Awkwafina felt "imposter syndrome" while filming ‘The Farewell’.
The 30-year-old rapper and actress – whose real name is Nora Lum – admitted that she was initially hesitant about starring in director Lulu Wang’s autobiographical movie about a family who upon learning their grandmother has only a short while left to live, decide not to tell her and schedule a family gathering before she dies.
Speaking during The Hollywood Reporter’s Actress Roundtable, she said: "I was really, really scared because I think you know what people think about you and stuff like that, but you don’t know what you can do."
"I think that you create all these different scenarios in your head about the worst it could go and the best it could go and you want to strive for this kind of invisible best that never will come true. But I think it’s that striving that you kind of run on. And I think without the neuroses, without the self-hatred, without the imposter syndrome, it would’ve been harder. But I still don’t know if it’s drama. I think it was the character. I really related to her and that’s the only thing I knew."
And Awkwafina insisted Lulu was open to her interpretations of the character Bili, who was based on the director.
She said: "She was always receptive to any input I had about what she would be doing, what she would be thinking."
"I think it’s that trust that I think also really helps a performance. When you have that trust, it’s nice. I think as a result, you reinvent something else and I think in the case of ‘The Farewell’, Bili really became this vessel for the Asian American experience — or the American experience — that is lost between two worlds and doesn’t know what to do."
Awkwafina’s ‘imposter syndrome’
