Lela Lee

{{Short description|Korean American cartoonist and actor}}

{{family name hatnote|Lee||lang=Korean}}{{BLP sources|date=May 2019}}

{{Infobox person

| image =

| name = Lela Lee

| caption = Lela Lee in 2014

| birth_place = Los Angeles, California

| occupation = Cartoonist / Actress / Writer

| nationality = American

| years_active = 1994–present

| website = {{Official URL}}

}}

Lela Lee (born in Los Angeles, California) is an American actress and cartoonist, television writer, and the creator of the animated cartoon Angry Little Asian Girl and the related comic strip Angry Little Girls.{{Cite web |title=Book Lela Lee {{!}} Speakers Bureau {{!}} Booking Agent Info |url=https://www.allamericanspeakers.com/speakers/390813/Lela-Lee |access-date=2022-03-12 |website=www.allamericanspeakers.com}}

Career

= Acting career =

She is a film and television actress, with roles in the 1998 film Yellow and the 2002 film Better Luck Tomorrow. She was a series regular in the short-lived Sci Fi Channel series Tremors, and had a recurring guest role on NBC's Scrubs. Lee made a guest appearance in the first episode of Season Four of HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm, playing an angry Asian woman, who launches a physical and verbal attack on star Larry David after he suggests Tang is a common Chinese name. Lee was also in the episode "Animal Pragmatism" of Charmed as Tessa, a college student.

== ''Angry Little Girls and Angry Little Asian Girl'' ==

Angry Little Girls was developed as a character she developed in 1994 when she was a sophomore at UC Berkeley. She developed the character after attending Spike and Mike's Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation with a friend.{{Cite book |author=Ono, Kent A. |title=Asian Americans and the media |date=2009 |publisher=Polity |others=Pham, Vincent N. |isbn=9780745642734 |location=Cambridge, UK |oclc=236321398}} That night, Lee stayed up drawing with typing paper and Crayola markers, and a video camera and made the first episode "Angry Little Asian Girl, the First Day of School."{{Cite book |last1=Scott |first1=Bonnie Kime |title=Women in culture : an intersectional anthology for gender and women's studies |last2=Cayleff |first2=Susan E. |last3=Donadey |first3=Anne |last4=Lara |first4=Irene |date=2016-05-24 |others=Scott, Bonnie Kime, 1944- |isbn=9781119120711 |location=Chichester, West Sussex, UK |oclc=950884948}} Three years after creating the first episode of the Angry Little Asian Girl, she created four more, and sent the five episodes titled Angry Little Asian Girl, Five Angry Episodes to festivals where they were well-reviewed by critics of the LA Times and LA Weekly.{{Cite web |last=Times |first=By Anh Do, Los Angeles |title=Watch out! Angry little girl is sharing her feelings |url=https://www.latimes.com/local/great-reads/la-me-ff-angry-asian-girl-20130425-dto-htmlstory.html |access-date=2019-03-19 |website=Los Angeles Times|date=25 April 2013 }} These episodes, like the first, use foul language and shocking imagery to bring attention to issues surrounding the intersection of being Asian and a woman. Audience members came up to her after screenings saying that ALAG spoke for them and that they too had similar experiences growing up in America. Lee then made a batch of T-shirts based on the show.

Lee expanded ALAG to include other girls of different backgrounds and personalities. She took two years to teach herself how to draw comics with books checked out from the library. With the newly created characters, and an umbrella name of "Angry Little Girls" Lee turned her work into a weekly comic strip self-published on her website www.angrylittlegirls.com. Lee added characters of diverse ethnicities and backgrounds to increase her strip's public and commercial appeal. In 2005, the first book of collected Angry Little Girls strips was published by Harry N. Abrams. Following this, several other themed collections of Lee's comics were published by the publisher's imprint, Abrams Comic Arts.{{Cite web |title=Lela Lee {{!}} Contributors {{!}} ABRAMS |url=https://www.abramsbooks.com/contributor/lela-lee_630978/ |access-date=2019-03-19 |website=ABRAMS – The Art of Books Since 1949}}

Filmography

= Television =

class="wikitable sortable"
YearTitleRoleEpisodes
1997

| Relativity

| Tour Guide

| Episode: "Billable Hours"

1998

| Felicity

| Pauline

| Episode: "Finally"

