Fifteen years ago in El Monte, California, law enforcement officials discovered 72 Thai nationals confined in an apartment complex ringed with barbed wire, lured to this country with promises of achieving the American dream. Under conditions of forced labor and slavery, some of the victims had been confined for as long as seven years. A seven-member Thai family led by a ringleader known as the notorious “Aunt Suni” was apprehended at the scene. The story made national and international headlines as the first case of modern-day slavery since the abolishment of slavery in the United States.

Written by Los Angeles playwright, Henry Ong, “Fabric” is the only known dramatization of the 1995 Thai garment workers’ slavery case. Company of Angels, Los Angeles’ oldest professional non-profit theater company, in association with the Thai Community Development Center (CDC), opened “Fabric” to sold-out audiences and standing ovations this past weekend.

Fabric is presented by Company of Angels, inside the Black Box at The Alexandria, 501 S. Spring Street, Downtown Los Angeles, and will run through August 8. Performances are on Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Sundays at 4:30 p.m. Tickets at $20 can be purchased at www.companyofangels.org.

Founded in 1959 as an artists’ cooperative, Company of Angels recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, making it the oldest non-profit professional theater in Los Angeles. The theater produces works that reflect the diversity of Los Angeles and the issues the City faces.

Thai CDC was founded in 1994, one year before the El Monte slavery case, with a mission to advance the social and economic well being of low and moderate income Thais and other ethnic communities in the Greater Los Angeles. The issues of human trafficking and slavery are an integral part of Thai CDC’s work as a majority of trafficking cases involve Thai nationals.

FABRIC
by Henry Ong

Co-Directors: Marlene Forte and Tchia Casselle
Produced by Kila Kitu, Joyce Liu, Henry Ong & Deborah Geer
Assoc. Produced by Gregory Gately
Starring: *Jennifer Chang, *Feodor Chin, Jolene Kim, *Dian Kobayashi, Jully Lee, Rudy Marquez, *P.J. Marshall, Eddie Mui, *Diana Toshiko, Ben Wang, *Jeff Watson, *Andy Hamrick
*Member of Actors Equity Association

JULY 8 – AUGUST 8, 2010
Friday, Saturday, 8pm; Sunday, 4:30pm
$20 General
$12 Students & Seniors
Box Office: (213) 489-3703 / info@companyofangels.org

Lighting Design: Christopher Singleton
Sound Designer: Dennis Yen
Stage Manager: Amelia Worfolk
Set Design: Luis Delgado

Location:
Company of Angels
inside The Black Box at The Alexandria
501 S. Spring Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013

Want to check it out, L.A. folks? 8Asians is doing a ticket giveaway on their site this week.

Waiting in line at the Director’s Guild of America on Saturday, early afternoon, I overheard the couple behind me discuss what we were in line for.  “I am so excited to see her,” she said.  “We are so lucky to live in LA,” the other she said.  Yes, yes.  There are a few times (i.e., Sunday morning, trying to get from Los Feliz to Santa Monica) when I get so angry at this city.  (Seriously, why is there rush-hour traffic on Sunday morning?  Sunday!)  And then I remember things like my then-previous day (Saturday), when I was waiting in line and overhearing that conversation.  Yes.  So lucky.  Los Angeles.

You see, I was waiting in line to see Jane Lynch.  She was set to be on an “In Conversation” panel as part of Outfest 2010, the film festival dedicated to queer cinema (it wraps up later this week on July 18).  I was very excited.  Some of you may know this, but, for a variety of reasons I won’t bother getting into here, I run Her Name is Jane Lynch, an unofficial ode to Jane Lynch.  At this, I’m a little embarrassed (I am, after all, a 28 year old (somewhat) grown-up woman (girl)), but also a little proud (the site was voted LA Weekly’s Best Celebrity Fan Site of 2009, huzzah!).  Now, if you live anywhere but LA, the idea of breaking through the digital fourth wall and actually meeting an object of a celebrity fan club or site is a far-off fantasy.  Here?  Not so much.  You’re more likely to run into your favorite celebrity at brunch than your best friend.

