Multicultural Monologues for Young Actors

Most High School Drama and filmmaking classes don't target multicultural themes. A close critique "On the making of" and reading the script of youth Hmong (untrained) actors in Clint Eastwood's "Gran Torino (08)" is a case-in-point. While a local, first-time Minneapolis Anglo screenwriter, Nick Schenk, wrote the dialog, ethnic film school aficionados have said that the dialog was not delivered using the Hmong lyrical idiom characteristic of their language. Essentially Hmong actors were winging dialog as nuevo-Americans in many scenes. Slaight and Sharrar's book of Monologues is a giant legitimizing step towards encouraging the next generation of actors needed for the emerging Multiculturalism genre. Mainstream youth directors and screenwriters can use the essence of this pioneering book harbinging advanced ethnic themes which can better bridge to the mainstream American audience as well as preserve the linguistic heritage. In short, use the ethnic foundation and go beyond Paul Haggis's "Crash (05)," and Danny Boyle's "Slumdog (08)," both produced by "establishment" directors and screenwriters. While this book has four Asian monologues, two poems each 1.5 pages long are in English, already translated from Vietnamese (girl) and Chinese (boy). Reference to original Viet or Hanzi is not included and no notes on enunciation or slang terms is shown, other than an a 3.5pg listing of playwright cites at the end of the booklet. WorldCatDotORG shows that this book is well distributed in college and public libraries nationwide. Ethnic distribution: For the Girl's parts: Native Amer (4), Black-Amer (3), Hispanic (3), Asian (2), Euro (2), East Euro (2), Mid-East (1), African (1), Amer (1). For the Boy's parts: Hispanic (8), Black-Amer (5), Euro (3), Asian (2), E Euro (2), Native Amer (1), Mid-East (1), African (1). Below is a listing of the Monologue titles, ethnicity or cultural basis, as well as the playwright, for more research or info: The Smith & Kraus "Youth series" has 6 books. The "Multicultural Scenes for Young Actors" has not been reviewed to see if this is a companion book with corresponding content. S & K also has a 3-book Hispanic Latino Monologues for Young Actor series by Marco Ramirez (NYU Tisch BFA Dramatic Writing, currently studying at Juilliard, and a Miami-based Cuban-Amer playwright in NYC and Humana), "My First Latino Monologue Book: A Sense of Character: 100 Monologues for Young Children (2009, My First Acting Series)." He is a fan of Anton Chekhov's Short Stories. As a new book series, this is not widely distributed yet 157525607X, -6088, -6096. Not many multicultural monologues are on YouTube.