GRRRRRRRRRL Power! in the Year of the Dog

APA Women on the Verge of Success

By Erin May Ling Quill, for IMDiversity Asian-American Village

March 12, 2006 - It’s the Year of the Dog now, and all I can say is: Hollywood and Asian-American women are off to a great start! 

Sandra Oh leads the pack (let’s not forget A-BOaT her being Canadian). How HOT is it that Sandra Oh won her Golden Globe and SAG Award, and Chloe Dao walked away with Project Runway’s top prize?  Damn hot.

Nothing happens overnight, though, and what I want to do is to highlight some Asian-American women whose success stories are still in the making, but who we need to get behind as a community, because they are our future representation.

Here for starters are three women who are making their dreams come true in a viable way, step by step: writer/director Georgia Lee, producer/actress Mia Riverton, and producer Jane Chen.

These three women produced the indie film, RED DOORS, which has played and won awards all over the country, including a nod at the prestigious Tribeca Film Festival in New York for Best Feature in 2005. In addition, CBS Network commissioned a pilot script based on the movie – which means, should it go forward to series, we will see a dysfunctional Chinese-American family vying for Nielson ratings alongside all the other dysfunctional families that litter our television landscape. All three women will write the pilot script.

If you missed RED DOORS at the film festivals, you will be pleased to know that Polychrome Pictures purchased the U.S. distribution rights, and plan a release in April 2006.

I’d like to switch to theater for a moment, if I may, to a very exiting play called YOU PICK COLOR, by Marita de Lara.  Marita has worked as an actress for several years, as well as a professional dancer, and entered the writing program at East West Players.  A graduate of Syracuse University, she is a great example of the merits of training to mold talent.

I recently saw a reading of this play and fell in love with it.  Its fast, funny, and furious pacing packed with hip cultural references while chronicling dueling Vietnamese nail salons had me literally gasping for breath in certain places. This play has an exciting future, I am sure of it.

Established playwright Alice Tuan has a new play dealing with Compton and race relations. Any year that brings new work from Tuan – who remains a distinct and relevant voice – is a great year.

Let’s go back to Laos-born “no, she’s not just a good pattern-maker’ Chloe Dao. I had hailed her as the one to beat for Season 2 of Project Runway because of the second challenge of ‘Clothes off Their Backs,” where she took her dress and coat and created a fabulous swing dress. Time and time again, I marveled at the ingenuity and technical skill that Chloe infused in her women-friendly designs. I was thrilled that she won, and I have text messages on my phone from a bunch of different Asian-American friends that were equally as pleased for her.  Hey Santino….suck it!

This next woman is a whirlwind of a person, and thus, we should all be aware: Diana Lee Inosanto is a mother, a wife, a writer, a director, an actress, and the living embodiment of the power of martial arts. The daughter of living martial arts legend, Don Inosanto, and the goddaughter of the one-and-only Bruce Lee, Diana is well versed in many martial arts forms.

She is also passionately committed to her feature film, THE SENSEI, which is currently seeking finishing funds.  Diana wrote, directed, and stars in the film, alongside a multiracial cast.  And the subject?  Tolerance.

The film deals with small-town prejudice – both racial and sexual – and how two people are able to find their paths through it using the martial ways. This film initially made the papers when it was first interrupted by the small Colorado town where it was set – overzealous townspeople yanked permission to film in the school after lifting pages of the script and deciding the subject matter was not to their liking.  This, despite the fact that the principal of the school was enthusiastic about an opportunity to open up a dialogue the film would have created.

In an era where we are beset by lies from all sides, where we are constantly seeing on the news the depraved depths to which people will go to harm one another, it is refreshing and encouraging that an Asian-American woman is not only ready to take on a feature film, but small-town prejudice. I wish her very well, and I hope her dream comes through.  The footage I have seen is very promising.

So there you have it – six Asian-American women taking the Year of the Dog by the collar and running with it. None of it was easy – each one has persevered through the agony of the blank page through to a realized production.  Brava!

Other Readings of Interest at the Village

• “Why There are ‘No’ Asians on Television”
  By Erin May Ling Quill, , Special to IMDiversity
  Noted Broadway performer, director, and former SAG diversity rep explores the truths and falsehoods, reasons and solutions -- in the industry and in ourselves. Complete 4-part series.
• In a Georgia State of Mind
  By Lynda Lin, Pacific Citizen Assistant Editor
  When her life seemed most perfect, Georgia Lee dropped out of Harvard, formed a production company with college friends and took on Hollywood with her bold film, Red Doors
• WHM 2006: APA Women's Wall of Fame
  By Asian-American Village
  Editors' starter list for new additions to our annually updated, Villager-contributed APA Women's Wall of Fame feature.  This year, we kick off with our appreciations for actress Sandra Oh, writer Lan Samantha Chang, and political candidate Tammy Duckworth.  Send in your own nominations!
• Arts, Culture & Media Department and Archives