Episode 450 - Ms. Juju Chan
Ms. Juju Chan is a martial arts practitioner and actress best known for her role at the Netflix' Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny
When I saw a clip of Bruce Lee doing nunchucks, I was so fascinated by his nunchuck skills. So, I made my own pair of nunchucks with rulers and shoelaces and just keep copying the moves. It was because of martial arts films I started learning martial arts.
Ms. Juju Chan - Episode 450
Making it to Hollywood is not an easy path especially in a time when there's not too many Asian women are cast. Ms. Juju Chan successfully navigated her way through the film industry armed with her martial arts skills and sheer will. She started out with a lot of stuff unrelated to martial arts in Hong Kong and eventually taking the journey to the martial arts. Ms. Juju Chan is known for her work at the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny and her latest one, the Wu Assasins. Ms. Juju Chan had a lot of cool stories so listen to find out more!]
Show Notes
Check out Ms. Juju Chan's IMDB page here.In this episode, we mentioned Iko Uwais, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny and Wu Assasins.
Show Transcript
You can read the transcript below or download it here.Jeremy Lesniak:Hello and thanks for coming by! This is whistlekick martial arts radio episode 450. Today, I'm joined by my guest, Miss Juju Chan. I'm Jeremy Lesniak, your host on this show, the founder of whistlekick and I love the martial arts and that’s why we do what we do and you can see everything that we do at whistlekick.com. There's a store there and if you make a purchase, it supports the show and everything we’ve got going on and you can use the code PODCAST15 to save 15% on your purchase. If you go to whistlekickmartialartsradio.com, you're going to see a whole bunch of stuff. Every episode we’ve ever done as well as transcripts, photos, videos, links to guest websites and social media and email addresses and all kinds of cool stuff. We do our best to make sure that the show notes add to the show and aren’t just simply a list of things that you're never going to care about so if you find that you're interested in a subject or a guest that we’ve had on the show, make sure that you're checking out the show notes and while you're there sign up for the newsletter. We send it out a couple times a month. There's original content, sometimes there are discounts and it's a great way to stay up on everything that we’ve got going on here at whistlekick because, to be honest, there's a lot going on. Not the least of it, this show, which we release twice a week and why we release martial arts radio? Because the goal here at whistlekick is to connect and educate and inspire martial artists of the world and if we do that just for one person each episode, it makes it worthwhile. You may have heard of today’s guest. In fact, you probably have if you follow martial arts film particularly, a fairly recent series released on Netflix. That’s certainly not the only thing in her filmography and we get into movies and martial arts and how the two connected for her and oh so much more so lets do this. Miss Chan, welcome to whistlekick martial arts radio.Juju Chan:Hi!Jeremy Lesniak:Thanks for doing this. Thanks for coming all the way across the world. It’s late there, isn’t it? It's night time.Juju Chan:Yeah, it's like 10 PM, actually 9, almost 10 here in Thailand. I'm in Thailand right now.Jeremy Lesniak:Are you travelling for work, for film?Juju Chan:Right now, I'm in Thailand taking some meetings and also reading some scripts so yeah, because I just got married a month.Jeremy Lesniak:Congratulations! That’s awesome.Juju Chan:Thank you. Less than a month ago so now is like catching up with some work.Jeremy Lesniak:Did you have a honeymoon?Juju Chan:Not yet. We’re planning to. Hopefully, we’ll do it before the year end.Jeremy Lesniak:Good luck. I mean, if you're in Thailand for work, I'm sure you’ll end up in other exotic locales. When most people get married, they think of going to places like Thailand. Where are you hoping to go?Juju Chan:We’re actually thinking of somewhere in Maldives.Jeremy Lesniak:Nice, cool.Juju Chan:So, yeah. Finger crossed, we have time to do it before next year.Jeremy Lesniak:When you look at scripts, what is it that you look for? Is there something you look for in particular that makes you say, ah! Yes! This project, I want to be involved in this.Juju Chan:Yeah, definitely the character I'm playing is important. If the character has a challenging personality, I usually like some challenging roles and also, the story. If the story’s interesting. I do mostly martial arts stuff so where the martial arts end of being mostly focused in action and less drama so I mean, I don’t mind that but definitely if the story has a strong drama aspect to it and then, the action also make sense and the room to create great choreography itself then I will give power to those projects.Jeremy Lesniak:How did you get started? We’ve had a number of guests on this show over the years who have ended up in film and they all seem to have a different path in and I'm curious what your is.Juju Chan:I started doing action films after I became an actress, actually, because I started in Hongkong first as a singer and then, I did beauty pageants, I did love stuff. that was right after I graduated from college and I know I wanted to become an actor but it's hard to get in to the, get