You’re cordially invited to a screening/talk on, “Becoming an Actress in New York”, by Yunah Hong & Esther Chae, on Friday, April 30, 2010, from 6PM to 8PM, at 25 West 43rd Street, Room 1000, between 5th & 6th Avenues, Manhattan.

Becoming an Actress in New York

“Becoming an Actress In New York” follows the lives of three young Korean American actresses (Vivian Bang, Esther Chae, and Jina Oh) as they pursue their dreams in The City That Never Sleeps.

We are given glimpses into their daily rituals and share many candid and revealing moments that further underline the drive and determination of these strong independent women. All three come from prestige drama schools and have agents. All three are Korean American, which further complicates their quest for parts. There is no Cinderella ending, which makes the women’s energy, professionalism and persistence that much more impressive.

Director Yunah Hong unfolds a rich tapestry of inner strength and inspiration that details the highs and lows of being a minority actress in such an unapologetic and merciless industry.

Yunah Hong is an award-winning video/filmmaker, based in New York City. She studied art history, photography and design at Seoul National University. She earned an M.A. in computer graphics at the New York Institute of Technology. While working as a designer in New York, she began to experiment with video. She has now made seven films, ranging in scale from a one-hour documentary to short experimental productions.

Over the past nineteen years since she became a video/filmmaker, Hong’s video/films have focused on women, and the arts. Currently, she is in the final stage of finishing a new documentary, “Anna May Wong: In Her Own Words” which will combine her previous experience of working in both documentary and fiction filmmaking to create a memorable portrait of Wong’s extraordinary life.

Esther K. Chae is an international award-winning actor/writer and academic based in Los Angeles and New York. Chae graduated from the Yale School of Drama with an MFA in Acting, the University of Michigan with an MA in Theater Studies, and Korea University.

Her numerous credits as a performer include TV shows Law and Order: Criminal Intent, The West Wing, ER; and theatre stages such as Yale Repertory Theater, La Mama, P.S. 122, CUNY/Martin Segal Theater and Harvard/A.R.T.

Her solo performance So the Arrow Flies, about a North Korean spy and the Korean-American FBI Agent who pursues her, was featured at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Ars Nova Theater Festival (NY), the World Women’s Forum (Seoul), the TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conference of which she is an inaugural fellow, and CUNY’s Martin Segal Theater and NYU’s Performance Studies. The play is being adapted into a feature film script.

This talk is free and open to the pubic. Please RSVP to this email with your contact information including zip code, or call our office at 212-869-0182/0187. Please be prepared to show proper identification at the front desk when entering the building for security purposes.

Note: Live webcast of this talk will be available online at www.aaari.info, beginning at 6:15PM EST. Streaming video and audio podcast (on iTunes) of the discussion will be available after the lecture.

For more details on this and all our upcoming events, please visit www.aaari.info.