There’s so much good in Joy Ride, but when you’ve got a screenplay from ace writers like Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao and a lead ensemble loaded with hugely talented comedic actors like Stephanie Hsu, Sabrina Wu, Sherry Cola, and Ashley Park, there’s bound to be some gems that just can’t be squeezed into the final cut.

One such example? During my chat with Hsu and Wu in celebration of Joy Ride’s July 7th nationwide release, Hsu revealed, “There’s a whole gay track between Sherry’s character and my character that kind of got edited.” Joy Ride clocks in at rip-roaring 95 minutes, and makes the most of every single second of screen time. But after 95 minutes of falling hard for this group of characters, it’s hard not to want more and, perhaps, to wish that that storyline had made it into the final film. But, there is still hope! Hsu teased that the idea could “be saved for the sequel.”

Hopes are high that this hilarious and wildly charming film starts going down that path in the near future. Joy Ride marks a phenomenal directorial debut for Adele Lim, one brimming with effective heart and humor courtesy of a team of artists that believed in the material, and also in each other. To get a better sense of the good vibes on the Joy Ride set that helped Hsu and Wu deliver their best work, check out our interview in the video at the top of this article, or you can read the conversation in transcript form below.

Image via Lionsgate

PERRI NEMIROFF: I’m very excited for Adele that this is her feature directorial debut. I have high hopes there are going to be many more movies for her to come, so can you each tell me something about her as an actor’s director that you appreciated and that you’re excited for more actors to get to experience on her future films?

STEPHANIE HSU: I think Adele really celebrated our writers and also really protected her actors. I think the reason why this film works is because it’s not only insane and chaotic and raunchy, but she did a really intensive effort in protecting the heart of the story between these friends and also this woman, Audrey, trying to find her birth mother.

SABRINA WU: Yeah, I second that. It really shows that she had obviously worked in TV as a writer because she was so, so specific about what the emotional journeys of each character were and making sure it was plotted through and carried out and well-executed.

To sing even more people’s praises, I love when people give each other flowers, so can you each tell me about a time on set when a co-star blew your mind, took something that was on the page and made more than you ever could have imagined with it, and you want to say good job to them?

HSU: I remember watching on the monitor the scene between Audrey and Lolo, Ashley and Sherry Cola, when Ashley’s in her Qipao and she’s talking about, “Wow, if I had gone to Asia sooner maybe I would have seen myself differently all throughout high school. I would’ve not needed to be just the Asian one, but I could be the smart one or the kind and funny one.” I remember watching that scene on a monitor, and it was so beautiful and completely not what we had been doing in the movie, and I just remember really feeling the heart of the film in that moment. I love that scene. I think it’s beautiful.

The balance of heart and laughs in this movie is what makes it so special. I love it.

How about for you?

WU: I was filled with rage seeing how good all three of you were improvising. I remember watching, the slapping gets kind of edited down to a very quick thing, but there was so much electric magic happening between Stephanie and Sherry. It was a little gay. It was awesome. [Laughs]

HSU: There’s a whole gay track between Sherry’s character and my character that kind of got edited and will be saved for the sequel. Sherry’s livid about it.

WU: Yeah, I know. It needs to happen in a sequel or something. But everyone is so quick, and some of those quick, off-the-cuff jokes — the movie is so joke-dense, and of course it’s the writers, but it’s also the actors who are just on fire sometimes. It is really scary to me. It’s like should-I-quit-comedy level scary. [Laughs]

I have so many follow-up questions for both of you right now. I’ll go to the first thing that crossed my mind, the slapping. For any actor out there who is about to do their first on-screen slap scene, can you give them one do and one don’t for doing a million believable slaps?

HSU: Well, definitely don’t actually slap them. However, I can’t 100% confirm that I did not actually slap Sherry. I don’t really know how we did that. We must have mimed it.

WU: I don’t know. I’m trying to remember.

HSU: I feel like a graze happened at one point.

WU: Yeah, with your long nails. You clawed Sherry one time.

HSU: Yeah, don’t slap your actual actor.

