It’s one thing to have your father give you condoms on the first day of school; it’s another to have your secret love letters unexpectedly released to each object of your affection.
In Netflix’s newest romantic-comedy this summer, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, high school junior Lara Jean Covey suffers through both humiliations in the first few seconds of the film’s trailer, released Thursday.
The coming-of-age film, streaming Aug. 17, stars Vietnamese-American actress Lana Condor (X-Men: Apocalypse) as Lara Jean. To avoid confrontation, she fakes a relationship with Peter (Noah Centineo), the most popular boy in school and one of the love-letter recipients.
“I really appreciate it, but it’s never going to happen,” Peter awkwardly tells Lara Jean. “I think it’s really cool that you think I have golden specs in my eyes.”
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Susan Johnson directed the film, based on Asian-American author Jenny Han’s best-selling novel of the same name. It was adapted by Sofia Alvarez.
John Corbett (Parenthood, Northern Exposure) plays Lara Jean’s well-intentioned father. Janel Parrish, Israel Broussard and Andrew Bachelor also star.
While the film features the usual young adult film tropes (cafeteria-set drama, climbing out a second-story window), few other rom-coms star Asian actors. Netflix recently began production on Always Be My Maybe, a 2019 rom-com written by and starring Asian-American comedians Ali Wong and Randall Park.
Coming to theaters just two days before To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is the highly anticipated Crazy Rich Asians, which has received attention for its all-Asian cast — a rarity in the world of rom-coms.
With rom-coms becoming a bigger priority for the streaming service, two other positively received Netflix originals — The Kissing Booth and Set It Up — have paved the way for To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before‘s release this August.
