A visit to the emergency room, an isolating silence, and a health secret that morphs into an inexplicable shame--The filmmaker embarks on a personal journey to understand exactly how a third generation Chinese American could be so paralyzed by silence and shame. From San Jose to LA, Vanessa asks her friends to share about their own painful experiences and investigates her hunches with leaders in the Asian American community. Encouraged by her friends’ candor and new knowledge, Vanessa does what was previously impossible and holds intimate conversations with her friends’ families. But, it is also their candor that leads Vanessa to confront her own secret—a past depression that she’s never discussed.

Vanessa navigates the generational conflict, the familial expectations, and the cyclical behaviors, because she knows what is at stake—Asian Americans suffer high rates of suicide and depression and are less likely to ask for professional mental health help. Thus, The Laundromat strives to air an entire culture’s dirty laundry, and in so doing, create a space for a whole community to dialogue about understanding your past in order to heal the present.

Director Biography - Vanessa Yee

VANESSA YEE (she/her) is a third generation Angeleno and Chinese American filmmaker who seeks to challenge stereotypes and give voice to the voiceless through the art of storytelling. She received her MFA in Directing at UCLA; and while there, Vanessa directed the documentary feature The Laundromat. The film inspired her lifelong commitment to mental health advocacy through the website, thelaundromatdoc.com, and the spin-off podcast, The Bull & The Badger. She still directs and produces documentaries, now pays the bills as a Post Production Manager at a tech company here in the Bay, and is constantly developing and collaborating on whatever storytelling canvas she can. Though she has directed shorts for The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, worked on an Emmy-nominated national TV show, and produced inclusive content for Silicon Valley giants, Vanessa is most proud of her time teaching with the Bay Area Video Coalition and Youth Cinema Project.