Bo Nawacharee on the set of ‘Pieces and Bits’ 2019
Starring Belle Visa, Andrew Bliek, and James T. Majewski, Produced by Angel Teng, Cinematography by Art Parnitudom, Length: 00:14:15
Photograph by Looksorn Thitipuk Teeratrakul and photo courtesy of the artist
Damaris Athene: Could you start off by telling me a bit about yourself?
Bo Nawacharee: My name is Bo Nawacharee, I go by Bo Nawacharee but Nawacharee is actually my first name not last. Coming from Thailand, I have longer name than just that, it’s Nawacharee Piyamongkol. Thai people usually grow up with a nickname and I was given Bo because my brothers' names are Boat and Bank. It's this B thing at home, it’s very common in a Thai family to have the names all starting with the same letter. Anyway, I’m now in California. I did graduate school here at a film directing program at California Institute of the Arts, Cal Arts. My undergrad I did in Thailand, which was a BA in cultural studies. So I'm coming to film in a theoretical way. To go further back, I grew up in a Thai Chinese family. I was put in a Christian all girls boarding school in Thailand for 12 years. It was a very interesting setting looking back at it. My mum is very religious, she’s Buddhist, and she’d often take me to a temple at the weekends and then I’d be going to church and singing hymns at school during the week. I felt in a bubble, especially growing up with two older brothers, I felt like a sheltered little girl. So throughout school from high school through uni I went to live in Oxford, London, and Bath, as well as Korea, even testing living out here in LA as well.
DA: So you moved around a lot?
BN: I wanted to because I was so sheltered growing up. I had this urge to see what the hell is out there! I grew up in the transition between connecting the internet with your home phone during the younger times, to using an iPhone when I was in high school.
DA: What motivated you to go to California?
BN: At first I'm very interested in the idea of movies world building and of escapism. I thought that if I wanted to study filmmaking, I should go to LA, to Hollywood. I have to say though that I both hate and love LA because it's such a weird city. I applied to New York too, but it's so rushing and I'm a type of person who rushes myself internally so I need to live in a chill city to calm myself down! I now live in Studio City.
DA: Is that where the studios are?
BN: I think it’s called that after CBS starting a studio here. We also have Warner Brothers and Universal nearby.
Three, 2019
Starring Bo Nawacharee, La-ongtham Nichakaroon, Ava Dulyachinda, Produced by Bo Nawacharee, Cinematography by Bo Nawacharee, Length: 00:03:49
Video courtesy of the artist
DA: Is it a weird place to live?
BN: It’s not, LA as a whole is weird. It's really similar to Bangkok actually. Bangkok in Thai is called ‘krungthep’ which literally means City of Angels, and LA is also a city of angels - Los Angeles. My friend pointed that out one day, and it blew my mind! They're both very flat cities that are spread out. You have to drive from one place to another, you can't really walk. The food wins though, that’s why I can't leave!
DA: Could you say a bit about your practice?
BN: I'm a writer/director, a filmmaker, but filmmaking is a very big blanket. I write my own scripts and then I direct them. Sometimes I direct commission work, but that’s pretty rare. I’m not in a studio system where I’m being assigned work all the time. Maybe I can say I'm grateful I'm not in a studio system where I'm being assigned works all the time so I can be picky with what I give to the world. I have to link myself to the work personally. I mean, filmmaking at the end of the day, sometimes we would question it - how important it is still, why are we doing this? But it is super important to me. It's weird but like any other art practices I believe the makers just want to keep making things. When I haven't made a film in a while I feel like I need it. I need to write something, edit a script, seek for possibilities, find approaches for my actors, go on set. Also sometimes I write prose and poetry. It helps me deal with emotions *laughs*. It's on my website.
DA: When you're making these films, what are the stories that you're telling?
BN: I usually tell personal stories, but I think most filmmakers would say that as well! I tackle concepts of identity, the relationship of the person and the world, and/or the person within themselves. Most of them deal a lot with sociopolitical issues and ambiguity. And when I say ambiguity, I mean identity ambiguity or relationship ambiguity. Who am I in this relationship? Or who am I to myself, or who am I to the world. When I look back at how I came about as a person, I've lived in so many places just to figure out who I am. I think the films convey that exploration of, who are we? I’m not too solid with all the identities that have been given to me, like my nationality, my race. I mean I am pretty Asian *laughs*, but I live in a Western setting. Even back home, I live in a Buddhist house, but I had a Christian education. All this ambiguity and blurred lines between identifying certain value to another is something that I enjoy picking out and giving to the world.
Fall Into My Palms (film still), 2021, unreleased
Starring Yue Zhu and Matthew Kuang, Produced by Bo Nawacharee, associate produced by Yikai Luc Wu, Cinematography by Yikai Luc Wu, Length: 00:03:35
Image courtesy of the artist
DA: What makes you choose film to do that?
