Gemma Chan Creates Her Own Good Work
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Gemma Chan’s curriculum vitae spans genres, areas of interest, and even industries: At one point, the Crazy Rich Asians star was a model, and she started out with ambitions of pursuing a legal career. Now, her current status still transcends arbitrary titles: Sure, she’s an actress (her latest role: starring as Sersi, one of the genetically mutated beings in the Chloé Zhao–directed Marvel Studios Eternals film), but she’s also a staunch AAPI-rights activist, consummately community-minded, and now, a producer too. For W’s annual Best Performances issue, Chan talks to Lynn Hirschberg about her very first gig, being painted blue in Captain Marvel, and returning as Sersi in a to-be-announced Marvel movie.
What was your first acting job?
I did a commercial for the now-defunct search engine Bing. I had to learn reams and reams of related words—it was a lot to memorize. The money from that commercial paid for drama school. But sadly, it did not do much for Bing.
Did you have trouble telling your parents that you wanted to be an actor?
Yes. I studied law initially. My parents were immigrants and wanted their child to have a steady profession. Not acting.
After school, you played a dominatrix in Secret Diary of a Call Girl.
That was fun! I’m still friends with most of that cast.
Chan wears a Maison Margiela tank top; Laura Andraschko dress and tights; Vivienne Westwood platform shoes.
You wore a lot of latex. Did that prepare you for playing Sersi in Eternals?
The latex was comfortable! My costume in the Marvel Universe was much more confining. But still far easier than my first time in the Marvel Universe, when I was famously painted blue in Captain Marvel.
Did you like being a god?
It was interesting. In Eternals, she starts out shy and then discovers her power as a leader. That was fun.
Will you play Sersi again?
Yes. Marvel owns us for life. [Laughs]
Did your life change after Crazy Rich Asians?
Not really. Good work is still hard to come by. I’ve started producing to find stories to tell.
Hair by Ali Pirzadeh for Dyson Hair at CLM; makeup by Sam Bryant at Bryant Artists; manicure by Michelle Class for Sally Hansen at LMC Worldwide. Produced by Wes Olson and Hannah Murphy at Connect the Dots; production manager: Zack Higginbottom at Connect the Dots; photo assistants: Antonio Perricone, Jeff Gros, Morgan Pierre; digital technician: Michael Preman; lighting technician: Keith Coleman; key grip: Scott Froschauer; retouching: Graeme Bulcraig at Touch Digital; senior style editor: Allia Alliata di Montereale; senior fashion market editor: Jenna Wojciechowski; fashion assistants: Julia McClatchy, Antonio Soto, Nycole Sariol, Sage McKee, Josephine Chumley, Rosa Schorr; production assistants: Tchad Cousins, Juan Diego Calvo, Gina York, Brandon Fried, Nico Robledo, Kein Milledge; hair assistants: Tommy Stanton, Sol Rodriquez, Andi Ojeda; makeup assistants: Tami Elsombati, Bridgett O’Donnell; manicure assistant: Pilar Lafargue; set assistants: Olivia Giles, Sarah Hein, Seth Powsner, King Owusu; tailors: Suzi Bezik, Cardi Mooshool Alvaji; tailor assistant: Elma Click
‘Eternals’ Actor Gemma Chan Starred in ‘Captain Marvel’ First in a Totally Different Role — Here’s Why
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Marvel and Disney have remained fairly strict about tying actors and characters together. Robert Downey Jr. played Tony Stark, Chris Evans played Captain Steve Rogers, they never suddenly popped up as totally different characters. However, that is exactly what happened with Eternals Sersi actor Gemma Chan, who previously appeared as Minn-Erva in Captain Marvel. Fans caught this and started asking questions if the characters have a connection or if it just comes as a coincidence.
Gemma Chan from ‘Eternals’ | Mike Marsland/WireImage via Getty Images
Why is Gemma Chan in ‘Eternals’ and ‘Captain Marvel’?
Marvel brought Gemma Chan back for Eternals after Captain Marvel simply because they valued her skills as an actor.
In Captain Marvel, Chan played Minn-Erva, a Kree sniper and ally to Brie Larson’s Carol Danvers. She did not have the biggest role in the Marvel movie.
She served as more of a henchman to Jude Law’s Yon-Rogg. Minn-Erva died when Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch) shot her ship down.
Usually, this meant the end of Chan’s run in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, Marvel President Kevin Feige had other plans for Chan.
Eternals director Cholé Zhao and Feige brought her back after Captain Marvel for a much more significant role. They cast her in Eternals as one of the most important figures in the movie.
