Jon Chu Steps Up To Hollywood
August 28, 2008
Directs ‘Step Up 2 the Streets’ now on DVD
When film producer Adam Shankman approached Jon Chu with a script for Step Up 2 the Streets and asked him to direct it, Chu was completely against the idea. Even though Shankman had given him carte blanche in making the film, Chu did not like the idea of a straight-to-DVD movie.
Then Chu had something of a Hamlet moment: to be or not to be a filmmaker. “I looked in the mirror and I said, ‘Why don’t I want to direct this movie?’” Chu recalls. “I said to myself, if I was a real filmmaker, it wouldn’t matter — so am I a real filmmaker or just a poseur?”
He accepted the offer and had the script completely overhauled. On the strength of Chu’s vision, producers decided that the film should have a theatrical release instead of going straight to DVD.
Step Up 2 the Streets, the sequel to the 2006 surprise hit Step Up, is about a young, street-savvy girl (Briana Evigan) who is thrust into an elite school where she must hold onto her identity. Sparks fly when she must team up with a classmate (Robert Hoffman) for a freestyle underground dance competition.
Chu says the most fun part about making the film was “meeting the dancers, because to me that’s what it is really about.” This is hardly surprising, given that Chu took tap dancing for fourteen years. Chu has also noticed how the film has inspired fans to organize their own dance competitions: A series of YouTube dance-offs between Miley Cyrus fans and Step Up fans are so popular that a televised battle is planned for the near future.
Chu is no stranger to musical films. As a student at the University of Southern California’s School of Cinema-Television, he made a number of musical shorts, the last of which generated so much buzz that it resulted in a call from Steven Spielberg.
“That film helped me get into the business,” Chu says, referring to his 20-minute original musical When The Kids Are Away, which The New York Times described as “a richly imagined fantasy of housewives stepping out during school hours.” The film won multiple awards and helped Chu get signed by the venerable William Morris Agency right out of school.
Spielberg became Chu’s unofficial mentor. “He was very friendly and took me under his wing,” Chu says. “When he does that, everybody listens to him.”
So how does one capture the attention of Steven Spielberg? Practice, practice, practice. Chu’s parents, owners of the hugely popular Chef Chu’s restaurant in the Palo Alto, Calif., area for the past forty years, were very supportive of his pursuits as a child and encouraged his and his four siblings’ interests from an early age. Chu was in charge of the camera for the family’s annual vacations, and he eventually had so much footage that he convinced his dad to buy him a video editor.
“As soon as I started making little videos and saw [my family’s] reactions, saw them laughing, saw them crying, I was done,” Chu said. By age thirteen, he knew he wanted to be a filmmaker and went on to make more than forty videos while in high school.
Chu is pleased with the direction in which Asian American filmmakers are moving.
“There’s a whole new generation of Asian Americans whose voices haven’t come through the media before,” Chu said. “It’s like a different vibe from any type of Asian American entertainment before. It’s not about being Asian; it’s not about doing this or that. It’s about the craft — proving yourself on that level despite whatever people might think when they first see you.”
Step Up 2 the Streets is now out on DVD.
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