Michelle Yeoh The Lady Interview

The Lady

Cast: Michelle Yeoh, David Thewlis, Jonathan Raggett
Director: Luc Besson
Genre: Drama, Biography
Rated: MA
Running Time: 127 minutes

Synopsis: The Lady is the extraordinary story of Aung San Suu Kyi and her husband, Michael Aris.

It is also the epic story of the peaceful quest of the woman who is at the core of Burma's democracy movement.

Despite distance, long separations, and a dangerously hostile regime, their love endures until the very end. A story of devotion and human understanding set against a backdrop of political turmoil that continues today. The Lady was written over a period of three years by Rebecca Frayn. Interviews with key figures in Aung San Suu Kyi's entourage enabled her to reconstruct for the first time the true story of Burma's national heroine.

Release Date: April 19th, 2012

About the Production

The Lady: Genesis of an amazing story
Aung San Suu Kyi is one of the leading opponents to the military junta in power in Burma. Her whole life has been devoted to fighting for the advent of democracy in her country. After winning the 1990 general election and being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize the year after, she remained under house arrest for over fifteen years but never gave up fighting. In 1999 she was unwilling to go to England to see her husband, who was dying of cancer, for fear of being denied re-entry to Burma - she was never to see him again. And when Aung San Suu Kyi was eventually released from house arrest in November 2010, she had not seen her two children, Alex and Kim, for ten years.

It was the unfailing determination and extraordinary courage of this woman fighting alone a brutal, tyrannical regime that made Michelle Yeoh and Luc Besson want to make her extraordinary journey into a film. "When I received Rebecca Frayn's script in 2007, I thought that it was not only a deeply moving story of love and sacrifice but that it offered me a role which I couldn't turn down," Michelle Yeoh explains. "I have long believed that we lack powerful female characters in cinema." Producer Virginie Besson-Silla agrees, "It took me just one hour to read the script. I knew right away that EuropaCorp Company must produce it. If you're going to struggle for a couple of years and be totally involved in a project, you must be blown away at once. The fact that a woman could prove to be so heroic was all the more touching as it is usually men, who are portrayed as heroic characters. There was no doubt we had to make this film." She goes on enthusiastically, "what mattered was that Luc and I had the same vision of the film, which we wanted to show onscreen. Well, my priority was to focus on the purpose of the project, and deal with the financial aspect later. Andy Harries and Rebecca Frayn came to Paris to meet with us. We all saw the same film and understood its potential impact."

Producer Andy Harries agrees, "After three years of working without financial support it was wonderful to join forces with Europacorp and have the opportunity to make this film with Luc Besson who is a director I have always hugely admired. Luc Besson and Virginie Besson-Silla were incredibly supportive from the first meeting and embraced this challenging project with us. It has been a brilliant experience."

However, it was not easy to come to terms with Aung San Suu Kyi's decision to sacrifice her private life for the sake of her ideals. "As I was reading the script, I couldn't help wondering how a mother could make such a choice," Virginie Besson-Silla goes on. "And it was so far from my own nature that I wanted to understand what had driven her to give up everything for her country. But after doing some research and meeting people who had known her and more than anything else, after meeting up with her just after her release, I understood that she had done it all out of love. She chose not to take into account her own feelings in order to help millions of people." Michelle Yeoh agrees, "while her husband was dying, Suu Kyi was busy giving a speech and performing her duties as an activist. You could, at first, think that she was cold and distant but, on second thought, you'd realise that she had a strong personality that you couldn't help admiring." Likewise, David Thewlis, who acts both as Michael Aris and his twin brother Anthony, had to force himself to come to terms with the idea of a person living a life of self denial. "She and her husband would sometimes spend years without seeing each other or talking to each other, which is totally unthinkable to me," the actor notes. "He had no idea whether she was being tortured or beaten, or if she was in an isolated prison cell. He raised their two sons alone and didn't see her even when he was told he had cancer. As I have never been through anything like this, it was difficult for me to fully grasp this situation."

