An Interview with award-winning producer Yue Wang
Please introduce yourself to the readers and how you first got into this field of work and who were some of your influences growing up?
I was born and raised in Chengdu, China before leaving to study and earn her first degree in Bulgaria, soon after I would discover my passions for filmmaking and moved to the United States and planted down in the star-studded city of Hollywood where I began my career in entertainment as a Chinese female producer.
My career path is exciting and satisfying to me. As a young and competent professional, I managed to quickly find my niche in the industry. I’ve done quite a few Chinese-American co-productions along the way. All of them are broadcast in China, and most of them can be found online internationally. My first-time production experience was in 2015 in Bulgaria. As a recent graduate I worked on the reality show “Master Chef” as a coordinator, then after I moved to LA in 2017, I worked with Jiang Liu, one of the best TV directors in China on the TV series, “The Way We Were” which stars two of the most popular actors in China, Yan Tang and Jin Luo. In late 2017 I was already producing my first feature, “Beneath the Banyan Tree” starring 3-time Golden Horse Award-winning actress, Ah-Lei Gua. Things only got better with bigger productions such as “The Rap of China ” in LA’s episodes where I produced season one and two, which featured guest judges, Migos and Kris Wu. In the summer of 2018, I was fortunate enough to work on a very important and moving film with Academy Award-winner, Helen Mirren at Universal. After producing the recent season of “The Rap of China”, I’m now going back to narrative storytelling, my last film, “Mother” has already gone on to win/nominated for over 20 awards worldwide and will be releasing very soon. Right now, I’m producing a new feature film”, which is a beautiful coming of age LGBTQ story set in California during the early 90s. I can’t express enough my excitement for this movie, I truly believe in it and looking forward to sharing it with the world.
What has been your favorite project to work on so far?
Producing The Rap of China for LA special episodes for 2 season was definitely one of my favorite projects. Having the chance to work with top tier professional in the Entertainment industry from China was absolutely a blast. It was such an honor to introduce them to Hollywood producing while learning interesting producing technic in China. Globalization, especially in entertainment, is inevitable and I’m proud to be one of many that witness and experience it!
If you had a chance to work alongside anybody who would that be?
Honest, it’ll be whichever professional I have the honor to work with. Everyone is different and unique, they all have their own way when it comes to working. You can always learn from different partner/team member. I learned so much about business negotiation and people dealing from working with my mentor, at the same time I learned the best trick to organize paperwork from a friend who works for me. I believe the essence of the concept is what makes the team. You learn from each other and grow together.
What projects do you have coming up?
I’m currently producing an indie feature which story is set in 1994. It’s an extremely heart-warming, LGBTQ story that definitely needs to be told. I’m very excited about this film.
Other than the feature, I’m also developing 2 other animation series with my team at Play Engine Multi-Media Group. One of which is a cartoon comedy and another one is a kid’s series. It’ll be my first experience of animation. Very looking forward to it!
Who is your inspiration?
Literally everyone in this industry.
I often say about filmmaking, about working in entertainment:
“If you truly love it — go for it, give whatever you have to follow your passion, chase your dream, there’s never a “fail” in pursuing the dream, but only, “give up”. I won’t be gentle about it. If you have a second of doubt of whether you truly want it — forget about it.”
Filmmaking is the hardest, most exhausting and stressful thing I’ve done in my life. So much sweat and stress, so much struggle and uncertainty.
Therefore, people who know what the industry is like, and still choose to stick with it, stick with their dream, is the most inspiring people in my opinion.
