Saving Marriage; Bill Ayers on his Fugitive Days

Mug shot from Chicago Police of Ayers

In our the next edition of Subversity, a KUCI public affairs program, we delve into two controversial issues this election season.

In part 1 of the program, we talk with two filmmakers, Mike Roth and John Henning, who directed a documentary, "Saving Marriage," on the ultimate success in Massachusetts to forestall a voter-ban on gay marriage. We'll ask them what lessons can be learned given that California voters will vote in November whether or not to ban gay marriage (Prop. 8) and overturn the state Supreme Court's recent ruling allowing it.

In part 2, given the controversy over Barack Obama's "palling around" (allegedly) with former fugitive Weatherman Bill Ayers (now a respected education professor in Chicago), we re-air portions of a past interview we conducted with Prof. Ayers. We asked him then to reflect on his fugitive days.

To listen to the entire show, click here: .

More online:

Saving Marriage web site: www.savingmarriagethemovie.com/home.html

Saving Marriage trailer: www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmjfKgnnCdA

Ballotpedia Proposition 8 entry: ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=California_Proposition_8_(2008)

Obama and Ayers:

NY Times:www.nytimes.com/2008/10/04/us/politics/04ayers.html?_r=1&em&oref=slogin (needs free registration)

NY Times Ayers profile: topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/a/william_c_ayers/index.html?scp=1-spot&sq=bill%20ayers&st=cse

Online Petition to Support Bill Ayers:

http://www.supportbillayers.org/

Pallin on Ayers:

www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/us/politics/05palin.html

Our 12 April 2002 interview with Bill Ayers on Subversity: .

Charlie Nguyen, Director, "The Rebel"

On our September 29, 2008 show, we talk with Charlie Nguyen, director/producer/writer of The Rebel, a period piece set in French colonial Vietnam that deals with a Vietnamese traitor in the struggle for national independence, with exciting scenes of martial arts. The film stars Charlie Nguyen's brother, Johnny Tri Nguyen and established actor Dustin Nguyen (21 Jump Street, Heaven and Earth) as well as Vietnamese actress/singer Ngo Thanh Van.

For Charlie Nguyen, a Viet Kieu (Overseas Vietnamese), the Rebel marks his return to his homeland. He also directed and wrote Chances Are and produced Finding Madison.

The film won the VIFF (Vietnamese International Film Festival)'s 2007 audience award at UCI among other awards.

The film will be screened Friday October 3 for free at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana in connection with a DVD release party; events start with a prescreening reception at 6 pm followed by the screening at 7 pm. Both Charlie Nguyen and actor Dustin Nguyen will be present for a Q and A.

The OC event is co-sponsored by VAALA. Founded in 1991 by a group of Vietnamese American journalists, artists and friends, Vietnamese American Arts & Letters Association (VAALA) is a community-based non-profit organization that seeks to promote and enrich arts and culture by, for, and about the Vietnamese communities. VAALA has organized numerous cultural events such as art exhibitions, book fairs, book signings, recitals, plays, lectures, the biennial Vietnamese International Film Festival (ViFF), the biennial Cinema Symposium, the annual Children's Moon Festival Art Contest and year-long art and music classes. VAALA recently developed smART Program, which offers free art workshops for non-profit youth organizations in the Orange County and Los Angeles areas.

Bowers Museumio is at 2002 North Main Street, Santa Ana 92706, telephone: (714) 567-3695.

To listen to the program, click here:

Remembering Third Party Candidate Peter Camejo

Irvine - On our 15 September 2008 show, Subversity remembers the life and times of third party candidate Peter Miguel Camejo, a Venzuelan American who died the past Saturday in Folsom, California.

Camejo, who was Ralph Nader's running mate in 200 in the presidential race, also ran for governor of california three times before. In the 2002 race he garnered 5 percent of the California vote.


As Ralph Nader remembers him:

Peter was a student leader, civil rights advocate, leader in the socially responsible investment industry with his own investment firm, Progressive Asset Management, Inc., and author of books on investment and history including Racism, Revolution, Reaction, 1861-1877, The Rise and Fall of Radical Reconstruction, California Under Corporate Rule, and his recent book, The SRI Advantage: Why Socially Responsible Investing Has Outperformed Financially.

www.votenader.org/blog/2008/09/13/in-honor-of-peter-miguel-camejo/

We talk with his comrades, including Matt Gonzalez, who is currently Ralph Nader's running mate in Nader's return bid for the presidency. Gonzalez, a former San Francisco supervisor, is a civil rights attorney in the bay area and Green Party activist. We also talk with Donna Warren, who was the Southern California Chair for Peter Camejo in the California Recall election when he ran on the Green Party ticket for governor.