Actors haunted by their characters
Michelle Yeoh, nobody else.
If choosing the right cast is crucial, it is even more so when a film is based on real facts. Without a doubt, Michelle Yeoh, the woman at the origin of the project, was the right person to play the title role. "Nobody but Michelle could have acted as Aung San Suu Kyi, given that even without the slightest make-up there is a striking resemblance between the two women," the producer states. "Not only are both women delicate and slender but I think that Michelle unconsciously mimics Aung San Suu Kyi whom she knows well and has long looked up to." The actress notes: "Of course I had heard of her but I was not aware of the minute details of her story, nor did I know what she had to give up on. Indeed it was difficult to be performing the part because she embodies the yearning for freedom found among all the world's every oppressed people's. I felt that I had great responsibilities."

First, Michelle Yeoh read all of Aung San Suu Kyi's works as well as the books the latter loves. She learnt that Suu Kyi was a Buddhist and a supporter of the philosophy of nonviolence famously advocated by Gandhi. "It was not so much a question of mimicking her by adopting her hair-do, her gestures or her beautiful English accent but of capturing her soul and understanding what made her leave everything including a husband and two children, whom she cherished, in order to embody hope for millions of people in Burma. Even though she had never given a public speech, all of a sudden there she was, addressing a million people. That's why I wished to understand where this kind of strength came from. "

As she was playing a character that put a premium on language, Michelle Yeoh wanted to pronounce Burmese properly. But she had a hard time learning it. "I first thought I'd never manage," she explains. "Well for three weeks I was to learn Burmese with this incredible Burmese teacher who spoke brilliant English and had lectured in the United States. It was a very challenging learning process but as I am relentless I came to the conclusion that I had to memorize the lines. And wherever I was, in the car, on the boat or in the shower, I'd just say the lines over and over again until I got them right."

But there were other challenges as well. The events recounted in the film taking place over a period of more than ten years, the actress had to work out whatever changes her character was undergoing. "It was not only a matter of hair-do or make-up," Michelle Yeoh explains. "Between 1988 and 1995, for example, Suu Kyi's looks and demeanour slightly changed, and so did the way she related to others. So I had to be constantly on my toes because we would be doing a scene happening in 88 in the morning, another scene happening in 95 in the afternoon and yet another one back in 89 in the evening because of the weather or the location. So every single day was challenging!"

In order to perfectly embody the character, Michelle Yeoh says that it was necessary for her to meet Aung Sang Suu Kyi in person. While several crew members had applied for a visa to enter Burma, only the actress got a green light from the Burmese government, albeit for only 24 hours. "They all envied me and at the same time we were wondering why the junta had granted me a visa," she remembers. "Luc [Besson] and Virginie [Besson-Silla] were both a bit anxious but quite happy for me. I went alone but I was carrying lots of messages and gifts on behalf of the whole team!" Once in Burma Michelle Yeoh went to visit Aung Sang Suu Kyi and the first thing that struck her was that there were books everywhere in the house. "I knew she was an avid reader because I had done research about her but that was when I fully realised how books had been her companions all these years: they were not only the source of her information and inspiration but they were also the source of her sanity. And they helped her to keep fighting." The encounter with Suu Kyi was like a moment out of time: "As soon as you see her you feel her warmth and generosity," Michelle Yeoh recalls. "No matter how petite she looks, she exudes amazing strength. More than anything else, I felt like I already knew her, like she was an old friend because I'd been watching her so intently and she was exactly what I figured she would be."

David Thewlis playing two parts
Best Actor winner at the Cannes Film Festival for Mike Leigh's Naked (1993), David Thewlis plays both Michael Aris, Aung San Suu Kyi's husband, and Anthony, his twin brother. Virginie Besson-Silla was more interested in the chemistry between the actors than in the physical resemblance of the actor with the characters he embodies. "Michael Aris was a unique character and a leading authority on Asian, Tibetan and Himalayan culture," the producer explains. "David Thewlis and Michelle Yeoh are a good physical match, there is the same contrast between them as between Suu Kyi and Michael, she being very tiny and he very tall." The producer praises the courage of the actor, who was willing to perform both parts. "He had to work hard for both parts, and he made it," she adds. It was quite hard in the beginning. "Of course, it was very challenging," David Thewlis notes. "I was a little worried about how to find the delineation between the two brothers."

