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its star, Nicole Kidman. She

0:44

plays a rich woman who is one of

0:46

three American so-called expats, living

0:49

in 2014 Hong Kong, whose

0:51

stories intersect. The

0:53

series was created by Lulu Wong, who

0:55

wrote and directed The Farewell. It

0:57

looks at the lives of these three women

1:00

who are all affected by one catastrophic event

1:02

and its aftermath. I'm Linda

1:04

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T-E-L-A-D-O-C health slash whatsyourwhy. Joining

3:09

me today is the Philadelphia Inquirer's

3:11

Arts and Entertainment Editor and Film

3:13

Critic Badatri D. Chaudhry. Welcome back,

3:16

Badatri. Thank you so much, Linda.

3:18

And also with us is our

3:20

pal, writer Cat Chow. Hi, Cat.

3:22

Hey, good to be on. Expats

3:24

is based on Janice Y. K.

3:26

Lee's bestselling book, The Expatriates. Lee

3:28

was herself born in Hong Kong

3:30

to Korean expats, then moved to

3:33

the United States as a teenager.

3:35

Nicole Kidman's production company optioned

3:37

the book and eventually Lulu

3:39

Wong, who was pretty much fresh off

3:42

writing and directing the film The Farewell,

3:44

was brought in to create the show.

3:47

Kidman stars as Margaret, a woman who

3:49

has suffered a loss that you will eventually

3:51

learn more about. Saru Blue

3:53

plays Hilary, a woman whose marriage is

3:55

lousy and whose husband is only sort

3:58

of present for her. And

4:00

she a new place. Mercy a

4:02

young Korean American woman living in

4:04

Hong Kong. The situation is much

4:06

more precarious than the well off

4:08

Margaret and Hillary that while those

4:10

to live in the same ritzy

4:12

building will eventually learn that their

4:14

lives intersect with mercies as well

4:16

as part is streaming now and

4:18

Prime Video. And we should mention

4:20

that Amazon supports and Pr and

4:22

pays to distribute some of our

4:24

content. But actually I'm gonna start

4:26

with you Ex Pats: Nicole Kidman

4:28

Rich people abroad. What is

4:31

you think is is very lukewarm

4:33

on it tonight as say excited

4:35

about it as an immigrant and

4:37

but I need to say something

4:39

before I. Tell. You more

4:41

about what I pod You know many years

4:43

ago I don't know. I don't remember where

4:45

I read it, but that is. This court

4:47

says something to the tune off. How do

4:49

you know the difference between an expert in

4:51

an immigrant and it's by the color of

4:53

their skin and the size of their one?

4:56

It and I have never forgotten that flawed

4:58

and even. Before I was third. Series

5:00

and I said the name as

5:02

like oh it's about retried people

5:04

to no three of job and

5:07

which is a problem that is

5:09

the problem of the so and

5:11

and absorbing. Talk more about it.

5:13

It could have gone so much

5:15

deeper. Displays in the intersections off

5:18

Z Spotted Xl, Gender, geography, All

5:20

of this. It's such a fertile

5:22

ground for good storytelling and it's

5:24

kind of a pity that the

5:27

series as and go there. Yeah

5:29

ah I. Am told. That.

5:31

There is a sense that an ex

5:33

pats. Is. A person who

5:36

is sort of by design.

5:39

Living where they're living temporarily.

5:41

That their online on. A

5:43

three year assignment or something like that. But

5:45

the problem with that kind of definition is

5:48

that it can always be kind of. Back.