1998

| Profiler

| Kathy Jung

| Episode: "Ties that Bind"

2000

| Rude Awakening

| Joyce

| Episode: "Yes Sir, That's my Baby"

2000

| Opposite Sex

| Judy

| Episode: "Homosexual Episode"

2000

| Charmed

| Tessa

| Episode: "Animal Pragmatism"

2001

| One on One

| Reporter

| Episode: "The Way You Make Me Feel"

2001

| Friends

| Wedding Guest

| Episode: "The One With All the Cheesecakes"

2001

| What I Like About You

| Waitress

| Episode: "Holly's First Job"

2001–2002

| Scrubs

| Bonnie

| 3 Episodes

2003

| Will and Grace

| Ping

| Episode: "Swimming to Cambodia"

2003

| Tremors

| Jodi Chang

| 13 Episodes

2004

| 10-8 Officers on Duty

| Marilyn Choi

| Episode: "Flirtin' With Disaster"

2004

| Curb Your Enthusiasm

| Bobbi

| Episode: "Mel's Offer"

2005

| Untitled Oakley & Weinstein Project

| Officer Chin

| Episode: "Pilot"

2007

| The Young and the Restless

| Speech Therapist

| Episode: "1.8672"

2009

| The Eastmann's

| Mother

| Episode: "Pilot"

2014

| Angry Little Asian Girl

| Kim, Maria, Deborah, misc voices

| 12 Episodes

2014

| Growing Up Fisher

| Mrs. Han

| 2 Episodes

2018–2020

| Better Call Saul

| Lillian Simmons

| 2 Episodes

= Film =

class="wikitable sortable"
YearTitleRole
1996

| Flow

| Yel Fan

1997

| Yellow

| Janet

1998

| Shopping for Fangs

| Naomi

2000

| The Girls' Room

| Chloe

2000

| Rave

| Lisa

2000

| This Guy is Falling

| Alison

2000

| The Medicine Show

| Incompetent Nurse

2000

| The Moment After

| Sarone

2001

| A Kitty Bobo Show

| Maggie

2002

| Better Luck Tomorrow

| Slapper

2003

| Exposed

| Missy

Writing credits

  • Angry Little Asian Girl (2014) – creator, writer, executive producer.
  • The First Day of School (2014) – writer
  • Dinner Party (2014) – writer
  • Kim's Date (2014) – writer
  • Mother Lee's Etiquette (2014) – writer
  • Sistahood (2014) – writer
  • Deborah's Diet (2014) – writer
  • Occupy Placentia (2014) – writer
  • Chuy, the Undocumented Chicken (2014) – writer
  • Kim's Twinkie Defense (2014) – writer
  • Fast Food Rude (2014) – writer
  • Xyla's Therapy (2014) – writer
  • Anger Management (2014) – writer

Bibliography

  • Angry Little Girls (2005) {{Cite book|title=Angry little girls|last=Lela.|first=Lee|date=2005|publisher=H.N. Abrams|isbn=0810958686|location=New York|oclc=58805309}}
  • Still Angry Little Girls (2006) {{Cite book|title=Still angry little girls|last=Lela.|first=Lee|date=2006|publisher=Abrams Image|others=Lee, Lela.|isbn=0810949156|location=New York|oclc=64684957}}
  • Angry Little Girls in Love (2008) {{Cite book|title=Angry little girls in love|last=Lela.|first=Lee|date=2008|publisher=Abrams Image|isbn=9780810972759|location=New York|oclc=191090468}}
  • Angry Little Girls: A Little Book of Love (2008) {{Cite book|title=Angry little girls : a little book on love|last=Lela.|first=Lee|date=2008|publisher=Running Press Book Publishers|isbn=9780762431151|location=Philadelphia, PA|oclc=864752710}}
  • Fairy Tales for Angry Little Girls (2011) {{Cite book|title=Fairy tales for angry little girls|last=Lela.|first=Lee|date=2011|publisher=Abrams Comic Art|isbn=9780810995932|location=New York|oclc=657596034}}
  • Angry Little Girls: A Little Kit for Friends (2013) {{Cite book|title=Angry little girls : a little kit for friends.|date=2013|publisher=Running Press|isbn=978-0762447947|location=[Place of publication not identified]|oclc=808216083}}

References

{{Reflist}}