To begin with, the English actor tried to focus on Michael Aris's personality. "The only pieces of footage that I had were the interviews Michael Aris had given on television. He looked solemn and quite mournful," he says. "So, I had to imagine what he was like at a party or when he was in his private moments with Suu, what kind of father, or what kind of teacher he was, given that I had no access to that kind of information." However, the main key to the role for David Thewlis was the voice. "Like his brother, Michael Aris had an extraordinary way of speaking," he continues. "It is a peculiar upper class accent, quite eccentric, that's not Standard English. It would have been wrong not to imitate this intonation and this way of speaking because that was the key to the whole character for me. I was a little worried too about how the audience will react to this odd accent!"

The actor never met Michael Aris, but he had long conversations with his brother, which was a great help for him. "I was very lucky to meet Anthony because otherwise I would have gotten Michael Aris wrong," he adds.

"Thanks to him, I understood that Michael Aris was extremely courageous and committed. From the very beginning, he had accepted that his wife, whom he worshipped, would give up her family, for the sake of her country and her ideals of democracy. How couldn't I have admired a man who showed such resilience and self denial in the face of adversity? Who would raise two boys alone and be willing to die without seeing his wife? I can only see his devotion to his wife as being unconditional love and respect of her own commitment. At no moment did he ever question her actions, not even when she was on hunger strike."

The encounter with Anthony also allowed David Thewlis to better understand the difference between the two brothers and to prepare to embody the two characters. He explains, "Anthony is more articulate than his brother, he is a bon vivant, a very charismatic man and very funny too! The first time I met Anthony, he said 'you don't look anything like us,' and we don't really. We have a different frame, we have a very different facial structure, so they pushed up my ears, gave me bushier eyebrows and I had to put on some weight to look more like Anthony. But what really mattered was that I could express the difference between the two brothers, the voice, the mannerism or the way of moving."

The couple's inner circle
Two newcomers in English cinema play the parts of Aung Sang Suu Kyi's sons. Jonathan Woodhouse, a Philippine actor, is Alex, the elder brother. "Alex is a rather quiet boy, he's very intelligent and interested in academic studies," he says. "I think he was more aware than his brother of the circumstances surrounding his family. The thing that helped me relate to him was that, like him, I have a strong mother who had overcome her own trials, and who gave me a sound education." Although the young man never met with Alex, he read quite a few books about him and about Burma's political situation. "As I play a half-Burmese character, I wanted to better grasp the country's situation and how the dictatorship came to power," he adds. "I read two biographies of Aung Sang Suu Kyi, Perfect Hostage and Letters from Burma, and I learnt a lot of things about the junta in power. I also found a lot of information about Alex," he resumes. "When you play a real person, you feel a real sense of responsibility and I wanted to do him justice." Jonathan Woodhouse was more interested in getting the character and the story right than in mimicking Alex. "Of course I worked on my accent, but what really mattered to me was to understand Alex's mindset especially when he collected his mother's Nobel Peace Prize. The hardest thing was playing a 14- or 15- year old teenager when you are 23."

There is even less information about Kim, Aung Sang Su Kyi's younger son. But when Jonathan Raggett, who plays Kim, met with him, he realised that the character he was playing was no different from him. "I did some research on the Internet and I found a couple of pictures," he relates. "When I met him, I found out that he was an extrovert, more attracted to skateboarding than to academic studies! When he was young, he was quite mischievous and cheeky, just like me! I am very much like him; I can't sit in class, listening to a teacher, for very long. I have always preferred music and photography to studies. It was quite comforting to know I didn't have to play a completely new person. I even had to get linguistic coaching to get rid of my Brighton accent." Moreover, Jonathan Raggett had the same kind of relationship with his brother as Kim: "When I found out that they kept fighting, it helped me get into the character's mindset because I keep fighting with my brother too. So it was not a character part!"

Apart from his wife and his two sons, Michael Aris was very close to Karma, his loyal student from Oxford University. When Benedict Wong was approached for the part, he knew nothing about the project: "Even after several auditions and after I got the job, I still didn't know what it was all about," he explains. "I must admit it was quite unusual and even a bit scary." Fortunately the actor could figure out the character when he read the script. "First, Karma was Michael Aris's student, then over the years the relationship grew into a friendship, so much so that they became like two brothers," he goes on. "He was there to guide him, and nurse him when he got ill. There was this compassion he felt for him and I guess he accompanied Michael through to his death really."

