The Power of Michelle Yeon

FROM ACTION STAR TO OSCAR NOMINEE, THE EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE ACTRESS GETS PERSONAL ABOUT BEING SEEN-AND HOW FIGHTING STEREOTYPES HAS CHANGED HOLLYWOOD FOR THE BETTER 

- JASON SHEELER

When Michelle Yeoh wakes up, she immediately thanks—and apologizes to—her body for the day ahead. If the action star’s past is prologue, Yeoh will likely push herself to the limit.

I’m sorry, she says. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you.

“It’s a mantra,” she says, spooling her lean 5'4" frame into a love seat in a house high above Los Angeles last month. She says it’s during these still moments in the early morning—whether at home in Paris with Jean Todt, 77, her partner of 19 years, or while filming on location—that Yeoh takes the time to address her entire being. “I wake my body up,” she says. Then the real work begins. “I’ll do an hour of cardio. Sweat it all out. It takes effort to look like a person who’s ready to work—to not look like you’re stumbling.”