Image via Lionsgate Movies

Sabrina, this is your first feature and, like Adele, I think there are going to be many more on the horizon, so what is something you experienced on your first feature here that you really appreciated and helped you deliver your best work that you hope to experience on more films in the future?

WU: Oh, it was genuinely that the cast and the creators gave me so much space. I think partially because there was this feeling of, like, this project is very special. It’s a first-of-its-kind. For a lot of us, it was a first in one way or another. Like Ashley’s first feature film too I think as a lead, and Sherry and [screenwriter] Teresa [Hsiao’s] first film. It felt like we were on a group project. No one was there just to be like, “I’m here to work.”

I had so many questions! I didn’t know what coverage was, how to advocate for myself, and I felt very much like Stephanie and Sherry and Ashley were like family and always checking in with me. I just would not be able to give the takes that I gave if it weren’t for them. I’d be like, “Oh yeah? You like that? Um, I feel terrible, but yeah, you know best!” It was good to just feel like I could say what I thought was funny and try — whatever, you get what I’m saying!

Great, great success with this film — I mean, both of you! This entire ensemble is something else!

Image via Lionsgate

A silly question that doesn’t apply to your characters specifically, but I brought it up in the other room, so now I want to know your opinions on this also. I play an acting Would You Rather game a lot and a question I love asking is, would you rather have to fake vomit or fake sneeze in a scene?

HSU: Ooh!

WU: Wait, somebody fill me in, is fake sneezing a hard thing?

That’s why I compare them! Vomit sounds gross, but I don’t know how someone can believably do a fake sneeze.

WU: [Starts to fake sneeze] Sorry! [Laughs] Alright, I’m fake sneeze. I’m team fake sneeze!

HSU: I’m fake vomit! That sounds so fun! To puke on you? That sounds so fun! [Laughs]

WU: I think as somebody who was puked on and left in the basement to wonder if we had moved on, I was like, I can’t deliver that pain to another person. We did reshoots. I had gotten puked on so many times. It’s actually just nice smelling oats and stuff, but truly I will never forget what it was like walking around set and seeing everyone look at me like this [feigns disgust]. It was hurtful to my core. I was like, “What’s wrong with me?”

That’s why vomit always feels like the wrong answer. It’s fake, but it genuinely grosses me out.

WU: Learn how to freaking act! Sneeze! [Laughs]

I have to ask about one other scene that I absolutely adore in this movie. Tell me absolutely everything about filming the cocaine train scene. Is something like that as chaotic for you on set as it plays for us in the final film?

WU: Okay, I thought it was actually very chaotic.

HSU: It was chaotic.

WU: It was literally like Steph being like, “Sabrina’s gonna stick this in my butt! Come on, come on, come on!”

HSU: Yeah, “Come on! Hey, camera guy. Yeah, yeah. Right there!” [Laughs]

Image via Lionsgate

That is an absolutely brilliant scene, but of everything you do and say in this movie, what’s one thing that made you think, “There’s absolutely no way they’re going to let this get into the finished cut,” and now it is in the final film that everyone will see?

[Long Pause]

WU: Okay, I think our pause is because there are so many things that I’m like, “Damn, that got cut, huh?” That genius line, you’re right; that was too crazy.

HSU: Which one?

WU: I mean, there’s a whole park. I mean, the gay slapping, I’m so sad is gone.

HSU: Well, there’s one thing that Sherry Cola does that I can’t believe is not only in the film — I mean, I can believe it’s in the film but I can’t believe it made it to the trailer, which is, they’re talking about sex, and she’s like, “You sure you don’t miss it? Because you seem a little tense from all the no-boning,” and then she goes [gestures], and she just does a really grotesque …

WU: Oh, I think that’s awesome.

HSU: I think it’s amazing! I just can’t believe it’s in the trailer.

WU: Okay, I have my answer. I think it’s the really detailed sound you get during the sex montage, where you’re like, “Wow, I am really hearing …” The Foley artist is going too hard on this moment! I can’t believe! [Laughs] But I hope that guy wins an Oscar.