After breaking and mending our hearts with her award-winning short film Bao, Domee Shi is stepping into a new role as a feature film director. Turning Red, produced by Lindsey Collins, features an impressive ensemble of women behind-the-scenes. Helping bring Shi’s original idea to life is production designer Rona Liu, visual effects supervisor Danielle Feinberg, and animation supervisors Patty Kihm and Aaron Hartline. This film is Pixar’s second feature to be directed by a woman (after Brenda Chapman worked on Brave), it is also the first to be directed by a woman of colour.

Disney and Pixar’s Turning Red introduces Mei Lee (voiced by Rosalie Chiang), a confident, dorky 13-year-old torn between staying her mother’s dutiful daughter and the chaos of adolescence. Her protective, if not slightly overbearing mother, Ming (voiced by Sandra Oh), is never far from her daughter—an unfortunate reality for the teenager. And as if changes to her interests, relationships and body weren’t enough, whenever she gets too excited (which is practically ALWAYS), she poofs into a giant red panda!

We had the opportunity to interview Shi and Collins. The pair spoke about what they imagined they would be when they grew up, what advice they would impart to artistic young people looking to find a career in the arts, and what music they loved and listened to when they were Mei’s age.

Check out the interview with Domee Shi and Lindsey Collins below:

Turning Red will premiere exclusively on Disney+ on March 11!

Published by Ferdosa

View all posts by Ferdosa