Paired with Camejo who ran for California governor, Warren ran for Lt. Governor in November 2002 and 2006. In November 2002, she garnered almost 400,000 votes statewide.


To listen to the program, click here: .

Ping Pong Playa Director Jessica Yu and Actor Jimmy Tsai

Ping Pong Playa star Jimmy Tsai with his buddy, Andrew Vo, from Orange County

Irvine -- For our next edition, KUCI's SUbversity show airs a live interview with the director and star of a new Asian American feature film, Ping Pong Playa.

The comedic take on the travails of a basketball star wannabe who ends up becoming a ping pong paddler pokes fun at both mainstream and Asian American stereotypes.

The director (and co-writer), Jesscia Yu, is an established documentary filmmaker undertaking her first feature film. Yu's documentaryshort, Breathing Lessons: The Life and Work of Mark O'Brien, on a writer who lived for four decades paralyzed by polio and confined to an iron lung, won her many awards including an Oscar and an Emmy.

Yu is perhaps best known as the director of In the Realms of the Unreal, her riveting look at the life and erotic obsessions of "outside artist" Henry Darger, whose prolific art formed the basis of her documentary, shown on the PBS series, POV. Yu is based in Los Angeles.

Jimmy Tsai is both the star of Ping Pong Playa and a co-writer. A production accountant turned indie filmmaker and now actor, Tsai was production accountant on such films as Justin Lin's Finishing the Game and Quentin Lee's Ethan Mao.

A young actor from Orange County, Andrew Vo, then 11, also appears in the film as Tsai's buddy.

The film opened in selected theaters nationally Friday 5 September 2008. In Orange County, it screens at Edwards University Town Center 6 across from the UCI campus.

Our interview with Yu and Tsai aired Monday, 8 September, 2008, from 9-10 a.m. on KUCI, 88.9 fm in Orange County, Calif.

Film web site: http://www.pingpongplaya.com/.

OC Register:

Review: www.ocregister.com/articles/ping-pong-movie-2144278-review-comedy.

KUCI alum Richard Chang's article: www.ocregister.com/articles/asian-american-tsai-2145420-ping-pong.

LA Times review:

NY Times review: movies.nytimes.com/2008/09/05/movies/05play.html?em.

Fandango listing: www.fandango.com/pingpongplaya_115690/movieoverview.

To listen to the program, click here: .

Celebrating the Life of Prof. Lindon Warren Barrett: Remembering Lindon

Irvine -- On the 21 July 2008 edition of Subversity, a KUCI public affairs program, we commemorated and celebrated the life of Prof. Lindon Warren Barrett, who was murdered in his home in Long Beach 7 July 2008.


Joining in reflecting on his life and scholarly career are colleagues and students who knew him, both during his long tenure at UCI and, more recently, at UC Riverside, where he ended up last year. He was a beloved English and African American studies professor at both schools, and for several years, director of the African American studies program at UCI. His family in Winnepeg, Canada, has posted this obituary in the Winnipeg Free Press: Obituary.


Born in 1961 in Guyana, he migrated to England when he was just one, moving to Canada in 1966. He grew up in Winnipeg, earning his BA from York University, an MA from the University of Denver, and ultimately a Ph.D from the University of Pennsylvania in 1990. His Ph.D thesis was titled: "In the dark: Issues of value, evaluation, and authority in twentieth century critical discourse" (216 pages, AAT 9101135; .Callalloo

Faculty participating in the memorial program are Katherine Kinney, who chairs the English department at UC Riverside, and her UCR colleague, George Haggerty and from UCI, History Prof. Winston James, who was until last month chair of African American studies program here.

Former UCI Ph.D students Arnold Pan (now teaching at UCI) and Lelia Neti (now at Occidental College) will also be participating. Jamie Park, former UCI undergraduate student and now pursuing her Ph.D at UCR, will also be on the program.

We'll also be reading tributes from other colleagues and friends of Lindon during the program.


