The Fairy Princess just put her almost ten year old on the bus. To school. An elementary school. She did not want to, because even though she is located in a “Blue” state, far away from Texas, people get shot here too. Thus far, no children at school, but let’s face it – it’s a matter of time.

In the past two weeks, 3 Korean women were shot at their place of business in Texas, 10 Black American, mostly seniors, were shot in Buffalo, NY while shopping, a Taiwanese American renowned Sports Doctor was shot dead at church while trying to prevent others at church from being shot and 5 Taiwanese American people were wounded, and now…we have the latest in a long line of tragedies – 19 Children were gunned down along with 2 of their teachers in Texas. Those children were mainly Latinx, as is the area, which is called Uvalde, and it is fewer than 80 miles from the border between the US and Mexico.

The reason TFP cannot say “all the Children were Latinx” is because their names have not been released, and that is because the damage done to some of their bodies that the shooter aimed his AR 15 rifles at, are so torn by bullets, that DNA swabs of relatives have to be used to identify them.

That work is ongoing.

It is time to stop screwing around. As a friend would say, “It’s been past time‘, and indeed it has.

TFP reaches people all over the world – and by the by – the world thinks America is crazy. We, yes, make a lot of money as our global superpowerness reigns over others and we step forward to take the lead in so many circumstances – but the people ‘we’ vote for refuse to stop gun violence because the NRA pays their bills.

That is not taking the lead. That is leading with greed. America is leading the world in gun related violence.

Just this last month we have found out that the Republican party wants to take away body autonomy from people with uteruses and, it must be stated, trans and LGBTQIA plus folx, while reducing their legal rights. They want to rescind marriage equality. We hold on to ‘child marriage’ in most states, so that a young girl can be forced into marriage with the permission of her parents, against her wishes. Now we have 21 more deaths to add onto their growing debt against America and it’s people.

Right now, America is a farce because we have let a domestic terror organization take over the Republican party, one lobbyist at a time. We became so convinced that it really doesn’t matter who is in charge, that we were not vigilant – and we let people like the Koch Brothers and the NRA buy all our politicians – and they are complicit, because they allowed themselves to be bought. We watch idly as Tucker Carlson and similar dreck spouting off on FOX News incite hatred and then shrug when there is a result.

There is a reason these gunmen aim at targets that are innocent. There is a reason that they believe FOX News – which should be listed as a Terror Organization, and be banned, as it is in New Zealand. They do it because all along, with it’s colorful graphics and it’s ‘us vs. them’ logic, they have been ramping up to this for years, and they are too far along now to pull back.

Unless America pulls them back. Mothers in Red States, you have to take a stand – for your children, and for our children. Fathers in Red States, the ability to hunt with a single shot rifle is a skill – tearing a deer apart with an AK47 is a crime against nature, and a cowards way.

When a similar situation happened in Scotland, they took away their guns. Likewise in Australia. Likewise in every Western Nation. Likewise in Eastern Nations. All over the world, automatic rifles have been taken away via access to purchase and background checks, from people who could potentially decided to murder someone.

In other countries, people may write their horrid manifestos of hate, but they do not have access to get the weapons that can kill 19 children in minutes, before they themselves have been taken out.

America will do nothing. Ninety per cent of America would like these laws enacted, but 50 Senators in Red states decided no, they won’t. They like the paycheck. Maybe they got into politics to do some good, but clearly they stay because bullying tactics to them, feel good.

There will be the usual howling of grief, and the Democrats will try and pass laws banning the sale of these weapons. However the NRA wants those weapons available if they decide to storm the Capitol Building again, so they will not allow that to happen. All those people killed in the past two weeks have been People of Color.

TFP repeats – the people gunned down and killed in the last two weeks have mainly been People of Color. Black, Asian, and now Latinx. America will do nothing.

This is not fixable by minority people.

Caucasian people in Red States are complicit in this crime wave against Americans. They have voted for these Senators that refused to budge on voting for gun safety laws. Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Krysten Sinema of Arizona, who purport to be Democrats largely vote with Republicans.

