JC
Nirali Magazine highlights Navi Rawat, an up and coming actress in her 20s. She is recently getting a lot of attention for her ability to play a diversity of roles (the New York Daily News just named her a “Hot Face to Watch” in its January issue). In this article, she discusses her mixed heritage […]

CVK
The New York Times reviews the new film “Face”:
“Face” takes a conventional culture-clash theme and gives it the kick (and hop) of a good music mix tape. In the 1970’s, a young woman in New York’s Chinatown (Bai Ling, who has the demure beauty of Audrey Hepburn) is date-raped and forced to marry her assailant […]

JC

OK, so Ashton Kutcher doesn’t get paid the big bucks because of his highly developed intellect. Sorry, that’s mean….but check out what he has to say about interracial dating. About.com prints an interview with Ashton from the Hollywood Premiere of “Guess Who“.
When “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” came out decades ago, it made an […]

CVK
Interesting that director Greg Pak was just talking about wanting to see Keanu Reeves play an Asian-American character one day. CHUD.com reports that Keanu will be playing Sinbad (yes, the sailor) in director Rob Cohen’s “The 8th Voyage of Sinbad.” No, it’s not an Asian character but he will be portraying someone of Arab descent–and […]

RN

Years ago filmmaker Cheuk Kwan was in Istanbul and came across a Chinese restaurant. Kwan had heard that the owner had actually walked from China. The discovery and amazing story sparked a life-long obsession that resulted in a 13-part documentary series that took Kwan and his crew to more than 13 countries. Kwan’s camera […]

RN

Filmmaker and musician James Spooner always felt like an outsider, and that’s not because of his piercings and bright red hair. Growing up in California and New York, Spooner was introduced to punk music when he was eight and fell in love with the genre’s energy, DIY attitude and rebeliousness. But as a black man […]

JC

Me! I admit I have become Mixed Media Watch’s unofficial re-make policewoman, but I just can’t stomach these ridiculous do-overs of classics! Forgive me if I am jumping the gun with my complaints, but…If it was GOOD, leave it *alone*. If it wasn’t broken, why make it WORSE? Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner will see […]

CVK
Director Eric Byler, best known for his critically acclaimed indie romance Charlotte Sometimes, will begin shooting his next project at the end of this month, and there are some big names in the cast:
Hi, I’m shooting a film called American Knees that starts March 21. Cast includes Chris Tashima (Oscar winner for Visas and Virtue), […]

JC
Mixed artist Laura Kina will have one of her pieces from Hapa Soap Opera displayed at the Korean Cultural Center as part of their 2005 Group Exhibition (March 11-24). At her site, Laura describes her motivation for creating the Hapa Soap Opera series:
My works draw inspiration from Asian film posters as well as European history […]

CVK

MSNBC reports that Eva Mendes was cast opposite Will Smith in the romantic comedy “Hitch” as a way to avoid the taboo of a black/white interracial couple:
Eva Mendes was given the role opposite Smith because the moviemakers were worried about the public’s reaction if the part was given to a white or an African American […]

CVK
Asian Media Watchdog, which along with Asian Media Watch is one of the leading Asian-American media watchdog organizations, and one of the powerhouses behind the Hot 97 “tsunami song” campaign, has posted a lengthy interview with director Greg Pak (”Robot Stories”) on their site. Greg talks about the state of Asian-American media representation, the positive […]

ES
Sort of not very timely now, but I noticed that Sandra Oh’s character in Sideways had a biracial daughter. We first see her in photographs on the fridge, where she looks black and Asian American, but when she appears in the flesh for the first time, a different girl portrays her. The actress […]

ES

“Bride and Prejudice” is opening today, and film critic Roger Ebert describes the director (and her interests)as follows:
“[Gurinder] Chadha, who was born in Kenya, raised in London, and is married to a Japanese-American, seems attracted to ethnic multi-tasking. Her “What’s Cooking?” is set in Los Angeles and tells parallel stories about families with Vietnamese, African-American, […]

CVK
By sheer coincidence, last week’s New York Magazine was chock-full of mixed folks in its Culture Pages section. First up was an interview with MMW Image Award winner Jennifer Beals:
After green-lighting The L Word, Showtime approached Beals about playing one of two characters: Bette, a headstrong, temperamental workaholic, and Tina, Bette’s slightly more well-adjusted domestic […]

CVK
Reuters reports that Raven Symone will star in the Lifetime TV movie “For One Night.” She will play a black teenager who, with the help of a newspaper reporter, braves decades of segregation to stage the first interracial high school prom in the history of their small town. “For One Night” (working title) is set […]

CVK
The LA Times reviews renowned black film historian Donald Bogle’s new book Bright Boulevards, Bold Dreams: The Story of Black Hollywood:
Heavyset and dark-skinned, with a beatific smile and nurturing demeanor, Louise Beavers forged a career playing domestic servants in such films as “Imitation of Life” (1934) and the 1950s TV show “Beulah.” But the real […]

JC & CVK
Media watchdog organization Mixed Media Watch announces that Jennifer Beals, The Rock, Showtime’s The L Word, UPN’s Girlfriends, and Verizon’s “The Elliotts” ad campaign are among its Image Award honorees.
New York, NY, February 9, 2005 — Mixed Media Watch, an organization that seeks to promote more realistic, three-dimensional portrayals of mixed race people, […]

CVK
The New York Daily News profiles actress Sophie Okonedo, nominated as Best Supporting Actress for her role opposite Don Cheadle in “Hotel Rwanda.” Okonedo’s breakout role was as a prostitute in 2003’s “Dirty Pretty Things.” (Thanks to Lee Swift for this item as well!)
1. Okonedo was born in Britain to a Jewish mother and a […]

CVK
Playbill reports that Jeffrey Wright is in talks to star alongside Ben Stiller in Neil LaBute’s new play, “This Is How It Goes” at New York’s Public Theater from March 8 to April 10:
In “This Is How It Goes,” LaBute trains his eye on a small town in America for what is billed as a […]

JC & CVK
Thanks to everyone who nominated our site for the 2005 Bloggies!
Mixed Media Watch is currently a FINALIST for the Best Kept Secret award, so please vote for us!
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