PBS Winter 2020 Press Tour Panel Biographies
Asian Americans Premieres May 2020 on PBS (check local listings)
Hari Kondabolu, series participant
Hari Kondabolu is a comedian, writer & podcaster based in Brooklyn, N.Y. He has been described by The New York Times as “one of the most exciting political comics in stand-up today.” In 2018, his Netflix special Warn Your Relatives was released, and he was named one of Variety’s Top 10 Comics To Watch. Hari has released two comedy albums, “Waiting for 2042” and “Mainstream American Comic,” with the legendary indie rock label Kill Rock Stars. He has performed on The Late Show with David Letterman, Conan, Jimmy Kimmel Live, John Oliver’s NY Stand-Up Show, @Midnight and has his own half-hour special on Comedy Central. He is a former writer & correspondent on the Chris Rock produced FX TV show Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell. In 2017, he released his critically acclaimed documentary The Problem with Apu on truTV. Hari is a regular on the public radio gameshow “Wait Wait, Don’t Tell Me.” Hari has also appeared on such notable radio shows and podcasts as “Fresh Air with Terry Gross,”” WTF with Marc Maron,” ‘2 Dope Queens,” “Morning Edition,” “All Things Considered,” “A Prairie Home Companion,” “Wits,” “Studio 360,’ and “Bullseye.” He co-hosted the popular “Politically Reactive” podcast with W. Kamau Bell and currently co-hosts “The Kondabolu Brothers Podcast” with his brother Ashok on Earwolf. Hari attended both Bowdoin College and Wesleyan University, graduating from the former institution with a B.A. in Comparative Politics in 2004. A former immigrant rights organizer in Seattle, Hari also earned a Masters in Human Rights from the London School of Economics in 2008. He was NYU’s APA Institute’s “Artist in Residence” for the 2014-2015 academic year. Hari was born and raised in Queens, N.Y. He went to Townsend Harris High School, and the school’s mascot, “Hari the Hawk,” was named after him during his senior year. (He sometimes fears that his greatest achievement.)
Renee Tajima-Peña, producer
Renee Tajima-Peña is an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker whose work focuses on communities of color, immigration, gender, and social justice. Her previous films include Who Killed Vincent Chin?, MY AMERICA...or Honk if You Love Buddha, Labor Women, The New Americans: Mexico Story, Calavera Highway and No Más Bebés. She also directs the multi-media Minecraft-based interactive teaching project, Building History 3.0. Her films have screened at the Cannes, Hong Kong, New Directors/New Films, SXSW, Sundance and Toronto international film festivals and the Whitney Biennial. She has been awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship, USA Broad Fellowship, Alpert Award in the Arts for Film/Video, a Peabody and a duPont- Columbia Award. Tajima-Peña teaches social documentary at UCLA, where she is a professor of Asian American Studies, the director of the Center for EthnoCommunications and holds an endowed chair in Japanese American Studies. She was the founding faculty of the UC Santa Cruz Graduate Program in Social Documentation and the inaugural Filmmaker-in-Residence of the International Documentary Association. Tajima-Peña has a long history of media and community and student activism.
Tamlyn Tomita, actress and series narrator
Tamlyn Tomita is an Okinawan/Japanese/Filipina- American actress. She made her screen debut in The Karate Kid Part II and has appeared in leading and supporting roles in the films Come See the Paradise, The Joy Luck Club, Picture Bride, and Four Rooms. She can currently be seen as Allegra Aoki in ABC's The Good Doctor. Tamlyn has played in independent films and other foreign and Hollywood productions such as The Day After Tomorrow, The Eye, Tekken, the Brazilian drama Gaijin 2: Love Me as I Am, Robot Stories, Only the Brave, Real Artists, The Ningyo, First World Problems, The Unbidden, Daddy and Operation: Marriage. Over her career, Tamlyn has also appeared in several TV productions including: Quantum Leap; Living Single; Highlander; Murder, She Wrote; Chicago Hope, Will & Grace, The Shield, Strong Medicine, The Mentalist, Women's Murder Club; Monk; Private Practice; Zoo; CSI: Miami; Touch; Criminal Minds; NCIS: Los Angeles; Bones; and Counterpart, among other dramas and comedies. She has also appeared in recurring roles on the soap operas Santa Barbara, General Hospital and Days of Our Lives. She has had recurring roles on shows including: Crossing Jordan, 24, Eureka, Heroes, Glee, Resurrection, Chasing Life, True Blood, How to Get Away with Murder, and most recently, Amazon's The Man in the High Castle. A series regular appearing on the The Burning Zone; and the Epix drama series Berlin Station, Tamlyn will be seen in two yet-to-be announced series in winter/spring 2020.