August 23, 2008 by me.

The idea of a calendar of sexy, hot Asian-American men isn’t new. In fact, back in 1995 I believe there was such a calendar produced, courtesy of A. Magazine (the pre-eminent magazine for Asian-Americans at that time, and founded by Jeff Yang).

Hindsight forces me to confess that even though I was really interested in buying a copy, I held off in the mistaken belief that the second year’s calendar would be even better (since any ‘bugs’ incurred in the production would of course be eliminated by then). So imagine my belated major disappointment when there was no calendar the next year!!!

I’ve had people asking me if there is a calendar of the “Hottest, Sexiest Asian-American Men of Chicagoland.” Right now there isn’t, but I can’t see why a calendar like this can’t be produced. After all, Asian-Americans now make up 25% of the student body at the University of Illinois at Chicago– and if UIC’s yearly Mr. Asian Sens-Asian Competition is any indication, there is no shortage of hot and sexy Asian-American men that can be featured in one!

So if anyone wants to pick up the ball on this one, by all means, go ahead. And let me know so I can spread the word…

Signing off for now,

Marie

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August 20, 2008 by me.

By now some of you might be curious for some info about our leading men.

So to start you off, here's a bio and headshot of the actor who plays

Leonard, our struggling actor:

Allan recently starred in a feature film by Split Pillow Productions,

titled “Eye of the Sandman,” scheduled for its Chicago release in the

Fall of ’09.  His commercial work includes spots and promotions for

Sprint, Harris Bank, Dave & Busters, Anheuser-Busch, and Eli Lilly.

On the Chicago stage, he’s been seen in productions with Victory

Gardens Theatre, Piven Theatre, Chicago Children’s Theatre, Rasaka,

and Big Picture Group, of whom he is a founding member and sits as an

Associate Artistic Director.  Prior to moving to Chicago, he toured

the country with the National Players, performing as “Tybalt” in Romeo

and Juliet.  He holds a BFA in Music Theatre from Illinois Wesleyan

University.  He wants you to know that despite his presentation in

Wingmen, in real life he loves his fiancé, Megan, and his shih-tzu,

Cole, very, very much.

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August 20, 2008 by me.

Besides YouTube and Google, our clips can now also be found on MySpace, Facebook and nelsok.com.

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August 19, 2008 by me.

So I finally got around to checking the results of the 2008 Chicago Comedy TV Pilot Competition and I just found out this year’s winner is “4 and a Half Terrorists” by Olive Films. Congrats to them and many good wishes for a great premise and the potential for a lot of fun (and enlightening) episodes!

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August 19, 2008 by me.

So two weeks ago I talked with a friend and former boss (we used to work together at AATV and since then he’s gotten a film degree and is actively working in the industry) about the possibilities of producing “Wingmen” for the overseas market as well as sister stations here in the U.S. He took a look at our pilot and compared it to our shooting script, as originally written. His opinion was that the original script was much better, that the story was clearer and funnier here as opposed to the story we had in the DVD we submitted to the competition last year, which played more like a dramedy than an outright sitcom.

So now more than ever I’m wishing we could have shot our pilot as written, because I do think we could have given the screening committee, the jury and our audience a fun night (and something to think about, besides)..!

Anyway, we’re still brainstorming ideas as to whom and where and when we can talk to people about “Wingmen” — whether this means reshooting the pilot at some point further on, or writing and/or producing extra half-hour episodes, etc.

In the meantime, until we find all doors closed to us from all sides, we’ll still be keeping on…

Perseverance, determination, and sweat, sweat, sweat!

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August 19, 2008 by me.

After more than a year and a half of delays, I’m glad to report that we have finally gotten our 3 clips from “Bubble Tea & Sympathy” onto metacafe.com, revver.com, veoh.com, blip.tv, YouTube and Google.

Thanks to Kyle Jenkins and Garrett Tam for your tenacity and hard work — we couldn’t have done it without you!

The final remastered version is about 2 days away from completion. However in order for us to air our pilot in its entirety, we still need to raise about $350 to fulfill our signatory agreement with SAG. So we’re hoping that as more people log onto these sites that we’ll be able to get this latest bit accomplished. And maybe even afford the licensing fees so we can include the songs we’d like to use..!
Gotta check up on a few more sites, now.

TTYL…

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August 7, 2008 by me.

Kind of hard sometimes seeing the proverbial forest because of those proverbial trees (i.e. ugh, we’re still running into problems because of music issues) so it’s time like these when it helps to breathe, take a step back and remember from how far we’ve come in order to alleviate my feelings about how far we have yet to go…

So to this end, it helps to remember that the Local Screening Committee made up of:

Kathy Byrne, Project Coordinator, Chicago Film Office

Elizabeth Donius, Executive Director, Independent Feature Project (IFP) Chicago

Jeff Hoover, Producer, WGN Morning News

Tim Kazurinsky, Screenwriter, Actor

Harvey Moshman, Senior Producer-Special Projects, CBS-2

Annie Porter, Series Producer-Image Union, WTTW-11 and

Steve Zacharias, Screenwriter, Producer, Director

…thought “Wingmen” scored high enough to merit a screening at the Music Box Festival last year before both colleagues and opinion leaders, and to be named a finalist and runner-up (for what will henceforth be known as the First Annual Chicago Comedy TV Pilot Competition - 2007) is an honor that we do not take lightly.

That we were given the chance to educate, enlighten and entertain others about the Asian-American experience, to open a window (so to speak) about the things we find funny about life and ourselves without (hopefully) resorting to tired, cliched stereotypes that do nothing to promote affection nor amiability between the mainstream and the soon-to-be majority minorities was (and still is) a fulfilling purpose.

So as we continue to follow-up on possible leads for the continued future of “Wingmen,” I’ll just finish today with one final thought:

Hey there, Chicago, Midwesterners, East and West Coasters, and the rest of this Big Blue Marble we like to call ‘Earth’ –

Youse ain’t seen nuttin’ yet. So stays tuned ‘n an’ stays cool, y’know whaddya mean?

Peace out…

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