U.S.A.
February 18, 2019
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 7
Tadashi Shoji ups the glam in
lace, sequin, and velvet gowns
Female directors of color
find a spotlight at Sundance
By Lindsey Bahr
By Leanne Italie
AP Film Writer
The Associated Press
ARK CITY, Utah
— Hollywood has
an abysmal track
record of hiring women of
color to direct its biggest
features. But at the 2019
Sundance Film Festival,
they’ve been behind some
of the buzziest films and
secured some of the biggest
distribution deals.
Gurinder
Chadha’s
Blinded by the Light has
been bought by New Line
for $15 million and Nisha
Ganatra’s Late Night,
written by and starring
Mindy Kaling, has been
acquired
by
Amazon
Studios for $13 million.
Lulu
Wang’s
The
Farewell has also gone for
$6 million to A24. Wang
says although she thinks of
herself as a filmmaker
first, that she does feel a
responsibility to represent
EW YORK —
Tadashi
Shoji
mixed
plus-size
models with the usual
ultra-thin ones at New
York Fashion Week, rolling
out evening gowns with
high slits, capes, and sari
influences in deep reds and
blues, along with classic
black.
Some of his touches were
an ode to a favorite
vacation spot, Southeast
Asia, along with the monks
of his religion, Buddhism,
the designer said in a
backstage interview.
“All the culture, history,
architecture,
costume.
Those kind of stuff inspire
me,” Shoji said.
He elevated the glam
factor with sequins, lace,
and velvet. A one-shoulder
gown in a silver and black
print fell just below the
knee in front but trailed on
the runway in the back in
grand fashion. He paired it
with black evening gloves.
Other looks were tiered,
including a pale pink
confection that fell off the
shoulder. Another was lace
on top in long sleeves and
an exposed neck with an
ombre effect below the
waist that turned from
black to a burnt orange at
the hem.
P
N
DIVERSE DIRECTORS. Lulu Wang poses for a portrait to promote
her film The Farewell during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah.
Among the 1,200 top films of the past 12 years, female directors of color
are in the single digits, with only five black females, three Asian females,
and one Latina, according to a study by USC Annenberg’s Inclusion Initia-
tive. But the 2019 Sundance Film Festival proved to be a referendum on
the dismal industry statistics. (Photo by Taylor Jewell/Invision/AP)
because there are still so
few Asian-American fe-
q
male directors getting their
films made.
Stanford probes faculty ties to China gene-edited baby work
By Marilynn Marchione
AP Chief Medical Writer
S
tanford University has started a
review of interactions that some
faculty members had with He
Jiankui (HUH JEEN-qway), the Chinese
scientist who claims to have helped make
gene-edited babies. A school official said a
review is underway.
Several professors including He’s former
research adviser have said they knew or
strongly suspected He wanted to try gene
editing on embryos intended for preg-
nancy.
The work has been widely criticized
since November, when He revealed the
births of twins whose DNA he said he
altered. Most scientists think gene editing
for reproductive purposes is too risky to be
tried yet because of the danger of harming
other genes and because the DNA changes
may be passed to future generations.
SHOJI SHOW. Model Shi Quing Wang attends the Tadashi Shoji Run-
way Show at Spring Studios during New York Fashion Week in New York.
(Photo by Brent N. Clarke/Invision/AP)
He mixed satin and vel- year, still gets a thrill when
vet
for
another celebrities don his clothes.
one-shoulder gown with a They
include
Octavia
full train and matching Spencer, Michelle Obama,
evening gloves. A bright and Katy Perry.
red gown included a
“It’s so exciting,” he said
crossover sash. He went of seeing his creations on
full silver sequins for red carpets and during
another look worthy of a Obama’s events as first
red carpet.
lady. “I’m very fortunate.”
Shoji, who lives in
AP writer Jill Dobson in New
York contributed to this report.
Shanghai about half the
Strangers’ suspicions rankle parents of mixed-race children
By Jonathan J. Cooper
The Associated Press
P
HOENIX — Amberkatherine
DeCory carried photos of her
daughter’s birth certificate in her
diaper bag in case she had to prove that the
lighter-skinned girl was really hers.
