‘Joy Ride’ Star Stephanie Hsu Talks About ‘Truly Hilarious’ NSFW Tattoo Scene in ‘Unhinged’ Comedy
SPOILER ALERT: This story includes minor spoilers for the upcoming R-rated comedy, “Joy Ride.”
Stephanie Hsu wants people to know that her big naked reveal in “Joy Ride” is hilarious, but it’s not her. “It’s a body double. Let me be clear and let my mother know,” the Oscar-nominated actor told me Monday at the film’s Los Angeles premiere.
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“Joy Ride” is a raunchy R-rated comedy that stars Ashley Park as Audrey, a high-powered attorney who travels to China on business. Joining her on the trip are friends Lolo (Sherry Cola) and Deadeye (Sabrina Wu). Hsu plays Audrey’s college friend, Kat, who is now a Chinese soap opera star. The four find themselves in various bonker scenarios that include drugs, sex and even basketball star Baron Davis.
Hsu’s body double was used when it’s revealed that Kat has a massive genital tattoo. “When I read it in the script I thought it was hilarious and it felt so obvious for the trajectory of that character, but then filming it was a different story. I was like, ‘Oh, my God!’” Hsu said. “Specifically when I saw the makeup artist do their work on our brave and courageous and body positive body double, when I saw that I was like, ‘OK, this movie is too much. This movie is actually unhinged.’”
Hsu means that in the best possible way. “It was also really beautiful because when I saw the first cut, the creatives and producers said, ‘How do you feel about this shot?’” she continued. “The first cut didn’t feel super great to me and they invited me into the editing suite and we kind of built that moment together in a way that felt that it wasn’t the butt of the joke, but actually truly hilarious. I’m really proud of where we landed on that.”
@therealmarcmalkin About last night. #joyride premiere. #redcarpet #justforvariety #sherrycola #sabrinawu #ashleypark #stephaniehsu
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The film, written by Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao, marks writer Adele Lim’s feature directorial debut.
“Joy Ride” also includes Park’s first sex scene. “I come from a dance background and it really is like choreography and we had an intimacy coordinator,” Park said. “I never had done an intimacy scene and then I had a three-way scene for an entire day on set. That was new. Honestly, for me, I think I would have had a different level of comfortability if Cherry, Teresa and Adele were not at the helm of it. I really trusted that they were not marginalizing or using my body for a joke. They were really taking care of me.”
Park said, “What I love about this movie is just when you think we pushed it as far as we can, something else happens.”
But there’s also a message behind all the madness. “This film is about being yourself and finding yourself and I think that is the most universal thing,” Cola said. “And we just happen to be Asian – what a plus!”
Cola also has quite the sequence with Davis. “I’m tongue-to-tongue with Baron Davis,” she said. “That was such a fun day. It was just us. Of course, there was an intimacy coordinator on set but more for his benefit. At one point I licked his forehead.”
Davis said, “I ain’t going to lie — I was nervous. Coming from basketball and you’re going to do a movie and they’re like, ‘You’re going to have a sex scene.’ And I was like, ‘What kind of sex scene? How do they have sex in movies? I’ve never had sex in a movie before.’ Sherry was so amazing. We were laughing all the time between takes and having a good time. She became my coach on the acting side.”
“Joy Ride” is in theaters July 7.
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