Lulu Wang on turning down Nicole Kidman's first Expats offer and capturing the resilience of Hong Kong

Lulu Wang was feeling uncertain. 

Not long after the release of her acclaimed autobiographical film The Farewell, Nicole Kidman came calling. Would she be interested in adapting Janice Y.K. Lee’s 2016 novel The Expatriates, about interconnected expats living in Hong Kong, into a series for Amazon Prime Video? Wang had her reservations, then decided to pass. 

The scope of the project — and most significantly, fears that she wouldn’t have creative freedom over a series set against the vibrant and tempestuous backdrop of Hong Kong — lent to those reservations. But when Kidman, a star and executive producer, assured her she would have free reign, “it became a very different experience because it meant that I would have this playground to really tackle some complex themes,” Wang tells EW.

Across six episodes, Expats (out now) follows the crumbling interior lives of three American women residing in 2014 Hong Kong: Margaret (Kidman), a mother grappling with the disappearance of her young son; Hilary (Sarayu Blue), a career woman wrestling with a fractured marriage and fertility, and Mercy (Ji-young Yoo), a college graduate living a life adrift. Bound by the tragedy that befalls Margaret, their lives irrevocably intersect.

Below, the series creator and director discusses her foray into TV, the resilience of Hong Kong and the women of the series, and casting her dog and certified good boy Chauncey.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: You shifted the timeline to 2014 to capture Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement, providing a rich contrast to the lives of these otherwise privileged Americans. How does that period relate to their stories?

LULU WANG: Our lives exist against the times that we're in — the cultural times, the political times. I wanted the story of Hong Kong to mirror the journey that my characters were going through, which is one where they're facing tremendous change up ahead and so many things outside of their control. [2014] was when the city was on the precipice of tremendous change, and there was so much hope. I wanted to capture that energy — the hope, the resilience — and remind people of that. It’s the same resilience that the characters have to fight for.

I was moved by the spotlight on the Filipina domestic workers in Margaret and Hilary’s orbits, also expats themselves. What was the creative intention behind that?

I think my access point into the world of expats is quite different from many western expats because I myself am an immigrant, so a lot of my world looks more like Essie and Puri’s when I'm back in China. What I recognize in my grandparents and aunts [are] these women who sacrificed so much for their loved ones. It was important to me that, in order to take a critical look at expats and their privilege, we can break out of that bubble and look at other perspectives and make them the center of their own stories. Ruby [Ruiz] and Amelyn [Pardenilla], who play Essie and Puri, said they were so nervous doing a show of this size. And I said, “But you're the star of it.” And they'd be like, “No, no.” And I'd be like, “No, but you are.” I wouldn't have done this series without them [and their standalone] episode. That's how important it was to me.

There’s a starry cameo from everyone’s soon-to-be-favorite nepo fur baby, Chauncey Wang-Jenkins. How’d he book the gig?

[Laughs]. He booked the gig in the way that I guess these things work, which is he just happened to be there. I couldn't get through eight months or however months it was in Hong Kong without him. I brought him with me and decided to put him in the show because quite honestly, it was like free dog-sitting. We had to have an animal trainer for him. He worked for free, but he got free training. I think he did a great job. Also, we’ve got bills to pay, so he's got to earn his keep in this household and we really want to put him to work. So please spread the word.

So he wasn’t a diva on set? He was a good boy?

He was. In all seriousness, he was truly an emotional support animal for all of us. Everybody was so excited to see him and it really lightened the mood.

This is your first foray into TV. How are you feeling about the TV landscape; will there be more of it in your future?

I hope to do more television, for sure. There's so much opportunity in television because you're not beholden to everything hinging on this one weekend at the box office. And I love the time that you have to really dive deep into characters. Obviously I love a beginning, middle, and end to a story, which is what I love about films, but I also think of television like a novel in that there's layers upon layers that you're continually unraveling. I love the journey and the way television is in your home and you live with these characters for an extended period of time. 

One of the series' themes is home: leaving home, making a home. What is home to you?

I think home is shifting all the time, and we have to be flexible about how we find home and make places feel like home. It's about community, the connections you build in any place. I spent three years in Berlin and I still feel like that is a home for me in so many ways. The east coast is home for me as well. Sometimes we recognize home in totally strange places. I don’t know if you've traveled and got to a place and suddenly felt like you recognized this place, yet you don't even speak the same language. I'm trying to have a looser definition of it and find that sense of home within myself that I can carry with me anywhere I go.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity. The first two episodes of Expats are streaming on Amazon Prime Video. New episodes release Fridays.

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