acting roles when you don’t know how to start and at that time, that was just 9 years ago. There weren’t that many Asian-American roles in films so it was very hard for me to get some decent roles when I just graduated so I went back to Hongkong and I started in Hongkong region first and I did some, my first TV series called Lumina, it's a thriller. After that, I got people in Hongkong noticing me that I speak English and I'm a young actress with multiple language skills so I started getting more projects in English-speaking films in Hongkong and then, I met Anthony Szeto, who is now my husband. At that time, he gave me some very good advice saying that a lot of young girls or young actress, actors, when they first started, of course, they would try different roles but to position yourself different from others are very important and he knows that I do martial arts but at that time, I didn’t actually, I didn’t really put my martial arts skill out and tell people oh, I'm a martial artist and I do action films and all that because 9 years ago, an action female wasn’t really a big thing especially in Asia. People have this perspective of a young actress to be more like a model, a barbie doll, very pretty looking and feminine. I was trying to hide my martial arts skills because I think it would make people think that I'm too tomboyish or masculine and all that but then, Anthony told me, you have these amazing skills, martial arts skills and there aren’t any real action female in the new generation. You should definitely focus in branding yourself using your martial art skill with acting and I was like, oh yeah! What a great suggestion and so, I took his advice and started letting people know that I have this action side of me and he was right and very quickly, I branded myself as the action girl and a lot of action roles started, when people think about having a strong female or having a kickass girl, they will come to me and ask me to read for it so now, people know that I'm the action girl and I've been doing a lot of action films which is great. That’s how I started.Jeremy Lesniak:You sound happier talking about that. I'm guessing it feels a lot better to be you and to seek out these roles that encompass all of who you are as a person, as a martial artist rather than part of who you are.Juju Chan:Definitely think martial arts has always been in me. When I was a kid, I started 10 years old. I started in judo. I started learning martial arts because of action films because my father loved watching action films when I was a kid. I watched Jackie Chan, Donnie Yen, Jet Li, all these amazing action stars on TV with my father so I would copy all their movies like when Jackie Chan was jumping from buildings to buildings. I was jumping from tables to coffee tables. I would break a lot of stuff at home and then, when I saw a clip from Bruce Lee doing nunchucks, I was so fascinated by nunchuck skills so I made my own pair of nunchucks with shoelaces and grillers and just keep copying the moves so it was because of action films made me start learning martial arts and also, because I always loved performing since I was a kid but I just didn’t imagine myself being an action star when I was a young kid. I just know I loved action, I just copied the moves but I know being an actor is so far away because I don’t know any, I don’t have any family members or friends who are in the entertainment industry so I've been brought up knowing that I should do something like an office job when I graduated or something more business, in the business field, because that’s what my parents are quite traditional so they, yeah, that’s why I didn’t go to film school or drama school when I was an undergraduate. I actually did it afterwards because I feel like I fulfilled what my parents want me to do. I did a very traditional way of doing business or science and after that, I feel like I wanted to try something that I actually always have passion in and so, for graduate school, I tried and see if NYU would accept me and they did and so, I started my film and TV and arts route after my undergraduate and I was glad to have that chance to learn from really good teachers when I was in Tisch and also have different opportunities to collaborate with people in the film industry and started to find a way to keep doing something I have passion in and I think, doing something you have passion in is very important. I'm very glad that I found my passion and can pursue it.Jeremy Lesniak:What did your parents think about this, about your career now?Juju Chan:At first, they were a bit skeptical and not fully supporting because they think being an actor and the entertainment industry is very risky and it's not stable and of course, there are a lot of rumors in the entertainment world that people will think you have to do this and do that in order to get a role and all that. because my parents doesn’t really know a lot about the entertainment industry, so I understand why they want to protect me and try and see if I can do something else instead of pursuing acting but I've been working my way and a lot of great mentors that guided me in this industry and I'm very grateful in meeting all these teachers and mentors I've had and so, now, my parents saw some of my films and saw that I'm a real, I'm serious in pursuing acting. I think they are more supportive now because they saw some results from my recent films and projects that have been coming out. They