Sam Song Li Is Just Excited for Audiences To Watch ‘The Brothers Sun’!
Sam Song Li may be leading the charge in The Brothers Sun, but he also has to star opposite some hard-hitting legends. Literally. I would never want to be hit by Michelle Yeoh.
In talking with him, it’s clear that he is not only excited for audiences to experience the show, but he’s also just excited to be part of such an outstanding cast. First, I asked him about working opposite Yeoh and what it was like to be not only leading the series but having to do so with some of the best in the business at his side.
“I was very intimidated actually when I first got to work with Michelle,” he said. “Because here’s the thing, Michelle is a certified movie star, she’s so busy. So even though we had a couple of chances to sort of hang out and get lunch, get dinner sort of thing, I felt like I didn’t nearly get to spend as much time with her as some of the other cast mates, simply because we just had more time.”
But that didn’t mean he didn’t cherish when he did get to spend time with Yeoh and work with her. “And so when I got the chance to work with her first on set, I actually was, as you can imagine, I was a little starstruck and I was a little bit overwhelmed. But the thing with Michelle is there’s something so inviting about her presence. There’s something so warm and so kind. And she’s somebody where if you get to be in a room with her, you’ll feel like you’ve known this woman for years. And I think she just has that effect on people. So it was very easy for me to sort of create a connection with her very quickly, because I think she naturally has a lot of maternal instincts as well. And, I have a lot in common with Bruce, who also was raised by a single mom and there’s a lot of similarities between me and my character. So I think the combination of being able to draw from that, but also working with someone as talented as her just made the process feel effortless.”
Bringing the comedy to The Brothers Sun
One of the fun aspects of Bruce as a character is that he gets to be the comedic relief in the midst of the action sequences. While his family is all prepared for their world and the fighting that has to be brought upon them, Bruce is less prepared for everything happening around him and even gets to drop an F-bomb in the trailer for the series.
When I asked Li about whether he liked bringing the comedy or if he longed for more of the action, I brought up how the show is a bit more “genre bending” than we’ve seen in the past, and he talked about how that is what makes the show so special. “It’s so genre bending,” he said. “I think this project is very genre bending and it really feels like two separate worlds colliding. In a lot of ways, I almost feel like what Charles is going through and what Bruce is going through could be two different shows on Netflix, if you think about it. The problems in these two brothers lives could not be more different. But I feel like that’s what makes this show so interesting, it’s almost like these two universes, these two worlds, these two almost separate shows in its own right, are colliding together to create the world that is The Brothers Sun.”
He then went on to talk about how that set up the dynamic of the show: “I think this is very unique and I feel like that gives it a really dynamic layer to the whole project. To speak a little bit on the action, I didn’t necessarily get to be a part of the action sequences as much as some of the other co-stars mainly because my character is supposed to not really be the fighter, more the lover. But I will say that I do think Bruce is dangerous in his own right and in his own sort of way. And I’m glad that I didn’t have more things on my plate , because I know with someone like Justin (Chien), he was really put through the ringer, right? He speak Mandarin and do a bunch of fight choreo. And I remember when I worked with the stunt department, who we had an awesome stunt department that worked on this show, they actually wanted me to avoid getting too involved because they preferred me to look more clueless when it came to the fight sequences because it just works that didn’t really know what was going on. So I felt like that really kind of shows and I’m glad because it’s also less work for me.”
Talking about Chien, we dived in a bit on what they all did, as a cast, to form a bond that comes across onscreen. “Just getting lunch together and hanging out and just sort of talking about it, I feel like when you get a chance to hang out with each other and just spend time with each other, you get a sense of who they are as a person,” he said. “And I just feel anytime you get a chance to hang out with people, you just get to know them more as a person. And that can only be helpful. So we didn’t really do much outside of grabbing lunch and talking about the project. But, I think that in its own way, it really helped bond us to the project and made us feel really passionate about what we were doing. And, in doing so, got us really excited, specifically Justin and I, and also I got a chance to hang out with, with Joon (Lee) who plays TK.”
Creating a new kind of show
With The Brothers Sun, we have a mixing of genres and a new kind of character in that world. Because the show is so different from anything we’ve seen before, I asked Li about the weight of that on his shoulders. “It’s interesting that you ask that because I’ve never actually thought about it like that. I’ve never actually thought about it in that sense because I think as an actor, the main thing you’re just thinking about is your character and the portrayal of the character. But I will say that I think this is where our showrunners and our director, Kevin Tancharoen and Byron (Wu) and Brad (Falchuk), I think that’s where they really shine in their work as well, because I think they do a great job of sort of guiding the tone. And I do feel like we’ve had conversations early on about the tone of the show because it’s so genre bending, there’s so much going on.”
He went on to talk about how they helped to guide those moments: “I think they were instrumental in finding those moments and seeing how those moments play. And I feel like our post team that does the editing and puts together everything we shot to make the final cuts. I think they were instrumental in really crafting how the story plays, because I think as an actor you’re just really focused on the moment. They did a great job of really helping guide me through my performance, really helping me, give me the freedom of choice to bring elements of my creative strokes from who I am as a person as Sam into Bruce, but also riding that fine line of guiding my performance to make sure that I am in the right tone or I don’t go too much in one direction because I think sometimes when we read something on script versus how it plays out on camera, or how we feel as an audience versus how we portray as actors, it’s quite different.”
You can see Sam Song Li in The Brothers Sun now on Netflix.
(featured image: Netflix)
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