Disney and Pixar’s “Turning Red” introduces Mei Lee (voice of Rosalie Chiang), a confident, dorky 13-year-old torn between staying her mother’s dutiful daughter and the chaos of adolescence. Her protective, if not slightly overbearing mother, Ming (voice of Sandra Oh), is never far from her daughter—an unfortunate reality for the teenager. And as if changes to her interests, relationships and body weren’t enough, whenever she gets too excited (which is practically ALWAYS), she “poofs” into a giant red panda!

Entertainment Affair recently joined the voice cast of “Turning Red” for a virtual press conference to discuss the making of the film. We heard from Sandra Oh, Rosalie Chiang, Ava Morse who voices Miriam, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan who voices Priya and Hyein Park who voices Abby. Check out a few highlights of the event below.

Chiang on the resemblance between her own life and her character’s life:
“Well, after watching the movie, my mom and I looked at each other like, ‘this is really similar,’” she explains. “There’s so many odd and really weird coincidences. First of all, my mom’s middle name is Ming. There’s no way they could have known that. My favorite animals were actually red pandas before the whole project even started before I was even introduced,” Chiang continued. “But the main thing is that my mom actually calls me Mei Mei before this project because Mei Mei means little sister in Chinese. And so when it came to a point where everyone called Mei Mei, even the people who were younger than me, which you’re not supposed to do. So when she goes, I’m perfect little Mei Mei. I’m like, ‘Hey, that I literally went through that.’”

Oh saw the 40-year friendships she shares now portrayed in this film:
“What I love about this film, through the friendships and also the music, is it [shows] that precious time when you’re starting to figure out who you are, when your friends become really, really important. You know, for me, the girls that I grew up with in Ontario. We’re still all friends. I love that,” she said.

“Having young women and young girls in my life watching television and films with them over the years, you just realize it. I don’t know who sets this up that girls are like this because I don’t think it’s very true,” Oh added. “I think this is an extremely good representation of deep friendships and the highs and the lows.”

Ramakrishnan talked about her own boy bands concert experience:
“I remember when, it’s gonna be very Canadian of me, but I remember going into grade nine, and I went to my first concert to see Marianas Trench,” she said. “And I lost my mind. I was always wondering, like, why do people cry at a concert? Oh, like, happy? Like, shouldn’t you be excited to be there? Like, you would be smiling, maybe laughing those. But then, as soon as he came out on stage, bawling, I was. Like, I understand. I understand why. I was so emotional. I didn’t know why. But it just made sense.”

Morse on how the films honesty about all the changes we go through in adolescence make it authentic:
“I’m currently a high school student, and everybody is just growing and changing together. It can be very stressful and even dark at times, ’cause everyone is going through a lot, and not everyone knows how to handle that,” she said. “But at the same time, it’s kind of a beautiful thing. Everybody’s in that together and putting their all into living their lives the best they can. I was really inspired by my own friends, putting them into Miriam herself; she is such a supportive and amazing friend to Mei and the other girls. My friends are so supportive and always there for me, no matter what, so I thought it was really cool to kind of ‘give back’ in that way.”

Park relates to her character through all those aspects of being goofy and honest with yourself:
“Those are the moments where I feel throughout my very ripe age whenever I had the hardest time. Those are the things that push me through and help me through. I have those friends where I can just be myself, cry, or be super-goofy and be crazy,” she said. Those are the parts that I related to the most.”

See Disney and Pixar’s Turning Red only on Disney+ March 11!