BN: It's more that I wanted to make film, and then this became something so important to me that I had to incorporate it into my work. When I was really young, like 10, I had an interest in music videos. It the summer holidays I would watch MTV. There wasn’t any internet or phones then. I thought, I can do this. I started coming up with like scenarios all the time. After a while, I forgot about it and I wanted to become something else. Then I found my way back into film when I was an undergrad because it became a sanctuary for me when I got so stressed out with school. I found escapism in film, I could be someone else for two hours - experiencing someone else's emotion, someone else's experience. It was a bubble for me and I start wanting to create that bubble for someone else and build a world. It’s now also become a medium of communication for me, and somewhere to exercise empathy and sympathy. It’s an opportunity to experience someone else's perspective.
DA: What interests you about tackling sociopolitical issues and personal stories?
BN: It's so intimate and personal and I think every single one of us can identify with it on some level. It's a constant struggle and it's a constant frustration. I walk around carrying this Thai woman identity with me, I did not choose it but it comes with a bunch of stereotypes that are perpetuated by the media. Almost every Asian women can be fetishised, this goes with Latina as well, for white women and black women. It became something that I wanted to touch upon, because it’s so constant, it’s 24/7.
DA: Yeah, I can identify with what you're saying. How did your interest in showing ambiguity in your films come about?
BN: It surfaced after a few films that I made at school. One of my mentors said to me, you often have so much ambiguity in your films, you touch on so much grey areas, but in your life you’re always trying to push for an answer and I feel like that's your problem. *laughs* it was one of those mentoring moments when you're like, holy cow am I in therapy? With me and my relationships in life, I have the urge to know what's going on. Who am I to you? Who are you to me? We should define this! We have to live it, let it breathe, but it's so hard. I think that's why I explore the possibilities of what it could lead to in my films. The pandemic actually fed into that. There's no solidity, there's no confirmation.
Fall Into My Palms, 2021, unreleased
Starring Yue Zhu and Matthew Kuang, Produced by Bo Nawacharee, Associate produced by Yikai Luc Wu, Cinematography by Yikai Luc Wu, Length: 00:03:35
Video courtesy of the artist
DA: I think ambiguity is one of the hardest things to learn how to deal with and, like you say, the uncertainty over the last year means that we have to learn to live with it.
BN: Yeah, I agree. It happens in almost every era in history, like after World War One and World War Two, people realised that there’s no assurance of the future. Now we’re all experiencing the same thing with a pandemic, we can't be sure of anything anymore.
DA: Have you found that the pandemic has affected the way that you work?
BN: The pandemic hasn’t affected the writing too much, apart from the fact I can't travel. Every time that I would feel stuck, I would try to go to another city and walk around. It helps a lot to look at peoples’ lives. New York is one of the most inspiring place to walk in because there are so many stories.
DA: It's just so alive!
BN: Yeah, without traveling writing was kind of hard. At the same time, I always reach out and meet new people. I find connecting with people helps with writing and is good for collaborations. Without meeting it's kind of difficult because Zoom doesn't feel the same as grabbing a cup of tea or meeting at a bar. Also production gets smaller and no-one wants to give money to making films anymore because there's no solidity and profit coming out of it. The grants have been cancelled too.
DA: Is that what you'd normally do? Would you come up with an idea and then apply for a grant to be able to make it happen?
BN: Yeah, I would go talk with the team of producers I have. There's six of us, me included, and they're all women. We all try to find investors, sponsorship, grants, fundings, or any sort of opportunities together.
DA: Nice. So I guess you haven't been able to do any filming?
BN: Last year was hard but me and my producer, we did a short film together in October. It was so difficult because there were only 10 people on set, including the actors. I’m dying to be like, Can someone adjust that damn light? But there’s no-one else there. We did a micro shooting in Thailand as well with even less people. We shot a dance film in March this year about air pollution in Bangkok. It’s a big issue in Bangkok at the moment, and it’s been going on for two years now. Our very inefficient, incompetent government is not dealing with anything. I can't fix the air, so I'll make a dance film about it!
Bangkok 2.5 (film still), 2021, unreleased
Starring Napat Rodboon and Saruda Chantrapanichkul, Produced by Pornpailin Chuaphun, Cinematography by Kero Sirinimitwong, Length: 00:04:17
Image courtesy of the artist
DA: Amazing! I look forward to seeing that when it comes out. When people are able to see your work, what would you like them to get from it?
BN: I always want them to get a good conversation out of it, whether it is about the film that I made or whether it is about their life. Whatever the film triggers them to talk about. With the film I made about Thai female identity, some people asked me like, Oh, do you want to educate people about this issue? But that's not a good word. For me, education is great, but it's not what my aim is. I want to tell them what's going on. I don't want to teach them about how bad we suffer. You know, I just want to be like, this sucks. Can you see? *laughs* My films can be a catharsis for them to talk about certain ideas that aren’t often spoken about in daily life. It can allow them to talk about something difficult, or something like intimate or sensitive, without feeling the burden of like, why are we talking about this or blaming each other or pointing fingers. I'm blessed if that happened.
