- The first time I ever felt like I was an actress,
was when I was in elementary school.
And I was chosen to do a fake lemonade ad.
I held an empty carton of lemonade,
and I read a teleprompter,
which was another second grader
holding a piece of cardboard.
And I remember thinking to myself,
this is something that I could do for my big life.
(upbeat music)
I'm Stephanie Hsu and this is On The Rise.
Growing up I just never knew
that you could really actually be an actor.
My mom specifically, she pointed on a TV screen and said,
"There's no way that you can be an actor,
because nobody on the screen looks like you."
And at the time,
pretty much all we had was Lucy Liu and Sandra Oh,
and she wasn't wrong.
There was really, there was no "Crazy Rich Asians"
there was not even a
"Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" at that time.
But I just, I don't know, I kept going.
Somewhere in the pit of my stomach,
knew that I had to try.
Another memory that I do remember is being...
When I was in again,
like second, third grade,
I was in a girl band called The Blossoms.
We would just sing and we would do choreographed dances.
The stakes were very high,
and people would also get tickets to our show,
even though it was free.
Cause literally we were all at recess at the same time.
But yeah, our manager Ryan he would hustle that blacktop.
(laughs) (upbeat music)
- I think the first role
that made me really feel like I was an actress,
was this role Christine Canigula
for this Broadway show called Be More Chill.
And in my head I wasn't like,
"I'm an actress."
I don't think I was thinking that.
But you know, growing up,
I never ever, ever thought
that I would be a lead on Broadway.
And so when that show came to Broadway,
I remember thinking to myself,
I've been given this crazy, amazing opportunity
and I have to just rise a above and beyond to this occasion
because I may never get a chance like this again.
So, and that show during that time
it was also the first season that I shot
for the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
So I was doing eight shows a week
and filming season three of Maisel.
I was taking it really seriously
'cause I knew how lucky I was
and I wanted to be excellent.
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I think somewhere in Google it says I'm a comedian
which I don't think I'm a comedian.
When I was in college,
I was in a sketch group.
It was called Hammerkatz.
Hammerkatz was started by Donald Glover.
And so there was Hammerkatz,
which was a sketch group.
And then there was a Danger Box,
which was the improp group.
And out of the two groups, there were three Asians.
It was me, Andy Dow and a little person named Bowen Yang.
And we used to do comedy shows all over New York together.
It was really fun.
And I remember thinking like I love comedy.
I love being silly.
I love being weird.
I love making people laugh,
but I can't it be a comedian
because the hours are so crazy
and you have to stay up so late, period.
I just can't stay up that late to be funny.
I'm sleepy.
My first celebrity crush was The Spice Girls,
all of them.
The end.
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I used to know every single lyric
to every single song.
I think that's where I first learned
to do British accent.
Learnt is learned to do a British accent.
No, I'm not gonna show you.
No, I feel your little head peeking behind the monitor.
(chuckles)
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The biggest discovery I've made in the last few years,
is that, I love making movies.
There's this clip of Keanu Reeves
when he's getting his hands
on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
and he goes, "I just love movies,
I love watching them, I love making them."
And that's how I feel.
I love movies.
I wanna make movies for ever and ever.
It is the best.
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Everything, everywhere all at once is I guarantee you,
unlike anything anyone has ever seen all at once
ever and ever, maybe sometimes.
It is a crazy wild genre mashup of a movie
that will truly blow your mind.
And also I think explode your heart
and make you ugly cry in a movie theater.
And you'll be like, "what just happened?"
It is a movie about a broken family
that is desperately trying to find one another
through the chaos of life,
but also the multiverse.
I play Michelle Yo's daughter, Joy.
One of my favorite scenes that we shot
for the movie is,
The Hallway Scene.
And I, well, this is gonna go,
I haven't figured out how to say this in press yet,
because, you know,
when you do videos or you do interviews,
if you say a bad word,
there's like a bunch of asterisks.
So I don't know if you're gonna use this,
but I have to swing at Michelle Yo
and it's a pretty freaky crazy scene.
And I come out dressed as Elvis
and I'm walking a pig,
and I have a cigarette in my mouth
and I explode someone's brain into confetti.
It's crazy.
And I am just so excited and feel so lucky
that I have gotten to be a part of it.
And I can't wait for you to see it.
One of my favorite movies of the last year
was Come On Come On.
And I would love to work with Mike Mills.
I think him and Miranda July are so dreamy and smart
and tender in the heart.
And I just would love to work with them
or even shake their hand one day.
(upbeat music)
In five years,
I do hope that I am living on some bucolic landscape
and I got a vegetable garden
and I dream of continuing to make things
like we've never seen before
and get to play roles that have never been seen.
And I hope by then,
one of the projects that I am working on
is made the next point of growth in my life
and in my career is to also be making things
that are coming from me,
to get something from a seed of an idea
to an actual production,
whether it is on Broadway,
at a downtown theater, a talk show or a movie.
It's a journey and you have to really want it
and really believe in it.
'Cause you're gonna get so many nos, all along the way,
which I guess some people
would say is the same for acting,
but I think it is even more vulnerable
when the idea and the words come from you,
as opposed to someone else.
(upbeat music)
I've been doing a lot of deep dive on Brad Pitt,
because he is beautiful.
But also,
because he elevates so many stories
and young filmmakers who are kind of starting out
and he's produced some of the most
critically acclaimed films.
I did see him one time in person at the sag awards.
It was that moment where he and Jennifer Aninson embraced.
I was literally right there.
I'm so short.
And I just remember looking up and being like,
"y'all are beautiful, you're literally beautiful."
I'm now hugely embarrassed.
If he ever happens to watch this video
I'm gonna be mortified.
But I also hope that Brad Pitt watches
Harper's bizarre on the rise.
To me, I think making it means,
that you get to make things
and continue to make with people
that you really care about
and love
and admire and new creatives you don't even know about.
And you get to,
like, live on a farm somewhere
and no one's bothering you
and you don't have to have an Instagram.
That's what making it feels like to me.
Chuckles
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