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Alison Stewart: This is All Of It. I'm Alison Stewart live from the WNYC Studios in SoHo. Thank you so much for spending part of your day with us, whether you're listening on the radio or if you're live streaming this or listening on demand, I'm really grateful you're here. On today's show, we have a live in-studio performance from some members of the band, The Revivalists. We'll speak with Aliza Nisenbaum about her new exhibit at the Queens Museum. We'll continue our conversation about women's role in our history with author Katy Hessel. That's the plan, so let's get this started with the film Past Lives.

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Alison Stewart: After wowing the film festival circuit, the new movie Past Lives opens in select theaters tomorrow. IndieWire says it is, "Destined to be one of 2023's best films." The story follows Nora from early childhood in Korea to growing up in Canada to her adulthood in New York. She's played by our guest, Greta Lee. When Nora's family leaves Korea, she's just 12 but has already experienced a love story of sorts with her friend, a thoughtful shy boy named Hae Sung. When they reconnect at 20-somethings over early social media, it becomes clear they never forgot each other.

When their regular Skype session start to feel loaded, Nora suggests a break, one that lasts for 12 years. Until Hae Sung visits New York for a week and Nora is faced with a few versions of her life, the one she's living in the East Village as a writer with her husband, Arthur, the version of her past self and then there's the version of what could have been and the version of what could be based on her next moves. She's grappling with the hazy distinctions between circumstance and destiny. Here's a clip from the film. Nora and her husband Arthur are lying in bed and talking after Nora has reunited with Hae Sung.

Nora: This is my life and I'm living it with you.

Arthur: Are you happy with it? Is this what you imagined for yourself when you left Seoul?

Nora: When I was a 12-year-old?

Arthur: Yes, is this what you pictured for yourself, laying in bed in some tiny apartment in the East Village with some Jewish guy who writes books? Is that what your parents wanted for you?

Nora: You're asking me if you, Arthur Zedaranski, are the answer to my family's immigrant dream?

Arthur: Yes.

Nora: Wow. This is where I ended up. This is where I'm supposed to be.

Alison Stewart: Past Lives is the directorial debut of Celine Song, who also wrote the script, which shares some similarities with her own life. Hi, Celine.

Celine Song: Hi.

Alison Stewart: Also joining us is Broadway, TV, and film actor, whom, of course, you know from Russian Doll, "Sweet Birthday Baby," High Maintenance, and The Morning Show, Greta Lee. Hi, Greta.

Greta Lee: Hi.

Celine Song: Hi.

Alison Stewart: Celine, this film opens with this moment that we come to later on towards the end of the film when Nora and her husband and Hae Sung, they're all sitting in a bar. We overhear people trying to figure out what's going on over there. Are they siblings? Is this a lover's spat? Is one the partner? What's going on? Why did you want to begin there with we, the audience, overhearing what people are thinking about your characters?

Celine Song: I think that when I found myself in that place, in that bar in East Village, I'm sitting between my childhood sweetheart and my husband, which is really the inciting incident that really made me think that maybe this could become a movie. I was looking around the bar and I saw people at the bar looking at us because we look like such a strange trio. My first thought was, of course, like, "Oh, man, you have no idea. You have no idea who we are to each other. You're never going to figure it out just by looking at us."

Then my second thought was, "Well, what if I really did take the time to tell you about it? What if I really make the effort to show you what it's been like? What it is like for somebody like me to live my life and be sitting here and end up sitting here with my childhood sweetheart and my husband?" I think that really was the initial impulse. I think that scene is about welcoming the audience into the mystery of these three strangers. It can really welcome the audience into the story and be like, "Okay, let's try to figure out who they are to each other. Let's try to really solve this mystery."

Alison Stewart: You notice people actually looking at you and your husband, your childhood sweetheart. Do you ever do that in bars, Celine?

Celine Song: I think I certainly do. I think I'm always trying to look or I think anywhere you go. That's one of the amazing things about living in New York City. There's people watching everywhere. I think that anybody's lying if they say they haven't done that in some way.

Alison Stewart: Greta, in this scene, as the camera slowly zooms in to show just Nora's face, you, she looks in the camera and gives us this sort of smile, a little bit of a grin. How did you and Celine talk about the meaning of that moment and that look?

Greta Lee: Well, it's exactly what Celine described, this invitation to the audience to join us in understanding the full scope of this experience and the beginning of this wild ride that we're hoping to take the audience on with us.

