[Editor’s note: The following contains some spoilers for Interior Chinatown.]

The Big Picture

The Hulu series ‘Interior Chinatown’ follows Willis Wu as he uncovers family secrets in Chinatown while trapped in a police procedural.
Showrunner Charles Yu, who also wrote the novel the series is based on, collaborated with Taika Waititi to establish the world’s unique look and feel.
The series explores the themes of identity and taking the lead in one’s own story.

Based on the novel by Charles Yu, Hulu’s Interior Chinatown follows Willis Wu (Jimmy O. Yang), a waiter working alongside co-worker and friend of the family, Fatty Choi (Ronny Chieng), used to being in the background of his own life when he witnesses a crime that pushes him into the spotlight as a main character. Being trapped in a police procedural called Black & White has left Willis wanting more, so when he finds himself drawn into the investigation by teaming up with a detective (Chloe Bennet) who is herself overlooked, he uncovers family secrets that he never could have imagined.

Along with writing the novel, Yu is also the showrunner, as well as a writer and executive producer, and he collaborated with pilot director Taika Waititi on establishing the look and feel of the show within a show. The result is a world layered with detail and nuance, where you can’t help but root for the background character who finds his moment to shine in the spotlight.

During this interview with Collider, Yu and Waititi talked about which real-life TV shows they’d want to be trapped in, embracing the weird, how tricky this series was to pitch, what Yu learned from working with Waititi, designing two different worlds, taking inspiration from Jackie Chan for the fight scenes, and what it was like for Yu to see his story brought to life off the page.

Collider: To start with a silly question, Willis finds himself trapped in a police procedural. If you guys were suddenly trapped in a TV series, what specific show would you want to find yourself trapped in?

TAIKA WAITITI: Definitely not Severance. I don’t wanna be trapped in anything that’s too cerebral or scary. Maybe M*A*S*H would be fun, but probably not even that. CHiPs seems fun.

CHARLES YU: I don’t know, probably Succession. I wanna be a billionaire, so I think I’ll just do that. But I wouldn’t bother with the family.

WAITITI: Just take the money and go live somewhere else.

‘Interior Chinatown’ Showrunner Charles Yu and Director Taikia Waititi Embraced the Weird

Charles, when you wrote this novel, what were you hoping for? Were you just writing a novel that you’d want to read, or did you have big plans and dreams for what it could be?

YU: More option A. I was stuck for a long time, so I just wanted to get it out, whatever it was. It had to be written, I just didn’t know what it was until Willis’ voice started to emerge in little snippets. I just felt like it was a story that was really strange. I didn’t know if it would be for anyone else, to be honest. To me, some of the things that I’m most interested in are usually like, “This is so weird. No one’s gonna like this, but I’ve gotta do it.”

WAITITI: Weird is good. Everything is so boring now.

Related ‘Interior Chinatown’ Review: Jimmy O. Yang Charmingly Leads a Metafictional Police Caper ‘Interior Chinatown’ premieres November 19 on Hulu.

Weird is good, but at the same time, weird is also particularly difficult to explain and market. Is this the most impossible show to try to describe to people?

YU: Yes.

WAITITI: Oh, for sure. You can’t even believe how hard it is to pitch something like this. Executives everywhere just want to know what it’s like. They’re like, “What’s the thing I’ve seen before that this is gonna be like, that’s easiest for me to understand?” This was a very hard thing to get them to understand, which is what I admired about it, in terms of the challenge and just how smart [Charles is]. The book is so complex and there are so many layers to everything and all of these things are happening. I’m too lazy to write something or adapt something like that and make it work. I give up very easily on things. For me, I was like, “I’m glad I don’t have to write this.” I had the easy part of coming in and just helping get it made and trying to figure out how to honor the world that [Charles] created. That was really fun for me, but also still difficult.

YU: Obviously, Taika is being modest. It’s such a hard thing to figure out how you take it from text to this. That was a huge challenge and I learned a lot. I don’t know why you would make it so hard on yourself. Learning to talk about it, and then seeing what emerges after you write it, shoot it, and then in post, something emerges. Ultimately, it’s a story about people playing roles in all kinds of ways and feeling defined by those roles and limited, but also wanting to surprise people and show people who you really are. When you start to unlock that, then people get it, from the executives and producers to hopefully the viewers.