5:50

Formed to accommodate what you're

5:52

talking. about which is the sense that

5:55

like an expert at is a rich

5:57

white person yeah and sort of you

5:59

get that session with with Mercy because

6:01

Mercy's not rich and not white and

6:03

in fact Hillary isn't white either although

6:05

she is rich. But I

6:08

still think that foundationally what you're

6:10

saying is right even though like

6:12

technically maybe there's another way that

6:14

those things are supposed to be

6:16

distinguished. Yeah I'm sure an immigration

6:18

lawyer listening to this will have

6:20

that mission. It's like there is

6:22

a difference but like how often

6:24

is that the difference versus exactly

6:26

what you're talking about particularly in

6:29

how people talk about it. Kat

6:31

tell me what you thought about X-Pats. Oh

6:34

wow you know I was excited when

6:36

I first heard about this show because

6:38

I love Lulu Wong's The Farewell and

6:40

also my family's from Hong Kong and

6:42

it has always been

6:44

a city that I've been

6:47

interested in you know as a Chinese

6:49

American and watching it I

6:51

was a bit disappointed. I mean

6:54

in general I'm just exhausted by

6:56

narratives about wealthy Americans

6:58

or just wealthy people in

7:00

general and I felt

7:02

myself so drawn to the narratives

7:04

that sort of were

7:07

a lot more quiet or showed up in

7:09

the back part of the series which I'm sure

7:11

we're going to talk about. Again what Badatri

7:13

was saying there was so much fertile ground

7:15

for this show to be able to plumb

7:18

but it was really difficult for

7:20

me to find any of

7:22

the major characters compelling or likable.

7:25

I mean I really wanted more

7:27

of Puri and Essie who are

7:30

considered the quote helpers of Nicole

7:32

Kidman's character and Saru Blue's characters. Yeah

7:35

I think that's right and I have

7:37

the same reaction that you did Kat

7:39

about being more interested in some of

7:41

the things that they just barely touched

7:43

on particularly as you

7:45

mentioned Essie who is

7:47

Margaret's helper who's played by Ruby

7:49

Ruiz and Puri who is Hilary's

7:52

helper who is played by Amlan

7:54

Pardanilla and I Found them really

7:56

interesting. both of those characters are

7:59

Filipina and. They talk

8:01

about their relationship between like

8:03

being nice helpers for families.

8:05

But being away from their own. Family Se in

8:07

particular is really pain by the idea

8:10

that that she's been separated from her

8:12

own family and something she doesn't love

8:14

these kids. but. In. The parts

8:16

of the story that are not specifically about

8:18

Se I thought it was a little. Kind.

8:21

Of. Overly. Romantic about how

8:23

much she felt like this family was her

8:26

family and I thought yes I bet that's

8:28

not right. Let's see, I bet these are

8:30

the people that you work for and it's

8:32

not the your you don't let them But

8:35

as in any job you know the difference

8:37

between your family and your employers. That and

8:39

I would have loved to watch the show

8:41

that was more about them and about poor.

8:44

He has a very interesting character and one

8:46

of my favorite. Yeah, me too And so

8:48

I find myself in the same position as

8:50

I think kind of what you're talking. About

8:53

cat which is like. I

8:55

never know how to respond to things

8:57

on my feeling is I wanted this

8:59

so to be about something else? Yes,

9:02

But in this particular context, particularly given

9:04

that there's this very fraught political situation

9:06

in Hong Kong and Which. And there's

9:09

some been reporting, including at Npr about

9:11

the crackdown from the government in Beijing

9:13

on political expression and things like that

9:15

and political activity and hop on. Like

9:18

making this the focus says it wasn't

9:20

what I wanted it to be about.

9:22

Yes, I totally agree. I mean, it's

9:25

hard, right? So this whole series takes

9:27

place and twenty four team. And

9:29

there are appearances of the Umbrella

9:32

movement which is when a lot

9:34

of students came about and protested

9:36

basically China's encroachment on Hong Kong

9:38

and as we know in recent

9:41

years and twenty twenty especially with

9:43

the National Security law that has

9:45

have become an even more dire

9:47

situation and it's hard I was

9:50

thinking about as as as preparing

9:52

to come on the cell, just

9:54

Hollywood in general and the struggles

9:56

to portray China and then also.