Alison Stewart: Celine, in an interview in Vanity Fair, you described that shot as a moment where Nora is in a position of "power," I think was the word that you used. What kind of power does she have in that moment and has she had anything like it before?

Celine Song: I think that maybe Nora has had that power always in her, but I think that she maybe didn't really know until she was sitting there because she's really by sitting there between these two guys that have no reason to really even know each other, let alone try to speak to each other if it weren't for her. She hasn't had to do anything different. She just has to be there. She becomes a portal and a bridge between these two worlds. I thought that that's actually a really powerful thing just by existing to collapse time and space almost.

Alison Stewart: Greta, if you were going to introduce Nora to a group of your friends, how would you describe her, or you were describing her to a group of friends, "Oh, you're going to meet my friend Nora. She's--" How would you describe her?

Greta Lee: I would say she's an author living in New York City, that she's a real woman full of knowingness in terms of what she wants out of life. She's got this exceptional steadiness to her and an ambition that is frankly unburdened by anything outside of her own just wants out of life. The kind of life that she envisions for herself. She's powerful. I'm very inspired by her just as this fictionalized person.

Alison Stewart: What about her inspires? Just she knows what she wants and that's that?

Greta Lee: Yes, I think from the jump, we had a lot of conversations about the type of movie this is and the type of movie that it's not. Often, we see the woman at the center of a, let's say, more conventional love story. She's this type of woman who maybe is lost or is uncertain about not just her identity but multiple aspects of her life. In a more conventional love-triangle scenario, she would maybe be looking to two men to fill in certain gaps in terms of her identity and her life and her life choices.

This is not that, which I think is such a flex. It is so rad and, actually, so true in terms of the women most dear to me in my life and the way that I've lived my life. I know that Celine feels this way too. That was always the goal. I'm so appreciative to Celine in leading the charge in terms of telling that story from that place. It's from that place we're able to investigate these larger ideas, these universal ideas about love and about living.

Alison Stewart: We're discussing the movie Past Lives. It opens on June 2nd in New York and nationwide on June 23rd. I'm speaking with its writer and director, Celine Song, and lead actor Greta Lee. Celine, the characters in the film, most of whom are bilingual, even Arthur. He gives it his best shot.

[laughter]

Celine Song: Yes.

Alison Stewart: Did you write the conversation specifically with Nora and Hae Sung in English or in Korean?

Celine Song: I wrote it in both languages because I speak both languages. I felt like on one hand, my collaborators, the folks who don't speak both languages would have to understand the script. Then on the other hand, I knew that I wanted to choose the words that the actors are actually going to be speaking on screen. I think that it felt important to write in both languages.

Alison Stewart: Did you write the full script in both languages?

Celine Song: Yes, except for the parts that are written in English, so the conversation between Nora and Arthur, that's written in English only. Every time a Korean is speaking, I've written it twice.

Alison Stewart: Greta, you were smiling at that. What did you think when you first saw that?

Greta Lee: That's what was so radical to me and exceptional about this ridiculously gorgeous script. Really just took my breath away and made me sob upon first read, but it is that specificity that can only be accomplished through, yes, in this case, dual languages. There's so much intentionality behind the choices that Celine made in the writing and the words these people are choosing to say in the little language that they're choosing to speak in that moment. I have to add. Having Celine not just write the script obviously but direct was crucial.

She was directing us in Korean. When I was doing the scenes with Teo Yoo, who plays Hae Sung, we were only directed in Korean, which was extremely helpful in terms of the dynamic between the two of us and also the scene work that we were trying to do. Then we would switch over to only English, with John Magaro, who plays Arthur. I can't even wrap my mind around what it would've been like if we didn't have Celine, who was able to navigate that duality. That is, again, so essential to the core of what the movie is.

Alison Stewart: You both come from a theater background. Celine, what is something useful about coming from theater and stage? What was something useful for you in making this film?

Celine Song: Well, first and foremost, I think I learned that the experience that I had in theater and the skills that I had in theater and developing in theater, which is just a connection to story and character, and also scene work and dialogue. There's a basic building block of storytelling and dramatic storytelling that I think I realized I had a decade worth of experience doing. I think that I was so happy to learn that when I was making my film debut in Past Lives, all those skills and experiences could just come right with me.

