Asian American Representation in the Time of COVID

Diane Paragas is an award-winning writer/director and producer of narrative features, documentaries and commercials. In 2012, she co-directed Brooklyn Boheme, a feature length documentary about an African American arts movement featuring Spike Lee, Chris Rock, Rosie Perez and many others. The premiered on Showtime and went on to win the Black Reel Award for TV Best Documentary. In 2019, Paragas completed her debut narrative feature, Yellow Rose, about an undocumented Filipino-American teen pursuing a dream to become a country music singer. The film won over a dozen Grand Jury and Audience Awards and will be distributed by Sony Pictures theatrically in 2020. Yellow Rose made history by being the first Filipino American film theatrically distributed by a major Hollywood studio. Paragas is currently in pre-production for a bold feature documentary about a wrongfully convicted illegal immigrant called The Three Lives of David Wong that uses puppetry to tell its story. The film is being supported by Sundance Creative Producing Labs, the Bertha Foundation and the CAAM and IFP Forum. Ms Paragas is a 2020 recipient of the prestigious Creative Capital Award. She was also selected for Goldhouse’s A100 list of Most Impactful Asians of 2020 along with film directors Bong Joon Ho, Lulu Wang, Jon Chu and Taika Waititi and other luminaries from politics, entertainment and technology. Paragas is represented by UTA and managed by LBI.

Emily Ting is an award winning writer, director, and producer. Her first feature Already Tomorrow in Hong Kong  KONG, starring Jamie Chung and Bryan Greenberg, premiered at Los Angeles Film Festival and was distributed theatrically by Gravitas Ventures in 2016. Emily’s latest feature Go Back to China, starring Anna Akana, Richard Ng, Lynn Chen and Kelly Hu, premiered in competition at the 2019 SXSW Festival and was released theatrically in spring 2020. Previously, Emily was most known for her producing work, having served as producer on Ishai Setton’s The Kitchen, starring Laura Prepon, Bryan Greenberg, and Amber Stevens, and Stephen Suettinger’s A Year and Change, starring Bryan Greenberg, T.R. Knight, and Jamie Hector. She also executive produced the films Pit Stop, Land Ho! and Man From Reno, which collectively have screened at Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca, and Los Angeles Film Festival. She most recently produced Lynn Chen’s directorial debut I Will Make You Mine, which was selected for the 2020 SXSW Festival. Emily currently resides in Los Angeles and is mom to her twins Austin and Celeste. She is represented by Verve Agency and Black Box Management.

Michelle K. Sugihara is the Executive Director of CAPE (Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment), the pioneering non-profit professional organization creating systemic change in Hollywood from the writers’ room to the boardroom to the living room. She is a fourth generation Japanese American born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. She graduated with honors from Claremont McKenna College with a dual major in Economics and Psychology and a minor in Asian American Studies, followed by a law degree from UCLA. Prior to joining CAPE, she was an entertainment attorney, film producer, and adjunct professor for the Claremont Colleges’ Intercollegiate Department of Asian American Studies. A prolific public speaker, Sugihara speaks across the country on Asian Representation in Media and other topics. She is also an associate member of Cold Tofu, the nation’s premier Asian American comedy improv and sketch group. She teaches “Improv for Lawyers” and has performed improv internationally. Sugihara’s community involvement includes her roles as founding member of the Asian Pacific American Friends of the Theater, leadership team member of Time’s Up A+, Los Angeles lead for #GoldOpen, former Co-Chair of the Multicultural Bar Alliance of Southern California, member of PBS-SoCal Asian Pacific Islander Community Council, former VP of OCA-Greater Los Angeles, past president of the Asian Pacific American Bar Association of Los Angeles County, past member of Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles’s Executive Advisory Council, and past board member of the Japanese American Bar Association. Sugihara is a 2010 recipient of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association’s Best Lawyers Under 40 award and a 2011 recipient of Los Angeles County Bar Association, Real Property Section’s Outstanding Young Lawyer award. She was named a “Rising Star” in Los Angeles Magazine’s Super Lawyer Rising Star section from 2008 to 2014.