9:59

That. complicated relationship that Hollywood has with

10:01

China in terms of the box office

10:04

and different concessions that have been made

10:06

in terms of what is shown. I'm

10:09

pretty sure based on BBC reporting the

10:11

expat is not even shown in Hong

10:13

Kong. That's what I'm told to. I

10:15

don't think it's available. And so yes,

10:17

I think there's just a deep irony

10:19

that this is in theory a show

10:21

so much about a certain demographic about

10:23

Hong Kong and yet the people who

10:25

live there and have their ordinary lives

10:27

there can't watch it. Yeah, and

10:29

I should say for people who have not

10:32

kept up with this story, when

10:34

expats was being filmed, among other

10:37

things, they procured an exception for

10:39

Nicole Kidman and a handful of

10:41

crew members from the

10:44

quarantine rules that would have applied to

10:46

those people when they

10:48

came to Hong Kong and that were being

10:50

applied to lots and lots and lots of

10:52

regular people. And the

10:54

fact that they got those

10:56

exceptions kind of I think

10:58

got the production off on a bad

11:01

foot in some ways with the community where it

11:03

was with the places where it's being filmed. And

11:06

I'm curious how you feel about this, Padashri, because

11:08

we've talked before about kind of immigrant

11:11

stories, which as you say, both is and isn't

11:13

a different thing from this. But

11:15

I'm curious what you thought about kind of the

11:17

way the place that this series puts its focus.

11:20

Yeah, of course, Hong

11:22

Kong is a very interesting place to

11:24

set any story in. But Linda, you

11:26

mentioned this in your NPR review a

11:28

little bit. The show,

11:31

as it is filmed and told, could

11:33

literally be in any big city which

11:35

sees a huge influx of immigrants

11:38

and expats and whatever you call it,

11:40

right? And to Cat's point, like,

11:42

you know, the protests are literally in the

11:44

background, barring, say, I don't

11:46

know, 10 minutes, not

11:49

even. And whatever we

11:51

see is also a very manicured

11:53

version of the protests. Like,

11:55

it's a photo op. If you didn't know what they were

11:57

about, I don't know if you'd even know what they were

11:59

about. No, you don't. You don't.

12:01

Yeah, there were some like news,

12:03

real, you know, voiceovers, but still

12:05

in the background. Yeah, and like

12:07

the banners are like, hear us

12:09

sing or whatever. Like, you know,

12:11

it could be any protest. It

12:13

could be any big city. So

12:15

I do not understand, you

12:18

know, this show of might to

12:20

make it happen in Hong Kong

12:22

specifically, especially when, you know, the end

12:24

product really doesn't, you know, I've not been there.

12:26

I'm not from there. But I don't think the

12:29

show does the place any justice. And

12:32

the irony in a way of this

12:34

show not appearing in Hong Kong or being

12:36

available to stream is, I mean, I think

12:38

what the expat as a series is grappling

12:41

with is how much should you show, how

12:43

much can you show? And there's, I don't

12:45

know, is there a way to be able to do it well? And

12:48

that's something that I've just been

12:50

thinking about. You know, honestly, Lu

12:52

Lu Wong does such interesting and

12:54

beautiful things with grief in

12:56

the farewell that I was

12:59

like, okay, even if she gets everything

13:01

else wrong, even if she does not

13:03

do her homework on Hong Kong, when

13:05

she's making the show, which, you know,

13:08

which is not okay. But even

13:10

if she did those interesting things with grief

13:12

and mourning that she does in the farewell

13:15

in this show, then this show

13:17

even with its faults would have been

13:19

a much, much better show. Yeah,

13:22

I think it's interesting because when I

13:24

wrote about this show for NPR, one

13:26

of the changes

13:28

that I had with people was, you know, clarifying, I don't

13:32

think the show had to be

13:34

a show about Hong Kong politics.

13:36

And once it's about these

13:38

three women, it's never going to be a show

13:41

about Hong Kong politics. But once you

13:43

said it in 2014, and once you have kind

13:46

of this one episode that touches

13:48

on the protest movement

13:51

that's going on, and also simultaneously

13:53

the lives of Essie and Corey,

13:57

once you do that, then you kind of have

13:59

to Sort of justify

14:01

doing it or do it well. Yeah,

14:03

because otherwise you're left with what is

14:05

that for and what do you think

14:07

that accomplishes? Foundationally

14:10

my biggest problem with this show over

14:12

the course of six episodes was that

14:14

I thought it was very boring I

14:17

think that once I got into these stories

14:19

of these women it was like I've

14:22

seen this on big little lies I've seen

14:24

this in other places. It's all very sad.