I could really find my footing. Even if technical things, I had to learn. The thing that I didn't have to learn is how to work a scene or how to block or how to work with actors, how to work with great actor like Greta and achieve something great and transcendental. I think those are the things that I really think was an easy kind of move from theater to film. Just story and character at the heart of it.

Alison Stewart: Greta, there is this theme that goes through as a child. Nora wants to win the Nobel Prize. When she becomes a writer, she wants to win the Pulitzer Prize. When she's a playwright, she sort of tosses up, "I'm going to win a Tony." What do these small moments tell us about Nora reveal to us about this woman?

Greta Lee: It just really fully fleshes out the reality of a woman like this. It's something that I can relate to deeply. That kind of unbridled, unabashed ambition is so central to who she is and really weaves itself into the dynamic of her relationships to these men that she is that kind of a woman who is so incredibly self-assured. It was so fun to access that. Celine and I both coming up in New York City and really feeling that being drawn to this idea of chasing our dreams at all costs. It was such a joy to embody that in her.

Alison Stewart: Let's talk about New York City. This film has so many New York moments, so many vistas. Whether it be looking at people through the subway car window and wondering what's going on with their lives, or just this expanse of Manhattan from Brooklyn side. It's just there are so many visual cues for New Yorkers specifically. I'm curious. As a filmmaker, Celine, did you have a notebook that you're like, "If ever I make a movie, I'm getting this shot"?

[laughter]

Alison Stewart: Were these shots that you thought of as you were writing it? I was curious about some of those iconic shots you got.

Celine Song: Well, I think that they really did come from-- because I feel like I've been to every spectacular, amazing places in New York. I think what really was important in choosing which parts of New York were the best part of New York for this movie is that it had to be connected to the story. The part of the Statue of Liberty, for example, was so funny because when I was scouting it with my crew there, because they're New Yorkers, they were like, "Oh God, are we going to shoot the Statue of Liberty?"

I was like, "No, you don't understand. Statue of Liberty is so romantic to tourists and immigrants." Hae Sung is a tourist to New York and Nora is an immigrant to New York. For two of them, Statue of Liberty is a really special place. I don't think that Statue of Liberty should be in every movie. I think that in this movie about an immigrant and a tourist, we actually need to see Statue of Liberty because that's the spirit that we're talking about, that Greta was talking about, about the ambition and the New Yorkness of it.

I think that, amazingly, this big symbol, Statue of Liberty is what it could be. I think something that did matter to me though is that by shooting Statue of Liberty, it had to be shot like the way you see it on the boat. I didn't want there to be a drone shot. I wanted it to feel like the way you can see it if you are a tourist and you are on a boat. I want it to feel organic.

Alison Stewart: We're discussing the film Past Lives with its writer and director, Celine Song, and lead actor Greta Lee. We'll have more after a quick break. This is All Of It.

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Alison Stewart: You're listening to All Of It on WNYC. I'm Alison Stewart. My guests are writer-director Celine Song and actor Greta Lee. We're talking to them about their film, Past Lives. It opens in New York tomorrow and then nationwide on June 23rd. Greta, in the story, Nora moves to New York in her early 20s after her family has moved to Canada. She's out to make her own way. She finds out that Hae Sung, her childhood sweetheart and friend, has been trying to find her and she reconnects with him. What interests Nora about reconnecting with Hae Sung?

Greta Lee: Well, I love this idea that certain people in your life can serve as a hologram or like a mirror to certain parts of yourself, certain parts of your identity, your past. I think that's true of Hae Sung at that particular moment in her life. She sometime has passed and she's immigrated. We are painting a picture of that kind of diasporic longing that is true of so many immigrants and having this experience.

I think she is reconnecting to that part of herself through this person. Then it expands from there from being cultural or maybe racially specific. It becomes so much more than that. Just this idea of two people who are so deeply connected, undeniably connected to each other, and what that can mean for someone. These were all things that we were discussing and trying to convey in those Skype scenes that they had together.

Alison Stewart: Celine, when they first meet, Nora is very warm to him. She goes in for the hug. She goes in for the double hug. He's not quite sure what to do initially. Was it written in the script that way or was that something that evolved out of being on set?

Celine Song: Oh, it was written exactly like that, you can say, because I feel like I think that really was always like that. I think my description for it was actually that Nora hugs Hae Sung like the kind of Westernized theater girl that she is because I feel like that's part of the culture of that too because I feel like she's been in theater. I feel like, in theater, we all hug all the time. [chuckles] All the time. I think that there is kind of a moment where it is a little bit of staring each other and really seeing a ghost there.