An actor's dream director
Some actors were startled by the unusual subject matter of The Lady, but they were all eager to be working with Luc Besson. Whether they had already worked with him - like David Thewlis - or just admired his films, they were all delighted when they heard the name of the director of The Fifth Element.

It was Michelle Yeoh who asked him to work on her project. "When I learnt that he would direct the film it was like a dream come true," Michelle Yeoh confides. "I have been a fan of his work for such a long time and when I was told that 'he does action movies' I replied that it didn't mean he wasn't a great director. For an action movie to be successful you must feel for the characters - and only a director who knows how to bring the best out of his actors makes successful action movies. And Luc Besson does. Not only does he bring flesh and soul into his characters, he has always championed very strong female roles." David Thewlis agrees, " Luc Besson is a great director, who brings the best out of me. I can be lazy sometimes if I'm not directed but Luc Besson never lets me be lazy and he does a lot of takes until he is satisfied. I like his method very much because each take is different and Luc Besson gives me a lot of advice from behind the camera during the take."

Michelle Yeoh agrees, "I admit that he is very demanding and, contrary to most directors, he is very punctual, which is one of the things I loved about him. When he said 8 o'clock on the set, he meant 8! And all the cast, even the extras had to be on their toes, ready to act. I love his way of working."

The actors are unanimous about Luc Besson's hands-on approach and his total commitment to the project he works on. "He is behind the camera, and it helps enormously," David Thewlis agrees. "He is technically highly proficient and is in charge of every level of the set. He's not behind the monitor twenty feet away from us. He watches your performance and gives you very subtle indications, including on English inflexions, which I find fascinating considering that English is not his mother tongue - but 99% of the time he's absolutely right."

Jonathan Raggett adds, "He's hands on, he really works well with the actors and steers you in the direction that he wants. This allows him to be very specific in setting up every sequence." Benedict Wong concurs, "I sort of see him like the captain of a ship, orchestrating the shooting. Everybody's scrubbing the deck and he's very hands on." "It's because he knows exactly what he wants and he has a very clear, distinctive vision of his film," Michelle Yeoh points out. "So I had great trust in him: when he said I had to do the take again, I trusted him. This kind of trust is necessary especially when it's a very vulnerable, very emotional role like that of Aung Sang Suu Kyi."

However the director gave the actors some room to breathe. "And on the set, when we are rehearsing, I like throwing around ideas and Luc has always encouraged me, even if, at the end of the day, he is the one making the decision," Michelle Yeoh explains. "There were some scenes we just improvised entirely," Jonathan Woodhouse adds. "He gives the actors a chance to give their own interpretation of the scene even if it was not in the script. He gave me one piece of direction, which for me was really invaluable, which was not to think too much, but just go ahead and do it." Jonathan Raggett nods, "sometimes you didn't know exactly when he was going to say 'Action!'or 'Cut', so that you forgot about the camera and got more into the part. It's interesting because he gives the actors a chance to have their own interpretation of the scene and go on their own impulse and yet he's hands on, and it's great."

Shooting with your heart
From Burma to Thailand
Obviously, it was not an option to shoot a film on Aung Sang Suu Kyi in Burma, so Thailand was the scene of the action instead. Virginie Besson-Silla explains, "Geographically speaking Burma and Thailand are very similar and many movies are shot in Thailand. We had all the technicians and the infrastructure on the spot and we didn't have to bring them along from France." Better still, there is a large Burmese community in Thailand, which made it easy for production to hire supporting actors and extras.

But Luc Besson and his producer still felt it was necessary to go to Burma because, "it would have been preposterous to talk about a country you've never set foot in," Virginie Besson- Silla explains. It was a unique experience to get to understand Burmese culture, "and even if we didn't stay as long as we wished, we still had time to get the feel, the energy, the tastes, the mores and the particular climate" she adds. "We spent some time in Rangoon, walking in the markets, the harbour, visiting the Shwedagon Pagoda and getting to understand the inhabitants' way of life. Luc took a few pictures that he inserted in the movie. We discovered an extraordinary country, different from all the places I have ever visited, sheltered from any Western influence and from all form of modernity. Of course we tried to come near Aung Sang Suu Kyi's house but we couldn't"

Although principal photography took place in Thailand, it was necessary to be secretive about the movie subject matter. "We had been warned that we risked being expelled from the country if we were too conspicuous because the government was concerned there might be upheavals," Virginie Besson-Silla recounts. "The good news was that the main setting was the house in which our protagonist lived. So we built a house in an enclosed, private place, which granted us complete freedom. However, the minute we were out in the street or in public places, we had to be careful. Not only did the whole team understand it, but they all played ball. And the inhabitants were not too inquisitive; none of them ever took pictures of us with their mobile phones, or posted anything on the Internet."