Jane Lynch plays Sue Sylvester in Glee, but hopefully you know she has been in pretty much every television show since the early 1990s and in a great number of movies.  She’s a character actor, one that most people recognize but, until Glee anyway, most couldn’t pinpoint exactly why the feeling of familiarity was so strong.  After some 20-odd years of working in the business and being known as “That lady from…”, she now has two Emmy nominations, Outfest’s Annual Achievement Award, and a ranking (99) on the Guardian’s list of the 100 most powerful people in media.  If there was ever a case of someone working hard and finally getting the recognition they so richly deserve, it really is Jane Lynch.  On that note, wow, am I happy that Tina Fey continues to be awesome and get work.

So, along with the rest of the sold-out crowd in Theater 1 of the DGA, I was eager to see Jane Lynch in conversate for 90 minutes about her life and career.  And she didn’t disappoint.

She touched on everything from her family life (“My family was not very funny”) to being only one of two women accepted into renown Chicago theater comedy troupe Second City to parlaying her “authoritative butch dyke” aura (“let’s call it what it is”) into roles originally written for men (i.e., her role as the store manager in 40 Year Old Virgin originally was written for a man) to her Vogue video on Glee (“I was awesome.”).  The discussion was capped by a question and answer period, which I usually find a bit boring, because people who attend these things often have a scary stalker-ish knowledge of the subject at hand, and will ask fairly esoteric question that make sense only to the person asking and the person answering.  The Q & A period following John Waters discussion with Carrie Fisher, for example, was filled with all sorts of references and allusions I had no hope of making heads or tails of.  (By the by, the John Waters event was organized by Zocalo Public Square’s awesome series; if you can’t support the library directly, buy a ticket to any one of Zocalo’s fascinating discussions!).

Thankfully, this was not the case during this session – people asked questions we all understood (Carol Burnett called Jane after Emmy nominations were announced to congratulate her; her favorite Sue Sylvester track suit is the purple with gold stripes; and she thinks she landed the role of Meryl Streep’s sister in Julie & Julia in part because she was the tallest actress director Nora Ephron knew).

Now, I have never, ever been one to ask anyone questions during a Q and A period.  My friends often do, and that’s usually because they are way more ballsy, and way more informed, than I am.  That said, I found my balls somewhere that day (stuck them in a drawer somewhere) and asked her whether she would be interested in hosting SNL (imagine that, an actress with an actual background in sketch comedy, hosting SNL).  This is the one question that I receive most often from fans who happen by Her Name is Jane Lynch, so I thought I’d take one for the team.  Almost 3,000 fans on the Jane Lynch to Host SNL (Please?)! Facebook page can’t be wrong.  So, would she host if asked?  “Yes.  I’d be terrified, but yes.”  Hello, Lorne Michaels?  Crickets?

Celebrity culture is such a funny thing.  I think as residents, we try to eschew what we consider “touristy” faux pas’es: caring that Ashton ate at your neighborhood brunch spot that morning, becoming excited that Pink is standing next to you at Macy Gray’s impromptu concert at the Hotel Cafe, etc.  We think we’re better than that.  I think I’m better than that.  Nonetheless, that does not stop me from getting a little bubbly every time I see someone I recognize (the level of excitement is directly proportional to how much respect I have for them).  This is a thrill that can’t be quite duplicated elsewhere, especially when one does really respect the particular celebrity for what they do.  That is my Apple-level fanboy love for Jane Lynch in a nutshell.   To actually hear these talented people recognize their own abilities without inflating them, and talk about their work seriously, without a hint of arrogance or entitlement – that is a real treat.

Only in LA.

2007 Lotus Festival by Jodi

After being canceled last year for budgetary reasons, the Lotus Festival returns to Echo Park this weekend. This event, in which local Asian and Pacific Islander communities come together to share and celebrate their cultures, has traditionally been held in July when the Lotus Flower blooms. Echo Park once house the largest lotus bed in the country. Unfortunately, the lotus bed died off two years ago and while there are efforts underway to bring it back, there will not be any of the pink flowers to see. (There weren’t many in ’07 as you can see).

