California

Robert Ito

Robert Ito is a well-known film actor. Born in Vancouver in 1931, he began his performance career early, winning local singing, dance, and elocution competitions from the tender age of eight as “little Bobby Ito”. He also performed in talent revues in the community, both in Vancouver, and later in Hastings Park. He was interned […]

Alan Kondo

Alan Kondo was the first lead singer of the Asia Minors, an Asian Canadian top 40s rock band in the 1960s in Toronto. After leaving the band, he went on to study film at UCLA under Jerry Lewis, and became an editor for Visual Communications in Los Angeles. He edited Hito Hata, the first Asian […]

Tomo Hattori

Tomo Hattori is a literary critic. He is an associate professor of Asian American studies at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). He is most recently the author of The Monkey and the Colonoscopy Machine: On the Destruction of Racism and Stereotype in Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese and Level Up forthcoming in Growing Up […]

Kayo Jane Miki

Kayo Jane Miki is a violinist. Born in Nanaimo, British Columbia, she began her violin studies at age nine. As a high school student she earned her diploma from the Interlochen Arts Academy and then completed her Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Violin Performance from the Eastman School of Music. She has participated in the […]

Natsuko Ohama

Natsuko Ohama is an actor who trained under legendary voice teacher Kristin Linklater. She is a founding member and permanent faculty of Shakespeare and Company Lenox, Mass., a senior artist at Pan Asian Rep New York, and was the Director of Training at the National Arts Center of Canada. Ohama has taught at numerous institutions […]

Lisa Betts-LaCroix

Lisa Betts-LaCroix is a writer, speaker, actor and dancer. A champion of radical educational reform, Lisa co-founded of a network of 350+ families in the San Francisco Bay area who independently educate their children outside of traditional school; the group sets new precedents for community-based, independent learning for high-ability kids. Her Free Learning Dinner Salons […]

Eric Koyanagi

Eric Koyanagi is a filmmaker, writer and editor. He wrote and directed the seminal Asian American feature film hundred percent, which LA Weekly declared, ‘A bright sharp comedy-drama with funky retro flair to spare,’ and the LA Times heralded as ‘Winning knockabout comedy!’ He followed it up with the US-Japan co-production, Shadow Fury, a high-wire […]

Nobu McCarthy

Nobu McCarthy (nee Atsumi), born in Ottawa, Ontario, was an actress, stage director and fashion model. Her father, Masaji Atsumi, was a fashion designer in Japan and a diplomatic attaché stationed in Canada when Nobu was born. She was raised in Japan where she studied ballet. While living in Los Angeles, she was discovered in […]