Creator

Alice Gu

Alice Gu is a director and cinematographer who made The Donut King, about Cambodian refugee doughnut entrepreneurs in California.

Alice Gu is a Los Angeles film director, writer and cinematographer who made The Donut King (2020), about Cambodian refugee Ted Ngoy.[1][2] She began her career as a director of photography, and The Donut King was her first feature as director.[3]

Career

As a director of photography, Gu worked with the documentary directors Werner Herzog, Stacy Peralta and Rory Kennedy.[3] She shot Kennedy's Take Every Wave: The Life of Laird Hamilton, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2017.[4] Her commercial clients have included Apple, Beats by Dre, ESPN, FIFA, the NFL, the NBA, the NHL and the WSL.[3]

The Donut King

Gu first heard about Cambodian doughnut shops in a conversation with her children's nanny.[5] She learned that more than 90 percent of the doughnut shops in the Los Angeles area were Cambodian-owned and operated.[6] She reached Ted Ngoy through the Cambodian American shop DK's Donuts, whose owner connected them on Facebook.[7] Gu shot the film herself over eight to ten months of filming, and she spent more than a year building trust with Ngoy and the other families in the film. Carol Martori was her editor and co-writer.[4]

The film follows Ngoy from his flight from Phnom Penh in the 1970s to the doughnut business he built in Southern California, and then through his losses from gambling.[6][8] It gives the history of why Ngoy and other Cambodians left their homeland, told through firsthand accounts and archival news footage alongside his business story.[9] The film also shows how refugees were received at Camp Pendleton, and it follows a younger generation of Cambodian Americans who are updating their families' doughnut shops.[5] Little of the Ngoy family's own archive had survived, so Cambodian American artist Andrew Hem drew illustrations for parts of the story.[7][6] Gu has said the documentary combines an immigrant story and a history lesson with an account of helping refugees build new lives.[10]

Ridley Scott and Freida Lee Mock were executive producers.[3] Gu partnered with Refugees International on the film, and a share of the proceeds went to the organization.[11] The film was selected for South by Southwest in 2020, but the festival was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic.[6] It opened in theaters and virtual cinemas on October 30, 2020, and premiered on the PBS series Independent Lens on May 24, 2021.[5][2]

Later work

Gu's second documentary, Really Good Rejects, premiered at South by Southwest in 2022. It follows Los Angeles guitar maker Reuben Cox and features Jackson Browne, Jeff Tweedy of Wilco, Aaron Dessner of The National and Phoebe Bridgers.[3][1] She was a fellow of the Concordia Studios Fellowship in 2022 and 2023.[3] She then directed the short Shimmer, Inspired by Eva Young, starring Harry Shum Jr., and the documentary Dear Ms.: A Revolution in Print, which premiered at the Tribeca Festival in 2025.[1] Gu mentors in film and television for Unlock Her Potential, Sophia Chang's free mentorship program for women of color.[3]

Recognition

For The Donut King:

  • Special Jury Award, documentary feature, South by Southwest (2020)[8][1]
  • Best Documentary, Sun Valley, Bentonville and Urbanworld film festivals[3]
  • One in a Million Documentary Award, Sun Valley Film Festival[9]
  • Best Emerging Director, 43rd Asian American International Film Festival[3]

Works


See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Alice Gu, Wikipedia
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Independent Lens (PBS), The Donut King
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 3.8 Alice Gu, About
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Script Magazine, Interview: "Donut King" documentary filmmaker Alice Gu (November 3, 2020)
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Forbes, Alice Gu serves up a bittersweet success story with The Donut King (October 29, 2020)
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 The Moveable Fest, Interview: Alice Gu on navigating the many twists of The Donut King
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Infoseek News, Interview with Alice Gu about The Donut King (November 8, 2021)
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 South China Morning Post, Rise and fall of Cambodian refugee Donut King charted in award-winning film (April 5, 2020)
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 SBS What's On, From refugee to millionaire, the rise, fall and redemption of the Donut King (May 30, 2022)
  10. ↑ Script Magazine, Interview: "Donut King" documentary filmmaker Alice Gu (2020)
  11. ↑ Independent Lens (PBS), From Cambodia to Southern California: Telling the story of a king of donut shops (May 24, 2021)
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This page was last edited on 26 September 2026, at 23:31.