Before Michelle Yeoh was among the big 2023 Oscar winners for her incredible leading performance in Everything Everywhere All At Once, the legendary actress actually joined the MCU to play the aunt of the first Asian-led superhero movie in its lineup, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. Following Yeoh getting her much-deserved flowers from the Academy, Shang-Chi actor Simu Liu is gushing about the first time he met his co-star.
Liu, who is set to play one of the many Kens in the Barbie movie this summer and will reprise his heroic role in the upcoming Marvel movies at some point, recently shared his experience meeting Michelle Yeoh for the first time on the set of Shang-Chi. In his words:
I was so nervous because she was such a hero of mine. I remember I bought the most expensive bottle of wine that I could find because I heard that she liked wine (which is not untrue, by the way). And I heard that she was on stage rehearsing… I went over, and I had this image of this larger-than-life, intimidating, powerful woman — not that she isn’t powerful, I want to be very clear — but I came up to her and was like, ’Hello, Michelle. I just wanted to say how much of an honor it is to be able to work with you and how excited I am.’
Yeoh is a beloved actress who has had an incredible career over the years, especially when it comes to action movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Police Story 3: Supercop. As Liu remembered it while speaking to BuzzFeed, he was nervous to meet her and decided to splurge on a bottle of wine to make a good first impression. Here is what her response was, per Liu:
She just about snatched the wine out of my hands and was like, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, thank you. You and I, we’re gonna have a great time.’ And it just was indicative of that warmth and radiance that she exudes every single day. She is nothing but kind, compassionate, and supportive.
As Liu recalled, he had this idea of Yeoh as a “larger-than-life” person, so when he met her, he wasn’t expecting her to extend the kind of “warmth.” It made his experience so much better knowing that she wasn’t this intimidating presence with whom he couldn’t get on the same level. It sounds like Yeoh was everything he wanted and more, from not only a “hero” of his, but a co-star on Liu’s biggest role yet at the time.
Michelle Yeoh played a supporting role in the 2021 Marvel hit as Ying Nan, Shang-Chi’s aunt, whom he meets in Ta Lo. While we know another Shang-Chi movie is on the way, the title hasn’t officially been added to the Marvel lineup. We also imagine Shang-Chi will be part of the upcoming Avengers films, especially considering his Shang-Chi director Destin Daniel Cretton is helming 2025’s Avengers: The Kang Dynasty.
In the interim of seeing Simu Liu as Shang-Chi once again, and perhaps him and Michelle Yeoh reuniting on screen, Liu just dropped his first single this week and he’ll be part of a major summer release with Barbie, coming to theaters on July 21. Yeoh’s next project is American Born Chinese, arriving to Disney+ on May 24.
