Published: 14 May 2026

Author: Justin Kroll, Andreas Wiseman

EXCLUSIVE: Chedi Chang, Sophia Xu, Yao, Zine Tseng and Owen Teague are set to star in Ang Lee‘s adaptation of Gold Mountain. Lee is directing the pic from a script adaptation by Pulitzer Prize finalist Chang-Rae Lee.

The film, a co-production between Fifth Season, The Ink Factory and Likely Story, is currently shooting in Northern California. It is being co-financed by Fifth Season and 127 Wall Productions.

Based on C. Pam Zhang’s acclaimed novel How Much of These Hills Is Gold, the story is set during the dying embers of the American Gold Rush. It centers on two newly orphaned Chinese immigrant children as they traverse a hostile California frontier to bury their father and free themselves from their past. They encounter family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different future as the film reveals the story of love, violence, delusion and theft that made their journey inevitable.

Likely Story’s Anthony Bregman and Peter Cron and The Ink Factory’s co-founders Simon and Stephen Cornwell are producing the pic together with Fifth Season and 127 Wall Productions. Lee and Emmy nominee Gregory Goodman are producing, with David Lee co-producing. The film is represented for sales internationally by FilmNation, across Greater China markets by 127 Wall, and domestically by CAA and Fifth Season.

Gold Mountain is being brought to life by a creative team that includes Academy Award nominee Joshua James Richards as cinematographer, four-time Academy Award nominee Jack Fisk as production designer, Academy Award winner Mychael Danna as composer, two-time Academy Award nominee Tim Squyres as editor, and three-time Emmy winner Avy Kaufman as casting director.

How Much of These Hills Is Gold is a national bestseller which released to critical acclaim in 2020. Listed as both a New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book of the Year, the novel was longlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize and also named a Barack Obama Book of the Year.