Kevin Feige defended the decision to bring Gemma Chan back for ‘Eternals’ after ‘Captain Marvel’
Before returning for Eternals, Feige approached Gemma Chan after Captain Marvel.
“I had bumped into Kevin Feige on the awards circuit [when] I was promoting Crazy Rich Asians,” Chan told Entertainment Weekly. “He very kindly came up to me and said, ‘I loved your work, and we would really love to work with you again.’ I just thought, ‘Oh, well, that might mean sometime in the future, who knows when? Maybe he’s just being nice.’ I was really not expecting to be back so soon!”
Feige had learned from his early days with the Marvel Cinematic Universe. When it came time to cast Captain America, some pushed back on the idea of Chris Evans.
“It would have been shooting ourselves in the foot,” Feige said about casting Chan in Eternals. “I can go back to Chris Evans being on the list for Captain America, and some people said, ‘Oh, well, he played the Human Torch [in 2005’s Fantastic Four]. Maybe we shouldn’t consider him.’ And we said, ‘No, that’s okay,’ and the rest is history.”
Gemma Chan likes playing Sersi more than Minn-Erva
The difference in characters for Gemma Chan between Eternals and Captain Marvel is not the only switch up. Chan liked playing Sersi more because she required far less make-up than the blue Minn-Erva.
She had “to spend four hours every day in a make-up chair” to become the blue Kree sniper, Entertainment Weekly noted. The process for Sersi felt quicker than Eternals speedster Makkari.
#Eternals is on @disneyplus right now. For free. All you have to do it hit play.
Hit play. pic.twitter.com/Hqt5HArXkL — Kumail Nanjiani (@kumailn) January 12, 2022
“I have to say that was somewhat of a relief,” she laughed. “It was nice not finding blue paint in my crevices weeks later.”
So while Minn-Erva and Sersi share an actor, that marks the only link between them. Fans of both Eternals and Captain Marvel hope to see Gemma Chan return to the screen in any shape or color.
RELATED: ‘Eternals: Thanos Rises’ Major Reveals for Marvel’s Baddest Villain
‘Heartbreaking and enraging’: Gemma Chan calls for official UK apology to Chinese seamen
“Eternals” star Gemma Chan recently wrote a heartfelt essay about her Chinese seaman father after learning about the hardships that seafarers like him endured under the British in the 1940s.
In her piece, which was published in The Guardian on Jan. 8, the 39-year-old actor wrote about the sacrifices her father made, working “for years on ships – mostly oil tankers – at sea for months at a time” and sending “money home to pay for his siblings’ school fees.”
Following a memorable dinner with her family last year, Chan was reminded of her father’s “Golden Rule” that nothing goes to waste, “which applies equally to food, clothes, household items, cars – everything really.” She shared that in their household, they use things “until they break,” and “if they can be mended, they will be mended, but rarely will anything be thrown away.” Chan also recalled the love she and her sister received from their father through “small acts of devotion.”
What she found hard to understand was her father’s “obsession with education, his aversion to waste of any kind, his insistence that we finish every bit of food on our plates; and his constant reminders not to take anything for granted. It was because he knew what it was like to have nothing.”
Chan’s father was the third of six children of an impoverished single-parent family in Hong Kong. Her grandmother took on three jobs, and her earnings were barely enough to support their family and secure a decent home. “At one point they were made homeless when the block of flats burned down,” she shared.
According to Chan, her father’s plight came to mind after she read an article published by The Guardian about Britain’s forced deportation of Chinese seamen who the government claimed to be “undesirable.”
Chan wrote that these seamen “had helped keep the UK fed and fueled on highly dangerous crossings of the Atlantic (approximately 3,500 vessels of the merchant navy were sunk by German U-boats, with the loss of 72,000 lives).”
She also mentioned that the surviving men who “married and started families with British women in Liverpool” were sent back to East Asia in secret and without warning. “Many of their wives never knew what happened to them, and their children grew up believing they had been abandoned,” she added.
The article left Chan in tears. She found it “heartbreaking and enraging” that the seamen have yet to receive an official apology, while their plight has yet to be officially acknowledged.
Chan would later have a long conversation with her father about his own experience in the merchant navy. While on his first voyage at sea, Chan’s father discovered how differently the white British officers and crew members were treated compared to the Chinese workers.
Representing other Chinese crew members on board, he complained to the shipping company’s superintendent about how they were employed under a separate category that forced them to work longer periods at sea, with lower wages and fewer benefits than what their white British counterparts received.
“Dad told them he just wanted equal treatment,” Chan said. “As a result, he and the others who protested were allowed to fly back home with holiday pay.”