14:26

Don't get me wrong. It's sad It's real.

14:28

Yeah, and I think if it had been

14:30

about just mercy who for various reasons

14:33

is the most interesting person to me

14:35

by far In this story. Yep, maybe

14:38

I would have been interested in it But to

14:40

me the Margaret story and the Hillary story are

14:42

both really boring Which is

14:44

sad for me particularly because I think

14:47

sorry you blue is somebody I've really

14:49

liked in other things Yeah, I like

14:51

her a lot and I have really

14:53

liked in both comedy and drama Did

14:56

not care about the story in this

14:58

so yeah, and also we've seen Nicole

15:01

Kidman do this so many times Yeah

15:03

so I mean a part of this

15:05

being boring is that because it feels

15:07

like we're watching a mash-up of Four

15:10

different TV shows that is completely yeah I've come

15:13

and gone on our screens for the last couple

15:15

of years and I do want to give a

15:17

shout out to I mean G young you who

15:19

plays mercy as you mentioned Linda the

15:21

storyline that I found so compelling was

15:24

the scenes that G young you shared

15:27

with the actress Bandushem

15:29

whose Cantonese name is Sun

15:31

Li and I

15:33

thought those performances Worked

15:35

so well because they really showed attention

15:38

in you know this Korean American mercy

15:41

Essentially, you know going through her own class

15:43

dynamics where she went to Columbia and she

15:46

was brought to Hong Kong through her wealthy

15:48

friend Who basically you know

15:50

abandoned her and is dealing with

15:52

this tragedy and this sort of? Sorry

15:55

for herself curse That you know,

15:57

she's been grappling with her entire life. And

16:00

yet while she my and away be

16:02

able to relate to the character Charlie

16:04

to see them strike suffer from entered

16:07

relationship with there's still a difference because

16:09

she is at the end of the

16:11

day American and so she might be

16:14

going about these protests. but the doesn't

16:16

really matter in a way because the

16:18

stakes are there are so different and

16:20

Charlie's open about that with her. Charlie

16:23

open about fang like this is not

16:25

you're saying like yeah Bit of one

16:27

of the most on settings about. This.

16:30

Whole, very large, very long screenplay.

16:32

Is in a world of extremely

16:34

selfish. the men and men it's

16:36

more. see who has the mirror

16:39

has to her face and gets

16:41

caught Us as this at like

16:43

that is not yet. I took

16:45

the note of that to Mercy

16:47

was the only one he sort

16:49

of to grapple with the consequences

16:52

and mean because she doesn't have

16:54

as much of that upward mobility

16:56

a better person She she is

16:58

a better person sees. Paying more

17:00

attention to other people's is paying more

17:03

attention to how she sits into the

17:05

world. And this whole series opens with

17:07

this very unusual presentation that almost looks

17:09

like a power point where you have

17:11

the i thought I was watching the

17:14

wrong. You know I was on the

17:16

wrong video file and it has It's

17:18

awesome. I was like I think Amazon

17:20

sent me the wrong yang said yes.

17:23

Me too. It's like a power point

17:25

where it's Mercies voiceover and she's talking

17:27

about different instances where somebody causes something

17:29

bad. To happen. So ultimately she's kind

17:31

of doing this voice over. That's about

17:33

culpability and the stories of people who

17:36

suffer. and then the stories of the

17:38

people who caused them to suffer. And

17:40

that's where you start to get into

17:42

this idea of Mercies Guilds. that did

17:44

She feels in my opinion on necessarily

17:46

which is a whole different question. There

17:48

is a moment where somebody finally says

17:50

summer see this could have happen to

17:52

anybody and I thought exactly this whole

17:55

thing of like her beating yourself up

17:57

is it really to the happen to

17:59

anybody The. that they presented. But

18:01

anyway, I felt

18:03

when I was watching that opening

18:05

like, oh, I'm interested in this.