are becoming my biggest fans right now so I'm very happy to get their support.Jeremy Lesniak:Yeah, it's got to be a great feeling.Juju Chan:Thanks.Jeremy Lesniak:When you look at the roles that you’ve taken who have you played that is closest to who you are?Juju Chan:A lot of the roles that I played are very strong independent female, a warrior. I have to say all of the characters have the strong side, the independent side are pretty much like me but every character has its own uniqueness which are also very different from my personality like Zan in Wu Assassins. She’s independent, I'm independent. She’s very strong; me too, I'm very strong, mentally and physically but the way that Zan was brought up and all the stories behind her made her become the bodyguard in this tribe, society, being a strong female and the things that she went through are totally different from my personal experience so that’s, actually, I love the different roles that I play that have very different personalities or upbringing from my own because as an actor, you always want to challenge yourself in playing another character, in being another character but of course, my physical side and my strong, independent character is always going to be there for these kind of roles. If you ask me which particular role is very similar to mine, I won’t say there is any roles that I played was exactly like me because I'm really creating a new character that is very different from me in some way.Jeremy Lesniak:Tell us about your early days in martial arts. You said you started young, you started with judo and I've seen some photos. You definitely spent some time in taekwondo so tell us about those early pre-film days of training.Juju Chan:I started in judo when I was 10 and then, I went on to do karate, Shotokan, Chinese Kung Fu Hung Ga, Wing Chun. Wing Chun, I learned from Master Joseph Cheng. He’s a great Wing Chun master and actually, I learned my proper nunchucks from him as well because I self-taught nunchucks since I was a kid but then, every time when I see some masters who are also very good in nunchucks when I meet them, I actually grab that and ask them to actually show me some tricks and ask them to help me improve my nunchuck skills and then, after the wushu and Wing Chun, I also went on to do taekwondo and after I got my blackbelt in taekwondo, I got selected into the Hongkong ITF national team representing Hongkong for world championships, Asian Championships and China Open Championships and then, after that, while I was doing taekwondo, I also got scouted to do Thai boxing for a gym in Hongkong and I was being coached by one of the champion in Hongkong so I also fought for Hongkong in Wu Tai for a while and now, as I'm doing more films, I also learn different forms of martial arts from different fight choreographer, action choreographer like recently in Wu Assassins, I did Silat. I learned Silat from Iko Uwais’s team. So, Silat, also Filipino martial arts. Yeah, I love learning different kinds of martial arts. I think as an action actress, you always need to keep up your skill level and also keep learning different forms, different styles because then, I can bring different styles to different characters and different films will have very unique choreography and I won’t just do one style for all my characters. I like for every character I play, I want it to be different than the one that I played before so the more discipline, the more styles of martial arts I know, the easier I can use different styles into different characters.Jeremy Lesniak:Cool, cool. Talk about the new project. Talk about the Wu Assassins project and how that happened and what it's been like working on that team.Juju Chan:Wu Assassins is an amazing TV series that I worked on because it's a lot of the past and also, our action team is really taught martial artists like Iko Uwais, I've always loved his film, The Rage and it was great to work with him on Wu Assassins and work with his team that’s why when I saw his team, when we first saw each other in the stunt room, I already grabbed them and asked them to teach me Silat, [00:21:08] and all these different moves and their own style that they have is so unique and it's so great on camera as well so I make use of all the time that I have during filming and on set and off set asking them to teach me their style and also, we have an amazing action choreographer. His name is Dan Rizzuto. He’s a super great martial artist. I love all his choreography. The kitchen fight that he choreographed with me is amazing. I got a lot of fans saying that their favorite scene and one of the best fight scenes they’ve seen, I’m terribly very happy to have been able to perform that with the team and there are also a lot of amazing choreography that Dan Rizzuto has choreographed for our cast in the show like Lewis Tan is also a great martial artist. He’s more in Muay Thai and boxing and he’s super fit and his moves are very fluid and it was great watching him with the team and all the choreography as well. I mean, we have a great action team for Wu Assassins and I hope all of you can tell me what you think after watching Wu Assassins.Jeremy Lesniak:I've spent some time watching it. it's unique. There's something really different, really special about what you’ve all put together there. Was that apparent when you started with it or was it only, I don’t know what it's like being on set. I don’t know what it's like as an actor, as a