About
Janet Yang
Janet Yang came to prominence through her collaboration with Steven Spielberg on Empire of the Sun followed by partnerships with Oliver Stone and Lisa Henson. Her extensive Film and TV credits include The Joy Luck Club, The People vs. Larry Flynt, Shanghai Calling and High Crimes.
Emmy Award and Golden Globe-winning Hollywood producer,
Yang is the President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Yang has worked with some of the most formidable filmmakers and talent in the world. She came to prominence through her collaboration with Steven Spielberg on "Empire of the Sun" (Warner Bros). That was followed by a long partnership with multiple Academy Award-winner Oliver Stone—where she served as Executive Producer on the iconic "The Joy Luck Club" (Disney), and as a Producer on the Golden Globe-winning "The People vs. Larry Flynt" (Columbia Pictures). Her most recent credit is as an Executive Producer on the Oscar-nominated animated feature, "Over the Moon." Based on her original story, the film was directed by legendary animator Glen Keane and released on Netflix in 2020.
Among her many other credits are: the Sundance award-winning "Dark Matter" (Universal Pictures) with Meryl Streep; "The Weight of Water" (Lionsgate) directed by Academy Award winner Kathryn Bigelow with Academy Award winner Sean Penn; "Savior" (Lionsgate) with Dennis Quaid; "South Central" (Warner Bros.) directed by Steve Anderson; "High Crimes" (Fox) with Morgan Freeman; a Chinese adaptation of the acclaimed Disney franchise "High School Musical"; cult favorites "Zero Effect," by Jake Kasdan, and "Shanghai Calling" with China Film Group. Yang won an Emmy and Golden Globe Award for the HBO movie "Indictment: The McMartin Trial."
Most recently, Yang was named one of the “50 Most Powerful Women in Hollywood” by the Hollywood Reporter, Variety's Power of Women 2023, and was featured on the Forbes 2024 “50 over 50” List.
Yang serves on the IMAX China Board and the Forbes APEX VIP Founding Advisory Board. She is also a board director at Unified Youth, a mental-health-focused organization.
Yang is the first Asian American president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and also has a pillar dedicated to her inside the Renzo Piano-designed Academy Museum of Motion Pictures.
Yang has been named one of the “50 Most Powerful Women in Hollywood”
by the Hollywood Reporter
Amplifying AAPI voices
Chinese film YELLOW EARTH gave Janet Yang the courage to believe that the Western world would also relish this work, which led to Yang beginning her career by running the first distribution company to market Chinese films into North America. She also brokered the reintroduction of American cinema to the Chinese marketplace on behalf of several studios after a decades-long hiatus.
Committed to fostering global understanding, Yang is a co-founder of Gold House, the non-profit collective of influential Asian cultural leaders; a long-standing member of the Committee of 100, an organization of the most prominent Chinese-Americans; and an advisory board member of Asia Society Southern California where she also chairs its highly regarded US-Asia Entertainment Summit.
Fluent in Mandarin Chinese, Yang holds a B.A. from Brown University in Chinese studies and an M.B.A. from Columbia University. She was appointed as a Presidential Fellow at Loyola Marymount University and recently awarded an Honorary Doctorate degree in Humane Letters from Bowdoin College.
Keynote Speaking and Consulting
Yang has been featured in The New York Times, LA Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Bloomberg, Variety, South China Morning Post, Harper’s Bazaar, as well as on numerous television and radio shows across the US and Asia such as NPR, CCTV and Beijing TV. She is frequently asked to consult on projects and sought after for public speaking engagements.
Janet Yang Productions is dedicated to creating works of influence and inclusion. Having already been responsible for many ground-breaking works, Janet Yang is currently focused on film and television products by, for and about marginalized communities. In particular, the Asian diaspora is a primary area of focus.
Never one to fall back on familiar tropes or genres, Yang continues to seek fresh stories that simultaneously have wide audience appeal.