A few years ago, director Sing J. Lee was wandering Bolsa Avenue, the main thoroughfare of Little Saigon in the Southern Californian city of Westminster. He ducked into the cafe Chez Rose and found a group of older Vietnamese men playing Chinese chess, or cờ tướng. “It reminded me of my grandparents in Hong Kong,” tells Vogue. “Every family gathering my grandmother would leave halfway through to go play mahjong.”
Lee struck up a conversation with one of the regulars, who eventually shared that the group was more one of companionship than true friendship; they’d gather to play chess, talk, argue, smoke, and drink and then part ways at the end. “A lot of them felt forgotten or left behind, as the city has changed with the generations,” Lee says.
He ultimately found a story for his debut feature that encapsulated this sense of isolation and ad hoc fraternity and took place in that very neighborhood, an enclave of some 200,000 that boasts the oldest and largest Vietnamese community outside of Vietnam. Based on actual events as reported in 2017 in GQ, The Accidental Getaway Driver follows an elder Vietnamese cabbie who finds himself embroiled with three prison escapees. The film doesn’t traffic in tawdry tropes of the manhunt-thriller genre, however; it’s a lyrical mood piece that evinces questions of otherness and masculinity as represented in the unlikely crew.
“I was drawn to the fragility and tenderness of these characters and the opportunity to tell a story of not just the events but how these people came to be and the decisions they make,” explains Lee, who wrote the script with playwright Christopher Chen and won the dramatic directing prize with the film at the Sundance Film Festival in 2023.
The idea of home lost and found is another theme. Little Saigon has been a nucleus for the Vietnamese American community since the fall of Saigon in 1975, when many of the two million who fled that country resettled in suburban Orange County. Many more followed in subsequent decades, and today its bustling shops, markets, and restaurants serve locals, tourists, and weekend visitors alike, all less than an hour’s drive southeast of Los Angeles.
“It’s on the doorstep of so many, and yet it’s a place many aren’t aware of,” Lee admits. “You don’t feel like you’re in Los Angeles. It has this beating heart and confidence in identity, and the warmth you feel is infectious. People are walking memories, and certain generations have been custodians of their traditions. But each generation struggles with its own identity.”
Recently from his home in Los Angeles, the British-born director—who previously created music videos with artists like Pharrell, Charli XCX, Alicia Keys, and Halsey—discussed some of the film’s significant Little Saigon locations.
Chez Rose
9191 Bolsa Avenue, Westminster
This cafe sells sandwiches, Vietnamese iced coffee, and tea. They have plastic chairs out front, and everybody just troops down with their own boards and chess pieces. It’s not planned; they just know that everyone’s going to be there. I’ve seen other places in Little Saigon with those congregations—there was something about the humor, laughter, and warmth that you can’t help but sit there and just watch. It inspired me to pay tribute to these men and put them in the film in different places, so they bookend the film as these textural characters playing chess, and we shot with those actual men who played there.
ABC Mall
8970 Bolsa Avenue, Westminster
You see the façades, and you just imagine, This is a place that should be in cinema. I knew immediately one of the scenes would be filmed there—whichever one, we would figure it out. Each shop has its own character and personality. It’s this amalgamation of vendors, from food to hair to electronics. Some crew members said they got their haircuts here as kids and would still go back even after they’d moved across town. The huge parking lot is always full. You really do have this cacophony of life. Many of the background actors were the proprietors or customers—a beautiful collaboration of real life and fiction.
The hair salons have these sun-bleached photos of Caucasian men and women, blond hair, blue eyes. I found that very curious because the clientele is definitely not that. It reminded me of my own experiences growing up in the UK, where we’re subconsciously or consciously trying to validate our sense of self and beauty through Western standards. The four characters in the film are all in different stages of assimilation. I thought it’d be great if Eddie changed his hair to blond, that when he’s trying to choose a different identity, he chooses one that’s a validation of Western standards.
A Dong Supermarket
9221 Bolsa Avenue, Westminster
We shot inside the supermarket for one scene, but it was really the back that caught my attention. There are these huge, regal white marble or granite deities crafted with such care that now just remain there amongst the dumpsters. Several years ago there was a whole garden of these statues that symbolized Vietnamese values, prosperity, and hope.
To me, these statues symbolize that as an immigrant or refugee you come with thousands of years of history, generations of stories. But as modernity happens, parking lots are built, generations change, culture shifts. These old values eventually become homeless or cumbersome, but they are stubborn and remain. Life builds around them. It reminded me of what our relatives may have gone through.
Thai Hien’s Home
Thai Hien is an incredible Vietnamese performer. She began her career as a teenager in Vietnam before the war and later became one of the first Vietnamese singers from here to be successful. Her father, Pham Duy, is one of the most influential Vietnamese musicians of his generation. They both use music to keep stories and history alive. There’s this authorship of generational stories that get lost because they’re not written or recorded.
It was a privilege to have Thai Hien’s voice in the film. Her walls at home are lined with the musical artwork of her whole family. She sits there with generations of voices that she’s a custodian of. She sang an adaptation of the folk tale about the birth of Vietnam to open the film, and then we end with a song called “Younger Ones.” Both times are just acapella, and they’re almost two polar opposites—the birth of Vietnam and then someone in their latter years, looking back and reminiscing.
PhởHolic
14932 Bushard Street, Westminster
I’m always drawn to the back kitchens of places like this, and what I loved was that the back doors are open, so you can see the 24-hour broth cooking in the kitchen. It ended up being the meeting point where the cab driver first picks up the three men in the film. I think a good place has a simple menu. This place has a simple menu, and we ate there a lot.
I come from a somewhat humble background. My parents own a Chinese takeaway in Wrexham [in Wales]. I’ve grown up in the back of takeaway shops, but this rhythm of life is still romantic to me in some ways. At these places I already feel connected to that, and that’s what I wanted to beautify. When choosing locations, they might not necessarily be tourist attractions—it would be where real life happens.
The Accidental Getaway Driver is in theaters in select cities now and nationwide on March 7.