Director Taika Waititi Wanted To Visually Set the Two Worlds of ‘Interior Chinatown’ Apart
Image via Hulu

Taika, watching this, you can see the different choices in lighting and camera movement. There are various subtle things that are done to play with reality versus the show within the show. How did you want to approach that visually? Was it always something you had a very clear idea for?

WAITITI: We knew that Willis’ world had to feel somewhat bland or just normal. We wanted the lighting to feel plain and a little flat and the colors to be a bit more muted. And then, with Black & White, the procedural, we wanted that to be heightened and to feel a little over the top sometimes with the lighting and dramatic in the melodramatic sense. What ended up happening for me is that I just fell more and more in love with Willis’ world and his reality became more beautiful to me. I don’t know if that was the design, but that’s also part of it. That was just an ongoing conversation between myself, Mike Berlucchi, the DP, and Charles Yu. We just wanted to be clear. You need clarity and you can’t be overly complicated because that confuses the audience. You just need to be like, “Here’s this thing that happens, the lighting changes, and that’s how you know something has shifted.” Once you start over complicating it and getting too smart, it’s annoying to have to shoot something super complicated each time you’re trying to show that world change. You’ve gotta keep it easier on yourself and so that it’s understandable for the audience. And then, once you start getting confident with that, you can add another little thing or something in the background. There are a lot of little things that you will see on repeat viewings.

YU: There are some Easter eggs and little things in there.

Related Jimmy O. Yang’s Wild Road From “Chinese Teenager #1” on ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ to Leading ‘Interior Chinatown’ “I don’t think people expect me to do martial arts, but I made sure I trained for it,” says Yang, about his ‘Interior Chinatown’ fight scenes.

Charles, what were you most nervous about when it came to adapting this and what were you most excited about getting to see brought to life?

YU: I was nervous to work with Taika, to be honest. I was excited, but certainly wondered, “Can I explain what I want? Have I thought about it enough?” Really it’s about, how do you conjure a world of a show within a show? It’s one thing to type some sentences out and the reader does the work for you. It’s another thing to actually have somebody build that, and then shoot it and light it correctly. I worried about whether it would translate. Would people be along for the ride? Would you care about Willis? I think it’s a wonderful ensemble. I love the cast. But it starts by caring about this guy’s perspective as he shakes up the world.

‘Interior Chinatown’s Fight Scenes Were So Much More Than Showrunner Charles Yu Had Imagined
Image via Hulu

Regardless of the location or the type of fighting involved, everyone has probably dreamed of themselves fighting the bad guy and winning, and these fights feel that way. How did you figure out the best way to approach the fight scenes?

WAITITI: I didn’t think too deeply about it. I just wanted to shoot a martial arts fight scene. It was two days of just destroying the restaurant. That was super fun. There were lots of things that we experimented with and we tried different things. Also, I’m a huge fan of Jackie Chan’s stuff, so using what’s around you in a fight was a big thing. When Ronny answers the phone, knocks someone out, and then scoops up the phone and hangs it up, all of that is super-duper fun. It’s just embracing the theatricality of those fights. There’s an incredible heritage and a history of martial arts fight scenes. It’s a real art form. I just loved having the opportunity to even give that a go.

YU: It was really fun to watch Taika and the team do that. On the page, that was one page, and I think we shot probably about six minutes. It’s probably half that in the episode, but there was a whole bunch of stuff in there. In the script, it was basically just, “Willis starts to win, but then he loses.” And then, they shot that for two days.

Related Jimmy O. Yang Goes Full Kung Fu in High Octane ‘Interior Chinatown’ Sneak Peek [Exclusive] The Taika Waititi-directed premiere debuts on Hulu on November 19.

Interior Chinatown Interior Chinatown, adapted from Charles Yu’s novel, follows Willis Wu, a background character in a TV police procedural. After witnessing a crime, he uncovers a criminal conspiracy in Chinatown and his family’s hidden past while exploring what it means to take the lead in his own story.Release Date November 19, 2024 Main Genre Drama Seasons 1 Creator(s) Charles Yu Streaming Service(s) Hulu Expand

Interior Chinatown is available to stream on Hulu. Check out the trailer:

Watch on Hulu