Michelle Yeoh looks back on how her career changed after playing a Bond Girl
The Everything Everywhere All At Once star says she was only offered "stereotypical roles" for two years after appearing in 1997's Tomorrow Never Dies
Aux News Michelle Yeoh
Michelle Yeoh began her acting career with a prolific run in ’80s and ’90s Hong Kong action movies. Decades later, she’s solidly booked and busy, with American Born Chinese, Wicked, and several Avatar sequels on the way. Of course, she’s also currently up for an Oscar for her multifaceted, multiverse-busting role in Everything Everywhere All At Once. However, 25 years ago, things looked very different for Yeoh.
The Malaysian-born star’s first foray into Hollywood arrived with the 1997 James Bond flick Tomorrow Never Dies, in which she appears opposite Pierce Brosnan’s 007. Yeoh’s character, another spy named Wai Lin, subverted expectations for the long-running series.
“James Bond at that point had only been known as macho, and the girls were just the ones with cutesy names,” Yeoh describes in a recent interview with People (via Variety).
The role immediately catapulted Yeoh to the international stage. While the job offers following Tomorrow Never Dies were numerous, they were still limited in crucial ways.
“At that point, people in the industry couldn’t really tell the difference between whether I was Chinese or Japanese or Korean or if I even spoke English,” Yeoh says. “They would talk very loudly and very slow. I didn’t work for almost two years, until Crouching Tiger, simply because I could not agree with the stereotypical roles that were put forward to me.”
Holding out for a project she believed in paid off, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon became a highlight of both Yeoh’s career and the martial arts movie canon. The Crazy Rich Asians actor also recently opened up to Deadline about pushing for better representation onscreen, looking back on her time filming Danny Boyle’s 2007 sci-fi horror Sunshine.
“I told [Boyle], ‘It’s interesting you only have one Asian in the whole thing; that you think in the future it’s still the Russians and the Americans,’” she remembers. “[Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland] were quick to recognize the opportunity, and so we ended up with such a diverse cast. Benedict Wong, Hiroyuki Sanada. What a great experience I had making that.”
15 Comments
Tomorrow is a solid step down from Goldeneye its not my favorite Bond film, but damn is Yeoh isn’t the best part of the film plus or minus Jonathan Price. Glad she beat the old Bond girl curse.
Loved Goldeneye. Plus the game.
Is there a bond girl curse? I feel like a fair number of bond girls have gone on to (or were already in the middle of) good careers.
Its a term mostly for the early ones. Ursala Andress had a minor career after but people like Daniela Biance or Claudine Auger not so much. Diana Rigg was the biggest example of bucking the “curse” for a while then you get Yeoh, Eva Green Halle Berry and so forth.
Diana Rigg was already a huge star destined for great things after the Avengers. I’m not sure how much James Bond impacted her.
It didn’t hurt being the only woman Bond married but you are correct. Although she had a hell of a bigger career then Honor Blackmen did and she was also an Avenger girl.
Claudine Auger did lots of movies in Europe after she became Bond, she just didn’t have an American career. I wouldn’t say she was cursed because odds were very low she’d have gone to America had she not done Bond anyways, especially since she struggled with English. Daniela Bianchi the same, her accent was so thick she’d have never made it in American films.
Good point. Several Bond Girls like Andress and Bianchi were dubbed by Dutch actress Nikki Van Der Zie. That is definitely an issue.
I was just pointing out to my father that Halle Berry as Jinx walking out of the water in that bathing suit is one of my earliest memories.
I’m a bit of a youngster but the modern Bond girls haven’t been cursed? Halle Berry!
Didn’t Halle Berry like win an oscar after the bond film? She’s been in some stinkers, but that seems more like poor choices (or poor advice from an agent). I never feel like “what happened to Halle Berry” – she’s had a fairly long and successful career.
True story: I had a buddy in theatre school whose Asian and he was even the lead in our year end production of Footloose and he just couldn’t stick with it out of fear of not getting roles cuz he’s Asian.
I think he’s an optometrist now. Good dude. Made jell-o shots with him for a Halloween party one time.
Reading the endless parade of Michelle Yeoh posts on this site over the last year has made it more than clear that Michelle Yeoh is a huge fan of herself. new celeb please!
“I told [Boyle], ‘It’s interesting you only have one Asian in the whole thing; that you think in the future it’s still the Russians and the Americans,’” she remembers. “[Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland] were quick to recognize the opportunity, and so we ended up with such a diverse cast. Benedict Wong, Hiroyuki Sanada. What a great experience I had making that.”Michelle Yeoh—taking no shit from Hollywood since 1997.
I deeply regret that her spin off series that was floated after TND came out never came to pass. That would have been badass.
I didn’t know that bit about Sunshine. Well done, Michelle!