Episode Details

My guest on this episode of Talking Taiwan is the film director Arvin Chen. He just directed Love in Taipei, the film adaptation of Abigail Hing Wen's bestselling YA novel Loveboat, Taipei. Related Links: https://talkingtaiwan.com/love-in-taipei-our-interview-with-award-winning-film-director-arvin-chen-ep-252/

If you're a long-time listener of Talking Taiwan you may remember when I interviewed Abigail about her bestselling YA novel. That success was preceded by 12 years of writing and over 20 drafts of the novel. It was also in that episode that she announced that Loveboat, Taipei was going to be made into a film.

I remember watching her journey afterward on social media as the film was being shot in Taiwan during COVID. Arvin directed the film version of the book Love in Taipei and I had a chance to speak to him recently about the film.

Some of you may be familiar with some of Arvin's other films, Au Revoir Taipei, Will You Love Me Tomorrow? and Mama Boy.

Here's a little preview of what we talked about in this podcast episode:

· The iconic scenes of Taipei that are captured in the film, Love in Taipei

· What it was like shooting at the Grand Hotel because Arvin got married there

· Some of Arvin's favorite scenes from Love in Taipei

· The challenges of shooting huge crowd scenes

· Arvin's favorite types of scenes to shoot

· What it was like shooting in Taiwan during COVID

· How the casting was an open call and what that process was like

· How Arvin usually writes and directs his films, but Love in Taipei was adapted from the YA novel Loveboat Taipei and Arvin was not involved with the screen adaptation

· Arvin's directing approach to Love in Taipei

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