Crazy Rich Asians: a Hollywood Hit or a Flop?

Crazy Rich Asians is the first Hollywood release featuring an Asian and Asian-American cast since 1993's The Joy Luck Club. It has been a box-office hit worldwide, making $230 million (Warner Bros invested $30 million in the movie). Film critic Richard Lawson describes it as a "fairy-tale romp, full of direct Cinderella references that has some muddied messaging about wealth. Mostly it just whisks us away on a whirlwind tour of an almost fantastical world. Crazy Rich Asians is breathless fun -but rather weightless too" (Vanity Fair). The richness of the language and the style make reading this review a C2 task.

But in mainland China, the reception of the film has been quite different. Katrina Yu, writing for Aljazeera, explains that Crazy Rich Asians has been a box office flop in China, it has only made $1.5 million, an "atrocious performance" according to independent China film industry consultant Jonathan Papish. The film is not seen as "a celebration of Asian culture, but a demonisation of it", according to popular reviews on Chinese movie websites. This Arts & Culture report can also be recommended for C2 students.

Finally, you can listen to NPR and read a Fresh Air interview to Kevin Kwan, the writer of the best selling novel that the film is based on, where he talks about his upbringing in a wealthy family and his gradual exposure to Bohemian society in Singapore, and where he also responds to the criticism of the movie for starring Henry Golding, a half British, half Malay actor and model. This radio interview with a script could be accessible to C1 students.

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