Arriving early for his interview, 17-year-old American Kyle Rothstein banters with the photographer like a native Chinese speaker, while his father Jay talks business. Based in Shanghai, they are in Hong Kong to promote their movie, Milk & Fashion, which opened across the mainland yesterday. And with Kyle as the male lead and his father as producer, it's very much a family affair.
Kyle's linguistic proficiency has made him something of a media personality on the mainland, says Jay Rothstein, a former international lawyer, whose company, China Venture Films, financed the US$1.4 million (HK$11 million) production. The teenager is a frequent guest on children's TV shows and Milk & Fashion could boost his profile.
Billed as a cross-cultural love story and coming-of-age drama, the production was directed by Taiwanese filmmaker Roy Chin from a script by Paul Collins.
Kyle plays Tyler, a ballet-dancing American nicknamed 'Milk' raised in Yunnan by an anthropologist father. After moving to live in Shanghai with his fashion impresario uncle, the boy meets ballerina Yao Yao, nicknamed 'Fashion', and falls in love.
The film's multicultural cast and Kyle's language skills have drawn US media attention. The Los Angeles Times has profiled the teen who 'can speak the lingo' and The Hollywood Reporter celebrated his Billy Elliot-style role in the first movie to 'include Chinese-speaking Caucasians in lead roles'.
For someone who is on the brink of stardom, Kyle is rather reticent, preferring to let his father do much of the talking.
