How do you react for those who’re an award-winning actress however really feel such as you don’t have a lot management over the course of your profession? Within the case of Taiwan’s Yen Yi-wen, you begin writing and directing your personal sequence.
Based mostly on her personal experiences, Yen has written and directed 12-part sequence, Born For The Highlight, produced by Netflix and Third Man Leisure, which is streaming globally from November 7. The Taipei-set drama revolves round a bunch of actresses, spanning totally different generations, from a newcomer making an attempt to get her first break within the trade to an older cleaning soap opera star, who feels she will’t retire as a result of she must help her household.
The core group of characters contains three girls supposedly on the prime of their sport – an actress turned supervisor (performed by Hsieh Ying-xuan); her former buddy and present adversary (performed by Cheryl Yang), who’s scuffling with the pressures of a fading profession, consuming closely and dwelling in resort rooms; and an actress who rose to fame by means of grownup films (Annie Chen), who might be naïve regardless of her horny, assured persona.
Yen says she began writing across the similar time that she received Finest Actress for TV film Angel’s Voice (2015) at Taiwan’s prestigious Golden Bell Awards. “I labored actually onerous to get recognised, however after profitable the award, it turned a burden or a take a look at – everybody had excessive expectations of me, however I realised there have been many issues exterior of my management,” Yen tells Deadline.
She made her debut as a author and director with 10-episode sequence The Making Of An Bizarre Girl, additionally starring Hsieh and produced by Taiwanese broadcaster CTS and Catchplay, which was praised for its portrayal of a middle-aged lady. The second season, produced by CTS and Screenworks Asia, received Finest Writing for a Tv Collection at Taiwan’s prestigious Golden Bell Awards.
Following her success with that sequence, Yen wished to make one thing extra immediately linked to her private expertise: “I wished to put in writing a narrative to indicate the viewers what life is de facto like for these actresses and the compromises they must make. You’re all the time judged in your efficiency however often you’ll be able to’t management the script and different parts of a manufacturing. There are lots of realities you must encounter behind the scenes.”
Born For Highlight producer Olive Ting says she got here throughout Yen’s script, initially a function movie, at a pitching occasion and inspired her to develop it right into a sequence. “I used to be fascinated by this story as a result of we hardly ever see the true facet of our trade. The day after profitable a significant award, life simply goes on.”
This sequence and The Making Of An Bizarre Girl are a part of a brand new wave of life like dramas rising from Taiwan – some equivalent to The World Between Us concerning social and psychological well being associated points, and different equivalent to Wave Makers coping with politics and office sexual harassment.
Hsieh, who has received finest actress awards in actual life for sequence Heaven On The Fourth Flooring and have movie Expensive Ex, says she’s inspired by the vary of roles she’s being supplied as of late, though there’s nonetheless extra work to be finished. “We’re seeing extra scripts that concentrate on feminine autonomy, and likewise painting girls of various social backgrounds, however I hope to see much more variety in feminine characters sooner or later.”
Though it doesn’t concentrate on the difficulty, Born For The Highlight does contact on the straying arms, male egos and different points that girls within the leisure trade must face. Ting makes the purpose that this isn’t particular to the Taiwanese movie enterprise, however a world drawback. “The constructive factor is that extra girls are talking out so the state of affairs is bettering. We’re witnessing a shift in society so that individuals in energy, whether or not male or feminine, are a minimum of extra acutely aware that they have to be respectful.”
Yen says that when she began working behind the digicam, she additionally seen constructive adjustments within the Taiwanese movie trade: “There are increasingly feminine crew – not simply writers and administrators, but additionally cinematographers and lighting crew. These are roles that was dominated by males.”
Taiwanese sequence are beginning to get extra international recognition, partially because of platforms equivalent to Netflix, Catchplay+ and HBO, which have been streaming them exterior of Taiwan. Yen says that she’s not enthusiastic about viewers exterior Taiwan when she begins writing, however believes there are lots of parts in Born For the Highlight that can resonate with worldwide audiences.
At its core, the sequence offers with the life-affirming however typically aggressive relationships between feminine associates, mother-daughter relationships and the pressures that each one girls face at totally different levels of their lives. “It’s a character-driven story and regardless that the language and tradition is likely to be totally different, there are many common parts,” says Yen.
Yang, who performs the fading actress and beforehand starred in Netflix Taiwanese sequence Gentle The Night time, a few group of ladies working in a nightclub, makes the purpose that female-centric drama is a pattern that’s occurring globally: “We see extra feminine characters breaking stereotypes and having totally different aspirations, not simply in Taiwan, however all over the world. And thankfully Taiwan does have the artistic freedoms to discover these subjects.”