TFP is going to say the part out loud you are not supposed to say…Republicans do not care about our deaths. Heck they fear our birth rates unless they get to take those children for their barren women and raise them to enact white supremacy from a body with melanin.

Republicans do not care about the deaths of Black Seniors going shopping, Asian women at work, Asian churchgoers, or Latinx Children. They shrug and think “well, let’s see you rise those population numbers now’, all the while forcing women to have babies, but refusing to vote to help them feed their babies formula. They want baby farms and guns, and they categorically do not care.

Therefore it is on you, White America – to decide you have had enough. To decide you do not want these stains on your conscience. These deaths on your hands. You did not shoot the gun, but you pulled the lever to vote for those who made it easier to get them.

To be clear, one shooter was Chinese (He had a white supremacist roommate, which is probably relevant), one shooter was Latinx, and one shooter was Black – only one shooter out of the four incidents this past two weeks was white – the one in Buffalo who slaughtered 10 people.

They all enacted white supremacy. The skin tones of the shooters do not match. What matches, is the access. They had access to weapons, they had access to vehicles, they picked a target, and they killed people. The targets they chose, for whatever reason, they had been lied to about, they had heard propaganda about, they had created terrible fantasies about how eliminating them will fix the world – they were all psychopaths, in whichever way they got there.

Yes, they are responsible for their own actions, and yes, they can ‘just’ be evil – not discounting that angle whatsoever. However the people who voted for Senators that hold us hostage, and the people who watch FOX News and quote Tucker Carlson – they allowed it. They continually allow it.

If you are a liberal leaning white lady in the South- it’s time to step up. You have to call ‘those relatives’ and you have to keep calling them till they vote Democratic to get you to stop calling them. If you are a liberal leaning white man in a Red State who has been largely quiet because you feel it is ‘not your place’, it is time to take your place. It is past time, plus- YOU KNOW, but it was not comfortable to you to have ‘those’ conversations, so you skipped them. You owe America at least 10 conversations on gun violence per week till we get these people out of office.

Let it be known and SAY it, ‘Oh, you vote for killing kids and seniors? Huh, would not have pegged you that way, but thanks for letting me know.’

You have to vote these Senators out. Parents must take the lead. Gay Parents, Straight Parents, Non Binary Parents, Trans Parents – PARENTS HAVE TO DECIDE.

America is relying on you. No doubt you will let us down – because you continue to do so, but perhaps you will surprise us.

When TFP told her child about the shooter in Texas, her child replied, “A teenager! Wow, he just gave all his goodness away then?”

It is not just him, my child. It is not just him.

TFP out.

The last few days there has been some news that has The Fairy Princess like…

Does this negate the fact that there are still crimes being committed against AAPIs within the lusty month of May? Most recently in fact – YESTERDAY…

Yes, yesterday...the day before today, 3 Asian American women were shot in a hair salon. In TEXAS. One wonders, if this overturn of Roe V. Wade had happened already, and one of those women had been pregnant, if she would have been prosecuted for being shot while pregnant. As we are, to the GOP, just baby makers creating a domestic supply of infants for infertile couples….Food for thought.

Thankfully, they will be ok.

Still, they were shot. In their place of business.

The police have yet to label it a ‘hate crime’.

The wheels of justice are slow to turn, and let’s face it, the wheels of the giant monstrosity that is the Entertainment World are even slower than that. Just when you think you have it figured out, things change.

An example is NYC having it’s FIRST AAPI parade this coming Sunday, May 15th! Starting at 10:45 am, proceeding down 6th Avenue from it’s start on 44th Street.

When you consider the first St. Patrick’s Day Parade in NYC was in 1762, and the first AAPI parade is this year in 2022….

Back to the biz…there was a giant dust up in television, with 17 shows being cancelled.

Nora from Queens, still on the air – Congratulations to BD Wong, Lori Tan Chinn and Bowen Yang.