choreographer handling all that. Do you know in the process is that something that’s going to work or is it only later when you watch it?Juju Chan:I have to say, filmmaking is team work. You can do an amazing choreography and sequence but if the camera man didn’t capture it correctly and the editor didn’t edit it correctly or the sound effects is not there, it would be different from what you initially thought it would be so, I mean, I'm glad that we have a great team here on Wu Assassins and what we envisioned when we shot the action scenes and what it came out is actually pretty close so the whole team did a great job from camera capturing the moves, to editing, to us performing. Yeah, everything came out really well, actually super happy with the action scenes that we’ve done for the show. Hopefully, fingers crossed, we will work together again very soon.Jeremy Lesniak:Fingers crossed for sure. I told you before we started that the show is really heavy on stories and telling stories. If I asked you for your favorite story from you, we’ll say anything involving martial arts, it could be on set, it could be training, it could be anything, what would that story be? What would you tell the audience?Juju Chan:Tell a story?Jeremy Lesniak:Yeah, your favorite martial arts story from your time as a martial artist. Whatever that means to you.Juju Chan:I don’t know if it's my favorite or not but on the top of my head, I can think of one when I was shooting Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon sort of destiny. One of the fight, we need to use a sword to fight and me and the other performer was shooting it. We shot actually a lot of takes and it was pretty good and right when we did the last shot, just for safety to do one more take, that’s when we got, I got injured. Maybe because it's my last take, the other performer might be tired. I don’t know why but she threw the sword earlier than before I finished the move before so the sword actually hit right into my eye and at that time, I thought I was going to go blind because it was so painful. It was a really heavy sword go straight into my eye. I got a huge bruise and I couldn’t see for 10 days. I really thought I was going to go blind and luckily, I didn’t but I couldn’t see for 10 days and had a huge bruise. It was funny because it was the very last take. We had great takes before. It's always like that. last take and then, something happened and that was actually, also the last take and scene for me and then, 2 days after, we have this wrap party. A lot of people thought I would go, I wouldn’t show up because I had my eye injured but I made an eyepatch. Very cute butterfly, red butterfly shaped eyepatch covering my right eye.Jeremy Lesniak:Do you have a photo of that? I would love to see that.Juju Chan:I do.Jeremy Lesniak:If you can send that over, I would love to put that in the show notes. That will be awesome.Juju Chan:Okay.Jeremy Lesniak:But, of course, you got your vision back.Juju Chan:Yeah, yeah.Jeremy Lesniak:Go ahead.Juju Chan:I don’t know why, every time, it's always my right eye that got injured. I got cut a few times on my right eye too, so yeah. People wouldn’t notice that actually, my right eye is a little smaller than my left. I guess it's all the injury and impact that I had throughout all the years that I had on the same eye.Jeremy Lesniak:It's a good thing that you hadn’t gone half blind because that would make depth hard and that would make doing choreography more challenging, I'm sure.Juju Chan:There's always a risk doing action films and stunts. There's always a risk that’s why it's important to be safe. Safety is so important. Also, when you are tired or your opponent is tired and you see something’s not right, it's better to stop it than keep going because if you keep going and going and going and not adjusting something or just take a break, then injuries might happen.Jeremy Lesniak:Absolutely. What was it like working on that 2nd crouching tiger film? I mean, were you a fan of the first one? The first one is my favorite martial arts movie of all time.Juju Chan:Oh yeah, the first one if my favorite action film too. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is more wushu style. It's more Chinese old form of martial arts where there are a lot of wire works, flying and doing swords. The moves are very, how do you say, it looks like a dance. It's really pretty but also with force and all that so it's a really different style from western action film and action style. I actually was very happy to be able to be in the part of Crouching Tiger 2 because, I mean, Crouching Tiger 1 is my favorite film and being able to do the sequel and also with Michelle Yeoh, Donnie Yen, it's a great experience. They are great actors, they are great martial artists and being able to work with them, I learned a lot and also, we shot in New Zealand. New Zealand is fabulous, a gorgeous place to film. We were there for 4 months, was it? A little bit more than 4 months so I was totally enjoying New Zealand. I would love to go back again. It was so nice. People are so kind and friendly as well and shooting there is an enjoyment.Jeremy Lesniak:That’s great, that’s great. I can only imagine what it could be like getting to step in and work on the sequel to your favorite film. It would probably be, I'm not an actor so there's far less likelihood I’ll ever get to work on anything like that but the idea of working with heroes like Donnie Yen, Michelle