18:07

This is an interesting idea to

18:09

explore in a piece

18:12

like this, this idea of culpability and

18:14

how you forgive yourself. And it wants

18:16

to get back to that. But

18:19

it has these long kind of diversions

18:21

where it's about other things that I

18:24

don't think are effective at all. Bad

18:27

husbands, I just took. Bad husbands,

18:29

dead neighbors. Oh, that whole thing

18:31

is so weird. Too much money

18:33

in their bank accounts so they

18:35

can rent other apartments. Put too

18:37

much money in their bank accounts,

18:39

you know, private caterers. It's just,

18:42

you know, it's just so distracting

18:44

from what you said, Linda, is the

18:46

core of the story. Yeah. And you do see, I

18:48

think, Lulu Wong's hand

18:50

in the directing. There is some

18:52

beautiful kind of attention to detail.

18:54

There are plenty of, I think,

18:57

beautifully framed shots. I

18:59

think you see her

19:01

kind of visual sensibility,

19:04

but I don't necessarily think they

19:06

came through in the content. I'm

19:08

also a little tired of like

19:11

these Asian parents never hug their

19:13

children kind of a trope, especially

19:16

as a South Asian

19:18

with Hilary's Sarayu Blue

19:20

story. Her mother is

19:22

like a cartoon character, like, you know, and

19:25

it doesn't need to be like that. We've seen

19:27

no one South Asian characters, some

19:30

played by her, you know,

19:32

mothers who are better than that. And I

19:34

was just like, no, no, no, no, we

19:36

are, we are really regressing into territory

19:39

we thought we were done with. And I'm

19:41

like, nobody needs more of this. Yeah. Oh,

19:43

for sure. And then also Mercy's mother too,

19:45

was another iteration of that with less screen

19:47

time. Oh, yeah. I think you're right, Badatri.

19:49

As soon as I, as soon as I

19:52

saw Hilary's mother, and you know, you hear

19:54

a few lines out of her, you think,

19:56

Okay, it's this, and what are they going to

19:59

do with it? The answer is unfortunately

20:01

not a lot more nothing story wise

20:03

than you typically see when you get

20:05

that sort of like mom doesn't think

20:07

you have a successful life because you

20:09

don't have children then you should be

20:11

doing this. He should be doing this

20:13

and type pending to your marriage and

20:15

you know she's unhappy because she thinks

20:17

that her mother has accepted to little

20:19

in her own air raids and just

20:22

very similiar. Yeah and also I think

20:24

it's a mean Of course it's true

20:26

for these characters, but it's also true

20:28

of the other quote unquote mean. Characters

20:30

like Susan, you know your was at a

20:32

point you wanna talk to the screen placing?

20:34

Stop trying to make me like them. Because.

20:37

They haven't seen that has been known

20:39

to bullets. May I don't need to

20:41

like these. Characters I just

20:43

need something interesting happened.

20:45

Too young to justify sitting and watching

20:47

six episodes, one of which is an

20:49

hour and a half which was my

20:51

favorite one. That still there has to

20:54

be something. the first half of that

20:56

episode actually. Is there Lulu on his

20:58

inform? Yes, there you all these health

21:00

stake a day off and those scenes

21:02

are beautiful. Yeah in that hour and

21:04

a half episode it's sort of follows

21:06

a day in the life of the

21:09

different helpers. A Also is the one

21:11

day where you kind of depend on

21:13

those protests and see some of the

21:15

students. And a little bit of that

21:17

activity around the protest. but most of

21:19

the episode is about those things and

21:21

and not as much about the the

21:23

characters we've been following year. and as

21:25

you guys are saying, they don't they

21:28

don't have to be likable. And there

21:30

was a a suggestion and some of

21:32

this sort of publicity or on this

21:34

show that it's kind of satirizing these

21:36

women. And it's not satirizing these women,

21:38

it's just sort of presenting them and.

21:41

Having. Something terrible happened to you

21:43

does not make you. Sympathetic.

21:46

Necessarily exactly as well. That is experts

21:48

for good and for ill it is

21:50

streaming on at Prime Video. We want

21:52

to know what you think about act

21:54

as find us at Facebook That Com/pch

21:56

that brings us to the end of

21:58

our says shall be.e D Chaudhry thank

22:00

you so much for being here is

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