Tsai played with the idea of becoming a social worker before her passion for creating led her to study illustration and start writing screenplays. Following success in these fields, she established the production company Movie Bird Films in 2011 in New Taipei City. She has directed two feature films to date, “Stilt” and “Packages from Daddy,” and is currently working on a third.
“After graduating from the Department of Social Work at National Taiwan University [in Taipei City], I thought about pursuing a master’s degree in that field, but I was also really drawn to painting. I’d started to practice at a private studio with some friends. In the end, because many local graduate art schools required applicants to have a degree in a related subject, I opted to go overseas to do my master’s. I studied illustration at the Pratt Institute in New York and got my graduate degree at Kent Institute of Art and Design, today’s University for the Creative Arts in the U.K.
After I returned to Taiwan, as well as working as an illustrator for books, magazines and newspapers, I had a number of other jobs including high school teacher, magazine editor and social worker before I started to write screenplays. That was about 10 years ago in 2009. My husband is a novelist and film director and I used the screenplay for a [2006] movie he made called “The Road in the Air” as a model for my own writing. My first attempt won a literary award for film scripts run by the Kaohsiung City Government [in southern Taiwan]. Named “Formosa Lilies,” it was about a 1990 student [pro-democracy] protest [in Taipei]. My next two works were TV dramas adapted from my husband’s novels and they won prizes too.
I find it much easier to deal with my frustrations and anxieties when I’m working on films. Turning a story into something visual fascinates me and I realized that this is where my passion lies. So I moved into movie directing, with my husband acting as my producer. I’d had enough experience over the years working with him and other filmmakers so we agreed to collaborate. I’ve made two features so far and they both explore family relationships. The second one, “Packages from Daddy,” is about a man who commits suicide, leaving his wife and two children to cope with the grief. My third production follows several homeless children who are sent to a shelter. I’m also busy writing a screenplay for a TV drama series about firefighters. I’ve done a lot of research for this show like going along with crews on emergency callouts. My script portrays what life is really like for a firefighter—their work and their problems—and it also touches on a number of social issues because they need to go into all kinds of homes as part of their job. I think it’s going to be tough when we start re-creating actual firefighting scenes.
(Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)
The project is funded by Public Television Service [PTS]. They really respect our work and from my experience working with them in the past, they’ve never interfered with production. I’m really interested in the topic but am unsure whether it’ll be commercially viable. Because it’s a collaboration with PTS, I know that I’ll be paid for my scriptwriting. It’s a great project and really deserves to be made and shown to audiences.
A film director needs to be able to communicate with people working in all different areas, so in this respect I don’t think there’s much difference between male and female directors. The real challenge for a woman in this profession is when she chooses to become a mother. Society expects women to take on the main responsibilities of looking after a family and I’ve come across these kinds of gender stereotypes in everyday life too. For example, when my daughter was in kindergarten there was a time when I was extremely busy promoting my first movie. I told her teachers that I would be away for work but instead of calling my husband they kept trying to contact me.
Most of the female directors I know have stopped making movies since they’ve had kids. Their time is fragmented by the need to take care of their children so they tend to work on smaller projects such as making a commercial or writing a screenplay rather than taking on a TV show or a film. They’re too time-consuming. Compare that with the situation for a male director. He’s not expected to give up his work for his family. Even those men who opt to become househusbands face some pressure because of their choice. A woman, though, can just quit her job and be a housewife and no one bats an eye.”
—interview by Pat Gao
Write to Pat Gao at cjkao@mofa.gov.tw