Which 2018 film was the first major Hollywood film with an all-Asian cast in 25 years?

“Crazy Rich Asians” was the 2018 film widely recognized as the first major Hollywood production in 25 years to feature an all-Asian principal cast.

Directed by Jon M. Chu, the film adapts Kevin Kwan’s 2013 novel about Chinese American economics professor Rachel Chu, who travels to Singapore with her boyfriend, Nick Young. She discovers that Nick’s family is extraordinarily wealthy and faces resistance from his mother, Eleanor Young.

The comparison point was “The Joy Luck Club,” released in 1993. “Crazy Rich Asians” therefore became a major representation milestone, especially because it centered Asian characters in a modern romantic comedy rather than presenting them mainly as supporting figures or historical subjects.

The wording is sometimes simplified as “all-Asian cast,” although the film’s principal cast represented different Asian backgrounds and included actors such as Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Gemma Chan, Awkwafina, Ken Jeong, and Michelle Yeoh. The film was also a commercial success, earning more than $238 million worldwide on a budget of about $30 million.