At 14, Turning Red Director Domee Shi Was Sketching Draco Malfoy Fan Art

In this spinoff of Bustle’s 28 series, successful women describe exactly what their lives looked like at 14, and what their goals were for the future. Here, Turning Red director Domee Shi reflects on her teenage years in Toronto, Canada.

In 2003, 14-year-old Domee Shi was taking her first halting steps into young adulthood. Her mom had recently let her bleach her hair, resulting in a very chic “bright orange” shade. If her clothes from The Gap weren’t the coolest — “my mom would go shopping with me all the time, so I didn't get to wear exactly what I wanted to wear,” she says — her chokers asserted her sense of style. She was drawing fan art of certified hottie Orlando Bloom (in character as Legolas and The Pirates of the Caribbean’s Will Turner, naturally), playing Naruto games on her unlocked PlayStation, and hanging with her “dork squad” of close friends.

As charming as it seems from the outside, Shi’s experience of adolescence was still “awkward and horrifying,” she says. If only the adult Shi could tell that struggling teenage girl that her painful experiences would be put to good use 20 years later. Enter Turning Red.

Shi co-wrote and directed the film (now streaming on Disney+), which is heavily influenced by her own life. Set in early-aughts Toronto, where Shi also came of age, the story revolves around Mei Lee (Rosalie Chiang), a Chinese-Canadian teen who begins transforming into a giant red panda every time she gets emotional — the result of a matrilineal family quirk. Mei’s panda-fication serves as a stand-in for every tricky part of puberty: the crushes, the periods — shoutout to mom Ming (Sandra Oh) for being ready with the pads and meds — and the growing rift between your past and future selves. “I like to joke that instead of going to therapy, I made this movie,” Shi says.

Some scenes are pulled directly from her memories, like the time her mom followed her on her first day of middle school (discreetly, in sunglasses, of course). “I was leaving the school with my newfound BFFs, one of them goes, ‘Who's that lady behind the tree?’ And it's my mom,” Shi laughs. The film also benefits from Shi’s grown-up perspective. “There's enough space between now and back then that I can look at that time and laugh at it and process what was going on,” she adds. “It also made me empathetic to my mom's side of that story. Whereas back then I was just like, ‘Oh my gosh, why is she so crazy?’”

There was a lot about Shi’s life now that her teenage self probably couldn’t have imagined — not least the fact that she’d become an award-winning animator. In 2019, Shi brought home the Oscar for her animated short, Bao, and given all the critical acclaim for Turning Red, she seems poised to collect even more accolades. And to think her success can be traced back to her first published artwork, which she uploaded to DeviantArt as a teen: an anime-inspired take on Draco Malfoy.

Below, Shi opens up about periods, celebrity crushes, and her last year of being a straight-A student.

What was being 14 like for you?

It was very similar to Mei in the movie. I was this confident, nerdy, passionate girl who was obsessed with anime and manga and totally oblivious to real life boys and completely obsessed with fictional boys.

I drew a lot. That's how I made friends at school. Drawing them with their crushes, drawing fan art of their favorite characters from Pokémon and Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. And I'm an only child, so I was really, really close with my girlfriends at the time. And we were just this dork squad.

So drawing helped you connect with people?

Yeah, it was kind of like my superpower, because I was really socially awkward. Around that time I developed a stutter. So I didn't talk that much, but I communicated and made friends through drawing and through my love of anime and manga. And even though I couldn't speak the most eloquently, I could draw a character and make friends that way. So that's kind of how I was able to cope and make friends.

Was there a celebrity crush from that time that stands out — someone who you were like, I have to draw them?

It was Orlando Bloom from Lord of the Rings. I would sketch rendered, beautiful portraits of him as Legolas, but also as Will [Turner]. Just like Mei, I kind of had that idealistic image of what a real man should look like — and they were a beautiful, poreless, long-haired British guy.

And did your mom ever see any of your sketchbook drawings, like Mei’s did?

No, thank goodness, no. I had a secret sketchbook hidden under my bed for years that luckily I think my parents never found. I’d hidden it away and I'd forgotten about it for years. But then one night I was in college in my dorm and I woke up, and then I texted my cousin who was staying with my parents at the time. And I was like, “Oh gosh, I need you to do a favor for me. There is a sketchbook under my mattress under this board. Could you take it and then burn it?” And then I hear from her 10 minutes later and she's like, “I took care of it.” And I went back to sleep. I still don't know what she did with it.

Did you have any moments where you felt like you were literally turning red?

When Mei first turns into a panda in the movie, and she's in the bathroom and she doesn't know what's going on and she doesn't want to tell her mom — that was immediately lifted from my experience. It's like when I first got my period, I didn't even know what was happening. I thought I had like, diarrhea or something. And then I was just in the bathroom washing my underwear. I didn't even want to tell my mom about it because I was just embarrassed. And I just feel like that scene in the movie is totally kind of an allegory for that experience of not wanting to tell anybody.

Did you have a creative routine down when you were 14?

I loved just turning on the TV and having that on in the background as I just lay on my bed on my stomach and I drew. It was one of my favorite things to do. I was teaching myself how to draw on the computer, too. I had saved up my money and when I was 14, I bought a tablet to draw Draco Malfoy.

And I remember just listening to music that I illegally downloaded from LimeWire, Kazaa, on my Winamp player, very early 2000s. And then I was teaching myself how to do Photoshop with my janky little tablet.

What did a typical weekend hanging out with your friends look like?

We were so nerdy and lame. There's this particular mall in the ‘burbs called Pacific Mall. And that was kind of like the Asian mall. They had Asian hair salons where you could get the latest Japanese digital perm. They had DVD and CD stores where they sold K-pop and J-pop — that's where we got our anime DVDs from. They had video games that were straight from Japan, too. And my friends would bring their PlayStations there and they would do this thing where they'd unlock it. Because back then — this is so nerdy — game consoles were like, region-locked. So your American PlayStation could only play American games. But at this mall they could unlock your video game, and then we could play the latest Naruto games and One Piece and stuff. And there'd be an arcade there, where we'd play DDR. So that was the place to hang out for me and my friends.

What were your biggest hopes and worries at the time?

I think that was around the period where I was realizing that I was more artistic and creative versus academic — I think that was like, the last year of me being a straight-A student. And realizing that I maybe wanted to pursue another path, but also being like, “How do I make both my parents happy and myself happy at the same time?”

I think I was worried, too, about, “Oh, high school — am I going to have to get a boyfriend? What does that mean?” Because at the time I didn't have any guy friends. All my friends were girls and I really didn't know how to talk to guys at all. I was worried about that. Then I think at that age, I started getting acne and just being a little bit more — definitely felt more self-conscious and aware of myself and how I presented myself.

And now years later with an Oscar under your belt, what would you tell your 14-year-old self?

Gosh, what do I tell her? Don't worry so much and just don't put so much pressure on yourself. I feel like every time a kid starts any milestone — like starting high school or college or after you graduate — they're like, “Oh, this is it. This is when your life changes.” And I felt that way. But now knowing what I do now, I'm like, “Just relax a little bit, and don't be afraid to have fun and to try things and don't take everything too seriously. Not everything is life and death.”

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.