#NerdsUnite: The Ramblings of a Raconteuse (How “Harold and Kumar” Changed My Life. Seriously.)

<editorsnote> Nerds, meet my buddy Helenna. We met on twitter this week, and she's totes mcgotes one rad chiquita banana with a flare for all things flair! That's right, Helenna here is what we call an artsy fartsy nerd. She's a poet, into all things dramatic arts, and she's going to come on board to write each week about her love of said drama. Well not like actual drama drama, like some cat fight shit - but you get the idea.

I only have one thing left to say ... HIT IT HELENNA!!! </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @Helslevy

It’s no secret I am a “fan girl.”  Perhaps too much at times.  When I find something I love I kind of freak out about it and want everyone I know to experience its awesomeness.  Whether it be a new food, a song, a great website, clothing, place, director, writer, film….you name it…if I love it, I’ll probably rave about it to the point of exhaustion, just so that someone else can experience that same joy.

Now, many of you know about my love for Harold and Kumar, but for those of you who don’t, here’s the back story…

I had just graduated from theater school and was planning my move from Vancouver, BC to Los Angeles with my at the time boyfriend, now husband, Barry W. Levy.  We were sitting with our cats on the couch watching a rented DVD of Harold and Kumar Go to Whitecastle. Yes, DVDs were cool in 2004, in fact I was still watching movies on VHS, actually I still watch movies on VHS, but I digress.  Watching Harold and Kumar was the moment that everything shifted for me.

It was the first time I had seen lead minority characters in a comedic film ever.  And not only were they minorities, but they weren’t “acting like” your typical minority characters in Hollywood films with accents and smothered in stereotypes…or rather…these two characters and this whole film, took the stereotypes, threw them into a big bag, shook it around, and then puked them back out at you. 

Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle and it’s creators Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg = Brilliance.

Now, going back to how they changed my life. 

Although I spent time living in Singapore and the Philippines until I was five, once we moved to British Columbia, Canada, the majority of my childhood was spent as the only “minority” in school.  In fact, when I was 7 years old the girl who was supposed to be my best friend and I got in a fight.  While standing in the classroom right after recess, she made some pretty nasty comments about me based on the color of my skin, words that no 7 year old could think up on their own, and I cried in the cloak room for a good twenty minutes.

This was the moment that I realized I was different.  Until then I had never even thought about the color of my skin or how I was perceived by others, but that was a harsh and surprising slap in the face.

During the rest of my elementary school years and high school, I was still one of the only “different”  faces in the whole town.  This never really bothered me however, in fact I never even gave it much thought, but I did always wonder why all of the shows I was watching and all of the movies I went to see, had so few people who looked like me.

Fast forward to sitting on our couch watching Harold and Kumar.  Suddenly, there were two characters who acted just like everyone else I knew and who weren’t in a film specifically made for Asian Americans or Indian Americans etc… they just were two dudes living their hilarious lives.  And “hilarious” was also a word that altered the course of things for me…

I had spent a lot of time in theater school delving into the darker side of myself, writing intense poetry, and loving artsy fartsy foreign films by people like Bertolucci.  I joke a lot that the intense “Russian/German side of me” and my “bright playful Filipino side” are always at odds with one another pulling me in two different directions as an artist and as a person.  While I always liked comedy, I never really considered it something that I would pursue because I always felt “most alive” doing gritty dramatic stuff.  That is until Harold and Kumar planted the comedic seed in me.  I started watching a lot of comedies.  I started re-watching comedies.  I decided that I would open myself up to the possibility that comedy would be a genre that I would pursue further. 

Fast forward to 7 years later.  One of my missions has been to be one of the many female faces on television and in films that help shift the stereotype just like Harold and Kumar did for me.  My hope is that there will be a little girl or young woman sitting at home watching something that I’m in whether it be film, tv, or web, and think “oh wow she looks just like me, I can do that.”  

While the visibility of minority faces in Hollywood has changed a lot in the past decade or so, I think there is still a lot of work to be done, and I am incredibly proud to be in the next crop of actors who can hopefully blow the top off of this box, and help more minority women rise to leading roles in film, tv, and the web, specifically in comedies. 

I myself am doing what I can to help this shift.  In 2008 I created The Day Player to show case my comedic ability as well as Helenna’s Tinseltown Tuesdays which kept me on track and accountable.  My husband and I have a couple of projects in development as well as many seeds of ideas that are just starting to sprout.  As an actress, I’ll be popping in to a neighborhood theater near you in a small role in next year’s American Reunion directed by Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg (yes, in connecting the dots, this is a “life coming full circle event”).   All in all, I am going to keep going on the quest that Harold and Kumar started me on and enjoy every minute of it.

Thank you Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg for creating a franchise that ignited a fire in me.  I owe you both some White Castle.  Although, my next quest might be to get a vegan burger into that joint, but again, I digress….

xooxox
hels

P.S. A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas is now in theaters and it is epicly HILARIOUS.  In fact, my face hurt from smiling so much.  Go and see it, your funny bone will thank you.

#nerdsunite

Want more from Helenna? Check out her site over yonder! and drop her a follow on the twitter!