This special program was also simulcast on KUCR, 88.3 AM in Riverside County via kuci.org. Our appreciation to KUCR for this collaboration.


To listen to the program, without the music, click here: .


A podcast of this program is now available at: podcasts.


Corrected Sunday July 20: There is no public memorial service in Long Beach Tuesday; the family plans to scatter his ashes in accordance with his wishes into the Pacific Ocean.


On Saturday August 23 a Canadian memorial service will be held in Winnipeg, MB, Canada.

Other services are envisioned at UCR and UCI later in the fall.

The family suggests in lieu of flowers, "[b]ecause of Lindon's love of reading, if so desired a donation to the Winnipeg Public Library or a charity encouraging literacy would be most appreciated. WPL donation page.


Other links:


OC Register's College Life blog:

Radio Tribute to Slain English Professor Lindon Barrett (about this program)

More on Death of English Professor Lindon Barrett

English Professor Found Slain


Los Angeles Times:

Slain Man Identified as UC Riverside Professor


Press-Telegram (Long Beach):

Popular professor found slain in LB


Press-Enterprise (Riverside):

Professor found dead hoped for change at UCR


Ned Ragget's Ponder it All blog:

RIP Lindon Barrett


Facebook page:

Lindon Barrett


Police report:
Murder

Remembering Photographer Dolores Neuman

On the 23 June 2008 edition of Subversity, a KUCI public affairs program, in the first half-hour, we celebrated and remembered the life of photographer Dolores Neuman. The Washington-D.C.-based photographer documented social movements and the people within them. She was involved with CovertAction Information Bulletin (later CovertAction Quarterly), co-founded by her husband, Louis Wolf. She provided photography for "Northern Lights", a documentary about farmers in North Dakota, and Rob Epstein's "The Times of Harvey Milk," a documentary about the slain gay San Francisco supervisor. She was instrumental in promoting many independent films and independent directors. She was a founder of the Jewish Film Festival. She passed away June 5.

We talked with friends of Dolores Neuman, including Amanda Spake, former managing editor of "Mother Jones" magazine, and a writer and investigative reporter for national magazines and news outlets, specializing in health and medicine, environmental issues, education, food and drug safety, and consumer protection, focusing recently on post-Katrina investigations as a Katrina Media Fellow. She is a UC Irvine graduate.


We also talked with Janet Cole, a social-issue documentary film producer ("Absolutely Positive", "Regret to Inform," "Paragraph 175" and others) who had a close friendship with Dolores for almost 30 years.

During the late 1970s through the mid-1980s when the American independent film genre was first being coined and documentary films were initially being shown in U.S. theaters, Dolores was one of the first grassroots specialists in creative audience development: Working with independent theater owners and distributors to attract audiences to see such social-issue films. She worked with Janet Cole on two films, first "The War At Home," which they promoted together in SF and a few years later, "Soldier Girls".

Also joining in the conversation was another long-time friend, Rob Epstein, the director of "The Times of Harvey Milk."

See the obituary adapted from the Washington Post: "Dolores Neuman, 66; photographer, promoter for public interest causes."

See: Guest Book on Washington Post site

To listen to the show, click here: .

Earthquake Relief: Organizing to Help

Irvine -- On our show airing 16 June 2008, KUCI's Subversity looks at how concerned UCI students and others helped spark relief efforts over the devastating earthquake in Sichuan, China last month.

We talk with Wei Li, a UCI doctoral student in Social Ecology, who spearheaded a relief drive at UC Irvine, raising over $30,000 in just days. He also organized a candlelight vigil at UCI for the victims of the earthquake.

Wei Li was born and raised in Shangqiu, Henan Province. He graduated with a Bachelor of Business Administration from Renmin University of China (Beijing), after working as an undergraduate for the Chinese Young Volunteers Association. He begin his interests in environmental planning in 2003 by joining the MA program in Environmental Studies, University of Waterloo (Canada). He came to UCI in 2006 as a PhD student in Planning, Policy and Design, focusing on environmental policy and economics. He is currently working on a research project on how trees in Los Angeles influence house values.

Wei Li can be contacted at: mailto:%20wli3@uci.edu.

He is working with the Orange County Chinese Professional Association on handling further donations.

UCI news profile: Campus responds to crisis.

To listen to the show, click here: .