You still might want to take in the free festival though, which runs today and tomorrow starting at 12pm. There will be a variety of entertainers and lots of food vendors. There is a good rundown of what will, and will not, be happening at this year’s 32nd Lotus Festival on the Echo Park Now site.

The festival is today, Saturday, July 10th from 12pm-9pm and tomorrow, Sunday, July 11th from 12pm-8pm. Echo Park Lake is located on Park Avenue between Glendale Avenue and Echo Park Boulevard, just north of the junction of the 101 and 110 freeways.

Some rights reserved by Veronica Jauriqui, used under a Creative Commons license.

Sorry, kids. There will be no bitching about how tack the DWP’s Holiday Light Festival this year. No arguing about how bike or pedestrian friendly it should be. That’s right – Santa Claus Tom LaBonge has cancelled the annual event.

Unfortunately, this isn’t some sort of mandate against the DWP for rate hikes and an aversion to accountability and transparency, but simply a matter of practicality. From LaBonge’s weekly update: “Due to the cost and amount of time need to halt a major construction project – the installation of a major water line, the River Supply Conduit – as well as the installation of the new zoo parking lot, it is in the public’s best interest to cancel this year’s event.”

However, LaBonge still hopes for “an alternative location for this great, free, family-friendly event,” and to contact his office if you have any ideas. Heck, leave a comment below and will nudge his staff to keep an eye on this thread.

MacQ's Blue Velvet Photo used through Creative Commons license

Starting tomorrow and running every Friday in July (as well as one Sunday and one Saturday), MOCA and Cinespia are copresenting a Dennis Hopper tribute at the Silent Movie Theater. The series opens with a double feature of Easy Rider (in case you missed it at Hollywood Forever last week) and a free screening of The American Dreamer, the 1971 documentary about Hopper (because admit it, you’ve always wanted to see footage of Dennis Hopper walking naked through downtown Taos). L.M. Kit Carson, the co-director, will be present to tell first-hand tales of the madness. One fears to think.

The series ranges from the classic Blue Velvet (Heineken? Fuck that shit!) to the obscure White Star, about which Cinefamily explains:

Made in 1981, whilst the synth-pop takeover in Germany was in full effect, White Star has Hopper playing a jive-talking has-been tour manager who vies to take his latest Tangerine Dream-like discovery straight to the top of the pops. For hardcore Hopperheads, this is the major discovery of our retrospective: Roland Klick’s White Star is balls-out, mood-swingin’, pure, unadulterated Hoppermania, and his performance is ultimately so awesomely unfiltered it seems it almost shouldn’t exist.

What could be wrong with that, I ask you.

For a complete list of the films in the Dennis Hopper: Wasn’t Born to Follow series, check out the Cinefamily site, or watch the trailer below:

Sure, the 4th has come and gone, but that doesn’t mean you have to stop celebrating America.  No, no, keep the fireworks going strong with some sweet poetry, music, a little improv, and a lot of good food TONIGHT at Tuesday Night Project’s Tuesday Night Cafe at 7:15 at the Aratani Courtyard in Little Tokyo.  I’ve posted about the Tuesday Night Project before; simply put, it is one of this city’s longest running open, public spaces dedicated to showcasing local artists and beat-boppers.  Organizers of the Tuesday Night Project curate the Tuesday Night Cafe series every first and third Tuesday; as today is the first Tuesday of July (already!), there already is quite a lineup, from spoken word duo Bownstar to the quick wit of Room to Improv.  The Park’s Finest, whose marriage of backyard BBQ and Filipino cuisine epitomizes what America is about, will be on hand to provide the eats.

For those who can’t make it out today (boo), the organization’s 12th year birthday-slash-benefit party is on July 31st from 5:00pm to 11:00pm at the JACCC Plaza, also in Little Tokyo.  Pre-sale and student tickets are only $15 ($20 at the door).  The party will feature past and present Tuesday Night Cafe regulars and almost-regulars, as well as various performances and a DJ for those who want to step out in your dancing shoes.  All proceeds go towards supporting the Project and keeping the Cafe alive and well for next year.  So we can, you know, celebrate America all year long.

