Before running marathons on screen, local actor Joel Choo confessed to “hating” the sport.
The 31-year-old spoke to AsiaOne at a recent press conference for the upcoming local film Pace about his experience preparing to play marathon runner Jing.
“On the surface, he’s also a YouTuber with a social media presence who teaches people how to run. But beneath it all, I think he’s someone who’s trying to find alignment in life through the sport,” shared Joel.
“He tries to find inspiration and connection with the world through nature – he’s quite the zen philosopher. You can tell from Jing’s blogs that he doesn’t just teach running, he also talks about his views on life.”
To get into character, Joel had the help of the film’s director, his older brother Jonathan Choo, who gave him an “extensive” character biography of all he needed to know – everything from where Jing studies, his grades, the books he reads to even the songs he listens to.
However, the one thing Joel was missing was the love for running.
“I hated it. But I started running and I fell in love with it,” he recounted.
“I came up with my own running programme with the help of ChatGPT. So now, I run three times a week, once on the treadmill and twice outside. And I try to run in the day to enjoy nature and the environment around me.”
In the film, Jing is the younger brother of the protagonist Malcolm (Desmond Tan), a middle-aged ex-drug offender who picks up long-distance running to straighten out his life. Jing is an “inspirational role” which spurs Malcolm.
Their elderly father Kong Sai, played by Joel’s own actor dad Zhu Houren, is a hateful and frustrated man.
Prior to Pace, Jonathan, Joel and Houren had worked together on short films and they say their dynamic on set is nothing short of “straightforward” and an “exchange of ideas”, surprisingly with no creative clashes between them as professionals.
When asked about his own inspirations in life, Joel took the moment to credit his 70-year-old father for being well-versed in front of the camera and behind the scenes, and for influencing him to become an actor.
“It piqued my interest to not just be a good actor, but also to pick up skills along the way like how to shoot stuff when he’s acting. Or when he’s watching and analysing a film, he sees it with a different lens, not just acting – he sees how things are being edited or shot,” said Joel.
‘A distance, a journey and a person trying to change’
With his older brother spearheading Pace, Joel had a rough idea of what was coming. Since 2022, he had known Jonathan was writing for a film and that the idea was always to cast him and Houren. It was only this year that he was invited on board when the final concept came into fruition.
But what really sparked the conceptualisation of Pace?
Jonathan, 36, told us: “At first, it really was a figment of thought. ‘What if my prodigal son who used to be a track star comes back to his family, has a brother, and it all culminates with a run?’ So those were the random frequencies I had.”
“Even though that idea came to me a few years ago, on a fundamental level, something about that moved me – because there’s a distance, a journey and a person trying to change.”
Through Houren’s personal connections, the Pace team had the chance to speak to various drug offenders seeking rehabilitation.
“I know many friends who are in halfway houses and have known them for many years. There are also many others who used to take drugs in the past but have now gone on to help others,” shared Houren.
“I introduced these friends to Jonathan so that he could find out more from them. He also visited the prison.”
While the issue of drug use and trafficking remains controversial in Singapore, it hasn’t deterred Jonathan from fulfilling his creative vision. With the primary goal of humanising Malcolm, he chose to stray from a didactic approach when writing the film.
“If you feel it’s educational, you think that there’s a message, right? That’s good, but what we’re really trying to show is the journey of this person who goes through the highs and lows of emotions in relapse and recovery; it’s much more complex than you think.”
Pace is supported by the Singapore Film Commission and the Infocomm Media Development Authority, through the Media Talent Progression Programme Long Form Content Grant and Yellow Ribbon Project. It also stars local content creators Simonboy and Zaki Hussain, and is expected to be released in the third quarter of 2026.
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kristy.chua@asiaone.com
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