It’s hard to believe how time has flown by since “ROMANTIC INTERLUDE” first hit the web, way back in October 1999.
Production began way back in September 1999 and was no doubt one of the more memorable things I have done in my life.
This was actually my second production which I have worked on since “The Real World: Anime America 1995”, which was a low-budget documentary about 12 people who didn’t really know each other, sharing a hotel room to attend an anime convention. Which I actually directed and was among the cast members.
With “Romantic Interlude”, I didn’t have a starring role, this time it featured a lot of people, many who I grew up with and many who I was attending college with.
Back in the day, I knew many of the Asian American talent working on indie Asian American films. As editor-in-chief of “Asian Pacific Review”, an Asian newspaper on campus, I interviewed many of the filmmakers and talents.
“Romantic Interlude” was more of an idea script which I wrote back in 1989 that was stuck as an idea, until after talking to actor John Cho (who has starred in “Star Trek”, “Harold & Kumar” films and many other films and TV series) who urged me that if I wanted to write or do something with the script, to just do it.
The web drama began in September 1999 with five friends as a college project. The drama was also inspired by Asian Avenue’s “Liquid Soap” (back when web dramas were popular on the Internet) and it was also published in like a live comic book format on “Asian Pacific Review”.
One of the things that I received comments about often is about my casting choices for “Romantic Interlude” and why I featured people of different Asian ethnicity.
Ever since I was in high school, may it be at Lemoore or Lakewood High to Fresno State, I always had friends that I hung out with of different ethnicity.
In college, as I was Editor-in-Chief at Asian Pacific Review, I was also involved in working or doing what I can to assist many Asian clubs on campus.
When I wrote “Romantic Interlude”, I wanted it to feature a group of different ethnicity and by the final episodes, I wanted to feature as many people of different Asian ethnicity as possible.
As for having relationships that of mixed Asian ethnicity was also what I wanted. Despite the difficult relationship between Japan and Korea for decades, the lead was going to be a Korean man and a Japanese woman. Two of the most vibrant and determined people I knew in my life, happened to be a Vietnamese and Chinese/Malay, but there energy was amazing and knew they were going to be the sub-leads after Joe and Rei. Khai and Min, played a major role as much as the two leads, serving as comic relief.
The drama also included friends who were American born Chinese, many of my Filipino friends, Hmong, Laotian, Cambodian, Mien, Indonesian and even non-Asian friends also took part. It may not seem possible for some people, it may not be the reality for some people but in my reality, being friends of people of different ethnicity has always been a big part of my life and so “Romantic Interlude” reflected that.
If I had a favorite scene in directing for “Romantic Interlude”, it was the airport scene. The airport scene was the last scene but it was shot in early December.
This was before 9/11, so getting to certain areas of the airport were much easier back then. And It was always interesting to shoot these scenes with all these people watching or those who were coming off their flight and were enamored by the scenes featuring the characters of Joe and Rei. Considering that the character of Joe was in a tuxedo.
While fun, it was also very difficult. Especially the kissing scene. Not difficult for the two to act the scene but difficult because I wanted the kiss to be a very good kiss. And that’s why I’m fortunate to have Mahito there to make sure he captured that scene and knew how each character’s position was staged and capturing it. I still laugh when I think about Mahito telling me that his impression of “Romantic Interlude” was like a modern Japanese drama…but not necessarily recent modern but something from the ’80s. Lol…
But I felt that everyone was on their A game and to capture that airport scene with a Christmas atmosphere was so cool. After it was all done, I was absolutely exhausted but so grateful for everyone’s performance, ideas and just doing an awesome job.
