On the 19 November 2007 edition of Subversity, a KUCI public affairs program, we discuss the nature of cultural work, new media (such as streaming video) and why screenwriters are currently on strike. We talk with Tony Bui ("Three Seasons"), a screenwriter-director, who is actively participating in the current Writers Guild of America strike, and with Sylvia Martin, a UC Irvine Ph.D student in anthropology, who has been doing field observation of the writers' strike and offers an ethnographic analysis of the picketing.
Tony Bui directed and wrote "Three Seasons," shot in Vietnam and starring Harvey Keitel. He also co-wrote and produced "Green Dragon", which his brother, Timothy Bui, directed. Airlifted out of Vietnam at age two, Tony Bui studied film at Loyola Marymount University and shot his thesis short, "Yellow Lotus" in Vietnam. His developed his screenplay for "Three Seasons" at the Sundance Filmmakers and Screenwriters Lab, with the film later winning at the Sundance Festival both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award. On the show, he addresses the importance of solidarity with striking screenworkers and the growing numbers of Asian American screenwriters in the guild.
Sylvia J. Martin is writing her dissertation in anthropology at UCI on media industries. She has conducted ethnographic research of the production process of commercial film and television programs in the Hollywood and Hong Kong media industries. Her fieldwork experience includes working at a film and television production company at Warner Bros. Studio and observing on the set of numerous films and television shows, even working as an "extra". Prior to graduate school, Sylvia worked on over a dozen National Geographic Television Specials and in visual effects in feature films.
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