The Tuesday Night Cafe starts at 7:15pm; those who want to get in on some open mic action best get there by 6:45 to sign up.  The Aratani Courtyard is on 120 Judge John Aliso, between 1st and Temple downtown.

This little guy is gonna be just fine.

As you read this, the good folks at the British Petroleum crude-oil concern are hard at work in the Gulf of Mexico, making sure that the term “cajun blackened shrimp” forever loses its association with the culinary arts. Yes, in addition to roasting sea turtles alive and threatening the Gulf’s elusive walrus population, the current world leader in unmitigated corporate dipshittery is forever altering the seafood industry in the United States, by contaminating half the edible species in the Gulf with oil, and making us  all worry that the other half might be contaminated too. So enjoy seafood while you can; with the upcoming holiday weekend, the price of shrimp cocktail is likely to shoot up to more than $4.00 a gallon.

But the seafood industry has problems worldwide, and it’s had them since long before BP came along. Overfishing and unsustainable practices are damaging not only the populations of Earth’s most delicious seagoing species, but having adverse impacts on whole marine ecosystems as well. Soon the only things we’ll have left to eat are mermaid steaks and whatever gets trapped in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

But don’t get too depressed. The key to changing the world is educating yourself, and the perfect opportunity is coming up: Pulitzer-winning LA Weekly food critic Jonathan Gold will appear at the Skirball Cultural Center next Wednesday at 7:30 PM to discuss the future of the seafood industry with Michael Cimarusti, head chef at Providence (which I’m told, by people who have more money to spend on food than I do, is very very good) and Mark Gold, president of Heal the Bay. They’ll discuss how our eating habits are impacting the environment, and how we can better align our love of good seafood with positive environmental stewardship.

Here’s more info.

When I was growing up, my parents never took me to the dentist unless it was an absolute emergency, so I consider myself very fortunate to have had consistent, company-sponsored dental insurance for the past 10+ years. However, many people are without insurance and can’t afford to go to the dentist, even if it is an emergency. That is why the Hollywood / Los Feliz Kiwanis Club, the same people behind the Annual Pancake Breakfast, have partnered with Queens Care and the Hollywood YMCA to hold a free dental clinic for kids and teens throughout the summer.

The only problem: They need another 50 children (ages up to 18) to sign up before Monday, July 5 to keep the clinic open past the second week of July. That’s where you come in! Help us spread the word to families and organizations that can help. Parents will need to fill out an application (available in English or Spanish) before Monday, July 5.

For an application, please contact Robert J. Menz, President of the Hollywood / Los Feliz Kiwanis Club at robmenz31@yahoo.com or visit hollywoodlosfelizkiwanis.org for more information.

Coming back home from Boyle Heights earlier this week on one of what’s become my now-rare bike rides,  I was rolling under the Beverly Boulevard bridge over 2nd Street/Glendale Boulevard and upon seeing this ominous and intriguing image pasted up on one of the overpass columns, stopped to snap it (click for marginal biggification).

Wondering what the date signified, I got on The Google later on and learned something new : July 11, 1926* marks the date the Mexican Episcopate voted to suspend all public worship in Mexico bringing about a bloody 3-year-long holy war in Mexico known as the Cristero Rebellion that began when President Plutarco Elias Calles, a reported fanatic bent on exterminating catholicism, signed a so-called “penal reform” law that specified priests were to be fined 500 pesos for wearing clerical garb and could be imprisoned five years for criticizing the government.

Though more than 80 years have passed since the fighting ended and long-silenced church bells once again rang throughout throughout the country, such a violent conflict between church and state is a chapter of Mexico’s history that obviously resonates enough for guerilla artists to remind us of it today.

* Seeing as the only other events I found connected to this date are the 1926 German Grand Prix; the birthdates of actors Burt Kaiser and Patrick Wymark; and the release of the W.C. Fields movie “It’s The Old Army Game,” I can somewhat safely assume the Cristero Rebellion is the event the poster is referencing and its installer is remembering.

