Sean Wang Still Remembers His Friends’ Cringe Facebook Statuses
The Oscar-nominated director on pop-punk, 2000s YouTube, and his debut feature-length film, Dìdi.
Little brothers: pimple-faced twerps clocking in daily at the “annoying” factory, stealing belongings without permission and deflecting every criticism with “your mom.” Sean Wang’s directorial debut, Dìdi — Mandarin for “little brother” — opens with shaky camera footage of one such bozo detonating a neighbor’s mailbox, he and his friends shrieking as they sprint away; later, he’ll upload the neighbor’s reaction to YouTube as “crazy white lady freakout.” It’s Fremont, California, in 2008, the age of spammed Facebook updates, Paramore’s Riot, casual homophobia, “ROFLOL” and not “ijbol.” Abandoning his kiddish nickname, 13-year-old Chris Wang — now “Chris,” not “Wang Wang” — is trying out new identities for size. He falls in with a group of older skaters. He flirts over AOL. He changes his ringtone from pop-punk to hip-hop.
Director Sean Wang wrote Dìdi as a love letter to friends, family, and his Bay Area hometown, even casting his own grandmother in the film. Like many coming-of-age stories — Bing Liu’s Minding the Gap, Bo Burnham’s Eighth Grade — it’s a potent capsule of an era. The film bottles recession-era ridiculousness but also the precise aimlessness of one’s early teens. As it makes clear, the basketball-short lotharios powered by Mountain Dew and prank compilations are also lost boys who never learned how to talk about their feelings. “Adolescent boyhood is often cast as stupid and crass. ‘All they do is play video games,’” Wang says. “But I think it’s deeper than that. It’s extremely confusing and sad and angry.” Their bewilderment has consequences for everybody. Joan Chen excels as Chris’s mom, a neglected beauty whose painting ambitions have been sidelined by motherhood — her absent husband disappeared to Taiwan.
Dìdi premiered earlier this year at Sundance, where it won the U.S. Dramatic Audience Award; shortly after, Wang’s short film, Nai Nai and Wài Pó, was nominated for an Oscar. Dìdi releases to the general public today. “The fact that we were an indie film and now we have theatrical distribution is something I’m still getting adjusted to, and it’s exciting,“ Wang says. At the moment, he is writing his next movie and filming a music video with Motion City Soundtrack, one of his favorite bands as a teen, for Dìdi’s end credits.
Dìdi is a time capsule of the late 2000s. How did you try to recreate the specific feel of that era?
It was a lived experience so it’s locked in my brain. I remember what MySpace pages look like. I remember the way people talked and typed. Facebook logs everything. So you can go and look at Facebook statuses from 2008 before Facebook Messenger, when people were just writing on each other’s walls back and forth. I did a lot of Facebook stalking and screen grabs of my friends’ conversations.
How did the script change over the six years you were working on it?
Hopefully it got better! It started as much more of a Stand by Me movie. It wasn’t until maybe my third year developing it that I really felt like something was missing in the script. It was the mother-son dynamic and the family stuff.
I interviewed my mom on camera and when we cast Joan Chen, I shared those interviews with her. I made a short film in 2021 that was me talking with my friends about our upbringings. We all happen to be first-generation Asian American kids. So there was a lot thematically that found its way into this movie. There’s a line where one of my friends is talking about how weird he was when he was 13, and he was just like, Man, I think I was just like, putting on all the time. And I was like, Oh, that’s what Dìdi is.
What was on the moodboard for the film?
As far as movies, the obvious ones: Stand by Me, The 400 Blows, The Rat Catcher, Beasts of the Southern Wild, Where the Wild Things Are. But I was also pulling from late-2000s YouTube videos — College Humor, Ryan Higa, Kev Jumba, that Wong Fu–era type stuff. It wasn’t the type of viral internet culture we have today. It just felt a little bit more innocent, and that’s something I wanted to capture. And skate videos, music videos.
What movies were influential to you when you were Chris’s age?
Stand by Me, Spirited Away, Boyhood, Superbad, Pineapple Express — those Judd Apatow movies were big, because you’d go to the theater to go see them. There’s a lot.
What do you watch on YouTube now?
I don’t know if I go on YouTube that much anymore, but I still watch skate videos. I watch a lot of music videos and covers. If I find a song I really love, I’ll try to find an acoustic cover. There’s this rock band called the Story So Far that just dropped an album. And I’ll watch live videos of them performing.
In the movie, the music is mostly pop-punk and emo, including bands like Paramore. Would you say you still have a taste for that music, or are your interests different now?
My taste is probably a lot more varied now. But even the Linda Lindas exist in that pop-punk lineage. So I definitely have not outgrown it.
Where do you get your best culture recommendations from?
My friends are way cooler than I am. I’ll just be like, “What are you guys talking about? What are you guys listening to?” My friend Lance Oppenheim has a new show on HBO called Ren Faire. It’s amazing. Been listening to that new the Story So Far album, a lot of Boygenius. Getting a lot of restaurant recommendations. There’s a restaurant called the Benjamin in L.A. that I really want to try.
What do you like to do in your downtime?
I skate. I’ve become a big swimmer. I’m trying to get into mixology, but I keep saying I’m going to and I don’t. More often lately, I’m just going on walks by myself and calling up a friend.
What skate media do you like to consume?
When our movie takes place, it was definitely like the Berrics and Crailtap and TransWorld. I’m a little less caught up with the current state of skateboarding. Jenkem Mag is a good one, by my friend Ian. But I don’t read skate magazines anymore. Actually, I’ve gotten to know some of my favorite skaters making this movie. But you can feel the shifting of a generation, whether it’s in the way videos are made, share media, or consume skate clips. The pro skaters that were big and meaningful for me when I was younger are now retired, or have transitioned into other business avenues.
What’s the craziest thing that’s happened to you this year?
My grandmas won “best dressed” at the Oscars by GQ, which was really cool. I think it made them feel very seen and very beautiful.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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