How Sandra Oh and Mina Shum's palpable chemistry generated lasting cinematic classics
They’ve shared the birth of their careers and continued collaborating for over 20 years.
Certain actor/director teams have that special chemistry that produces lasting and legendary cinematic gold: from Burton and Depp, Scorcese and De Niro to Tarantino and Samuel L. Jackson.
Coming out of the Vancouver film scene, director Mina Shuma and actress Sandra Oh have the exact same undeniable magic formula.
Their blooming sisterhood over the years translated into Canadian classics like 1994's Double Happiness and 23 years later, Meditation Park, which you can now watch on CBC Gem.
Finding their own path
Mina Shum has worn many professional hats over the last almost third of a century — from producer to writer and director to even actress — but she primarily considers herself an independent filmmaker.
However, it's hard to believe that filmmaking was not her first love. That distinction belongs to theatre and acting.
Though her parents had a different vision for her future — hoping she would become a news broadcaster on CBC — Shum carved her own path despite their disapproval. She enrolled in the theatre program at the University of British Columbia where she eventually received a bachelor's degree and a diploma in film production.
Shum's love affair with filmmaking ignited at 19 years old after watching Peter Weir's film, Gallipoli. That's when she discovered the immensity and power of combining multifaceted and intimate storytelling with magnificent visuals — and that you can tell stories other than just, at the time popular, American-centric narratives.
After graduating and briefly becoming a part of the director's program at the Canadian Film Centre in Toronto, Shum made her first feature-length film in 1994 called Double Happiness — inspired by her own story and family dynamic around what was expected of her versus her own passion.
Sandra Oh, known today for her roles of Dr. Cristina Yang on Grey's Anatomy and British intelligence agent, Eve Polastri, on Killing Eve, was cast for the lead.
Oh started acting at the age of four when her parents enrolled her in ballet and acting classes. By the age of ten, she played The Wizard of Woe in a class musical called The Canada Goose and by the time she reached high school, Oh was clear on what she wanted to do: pursue a career in acting.
Abandoning ballet, she started to lay the groundwork with drama classes, acting in school plays and becoming a part of the Canadian Improv Games and a comedy group, Skit Row High.
Much like Shum and against her parents advice, she paved her own path — even rejected a journalism scholarship to Carleton University to study drama at the National Theatre School of Canada in Montreal.
The beginning of a beautiful friendship
After graduating, Oh landed a few acting gigs, which lead her to the CBC in 1993 where she booked a lead role in a film The Diary of Evelyn Lau.
It was on the set of this movie that the dynamic duo, Oh and Shum, first met.
While the director of The Diary of Evelyn Lau, Sturla Gunnarsson, was looking at audition tapes for the role of a social worker, Sandra Oh was looking in and pointed to Shum's audition tape saying: "Pick her, she is the best!"
Shum ended up being hired for the role and while on the set shooting for one day only, she used the opportunity to approach Oh proposing that she audition for her upcoming film, which was Double Happiness. Shum gave her the script and Oh came to audition.
25 years later, they are still collaborating.
Teaming up on groundbreaking movies
Double Happiness was Oh's and Shum's first feature-length film which debuted in 1994 but also one that elevated their profiles to prominence, catapulting them to stardom and making Shum the first Chinese-Canadian woman to direct a feature film with a wide release.
The film gained critical acclaim, winning awards at the Toronto International Film Festival and Berlin Film Festival as well as two Genies, known today as The Canadian Screen Awards.
Echoing Shum's real life struggle towards finding double happiness — a balanced happy medium between her passion and her parents' expectation — this semi-autobiographical film follows a 20-something Chinese-Canadian woman, Jade Li (played by Oh), who symbolizes Shum but also Oh who's had a similar life experience in her Korean upbringing.
In her interview about Double Happiness with CBC's The Filmmakers, Shum expands on the story of her decision to commit to her creative pursuits, despite the cultural traditions and expectations of her Chinese-Canadian family.
"I had this epiphany that if I was to pursue a creative life, that I had to turn my back on my obligations to my family," says Shum.
Naturally, in the movie things get even more complicated when love beckons in the shape of Mark, a white university student, and the facade of the perfect Chinese daughter begins to slip.
Sandra Oh won a Genie award for best actress for Double Happiness and received praise from the critics, including The New York Times who wrote: "Ms. Oh's performance makes Jade a smart, spiky heroine you won't soon forget."
The film also went on to win prizes in Italy and Germany and had its American premiere at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival.
23 years later and after multiple team ups, including Long Life, Happiness and Prosperity in 2002, the dream team got back together to tell another powerful tale of Chinese female empowerment — this time from a 60-year old woman's perspective.
"If you don't see yourself, you're invisible," says Mina Shum about representation, in this interview with Mongrel Media.
The legendary Cheng Pei Pei (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), a major Chinese film star, plays the role of a devoted Chinese-Canadian wife and mother, Maria Wing, whose life is altered when she discovers a scarlet thong in her husband's pants pocket, a day after his 65th birthday.
As Maria begins to suspect that her husband, Bing (Tzi Ma), is having an affair, she is forced to confront the harsh reality that her world may not be what it seemed. She is forced to confront how powerless she truly is, which in turn sends her on a journey of liberation she's never felt as a housebound immigrant wife.
"It's important in the film [Meditation Park] to illustrate what it is to be powerless," says Shum in her interview with The Filmmakers.
Those women are invisible, so I really wanted to shine a light.- Mina Shum
Shum has achieved just that through a resonant and authentic narrative along with the stunning visuals, which among many includes a powerful moment depicting liberation through a scene set against the beautiful mountains and the ocean where the character of Maria is on a boat finally at peace and content with her own self.
About that specific scene, Shum said she was inspired by one of the filmmakers she admires, Akira Kurosawa, particularly his films Rashomon and Ran.
Shum wrote the screenplay for Meditation Park in a month, with Oh in mind for the role of the daughter. They ended up shooting the whole movie within 18 days. Meditation Park was the top Canadian film at the box office, at its 2017 release.
Watch Double Happiness, Meditation Park and more Canadian films on CBC Gem.
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