Why Joy Ride director Adele Lim wants to show the ‘nasty, raunchy, disgusting side of Asians’, how the movie developed and what the hardest part of her job was

The directing debut from Crazy Rich Asians co-writer Adele Lim, Joy Ride is a raunchy, R-rated comedy about four Asian-American friends on a road trip

Lim explains how the actors’ personalities informed their characters, how the team made Canada look like China, and why the movie is ultimately about belonging

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(From left) Stephanie Hsu, Sabrina Wu, Ashley Park and Sherry Cola in a still from “Joy Ride”, a new comedy movie directed by Crazy Rich Asians co-writer Adele Lim. Photo: Ed Araquel / Lionsgate

Published: 11:15am, 5 Jul 2023Updated: 4:38pm, 7 Jul 2023

In Joy Ride, four Asian-American friends take a road trip through Asia in search of one of the group’s biological mother in an R-rated comedy that turns as raunchy as it gets.

The new film is the directing debut of Adele Lim, who is best known for co-writing the big-screen adaptation of Crazy Rich Asians.

Lim thought up the project with her writing friends Cherry Chevapravatdumrong and Teresa Hsiao.

“We’ve all been through the development process,” Lim tells the Post on a Zoom call. “Our thought was not to pitch the idea, but write the entire script first. It’s a hard R-rated comedy with four Asian leads. It’s very culturally specific. We wanted to see our creative ideas through before we approached Seth and Evan.”

That would be Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, who helped produce the script under their production company, Point Grey Pictures.

At the time, Lim was working on the Disney animated feature Raya and the Last Dragon, while Chevapravatdumrong and Hsiao were involved with several TV series including Family Guy and American Dad!.