Crystal
Yu

With nearly two decades of experience working across film, TV, and theatre, and a voting BAFTA member, Crystal Yu is a highly skilled voice and dialect coach, translator, and consultant specialising in Chinese-Cantonese. Her extensive background in the entertainment industry, combined with a Master's Degree in Education and a deep understanding of language and cultural nuances, makes her the go-to expert for projects requiring linguistic precision and authentic dialect work.

Crystal has lent her expertise to high-profile productions, including translation and dialect coaching for actors such as Benedict Wong and Jason Statham on films like Hummingbird (2013).  She has recently reunited with Wong on an upcoming feature as the Cantonese Script Consultant and dialect coach.  Crystal has also contributed her translation and dialect expertise to the long-running BBC series Casualty, working with actors Daphne Cheung and Dave Wong. Her work doesn't stop at coaching; she has served as a Chinese-to-English and English-to-Chinese translator for screenplays and theatre: collaborating with acclaimed playwright Amy Ng for the Hong Kong Arts Festival and translating for Elladar Productions on the playreading of Birthright at Soho Theatre, written by Kevin Shen and directed by Mingyu Lin.

In her teaching, Crystal believes in creating a supportive environment where actors feel safe to explore without the pressure to be perfect immediately. She emphasises the importance of authenticity in both language and performance, guiding actors, directors and writers to find the delicate balance between staying true to the original text whilst making the dialogue feel natural and connected to their characters. Whether through translating scripts or coaching on dialects, Crystal brings a unique sensitivity to her work, ensuring the integrity of the written word while accommodating the actor’s performance needs.

Beyond dialect coaching, Crystal has also worked closely with directors, producers, script editors, designers, prop makers, and costume designers to ensure that the linguistic elements of a scene align with the cultural and contextual details of Cantonese-speaking characters. This interdisciplinary collaboration ensures that every aspect of the production, from dialogue to costumes, resonates with authenticity and accuracy.

Crystal can support a wide variety of production language needs, such as language and accent coaching, earpiece, Cantonese phonetic transcriptions, support on set, post-production (ADR, Subtitles) and script translation.