Cydnee Rafferty gives her husband a letter
explaining that he has permission to travel
with their five-year-old biracial daughter.
Families like theirs were not surprised
when they heard that Cindy McCain had
reported a woman to police for possible
human trafficking because the widow of
senator John McCain saw her at the
airport with a toddler of a different
ethnicity. Officers investigated and found
no evidence of wrongdoing.
Parents whose children have a different
complexion say they regularly face
suspicion and the assumption that they
must be watching someone else’s kids.
“This is a problem that, to be frank,
well-meaning white people get themselves
into,” said Rafferty, who is African
American and whose husband is white.
“They think, ‘If it doesn’t make sense to me
it must not be right.’”
After McCain’s report, Rafferty posted
to Twitter a selfie of her with her two
children, ages five and five months.
TALKING STORY IN
ASIAN AMERICA
“I know they don’t look like me, but I
assure you, I grew them in my belly,”
Rafferty wrote to McCain.
McCain claimed on Phoenix radio
station KTAR that the woman was waiting
for a man who bought the child to get off a
plane and that her January 30 report to
police had stopped the trafficking. She
urged people to speak up if they see
anything odd.
“I came in from a trip I’d been on,”
McCain said. “I spotted — it looked odd —
it was a woman of a different ethnicity
than the child, this little toddler she had.
Something didn’t click with me. I tell
people ‘trust your gut.’”
She said she spoke about her suspicions
with police “and they went over and
questioned her. And, by god, she was
trafficking that kid.”
Phoenix Police Sgt. Armando Carbajal
confirmed that McCain requested a
welfare check on a child at the airport, but
said officers found “no evidence of criminal
conduct or child endangerment.”
McCain has declined interview requests
and has not said if anything besides the
difference in ethnicity led her to suspect
trafficking. A spokesman for the McCain
Institute for International Leadership at
Arizona State University said McCain was
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Polo’s “Talking Story”
column will return soon.
“only thinking about the possible
ramifications of a criminal act, not the
ethnicity of the possible trafficker.”
After police debunked her claim,
McCain reiterated the importance of
speaking up when something looks wrong.
“I apologize if anything else I have said
on this matter distracts from ‘if you see
something, say something,’” she wrote on
Twitter.
Rafferty, a 38-year-old New Yorker, was
surprised that McCain, who adopted a
daughter from Bangladesh, would make
the same something’s-not-right assump-
tion that mixed-race families grapple with
constantly. It’s not always summoning the
police. Other, more common ways of
calling out the differences sting too.
For Rafferty, the questions are
frustrating and offensive: “Whose baby is
that?” from a woman in the grocery store.
“Where’s her beautiful golden skin and
curly hair?” from a client at the office, who
had a distinct idea of how a biracial child
should look. “You’re the ...?” followed by a
pause for her to fill in the blank with
“mom.”
And if she pushes a stroller on Manhat-
tan’s Upper West Side, everyone assumes
she’s the nanny. At the park, neither the
mothers nor the caregivers know whether
Portland
Housing
Bureau
Interpretation services available
to embrace her in their camp.
DeCory, a 38-year-old police officer
outside
Minneapolis
who
has
African-American and Native-American
ancestry, said the anxiety between mom
and baby is a constant challenge for
mixed-race families that isn’t talked about
enough.
She recalls being haunted by a terrifying
vision she couldn’t shake: Someone would
question whether she was truly the mother
of her daughter, and she wouldn’t be able
to prove it. She’d imagine her daughter,
Mila, being placed between her and a
white woman while someone in authority
watched to see which way she crawled.
Until her daughter could speak, DeCory
carried her birth certificate and even a
photo of her giving birth, just in case she
had to prove that her light-haired,
blue-eyed child was truly her own. As Mila
has gotten older, her hair has darkened.
She’s now 11.
DeCory didn’t face the same anxieties
with her other two children, who have
darker skin closer to her own.
“I would get anxiety going out with her
in public,” DeCory said. “I was very
reluctant to breastfeed her in public or do
anything that would draw attention to
me.”
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