That Crying In H Mart movie "isn't happening any time soon"

Bad news for all the melancholy brunettes and sad women out there. Michelle Zauner, frontwoman of the band Japanese Breakfast, has revealed the film adaptation of her memoir Crying At H Mart is on "pause." The New York Times bestseller was first greenlit for adaptation by Orion Pictures back in 2021. In 2023, writer, actor, and director Will Sharpe (The White Lotus, A Real Pain) was tapped to direct the film. But in a new interview with SSense, Zauner says circumstances have changed.

"Well, it’s on pause. There were issues with the Hollywood strikes, and the director stepped away from the project," Zauner said when asked about the film's progress. "I spent a year working on the screenplay, which was a tough but rewarding process. I still have faith it will get made someday, but it’s not happening anytime soon. Right now, I’m focusing on other creative projects, so the film will have to wait."

Sharpe, who directed the 2021 feature The Electrical Life Of Louis Wain (among others), will next appear in Lena Dunham's romantic comedy series Too Much on Netflix. And as Zauner mentions, she has her own projects in the works. Japanese Breakfast recently announced a tour to support the upcoming album For Melancholy Women (& Sad Brunettes), which is due out on March 21. And Zauner is also working on a new book, though it'll be a while before it hits shelves.  "The book will take at least two more years to write. I’ve been keeping a diary for the past year—over 500,000 words of raw material," she told SSense. "Next year, I’ll start weaving it into a narrative. It’s very different from Crying In H Mart because this one’s written in real time, not retrospectively. It’s going to be a long process, but I’m excited about it."

The new memoir has to do with Zauner moving to South Korea for a year to study Korean (she says her mother always told her living in the country for a year would help her become fluent). "After the last three years—the success of my book and record—I felt like I had won the lottery. It was an amazing, life-changing experience, but I was also terrified of losing the ticket. The pressure and fear were overwhelming, and I needed a break," the artist says. "It’s much lighter than my last book. There’s a lot of humor in the mistakes you make in another language, being in your 30s in a class full of teenagers, and confronting your own limitations. My last record was joyous, and my book was heavy and intense. This time, it’s flipped—the record is more melancholy, and the book is joyful, funny, and hopefully heartwarming."