Michelle Yeoh

NPR's Ailsa Chang speaks with actress Michelle Yeoh about her leading role in the sci-fi action movie Everything Everywhere All at Once.

CHANG: So well said. So we have to be present in whatever universe, in whatever life. I think the core spirit - the core emotion is very, very real in whatever universe you are in. So I don't really spend time doing that, but I think in "Everything Everywhere All At Once," every choice that you make splinters into a full-blown universe of its own, with a real life, even regardless of whether you have hot dog fingers, whether you're a rock, what you have evolved to. And it made me wonder if you have ever imagined what other universes would have opened up had you made different choices in life. YEOH: Yes. Yes. Well, speaking of taking a stand, making decisions, making choices in life, you know, your character, Evelyn, she travels back and forth between alternate universes in this story, where she catches glimpses of what her life would have been like had she made different choices. And you can't give up on family and love and kindness - you just have to keep trying. YEOH: Ah - but that was it. Maybe that's one of the reasons why I never did it before - because it was so hard (laughter). So when our co-host Ailsa Chang spoke with Michelle Yeoh last April, she asked what it was like doing physical comedy for the first time.