Magnum, P.I., however, did not get the renewal!

Which seems crazy because it had great ratings…but it seems there was a disagreement between the studio that produced it and the network that aired it. This is why we cannot have nice things- so ‘we’ lose a show everyone enjoyed and all those filming jobs from Hawaii.

Sadly, Kumu, played by the brilliant Amy Hill, will not be back – but Ms. Hill will be heard, in the new Netflix series of Kung Fu Panda;The Dragon Knight, where she will voice the character of Pei Pei.

It is because these giant monoliths of networks and studios move so slow and then speedrace into a different moment, that some things seem to take an eternity.

Some are over before they have even had a chance to begin.

Like, as an example- WHY would ABC pass on the pilot JOSEP based on Jo Koy’s comedy? A sitcom about a Fil-Am Fam? Slam dunk! To TFP, anyway.

‘Josep’ Comedy Pilot Not Going Forward, ABC Hopes To Redevelop Project Starring Jo Koy

Read the rest of this entry »

The Fairy Princess wishes a Happy USA Mother’s Day to those who celebrate.

Whether your Mother is with you, is watching you from ‘elsewhere’, know that she loves you. If your Mother figure is not the societal norm, and rather ‘Chosen Family’, that absolutely counts and please call them and take them to Drag Brunch if you can.

Anyway, if you are a Mother, contemplating a gift they made at school, with the the myriad of conflicted thoughts about said gift and where it will sit and how long before it disintegrates – know that you are not alone, TFP sees you and acknowledges all you do, even if the Supreme Court Ultra Conservatives want to control your uterus.

By the way, you know interracial marriage and LGBTQIA+ rights are next, yes? It’s not just about body autonomy – that is just where they are starting.

Politics aside – we have a new (to general audiences) Television star, Mr. Raymond Lee, coming to us on QUANTUM LEAP, where he will play Dr. Ben Seong.

Here is what you need to know – Mr. Lee is a New Yorker. He has been working quite a while, in fact, TFP saw his work first at an AAPI Film Festival where he appeared in KTown Cowboys in 2010. He’s been in a few series before beginning on YouTube where he was in ‘Best Couple Ever‘. He did 2 episodes on SCANDAL, before landing several episodes of MOZART IN THE JUNGLE (TFP went crazy for that), in 2018 he did a show called HERE AND NOW, and then in 2021, he was a regular on KEVIN CAN F*CK HIMSELF. He also had a lot of co-stars and guest stars along the way – and Folks, that is how it works.

Now, he is starring on the reboot of QUANTUM LEAP which takes place 30 years after the O.G. star of the show, Scott Bakula, playing Dr. Sam Beckett, supposedly ‘disappeared’ and did not come back. So expect to see Mr. Lee bopping through time and jumping in and out of various people’s experiences. Congratulations to Mr. Lee and his team.

Also please remember this was not always a show where it was a ‘nice’ jump into a ‘nice’ person – there were a few hairy jumps for Dr. Beckett, and one assumes, there will be some for Dr. Seong – so not a WORD of complaint from us, get me? He is not part of an ensemble cast here – he is the LEAD, he is number ONE on the call sheet on a Network Show, and we have not seen that as frequently as we would like.

Remember DDK saying how chuffed he was to get to that point? Being the face of a show? That was LAST YEAR.

In regards to his role on “The Hot Zone: Anthrax“. The only other one who is that status, who is of Asian heritage, is Sandra Oh for KILLING EVE, which just ended.

FRESH OFF THE BOAT and DR. KEN are no longer on the air, so…yeah, this is a big deal.

Another giant piece of news is that in the MCU, Folks are no longer sleeping on the potential of Wong, played by British East Asian Actor, Benedict Wong, and what is cool is that there is a hashtag and articles already out.