She noted that her father’s experience mirrored the plight of the deported Chinese seamen who were deemed “undesirable” for fighting for better pay and benefits.
Chan is now hoping that such “the wrong done to those men and their families” and the “terrible act of state-sanctioned racism” will officially be acknowledged one day. “I hope that the surviving children get the answers and justice they deserve and that they can find peace,” she added.
Chan’s essay can also be found in the upcoming book “East Side Voices”, which is set to release on Jan. 22.
Featured Image via British Vogue
Story continues
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Marvel’s ‘Eternals,’ starring Angelina Jolie and Gemma Chan, is now streaming at home — all Disney Plus members can watch without paying extra
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© Marvel Studios Brian Tyree Henry leading the group as Phastos in “Eternals.” Marvel Studios
Marvel’s “Eternals” is now streaming on Disney Plus.
The superhero film focuses on a group of immortal beings who have lived on Earth for centuries.
A Disney Plus subscription costs $8 a month or $80 per year.
Marvel’s “Eternals” is now on Disney Plus after spending two months playing exclusively in theaters. You can also buy the movie on its own to stream through retailers like Amazon and Vudu for $20.
“Eternals” is the third of four MCU films that were released in 2021, along with “Black Widow” and “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings,” and “Spider-Man: No Way Home.”
The movie introduces some of the most powerful characters in the Marvel universe, and follows a group of immortal beings who have been secretly living on Earth since the earliest days of man. The film’s ensemble cast includes Angelina Jolie, Salma Hayek, Gemma Chan, Kumail Nanjiani, Brian Tyree Henry, and Kit Harington. The Marvel series was originally created by legendary artist Jack Kirby.
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“Eternals” is directed by Academy Award winner Chloé Zhao. Zhao’s previous film, “Nomadland,” won the 2021 Oscar for best picture. You can watch “Nomadland” now on Hulu.
How to watch ‘Eternals’ on Disney Plus
“Eternals” was made available to all Disney Plus subscribers on January 12. You can watch the movie as part of a regular membership — no extra fees are required.
Disney Plus costs $8 a month or $80 per year. To subscribe, visit DisneyPlus.com or download the Disney Plus app. If you’re also interested in subscribing to Hulu and ESPN+, you can sign up for a discounted bundle with Disney Plus starting at $14 a month.
The Disney Plus aoo supports up to 4K streaming with Dolby Vision and HDR. You can access the service on Apple devices, Android, PlayStation, Xbox, Roku, Fire TV, and most smart TV brands.
In addition to “Eternals,” Disney Plus is the streaming home for nearly every movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, except the films starring Spider-Man and Hulk.
Marvel’s “Black Widow” started streaming on Disney Plus the same day it hit theaters in July 2021 with a $30 Premier Access fee. The move sparked controversy and led to star Scarlett Johansson filing a lawsuit against Disney that was eventually settled. The next Marvel movie, “Shang Chi,” premiered in theaters in September 2021 and hit Disney Plus on November 12.
How to watch ‘Eternals’ without Disney Plus
If you’d rather buy “Eternals” on its own instead of signing up for Disney Plus, you can purchase the movie to watch at home through several on-demand retailers. “Eternals” costs $20 to buy on Amazon Prime Video, Vudu, Apple TV, Google Play, and Microsoft Movies.
Once purchased, you can stream the movie whenever you want as many times as you’d like. Buyers should also consider getting a Movies Anywhere membership. This free service allows you to link your Amazon, Apple, Google, Vudu, and Microsoft accounts so you can watch movies across every service.
For example, if you buy “Eternals” on Amazon Prime Video but have your Amazon and Vudu accounts linked via Movies Anywhere, you’ll also be able to stream the film on the Vudu app without paying extra.
A cheaper rental option for “Eternals” is expected to be available in the near future, but an exact release date has not been announced.
Eternals’ awful sex scene is kind of clever the second time around
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Marvel’s Eternals from director Chloé Zhao was a film of many firsts for the studio, but it would be a bit inaccurate to say that it featured the MCU’s first sex scene, as a lot of people seem to think it did. Daredevil and the rest of the Netflix / Marvel gang spent seasons getting it in over in their neck of the cinematic universe, and those shows very much laid some groundwork for Eternals’ much-tamer take on superpowered sex. Eternals’ sex scene might not technically be Marvel’s first, or particularly “fun” to watch, but it’s one of the movie’s more clever ways of stating the obvious about how its story is going to end.
This essay contains spoilers for Marvel’s Eternals.
