An Interview with Kit Yan
Last month, Kit Yan was the East Meets Words open mic featured performer. He read and spit a few pretty amazing pieces. While we weren’t able to record his performance, you can listen to many of the previous open mics sponsored by the Boston Progress Arts Collective by selecting “Podcasts” in the Categories pull-down menu in the sidebar.
Though we didn’t record the open mic, we did have an opportunity to meet with Kit a week before the open mic. He came by the East Meets West Bookstore in Cambridge and I was lucky enough to talk to him for a few minutes about his art, his family, and his inspirations.
When you listen to this interview, imagine that you have the power to bend the space-time continuum like Hiro Nakamura from the show “Heroes” on NBC. That way, when you hear Kit refer to September 14 as though it hasn’t happened yet, you won’t get freaked out. Just pretend that you happened to have zipped back into the past.
Speaking of Hiro Nakamura, did you know that Masi Oka, the actor who plays Hiro was featured in a Time Magazine article about Asian American smart kids. That whole story smells like someone idealizing the Asian American minority group. Masi Oka was most recently a computer engineer for Sony… before he hit the big time. Maybe an engineer like me could one day be an actor like him. Or be better.
That was a total digression. I hope you enjoy the interview. Thanks to Kit for being so candid. If you liked his pieces, he’s performing in Boston at the 2007 BASIC Conference being held at Harvard University on October 13, 2007.
Last 5 posts by eugene
- East Meets Words Open Mic featuring BROWNSTAR - July 3rd, 2009
- In Memory of Professor Ronald Takaki - May 28th, 2009
- Open Orchestra-ing With Us and With You - April 8th, 2009
- Stage Presence: Conversations on Filipino American Performing Artists - March 31st, 2009
- East Meets Words Featuring Kevin So - March 25th, 2009
i had heard he was the kid on the cover of that infamous time article, which along with the moynihan report did a lot to skew america’s understanding of the realities of immigration from asia, which we are still not over.
kit is fire!