Winnie Holzman (left, "My So-Called Life") interviews Callie Khouri (right, "Thelma and Louise")

I know your secret. I know you’ve written a screenplay, and you have it stored somewhere on your hard drive.

Oh, wait – how silly of me. This is Los Angeles. Nobody keeps their screenplays secret. Even those of us who probably should. Like the claims adjuster for State Farm who’s written a screenplay about a secret agent who long ago was brainwashed by an off-the-grid coalition of Taliban dissidents and ex-KGB counterintelligence specialists to believe he’s a harmless State Farm claims adjuster with a wife who may or may not be cheating on him with his supervisor and a kid who I swear to god hasn’t looked up from his PSP since March. It could totally also work as a two-hour pilot.

If you’re that claims adjuster, July is the month for you. The Writers Guild Foundation (who I’ve blogged about before) is holding a series of panel discussions with working screenwriters every Thursday this month. Each panel will focus on a different genre, from action to horror to comedy to drama.

Panelists include the Duplass Brothers (who wrote Cyrus, which I’m suspecting will be one of this summer’s sleeper hits); Nicholas Meyer (who worked on scripts for several of the even-numbered, or “good,” Star Trek films); Mark Fergus (who co-wrote Iron Man as well as my favorite movie of 2006); Scott Frank (who wrote another of my favorite movies). All panels are moderated by Dan Petrie, Jr., who himself wrote Beverly Hills Cop. Other writers of other excellent films abound (City Slickers, Arachnophobia, Get Him to the Greek, and You Don’t Know Jack, just to name a few); visit the Foundation’s event page for more information.

You can order tickets via the WGF’s website, or purchase them at the door. Tickets are $20 per night, $10 for students. Until tomorrow, you can buy tickets for the entire series as well — it’ll get you a 20 percent discount if you want to go to every one. Panels start at 7:30 every Thursday, and are held at the WGF headquarters at 7000 West 3rd St.

This Wednesday, June 30th, Mark Frauenfelder will be speaking at Crash Space. In case you are unaware, there are semi-regular speakers on Wednesday nights at the hackerspace in Culver City. Mark, of BoingBoing fame among other things, will be speaking about his new book and the MAKEr culture as a whole. If you like doing things yourself, you won’t want to miss this.

Crash Space is located at 10526 Venice Blvd, Culver City CA 90232
Event starts at 8pm and is free for members, suggested donation of $10 for non-members.

Delivering food on bikes is so Peter Parker.  No, in this city, we like our food delivered in style – say, Vespa style, courtesy The Scootabaker.  Upon your order, Scootabaker Heather Wong bakes up cookies, tarts, and cupcakes and delivers them to you via Vespa.  This Sunday, she’s leading a Sweet Street Scooter Rally from one side of town to the other.  At 11am, Vespa owners will take the streets Critical Mass-style from the Vespa of Sherman Oaks and scoot across the city, finishing around 2pm at the Silver Lake record label company that brought us Silversun Pickups, Dangerbird Records.  For those of us (me) without Vespas, we’ll be waiting at the finish line for our rewards: Scootabaker, along with The Sweets Truck, will have all sorts of goodies for your consumption.  The ride and ensuing bake sale are all part of a fundraiser for the Pablove Foundation, an organization dedicated to funding pediatric cancer research.  This is an issue near and dear to Dangerbird’s heart – the organization was founded in honor of Pablo Castelez, the 6-year old son of Dangerbird Records founder Jeff Castelez who passed last year on June 27th.

It’s a rally, it’s a bake sale, it’s a fundraiser, it’s a great Sunday.  See you there.  I’ll be stuffing my face whilst innocuously trying to ride your Vespa.

Full details of the Sweet Street Scooter Rally can be found on the event’s Facebook page here.  Oh, Facebook, are you the Evite killer we all are waiting for?

UPDATE: If you can’t make it out the Sunday event, vote for them to receive a Chase Community Grant here.

Rad vespa photo courtesy Fire Monkey Fish via the Metblogs Flickr pool.

The 2010 Los Angeles Film Festival is well-underway, but you still have four days to partake in the diverse program of features, short films, and music videos. Personally, I’m a documentary junkie and have seen five so far that I really enjoyed. I’ve watched a lot of great (and of course, not-so-great) films over the past six or seven years of attending the festival that continues to change and grow.