Mr. Wong joined the MCU in DR STRANGE in 2016, participated as Dr. Strange’s sidekick in quite a few of the films and most recently appeared in SHANG CHI. If you are hoping for a spinoff series like Marvel has done for other characters – keep hashtagging and tweeting and ‘gramming about #WongForWong – apparently it is gaining traction enough that Mr. Wong felt comfortable sharing it on late night television.

Now since the CRA script kerfuffle has really been overwhelming the actual filming of the sequel of the mega hit, we have learned yesterday that the role of Astrid, played so wonderfully by British East Asian talent, Gemma Chan, is going to get her own spinoff. In the second book, TFP recalls it generally being about Astrid and her romance with tech guru, Charlie Wu, played by Harry Shum Jr.

(Legit, she kinda skipped around to read their sections)

This screenplay is being done by Jason Kim, he has an EMMY nod for the show ‘Barry’…and….he also has a Broadway musical opening soon – KPOP, which he wrote the Book for. KPOP opens on Broadway in October. KPOP has a book by Mr. Kim, with Music and Lyrics by Max Vernon, and Music, Lyrics, and Arrangements by Helen Park.

The story is a behind the scenes look at what it takes to be a Kpop star, and in fact, there are Kpop stars that are part of the cast. If you want to know anymore, you have to get your tickets.

Get them NOW.

The cast is as announced:

Luna, Julia Abueva, Will Brill, Major Curda, Joomin Hwang, Jinwoo Jung, Jiho Kang, Amy Keum, James Kho, Bo Hyung Kim, Eddy Lee, Jully Lee, Min, Timothy H. Lee, Abraham Lim, Kate Mina Lin, Aubie Merrylees, Patrick Park, Kevin Woo, John Yi

Welcome to the Broadway, Folks.

As we close out this blog today, TFP wanted again to point out, during May, which is AAPI Heritage Month of how all these opportunities that people are seeing happen, are the result of years of work.

YEARS of work – and not just by the individuals whose names are on the front. There are educators, journalists, executives, bloggers, casting – as well as Artists, of course. There are people who do graphs and numbers, who provided valuable stats- hey whaddya know – your Parents were right, everyone needs math.

Nothing happens overnight- even if the internet makes you feel it does. It doesn’t. You are on your own path, and it is OK.

Thus, to add to the collective fun and the joy this month is supposed to embody- please watch this trailer of the Jo Koy film, EASTER SUNDAY

TFP wants to give a shout out to Lydia Gaston, Rodney To and Melody Butiu – Good to see them set up to shine on the big screen.

TFP hopes you get all that My Big, Fat Greek Wedding energy, and a sequel.

There are tons of books for kids that have been in the works and have ‘dropped’ as it were – and children are the future (Though if grown ass people do not get it together, the kids have 30 good years, and don’t act like that thought doesn’t keep TFP up at night). If it is important that your kids ‘see themselves’ and of course it is, make sure you give these, and the hundreds of others, a look see and help your kids see that they are deserving of ‘space’ in the world.

Happy Mother’s Day, Y’all

TFP Out.

The Fairy Princess has been on a self mandated break – because frankly, watching AAPIs get attacked via news reports, almost every day in the past few months, has made her very wary of engaging in any sort of debate because she has been doing this for ten years.

Yes, 10 years!

In her TEN YEARS of breaking it down for folks, it is super depressing to note that however many people she was able to ‘reach’, there was a far greater number who hate and would do violence to her simply because of the way she looks or where her family has heritage, she really had to ponder the worth of what she does.

The only thing that kept her hanging on was that Warrior got another season and starts filming in July 2022.

Sometimes it does not seem like anything has been accomplished at all. However that is defeatist and actually, quite a lot has changed, and not just her blood pressure.

Do AAPI’s have enough people on Broadway to represent the AAPI population of New York City at least?

No. Not even close.