There's a bit of a person who they-- they're looking at each other. It really does have to feel like something devastating. There's a resurrection or something of another person in a way that can only happen when you are faced with an old connection. Then, of course, the next thing, the thing that really breaks it is going to be Nora. I think it was just in her character because she's in theater, because she is a really Westernized person that she's going to make the first contact, and she's going to leap for a hug.

Alison Stewart: There's a concept in the film that's tied to the idea of destiny. It's called "In-Yun." I hope I'm saying this right. Let's play a clip from the film, Past Lives, where Nora is talking about it, and then we can discuss this on the other side.

Nora: There's a word in Korean, "In-Yun." It means fate, but it's specifically about relationships between people. It's an In-Yun if two strangers even walk by each other in the street and their clothes accidentally brush because it means there must have been something between them in their past lives. If two people get married, they say it's because there have been 8,000 layers of In-Yun over 8,000 lifetimes.

Alison Stewart: Greta, how familiar were you with this concept of In-Yun?

Greta Lee: Not too familiar, I have to be honest. I think growing up being Korean-American, In-Yun was a concept that I was aware of, but I didn't really have a personal connection to it until making this movie and until meeting Celine. It felt like a distant highfalutin, something so separate from my understanding of life. Now, I've found like, "Oh, now, I can't not see In-Yun everywhere."

Alison Stewart: [chuckles] How about for you, Celine? Was this something that was important to you growing up in your household?

Celine Song: Well, I think that I was as familiar with it as somebody who has a Korean culture as a part of their lives or any kind of Eastern philosophy as a part of their lives. I think in making this movie and writing this movie and telling this story, I think that it did become something that became more clear or something that I really felt was more vivid than I think it was before. The word was a discovery for me as well, but I knew that I need to introduce this word to the movie because it is describing something that I don't think there is a word for, because there are some relationships that are easier to define like simple as friends or lovers or exes or something like that.

The central relationship in this movie can't really be described in another word. It can only be really described by this ineffable feeling that there is something deep going on, something really deep, and something that spans time and space and endures through time and space somehow that I felt like I needed to introduce the word "In-Yun" just to describe who Hae Sung and Nora are to each other.

Alison Stewart: This film plays with expectation a lot and the rhythms that we've all gotten used to about love stories and triangles as you mentioned. At one point, Nora's husband, Arthur, says, "What a good story this is. In this story, I'd be the evil American husband standing in the way of destiny." How did you want to play with the audience's expectations in this script, Celine?

Celine Song: Well, I think because this movie is about ordinary people and the people we know who's going through life the way that every audience member will be going through life, I think what was important to me is for this character to be as intelligent and as emotionally intelligent as an average person. I think that it just had to feel like we needed the kind of connection and the kind of authenticity to what it is like to be a person just in general or period.

I thought that it was really important for, for example, Arthur to have a sense of the story or have a sense of what place he is in, in the story, for example. Because if you and I, we were talking to a friend and they're telling us the story, I think that is exactly how they would describe themselves. I think there's a part of it where this commitment that I had to make the characters be as smart and as emotionally deep as just the people we know in our lives.

Alison Stewart: Greta, in this film, you are the lead. This is you. It's yours. What is something that you've learned that you maybe didn't know before this film?

Greta Lee: Oh, gosh. So much. It really has set the bar so incredibly, painfully high in terms of what I want creatively and artistically. That extends to process too. It sounds cliché, but it was such an incredible way of making this movie. There's so much trust and that is so key to the final thing, to the final product that you see. On so many levels, it's restored my faith in, well, fighting for making sure that there's space or continues to be space for stories like this.

Being Asian American navigating this business, the truth is it's been tricky. There have been limited opportunities. The fact that we still have to discuss representation, these things aren't lost on me. To be able to do this with Celine and tell this story in this way, exactly the way that we wanted to and not in any different way in service of any kind of gaze, whether it's like a white gaze or a male gaze. I don't know what's better than that to have this chance to do this.

Alison Stewart: The name of the film is Past Lives. It's got a limited opening tomorrow, June 2nd, then nationwide on June 23rd. I've been speaking with its writer-director, Celine Song, and its lead actor, Greta Lee. Thank you so much for making time today.

Celine Song: Thank you. Thank you, Alison.

Greta Lee: Bye, guys.

Celine Song: Great conversation. Thank you.

 

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