For the past four years, the L.A. Film Fest took over Westwood for 10 days. It was so much fun the first year it was there, but declined a bit every one thereafter. Parking was always a pain, each year a theater closed down, and the entire area was clearly hit by the economy with more storefronts shuttered leaving little to do between screenings. I was very excited when I heard the operation was packing up and heading downtown.

View of Downtown from L.A. Live

I love Downtown L.A. and it’s been amazing to see the number of people attending various screenings. The festival is spread out among several venues including The Regal Cinemas and Nokia Theater at L.A. Live, The Grammy Museum, the REDCAT, Grand Performances at California Plaza, and one of  my favorite places in this city, the Downtown Independent. Parking has not been an issue and I’ve taken advantage of the free festival shuttle to move between theaters. I would be using the Red Line more, but am often hanging out until after it stops running. I was struck by this awesome view when coming out of a screening at the Regal. I hope the L.A. Film Fest makes Downtown its forever home.

I’ve ranted before in this space about the perils of irresponsible pet ownership; in short, if you don’t obey leash laws, YOUR DOG WILL BE EATEN BY A COYOTE. So leash your dogs, kids. Everyone knows coyotes are the Hannibal Lecters of family Canidae.

OK, so maybe that was a bit harsh. But never let it be said that I don’t alert you, dear readers, to opportunities for you to make your pets happier, healthier and safer. This Saturday the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Los Angeles (spcaLA) is offering a low-cost vaccine and microchip clinic in West Hollywood. The event runs from 9 AM to 1 PM, at 8300 Santa Monica Blvd, behind City Hall.

Microchipping is probably the most reliable way to make sure your pet is returned to you if he or she runs off (that dog was on a leash, right?); to microchip a pet, a veterinary technician will implant the chip — which is smaller than a grain of rice — just under the animal’s skin. Then, if your pet is found, a scan of the microchip will reveal that you’re the owner. The fee for this is $25.

The clinic will also offer a host of vaccinations, ranging in price from $5 to $15. For more information, contact the spcaLA at 310.676.1149.

CLARIFICATION: Yeah, I’m a bit of a dumbass. The event is NOT taking place at the Writers Guild Theater, which is on Doheny, but at the WGF/WGA Headquarters. The address I give below (7000 W 3rd St.) is correct, but that is NOT the address for the Writers Guild Theater. If you’re looking for it on Google Maps or Mapquest, just plug in that address and you’ll be fine.

I was never much of a Twilight fan. This is probably because I’m a 35-year-old man, and as such my daddy issues run more toward “crippling feelings of inadequacy” than “desperate need for a brooding hunky celibate vampire to come and take me away from it all.” But, hey, I liked Buffy, so who am I to judge Team Edward?

Now, hang on, Twihards: Before you start sending me angry emails about how you’re actually on Team Jacob, or how Twilight is totally different from any other vampire franchise for the following sixty-two reasons, or how boys are just generally icky, know this: Melissa Rosenberg, screenwriter of the three Twilight films to date, will be appearing at the Writers Guild of America at 7000 W 3rd St. on July 13. She’ll be interviewed by LA Times writer Gina Piccalo, about how her time as a writer on great shows like Dexter and The O.C. led to the vamp gig. The event is hosted by the Writers Guild Foundation, the charitable arm of the scriptwriters’ union.

And if you can’t get tickets, there’s still a bit of good news: The Writers Guild Foundation is offering tickets to an online audience. So if you can’t pre-order a ticket to the actual event (which you can do by visiting this page), you can still watch the event from the comfort of your own coffin, via WGF live stream. To get tickets to the live stream, go here. Tickets to the live event are $20; live stream tix are $10.

Oh, and I’ll be there! Not because I’m secretly into Twilight or anything; I’ll probably be working the door. So come to meet me, too. I’m exactly one thousand times less successful and famous than Melissa Rosenberg, but, y’know, still.

Visit the Writers’ Guild Foundation for more information on this event.