However we do have Shoba Narayan in ALADDIN, Zach Piser in DEAR EVAN HANSEN, Manu Narayan (no relation) in COMPANY, Eva Noblezada and Kay Trinidad in HADESTOWN, Andrea Macaseaet in SIX, Kelvin Moon Loh in BEeTlEjUiCE, Marc Delacruz, Eddy Lee, and Preston Mui in HAMILTON on Broadway, as well as several AAPIs throughout their touring companies. In MUSIC MAN we have Ann Sanders in the Ensemble. In one of the ‘straight’ plays on The Broadway, POTUS, you can find Dr. Ken’s Suzy Nakamura as the Press Secretary and Lisa Helmi Johanson covering the role of Dusty.

Whilst downtown at NY’s Public Theater they just closed THE CHINESE LADY by Lloyd Suh, starring Daniel K. Issacs and Shannon Tyo, understudied by Cindy Im and Jon Norman Schneider. The Public currently have on the boards, SUFFS with Philippa Soo, Nadia Dandashi, Jaygee Macapuguay, and Mia Pak as Suffragettes.

Not to mention, but mention must be made of Conrad Ricamora in LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS…

Plus, the cast of INTO THE WOODS at City Center, going up with a limited run till May 15th, has Ann Harada,, Albert Guerson, Brooke Ishibashi, Kennedy Kanagawa!

Ms Kristina Wong won the Lucille Lortel Award for Best Solo Show! For her show Sweatshop Overloard, about her Auntie Sewing Squad making masks during the pandemic!

Lia Chang, photographer , filmmaker, actress and archivist won the Prospect Muse Award for her excellent, artistic photographs

One also has to get excited about CITIZEN WONG at Pan Asian Rep in New York City – a new play about social activist Wong Chin Foo, a Gilded Age pioneer who was the first to fight US law banning any people of any race from the United States – imagine where we’d be now if he had not done that?

Get your tickets here: https://ci.ovationtix.com/252/production/1110862

Other news includes ….BHANGIN’ IT with a book by Rehana Lew Mirza and Mike Lew slayed in La Jolla!

The new workshop production of COME FALL IN LOVE, direction by Aditya Chopra, with book & lyrics by Nell Benjamin, Choreo by Rob Ashford and Associate Choreo by Shruti Merchant which starred Shoba Narayan and Vishal Vaidya according to little birdies, went amazingly well!

Let’s say that again – there were TWO South Asian Musical Theater Projects happening one right after the other….TFP has never been able to write that about Broadway bound South Asian projects.

It’s slightly better.

What TFP does keep reminding people is that change is slow.

She just said that to a group of students up at University of CT. You might really want to jump up and down and scream your face off because you are on a schedule and opportunity is running late – and feel free – but real and actual change is slow. It takes time… building a career in musical theater, just as it does in television and film. Not to mention, building it so that Executives trust you with their project…it takes building those credits one at a time, getting better at auditioning, honing the acting…nothing happens overnight.

When TFP first began this blog, there were no de facto AAPI Film or Television stars except Lucy Liu, Sandra Oh, Tamlyn Tomita, Daniel Dae Kim, Reggie Lee, Grace Park, Roger Fan, Sung Kang, Parry Shen, Masi Oka, James Kyson Lee and John Cho.

That was who was working.

Pretty much that was it.

Of course there were people who starred in films or who were on television shows who everyone predicted big things for, but the big things did not materialize in a lot of cases, and that’s not mean, that’s what happened. Guest stars and let’s be honest, mainly co-stars was where the majority of AAPI actors were relegated.

AAPIS got knocked down a lot – but we got up again, every time.

Over the past decade TFP has seen a lot of new faces – not a plastic surgery joke btw – some via reality tv, some coming from modeling, some coming from comedy, some from prestigious universities – the point is, there has been change and there will be more change. We will likely not ever be ubiquitous in the United States, but we will become more visible, which is all we are asking.

We have a diversity that is only beginning to be recognized – Rizwan Manji and Annie Chang on Peacemaker fills TFP with joy.

Ali Wong, Aparna Nancherla, Hari Kongabolu, Ronny Chieng, Romesh Ranganathan and Jo Koy make her laugh till she cannot breath and look, Jo Koy has a pilot that looks like it is being picked up.

