Michelle Zauner's best-selling memoir is about to become a movie.
Knopf Crying in H Mart: A Memoir
Crying in H Mart, the critically acclaimed memoir written by the front woman of indie pop band Japanese Breakfast, will officially be adapted into a film by MGM's Orion Pictures. In the book, Zauner grapples with grief after the death of her mother, Chongmi, who passed of pancreatic cancer in 2014.
Zauner is set to adapt the screenplay and, with Japanese Breakfast, will provide the film's soundtrack. The film has also recruited the talents of The White Lotus star Will Sharpe—who will direct—and producers Stacey Sher (Erin Brockovich) and Jason Kim (Barry).
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Ahead, everything we know about the upcoming adaptation.
Who is directing?
Will Sharpe will direct the film adaptation of Crying in H Mart. Sharpe most recently earned critical acclaim for his award-winning performance in Season 2 of The White Lotus, but he has also previously garnered various BAFTA nominations for his directing and screenwriting work.
"There were lots of things that resonated with me as somebody who is half-Japanese, half-British, spent my childhood in Tokyo. Some of the descriptions of being jet-lagged in your family's kitchen felt very familiar to me," Sharpe said of the book in an interview with People. "I found that it felt universal in its specificity."
Zauner told the outlet that Sharpe's "sensitivity as a director and an actor, his ability to find humor and grace within the tragedy of the everyday, and his own personal experience, having grown up between two cultures, make[s] him the perfect director for this film."
What is Crying in H Mart about?
Per Variety, an official synopsis from MGM describes the film as a "coming-of age story about a half-Korean daughter who returns to small town Oregon to care for her Korean mother. Critical and smothering Chong-mi and creative and independent Michelle struggle to understand each other across a cultural fault line, only learning to see and accept one another through the formative power of music and the vibrant flavors of Korean cooking."
Watch this space for updates.
As an associate editor at HarpersBAZAAR.com, Chelsey keeps a finger on the pulse on all things celeb news. She also writes on social movements, connecting with activists leading the fight on workers' rights, climate justice, and more. Offline, she’s probably spending too much time on TikTok, rewatching Emma (the 2020 version, of course), or buying yet another corset.