Throughout Eternals, an emotionally-inert foray into the cosmic origins of Marvel’s cinematic universe, there are multiple moments meant to show you how the Eternals themselves grew to love and identify with humanity during the thousands of years they spent living on Earth in varying degrees of secrecy. With there only being but so many Deviants — cosmically-empowered monsters — around for the Eternals to hunt down over the millennia, it doesn’t take long in the grand scheme of Earth’s history for the Eternals to find themselves with enough downtime to develop interests in… other things like reading, farming, picking up new languages. You know, human stuff.
In addition to those kinds of activities, though, a few of Eternals’ heroes also find themselves gravitating toward and wanting to know one another in the biblical sense, an idea the film explores in particular with Sersi (Gemma Chan) and Ikaris (Richard Madden). While Eternals doesn’t explicitly say that romance and physical intimacy were things the Eternals learned about by watching humans, Sersi and Ikaris’ much-buzzed-about sex scene more than makes that seem like it might have been the case given how awkward the moment is.
Soon after the Eternals are first led to believe that they’re finally being given the freedom to pursue their own dreams, Ikaris, the team’s flying brick with laser vision, musters up to courage to tell Sersi, a soft-spoken mediator with transmutation powers, that he’s deeply in love with her, always has been, and always will be. Though the Eternals are alien beings with their own ways of life, Seri and Ikaris consummate their love in the most human of ways as the pair venture off together in early the film and end up naked on a sandy dune locked in what’s best described as perfunctory sexual congress.
Even though Ikaris and Sersi’s relationship plays a major role in how Eternals’ story unfolds, Madden and Chan’s lack of on-screen chemistry makes the characters’ interpersonal dynamics one of the least compelling aspects of the film, which is a wonder considering how important the scene was to Zhao and how much genuine on-screen chemistry there is between other Eternals like Makkari (Lauren Ridloff) and Druig (Barry Keoghan), and Thena (Angelina Jolie) and Gilgamesh (Don Lee).
The pair end up locked in what’s best described as perfunctory sexual congress
By the time that Eternals’ shifts its focus to the present day, when the Eternals are brought back out of hiding by the Deviants’ sudden reappearance, the world’s a drastically different place, and most of the Eternals have become different people. Where Sersi and the others all manage to find happiness in their new lives and letting their past selves go, Ikaris remains steadfast in his commitment to their true mission, which only he and Prime Eternal Ajak (Salma Hayek) are privy to at first.
Because Eternals is such a busy film, some of its ideas, like how power and authority are balanced on the actual team, get a bit muddled, but when a dying Ajak chooses Sersi to become the new Prime Eternal, the story’s brushing up against the broadside of something interesting.
Though neither Sersi nor Ikaris can initially understand why Ajak would choose her to be the next Prime Eternal, her reasoning’s pretty easy to grasp just from watching any of Eternals’ trailers. He’s a superstrong living weapon whose gaze literally burns holes through things, whereas she’s a creator who expresses reverence and love for the material world while showing off her superhuman mastery over its constituent elements. It’s in moments where Sersi begins to piece together how and why she’s the new Prime Eternal that Eternals feels as if it’s the most confident in its ability to bring something slightly new to the pantheon of Marvel’s big-screen spectacles: a feature about a woman getting a promotion.
Much like Zack Snyder’s Justice League before it, Eternals’ family drama briefly turns brutal as everyone comes together to fight one of their own. But unlike the amnesiac Superman, Ikaris emerges from his battle with the other Eternals definitively marked as the villain of the movie who’s willing to put the entire Earth in danger in order to complete their mission. As the world teeters on the brink of destruction in Eternals final act, Sersi and Ikaris are left seeming as if they’re about to tearfully fight to the death, and the movie cuts to a montage in an attempt to make you feel what they’re feeling.
The two come across more as Very Good Friends, not people who’ve seen each other naked
In Eternals’ defense, flashbacks to a sex scene during a big superhero fight might not play all that well with audiences, which is likely why it doesn’t pop up again on screen as Ikaris and Sersi reflect on all the history they share. It does feel telling, though, that the two come across more as Very Good Friends rather than people who’ve seen each other naked as they fight over the fate of the Earth. By the time Eternals gets to this part of its story, the movie’s already so mired in barely explained cosmic lore and aggressive special effects that none of its emotional beats really work.
What does work, especially when you go back and watch Eternals more closely, is the idea that Sersi knew on some level that her romantic entanglement with Ikaris wouldn’t last. In a movie with so many moving parts, that sort of detail’s something you really have to look for, but with Eternals now streaming on Disney Plus for everyone, going back to pinpoint the moment when Sersi knew just got much easier.