Who does it focus on? Jo Koy’s family. So who is hired to play his family growing up?

Filipino American Actors! However, keep in mind, Jo Koy has been doing comedy for close to twenty years. This is what TFP means – he had to build his career – and now that it is going gangbusters, he has the opportunity to launch a show and help other Fil-Am Actors.

He has always been funny – America just needed to catch up.

That’s how it works. Same with Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson – it takes time, Folks.

To that end, and because TFP doesn’t want this part to be too ‘preachy’, she is going to ask you to celebrate AAPI Month by purchasing a copy of RISE for yourself and asking you to actually open the book, not just put it on the coffee table.

In here you will find, (TFP is very fond of pages 44 and 45), much of where AAPIs have been, and why noted journalists and bloggers and film makers who curated and contributed to it – (TFP mentioned pages 44 and 45, yes?)- predict greater moments to come.

TFP cannot show you better than to show you this book and request that you find out your past to foresee your future. You can follow the book on Instagram, to see signings and readings near you.

It was an honor to be asked to contribute – thank you Jeff, Phil, and Philip.

There is much to be grateful for – we can look to streamers and see ourselves!

It is exciting to see Bridgerton embracing South Asians in their storyline, and it must be said, very refreshing to see people with darker complexions being hailed in the storyline as ‘diamonds’ – because in Bollywood, they are not. HUGE. Everything that TFP hoped for when she wrote about the first season of Bridgerton.

The Daniels (Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert) have done a brilliant job relaunching International Film Goddess Michelle Yeoh in “Everything Everywhere All At Once”

May was looking ok – barring the attacks on the street and in the subways… and then few celebrities or their stylists seem to understand the concept of the Gilded Age and started putting their clients in their best Golden Girls drag (Mrs. Astor would have NEVER…), at the MET Gala…TFP was distraught

and then SCOTUS leaked…

All the while, a war is continuing in the Ukraine, the planet has 30 years to continue on if we do not change, and oh yeah, men will be completely in charge of female bodies if you live in a Red State.

That is correct – SCOTUS is planning an overthrow of Roe V. Wade, which grants people the right to a safe medical procedure, known as an abortion. Something that should not be happening, especially given the climate crisis the world is facing whether it wants to, or not.

The planet is dying. Read the report.

You can get all up in your feelings about this procedure, but TFP believes that if one truly did not want abortions in the world, then men would get vasectomies, which are reversible. That way, the man is fully in control of when he wants to procreate, and there would be no ‘mistakes’ because if one is taking care of one’s own reproductive health with authority and responsibility, there would be less unwanted pregnancies and less abandoned children.

Vasectomies are safe, as well as being about male health and thus will never be in jeopardy of not being covered by insurance. Nor will people who have uteri ever try to jump in and ‘mandate’ them in any way, shape or form – because people with uteri know that that ‘procedure’ is between the person with the penis and their doctor. Does not matter the reason for the procedure.

The Person with the penis has the sperm for full term, while the vessel…

In other words, men do not care about…hold up – Cisgendered Straight Men – do not care about access to abortion, because even if their proclivities wind up in an unwanted pregnancy, they can and do walk away.

Yes, there are some that care – if you are a cisgendered straight man and feeling attacked after you read this whole blog, trust and believe, you will feel the sting for all of twenty seconds – the rest of us LIVE there. You will be fine.

It is time for LGBTQIA+ peoples and Women and Indigenous People and People of Color across all boundaries to come together and vote.

Come together and fight.

Body Autonomy is first on the list, next is Marriage Equality, and your ability to gain access to vote.

There are no ‘both sides’ – we are past that, America. We have to get them out of power, we have to get them out of even having a dream of a semblance of power. We cannot mess around any longer – the planet needs change, the people need change, the future must change or there will be no future.

TFP is choosing violence for her first blog in a while – because she remembered to NOT act, is to let evil win.

TFP out.