Yeoh is just mind-blowing.Juju Chan:Yeah, oh yeah because I watched them when I was a little kid and their films inspired me to become martial artist so being able to work with them when I grew up is like a dream come true so yeah.Jeremy Lesniak:That’s great. Outside of acting, outside of martial arts, what do you do? Do you have time for hobbies? Do you have hobbies?Juju Chan:My hobbies are very much martial arts-related but besides the martial arts, I also love cooking. I love to cook. I cook a lot. I host parties a lot in my home. I also love watching movies and also, travelling so these are definitely what I usually do when I'm not working on a film project. I would usually be travelling to different places and also, watching movies, TV series and also, cooking.Jeremy Lesniak:That’s nice. Now, in past episodes, I’ll often ask someone if you could train with anyone anywhere in the world, anywhere in time, who would that be but lately, when we’ve had actors on the show, I've changed that up a little bit. If you could construct your dream film, you get to pick the script, you get to pick the director, the choreographer, the other actors involved, the genre, what would that dream movie look like for you?Juju Chan:It would be an action musical because I love musicals a lot and musical, I was a singer before. I love to sing, dance. I did my dance minor when I was in undergraduate so acting, singing, dancing and being able to do martial arts as well and if it will all come together in one project, that will be an action musical. I would love to do an action musical with all my heroes and idols that I've loved since I was a kid like Michelle Yeoh, Donnie Yen, Jackie Chan, The Rock. We can all do this action musical, that would be awesome.Jeremy Lesniak:You got me hooked. I would be in line to watch that. That would be quite the film. I don’t know if I've seen an action musical.Juju Chan:The closest I can think of is some Bollywood film. Bollywood films have one of dancing and action in it but yeah, like a mainstream Hollywood movie I have, I don’t think I've seen an action musical before and I really want to do it.Jeremy Lesniak:Maybe that will happen because from my understanding, the influence that Bollywood’s having culturally globally is growing. Right? They're doing some pretty major projects.Juju Chan:Yeah, I would love to work in that. I would love to work in a Bollywood film too. it would be so fun. All the Bollywood films I've seen, it's quite fun. Yeah! Quite fun to watch.Jeremy Lesniak:Nice. If I had to pin you down for a favorite actor, martial arts or otherwise. Would you be able to do that?Juju Chan:Oh, there are so many great actors. It changes all the time for me who is on the Number 1 list. I always love Meryl Streep. I think she is amazing. Meryl Streep is definitely always on top of my list and Anne Hathaway. Oh my god, there are so many.Jeremy Lesniak:That’s okay.Juju Chan:There are so many, it's so hard for me to name it off the top of my head but there are so many great actors that I actually want to work with.Jeremy Lesniak:Let’s look into the future. We've talked about what's going on now, we’ve talked about your past, let’s talk about what's coming up. Projects or training, traveling? When you look out over the next 5 to 10 years, what are you hoping to accomplish?Juju Chan:I would love to really do an action musical but besides that, definitely, I would love to work on a Marvel or DC superhero project. That’s something I would love to be able to get involved in and also, I have my own script that my husband and I are kind of developing right now and if we can get that going, that will definitely be one of our goals in the upcoming years.Jeremy Lesniak:Can you tell us anything about that script?Juju Chan:It's full-on action because my husband is also an action person. He’s an action movie director. He used to be a stuntman when he was young. Now, he’s a director and we have worked together for a few projects many years ago. The reason in the past few years, we haven't worked together. I would love to work with him again and hopefully, on our projects so yeah.Jeremy Lesniak:Now, if people want to find you online, stay in touch, see what you’ve got coming, how would they do that? Social media, websites, stuff like that?Juju Chan:Yeah, my Instagram is @jujuchanhk and my twitter is @juju_chan and my Facebook is just Juju Chan. That’s my Facebook page.Jeremy Lesniak:Nice and easy. We’ll make sure to link that for everybody else.Juju Chan:Yay!Jeremy Lesniak:Cool. I really appreciate you coming on today. Thank you so much for your time and one more thing before we head out the door, what parting words would you give to the listeners today?Juju Chan:Follow your heart and your dreams will come true.Jeremy Lesniak:If you're a longtime listener, you know I am absolutely fascinated at the ways that people take their passion for martial arts and turn it into a career. Not the least of which, is acting. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t dream of maybe one day being an extra in a martial arts film so I always appreciate stories that our actor friends, our actor guests tell us when they come on the show. Even better when they talk about the why and who they are and the emotions that go with it. I had a good time talking with Miss Chan so thank you very much for coming on the show and thank you to all of you for listening. 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