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Chapter 5: How does Chloe Zhao define the relationship between personal and professional success?
I was also just thinking, when you brought up the to be or not to be, the stupid thought in my head was like, oh, that William Shakespeare really had some good ideas.
That guy, dude, that guy. I have to say, I really... Underrated. Underrated.
Shakespeare.
I used to think, oh, you know, he just... Writer, you know. But then I think he is actually like a jurid, you know. I really do. I think he's tapped into the unseen. Because the symbolism, the archetype that he creates, it's been used in depth psychology. You know, it's so... all the great myths all around the world. You go, he must be on something.
He must be on something, yeah.
Or maybe there were mushrooms growing in Strasbourg. In Strasbourg, yeah. That was... I mean, some of his plays, you think he must be on something.
Yeah.
I didn't say that, by the way. I did not.
For the record. Shakespeare's not going to have a problem.
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Chapter 6: What insights does Chloe Zhao share about the experience of loss and grief?
They say, oh, we all die alone. It is true. Even when you're surrounded by loved ones, it is a very internal, solitary experience, just like birth, as you're going through the birth canal. And when you see that it is a very individual journey, There's a solace to that.
You know, it made me realize I don't have to accumulate and try to make life decisions so that I won't die alone because it's so scary to die alone. It's not true. I know that for a fact, but I don't try. I'm not telling that to anyone else. You know, everyone has their own journey to get to that. But I do not want to spend my life preparing for my death. You know, I want to live.
And if that decision led to me being completely on my own in the moment of death, I know that won't make a difference for me in those last moments, being surrounded by accomplishment, security, loved ones. It's still going to be an individual experience, my experience.
that that's also my experience. My, uh, I was with my mom when she died and my mom, it was, it was interesting because I was there with, uh, a couple other close family members there as well. And my mom wanted us to all be there. And just knowing the type of person who my mom was, I would have thought that she wanted us to all maybe have our arms around her or something like that.
But it was so clear, um, Sorry, it was so clear just in the few moments before it happened that she went somewhere on her own, you know? Yeah. I also have witnessed the same sort of thing that you witnessed.
Wow. How special it is that you were there to be with her in that moment.
Yeah, I mean, I certainly don't see life the same way after that. Of course, exactly. You learn some things. Exactly. How do I segue out of that? Let me find, oh, accomplishment.
That's what I was going to talk about.
That thing.
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