DA: And whose work inspires you?
BN: This is one of the most difficult questions! It’s hard to say because there are loads of filmmakers where I like some of their work but not all of it. I did think about two people. One of them is a writer. His name is Alex Dimitrov and he's a poet based in New York. He wrote this book called 'Together and By Ourselves', which I have not finished because I can't bear to finish this book. I’ve reread it so many time. I love it so much. His prose and his poems are so visual and have so much feeling in them. When I can't think of a scene I'll read his work and so many pictures will come up in my head. Then the other person is a film director, called Kim Bora. Her short film 'Recorder Exam' is one of my favourite shorts. It's amazing. It's so simple. I usually love intense, disturbing things, but this is so simple and beautiful. It's about a little girl and her relationship with her family and her relationship with herself and the family hierarchy.
DA: It’s hard to have someone where you like everything they make.
BN: I also love Yorgos Lanthimos’ films a lot, I have to say. They’re so strange and courageous. And I love Jenny Holzer, but I can't say how her work impacts my practice.
Bo Nawacharee, crew, and cast on the set of ‘Pieces and Bits’ 2019
Starring Belle Visa, Andrew Bliek, and James T. Majewski, Produced by Angel Teng, Cinematography by Art Parnitudom, Length: 00:14:15
Photograph by Looksorn Thitipuk Teeratrakul and photo courtesy of the artist
DA: I think it all feeds in though, subconsciously. Yeah. What was your most memorable experience with art?
BN: That is also another very hard question. I've thought about it for so long and one of my most memorable experiences was in London. I saw three big Monet water lily paintings that were shown together for the first time. They’re usually in three different countries.
DA: I know exactly what you mean. I saw it too and it was amazing.
BN: When I was growing up, I admired him and his painting so much. To see it in front of my eyes when I was older was insane!
DA: Especially the fact that they've never been together before! What projects have you been working on recently?
BN: A bunch of things actually but also we’re funding a script for a short film that I finished writing last year. I've been writing it for a year or more.
DA: So it takes a long time to write then?
BN: Yeah, I do fix my scripts like crazy. I think it might be something that comes out of school for me as I had the luxury of being able to keep on fixing it and try out every possibility. The short film is about a Thai photographer who lives in Singapore and go back goes back to her family because of family issues. It allows her to relive a life in Bangkok. It's called 'Bangkok A Brief Walk’. It’s literally her walking around the city, seeing what's going on here. There are a lot of people who suffer from the really bad city planning which is already super hella stressful to look at, like, the cracks on the sidewalk or electricity cords that hanging from everywhere, that could electrocute you to death. We've been trying to finance the film, but it's not a good time so we’ve put it on hold. Then I just wrote another script last week funnily enough.
DA: Amazing!
BN: It's about two girls who get stuck in a Thai restaurant in LA and find out something that they shouldn't know. I haven't started editing that script yet. It might take a bit longer.
Pieces & Bits, 2019
Starring Belle Visa, Andrew Bliek, and James T. Majewski, Produced by Angel Teng, Cinematography by Art Parnitudom, Length: 00:14:15
Video courtesy of the artist
DA: Apart from that, have you got other plans for future work, are you just going to be editing that script?
BN: I mean, there are a lot of other scripts that I wrote and we have to find funding for. I finished three films last month, and I’m waiting to circulate them. I don't think there's gonna be any shooting soon.
DA: How long does a film normally take to make? Is that a very difficult question?
BN: It's very difficult. It depends, with my thesis film 'Pieces and Bits’, about Thai stereotypes, I took a year and a half to write a script and half a year to research it. It was half a year of finding funding and then shooting for two weeks. I think I did half a year of post production.
DA: How long was your thesis film?
BN: 15 minutes long.
DA: Wow! I’m always amazed when I've done any film work myself by how long it takes to make such a short a bit of film.
BN: I think it’s because I'm very meticulous about it as well. With some projects we have the luxury of being able to keep on editing. When I edit myself it goes a bit crazy because I explore every possibility of what the film could be from the materials I shot.
DA: I guess there's an infinite number of compositions with the footage that you have.
BN: Right. I think it's the same with any artwork too. You can keep doing it forever. I think it’s the most difficult thing to know when to stop!
DA: That’s so true! Thank you Bo. It’s been lovely meeting you and chatting about your work.
BN: Thank you so much.
After10: Keep You Cool (still from commercial film), 2019
Starring Saruda Chantrapanichkul and Kanokporn Worapharuek, Produced by Ladapha Sophonkunkil and Nattanich Luengteerapap, Cinematography by Art Parnitudom, Length: 00:01:17
Image courtesy of the artist