Michelle Zauner’s “Crying in H Mart” Film Adaptation on Hold

“Right now, I’m focusing on other creative projects, so the film will have to wait.”

Michelle Zauner Crying in H-Mart, the memoir by Oregon musician Michelle Zauner, aka Japanese Breakfast, was optioned for a movie. (Sam Gehrke)
By Andrew Jankowski

Michelle Zauner has some news.

The Eugene-based writer whose music as Japanese Breakfast earned a Grammy nomination in 2022 headed to South Korea following the success of her 2021 memoir Crying in H Mart. The book’s film adaptation was announced in 2023, but Zauner told SSENSE Magazine that Crying in H Mart’s movie development is on pause. She attributed the delay to fallout from Hollywood’s SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild of America strikes in 2023, and director Will Sharpe leaving the project.

“I spent a year working on the screenplay, which was a tough but rewarding process,” Zauner said in an interview published Jan. 31. “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.”

In the same interview, Zauner dished on her forthcoming new album, The Melancholy Brunettes (& Sad Women), which is slated for release March 21 through Dead Oceans. She also discussed her literary follow-up to H Mart, which she said will take two more years to complete but already has more than 500,000 words of raw writing composed for it.

“My last record was joyous, and my book was heavy and intense,” she said. “This time, it’s flipped—the record is more melancholy, and the book is joyful, funny, and hopefully heartwarming.”

Read the full interview (presented bilingually in English and Korean) here.

Willamette Week’s reporting has concrete impacts that change laws, force action from civic leaders, and drive compromised politicians from public office. Support WW's journalism today.