Jon M. Chu didn’t think he “deserved” to be in Hollywood but learned to trust in his ideas.
Jon M. Chu didn’t think he “deserved” to be in Hollywood.
The Wicked filmmaker has reflected on his career choices over the years and always wanted to “be like” the “greats” of the movie industry, even when he didn’t know how to properly express his ideas and was struggling to find his footing.
Speaking during the Canva Create 2026’s Building Worlds: From Script to Spectacle panel at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles last month, People magazine reports he said: “I remember in what I realised, as I had done this over and over again, you are so conscious of … doing it because you’re not like the greats, but the greats are the ones that inspired you.
“You want to be like that so badly you don’t have quite the language or the tools or the ability of the craftsmanship yet, how to express that.
“[I ask myself] ‘Why am I the person to tell the story?’.”
Jon compared his success with breakthrough film Crazy Rich Asians to winning the lottery.
He said: “When you said my list of movies, it lit up and you said Crazy Rich Asians. That was a big point in my life. I didn’t think I deserved to be in Hollywood.
“I was discovered and I got very lucky. And when you win the lottery, you think you actually don’t know how you got there. So you actually can’t win the lottery again.
“I had to learn how to win in a different way or how to tell my story.
“As I go through my career, that moment, choosing to do something that only I could tell was a scary … I was like, ‘No one’s going to see this movie.’ I actually told my team, I was like, ‘I’m going to make a movie. I’m going to take five years and I’m not going to make you any money.’ Luckily they were fine with it.”
The 46-year-old filmmaker learned to trust himself after seeing his team “believed” in him and also “this Asian culture, diaspora from all around the world.”
He added: “I knew that audience, whether you were Asian or not, would fall in love with the things that I fall in love with my family, the meals that we eat, the conversations we had, we could make fun of ourselves and how we are, and we had all walks of life in there.”
The In the Heights director is guided by his imagination.
He explained: “It either sparks me or not, or I have to go on some journey to find if I connect with it. Other times I’m like, ‘I have to tell this story.’
“That’s how I start. Because without that, I can’t tell you what colors. I can’t tell you what we should build for and it doesn’t mean anything to me.”
Jon M Chu didn’t think he ‘belonged’ in Hollywood
