“Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó”: Interview of Sean Wang, His Grandmothers

The place I am From: Now and Gen options in-conversation items between generations — like a youthful lady and her grandmother — discussing a subject like magnificence rituals, funds, or marriage. We sat down with filmmaker Sean Wang and his grandmothers, Yi Yan Fuei and Chang Li Hua, the topics of Wang’s Oscar-nominated documentary brief, “Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó.” Learn their heartwarming chat about friendship under.

In 2021, within the wake of elevated anti-Asian violence and the continued pandemic, filmmaker Sean Wang moved again dwelling to San Francisco. There, he began observing — then filming — Nǎi Nai and Wài Pó, his 94-year-old paternal grandmother and 83-year-old maternal grandmother, respectively, who occur to be inseparable buddies and roommates. As he captured the mundane moments and joys of their each day lives, he created “Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó,” an Oscar-nominated documentary brief that lately landed on Disney+.

The Taiwanese American director — whose debut function movie, “Dìdi,” lately premiered on the 2024 Sundance Movie Competition — primarily filmed a sequence of dwelling movies, which he become a fantastic 17-minute “private love letter” to his grandmothers. “As a lot as this film is about my grandmothers and my relationship with them, it’s about friendship, sisterhood, and the bonds that you just keep and water in previous age,” he tells POPSUGAR. “I am not 86, 96 years previous. However I feel [their friendship] is an effective north star — hopefully, the friendships I’ve now that I really feel are deeply particular in my life, those that I do know will final, that I hope may very well be Nǎi Nai and Wài Pó in our previous age, are nonetheless as foolish and vibrant and enjoyable.”

Forward of the 2024 Oscars, Wang and his grandmothers talk about their decades-long bond, the facility of friendship, and the life classes they’ve taught each other.

On Nǎi Nai and Wài Pó’s Distinctive Friendship

Chang Li Hua (Wài Pó): Us with the ability to spend our days collectively and dwell collectively can also be a type of destiny and success. Nǎi Nai is older than me by 10 years, so I’ve all the time seen her like my very own massive sister. I’m youthful than her by 10 years, so anytime I’m able to assist her and deal with her, I’ll do my finest to take action. We’ve got nearly all the identical hobbies. Studying the newspaper, exercising within the yard, going out for walks. Every single day, we go to our orchard collectively to test and see which tree has grown fruits. Every single day, we eat fruits collectively, and we take the peels of vegetables and fruit to the yard and make fertilizer.

Yi Yan Fuei (Nǎi Nai): [Wài Pó and I] have the identical angle. We each love buddies, we like to train, and we like to learn the information, so we’re capable of be collectively harmoniously, similar to sisters. Sean is aware of too. He turned shut with us, and I cherish the time we spent collectively on daily basis.

Sean Wang: They’re my grandmothers. And as their kind of mischievous, younger filmmaker grandson, I feel our relationship is certainly one of such pleasure, silliness, and this childlike, youthful vitality. They point out it within the movie that I convey it out of them, however in addition they convey it out of me. I feel that ends in some enjoyable collaborations and these foolish movies that we make. Plenty of these have been the seeds that turned one half of “Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó.” The silliness, the chaotic pleasure, I prefer to name it, that balances out of with the extra poignant, deeply human grounded pains of their lives.

On What They Realized About Every Different All through Filming

Sean Wang: I feel I knew all of the broad strokes of their lives, however getting to essentially speak to them about their childhoods and their lives earlier than they have been my grandmothers was actually enlightening. However slicing to current day — and perhaps I all the time knew this — I realized simply how a lot of those inventive spirits they’re.

A lot of this movie was only a approach to give them a platform that I feel no person had ever actually thought of them for. They dance, play, and permit their silliness to take middle stage. And now that they will the Oscars and being enveloped on this world that is filled with spectacle and fancy attire, they’re actually loving it and getting to precise a muscle that they so clearly have, that nobody has ever allowed them to flex.

Yi Yan Fuei (Nǎi Nai): Sean was very approachable with us previous individuals. He did not deal with us as previous individuals in any respect. He joked with us on daily basis. He did not even act like we have been dozens of years older than him. We have been very comfortable having enjoyable collectively.

Chang Li Hua (Wài Pó): I discovered that Sean was very gifted — he has an awesome imaginative and prescient. Additionally, he was very affected person with us once we have been filming the film. He would educate us how one can pose. He is a child who loves to show his buddies. He is in a position to hang around with previous individuals, kids, or buddies of the identical age. He is a younger man with a full of life persona, but in addition works very onerous.

On the Life Classes They’ve Taught Every Different

Sean Wang: There is a line within the film that Nǎi Nai says that has actually caught with me. She says, “The times we spend feeling pleasure and the times we spend feeling ache are the identical days spent, so I am going to decide on pleasure.” I feel that quite simple resolution is a strong one: selecting pleasure. Particularly for somebody like her who’s within the twilight years of her life, figuring out that her days are extra restricted than mine. In our dumpster fireplace of a world at instances, permitting your self to decide on pleasure and rejoice the individuals round you is a worthy resolution.

Yi Yan Fuei (Nǎi Nai): This younger child can get alongside so properly with others. He would not deal with us like previous individuals; he nonetheless shouts like us younger individuals in entrance of us on daily basis. When he is right here, now we have a really comfortable life. We needs to be like him, whether or not he is younger or previous. He’s our buddy.

Chang Li Hua (Wài Pó): He helped us be taught we’re not ineffective once we are previous. We will nonetheless be helpful individuals once we are previous. We will nonetheless dance, make films, and be actors. Previous individuals shouldn’t underestimate themselves. The aged are additionally able to doing so many issues.

This interview has been translated, edited, and condensed for readability.

Yerin Kim is the options editor at POPSUGAR, the place she helps form the imaginative and prescient for particular options and packages throughout the community. A graduate of Syracuse College’s Newhouse College, she has over 5 years of expertise within the popular culture and girls’s life-style areas. She’s obsessed with spreading cultural sensitivity by the lenses of life-style, leisure, and magnificence.