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Rosalie Chiang, Breakout Star of Pixar’s Turning Red, Has A Singapore Connection

Turning Red, Pixar’s first Asian-led feature, is now streaming on Disney+.

Rosalie Chiang, Breakout Star of Pixar’s Turning Red, Has A Singapore Connection

In Turning Red, newcomer Rosalie Chiang plays a boyband-obsessed Chinese-Canadian teen Meilin who turns into a giant red panda when she experiences certain emotions. Helping her navigate the throes of puberty is Mei’s domineering mother, Ming, voiced by Killing Eve’s Sandra Oh, who has her own secrets.

Pixar’s first Asian-led feature — inspired by Bao director Domee Shi’s own teenage experiences growing up in Toronto, and influenced by the works of Hayao Miyazki and Fujiko Fujio — is a delightfully heart-warming were-bear flick-cum-metaphor for a young girl on the cusp of womanhood.

To portray someone as “energetic, confident and emotionally messy” as Mei, Pixar went through a gruelling audition process before they found 12-year-old San Francisco-born Chiang who, like her animated counterpart, is — per long-time producer Lindsey Collins (Wall-E, Finding Dory) in the production notes — “super close to her mum, home-schooled and an A-student”.

Before Turning Red, Chiang has appeared in short films, TV guest roles and commercials (notably, the Yamaha Piano’s first North American TV ad in 2017). She’s also a published poet with two books under her belt, 2016’s A Is for Albatross: Birds A-Z Book and 2020’s A is for Arowana: Freshwater Fish A-Z.

8days.sg recently spoke to Chiang, now 16, on Zoom and this is what we found out…

1. Turning Red is Chiang’s coming-of-age story as well. 

In 2018, Chiang was 12 when Pixar hired her to provide the scratch — or temporary voice —for Meilin in the early development stages. When it came time to cast the role, the producers figured that after two years working with Chiang, they couldn’t imagine Meilin voiced by anybody else and so they offered Chiang the gig. “During the entire recording years, I was [going through] my own coming of age,” says Chiang. “So [Mei and I] shared that mutual understanding of change and how it’s super-messy, awkward, weird and cringy.”

2. She had to keep her Pixar job a secret from her pals.

So what lies did she spin to throw them off the scent? “I just said, ‘I’m not doing anything,” says Chiang, innocently. “They were always asking, ‘What’s your next project?’ I was tempted to tell them because they always seemed so disappointed [that I wasn’t working].” When she finally revealed the truth — like four years later — they couldn’t be happier. But will they believe her again? “I don’t know. [Maybe they’ll say] ‘Oh, we trust you’ but in their heads, ‘she must be working on something.’’”

3. Voicing Meilin was easy, but Meilin the Red Panda, wasn’t.

It helped that Chiang enrolled at Kids VO, a renowned Los Angeles voice-acting school. “I was able to use everything I learned at school and applied them to voicing Mei,” says she. “Because Mei has literally every single emotion in the book.” More challenging is voicing Meilin's furry alter-ego: “That’s Mei times 100! Whether she’s angry or sad, everything is bigger. There was a lot of yelling and screaming, especially her fight with her mother when she starts roaring all over the place. That was really hard — it took out my voice a little.”

Red, white and blue: Rosalie Chiang with her screen mum Sandra Oh at the Los Angeles premiere of Turning Red at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, on March 1, 2022.

4. She only met Sandra Oh after the movie wrapped.

In animation, voice actors usually record their lines separately, and Turning Red was no exception. Chiang only met Oh just before the press tour. “She invited me to lunch,” she recalls. “She’s such a warm and nice person and it’s a pleasure to work with her because she’s such a professional when it comes to handling the press, acting, and the entertainment business.” The junket rookie felt blessed to have Killing Eve star covering her back. “If there’s a question where I don’t know how to answer it, I would kinda give her a look and she’ll take over.”

5. Her go-to Pixar movie that makes her cry is…

Every single one,” she gushes. But if she had to pick one, it would be 2015’s Inside Out, about Riley, a girl with conflicting feelings after moving to a new neighbourhood. “It was when Riley comes home and she starts breaking down to her parents about how she’s having a hard time,” she says. “There's also the scene where Joy [voiced by Amy Poehler] realises that Sadness is a key emotion and it’s okay to be sad. I just remember her breaking down and I started breaking down too and everyone in the theatre started breaking down as well.”

Tears for fears: Pixar's Inside Out never fails to make Chiang cry.

6. She has a few ideas for Turning Red 2.

Chiang is always ready to reprise Meilin should the powers that be ever greenlight a sequel. “Maybe Mei goes to college?” says Chiang, who herself is planning to study biology. She also thinks the follow-up can be a prequel about Meilin’s mother, Ming, and her mother and what they went through. Or it can even be a side-quel. “Why is 4- Town [the boyband Mei worships] is called 4-Town even though there are five members?”, she pitches. Hmmm…come to think of it, why is that? She’s onto something there.

7. She has a Singapore connection.

Chiang’s mother is Taiwanese and her father is a Singaporean. (Her parents' names and occupations are not available.) How Singaporean is she? “When my family first travelled to Singapore for vacation,” she recalls. “I immediately fell in love with the country, such a beautiful place. It’s safe. The food is incredible. The sights are beautiful. I had so much pride to a point that when I watched a TV show or a movie that has the Merlion or other Singapore landmarks, I would go, ‘Oh my God, I know that place!’” And what’s her fave local food? “Hainanese chicken rice. My mum cooks that on special occasions as well.”

Turning Red and Bao are now streaming on Disney+.

Photos: TPG News/Click Photos

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