Intense moments
The crew and the cast have intense memories of this extraordinary shoot, which took them from Thailand to Oxford (England) to France over a period of three and a half months. The scene of Aung Sang Suu Kyi delivering a speech in Shwedagon, with nearly three thousand extras, was particularly memorable.

"Seeing Michelle Yeoh with so many supporters around her, speaking on behalf of the people, was absolutely incredible and exciting," Jonathan Woodhouse remembers. "It didn't feel like acting, it felt real," Jonathan Raggett nods. "Sometimes, we would forget it was a movie. Like this scene when Suu Kyi got put under house arrest and we huddled together like a real family, I was holding Michelle Yeoh tightly like she was my real mother. I was even scared when the guys acting as the soldiers were really aggressive, and they did it fantastically well…" For Jonathan Woodhouse, the Nobel Prize scene was the most difficult one. "It was shot toward the end and I had been anticipating it for months," he says. "It was really very daunting for me, and I did feel under pressure, and I remember David (Thewlis) tapping me on the shoulder and saying 'no pressure'. I had studied the speech so much and when I saw that there were hundreds of extras, I felt that I was not really acting; I felt I was delivering a real speech. It was doing justice to the real Alex, to Suu Kyi and to her people." David Thewlis recalls his relationships with Michelle Yeoh and the two young actors playing their sons, "Michelle is very smart and very funny and she is a great actress. It wasn't hard to form that bond with such a lovely woman. As to the two Jonathans, they made me laugh a lot on the set; we played lots of jokes on each other, so that it was easy to form a great bond with them. We were like a real family."

A long-awaited release
As Luc Besson was almost finishing The Lady, the team heard of Aung Sang Suu Kyi's release on November 13, 2010, after serving several years of house arrest. The emotions were very raw. "Even if the date of the release had long been known, until the very last minute - until we saw it with our own eyes - we didn't believe it," Virginie Besson-Silla states. "And then, we saw it live on TV. We saw the soldiers removing the barricades that cordoned off the street where she lived and we thought, 'that's it, they are releasing her!' It was an amazing moment because, only the day before, we had been shooting the scene of her previous release in 1995. Suddenly facts were meeting fiction, Suu Kyi walked with a determined stride toward the gates, as if nothing had changed, she put flowers in her hair, in the same way as we had filmed Michelle Yeoh putting flowers in her hair, the day before, while the supporters were waiting at the gates." Michelle Yeoh nods, "I think the look on Luc's Besson face was priceless, I'll never forget it. It was a very intense moment for all of us." David Thewlis adds, "It was one of the most memorable days of my life. We were with Kim, Suu Kyi's younger son. At last, he could speak freely with his mother. It was an incredibly real piece of history in the making."

A film with a message of hope…
In conclusion, all those who have worked on this movie hope that it will raise audiences' awareness of Burma's political situation and do justice to Aung Sang Suu Kyi's values. "The film shows that, in some countries, there is no freedom and that some rare people are willing to make sacrifices to help their country," Virginie Besson- Silla points out, "I would hope that the film does raise awareness of Suu Kyi's cause and that a lot of people will be moved by her story, and that Burma does not disappear from the headlines." David Thewlis adds, "The way things are today, things arise to prominence and overnight Burma does not make the headlines any more. It is true that terrible things happen in the world all the time. But we must always remember that Suu Kyi chose to stay in her country to fight, when she could have become a leader in exile." Jonathan Woodhouse goes on, "it would be great if the film made people want to take action about Burma and stop thinking, were it for a brief moment, about their own struggles".

"I do hope Suu Kyi will be touched by the film," Virginie Besson-Silla concludes. "We filmed her husband and sons during private moments, even if she has not actually lived those moments since she was separated from them. I hope she will endorse 'our story' and will think we have been true to her message."