Mia Park
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/60/Mia_Park%2C_Yoga_Teacher.jpg/220px-Mia_Park%2C_Yoga_Teacher.jpg)
Mia Park is an American TV show host, actress, drummer, and yoga instructor based in Chicago. She is the long-time host of the children's dance show Chic-a-Go-Go, and co-founder[1] of Chicago's A-Squared Theatre Workshop.
Early life and education
[edit]Mia Chan Mi Park was born in Philadelphia.[2] She attended Shimer College, graduating with distinction in 1995.[3][4] Then located in Waukegan, Illinois and currently located in Chicago, Shimer is a Great Books college with a four-year core curriculum.[5]
Performance career
[edit]Park is the host of the Chicago underground children's show Chic-a-Go-Go, "a dance show for kids of all ages".[6] Lonely Planet described the show as "a kiddie version of Soul Train."[7] Reviews of the show frequently focus on Park's "deliriously chipper"[8] style or "always-up rock-n-roll demeanor".[9] She has hosted Chic-A-Go-Go since 1998.[9] Her connection to Chic-a-Go-Go actually goes back to the very first show in 1996, when her then-boyfriend's band performed as the show's first musical guest, and she appeared as a dancer.[9][10] Park, who typically moves rapidly from one project to another, has described the show as "the longest thing I've ever done in my life."[10]
As the host (or co-host, as the host is nominally hosted by the rat puppet Ratso), Park interviews the guest musical groups after their performances. In a 2012 Chicago Reader feature, she complained about having missed the opportunity to interview Duran Duran due to a scheduling mixup;[11] In August of the same year, however, Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran made good on their original promise.[12]
A drummer and percussionist, Park began performing in bands in 1995. Many of the bands in which she performs are all-female and/or all-Asian, including Kim (which she described as a "pop-rock, punk-out, all-female Asian band")[13] and Pook Nury (a Korean female drum group).[13] As of 2012, she was a percussionist for the all-female pop orchestra Girl Group Chicago.[12]
In 2001, she wrote of the challenges facing rock groups of this kind:
When I tell people that I am the drummer for an all-Asian American female rock band, I don't expect to be taken seriously. There aren't any other bands like Kim in Chicago, let along in america, so I don't expect the masses to comprehend that, YES, women rock, and that, YES, Asian American women also rock ... and we rock hard, dammit![13]
Park organizes an annual event of one-night-only female cover bands performing to benefit the homeless, called "Covers for Cover."[14]
Park is a co-founder of Chicago's A-Squared Theatre Workshop, the city's only pan-Asian theater troupe.[4] She conceived of and appeared in the company's highly successful 2012 production My Asian Mom, a series of eight short one-person plays by Asian performers about their mothers.[15] Park's contribution, which dealt with her grandmother's escape from North Korea and also involved a lengthy handstand, attracted particular attention.[16]
Park is an advocate for Asian American representation in theatre. From the Chicago Sun-Times: "For decades, “Chicago Med” regular Mia Park has seen race used as an excuse for lazy or uninformed casting. On the one side, she constantly hears the refrain that Asian-American actors — whether their roots are in Hawaii or India or China or Pakistan — are hard to find. On the other edge, there’s the belief that they simply aren’t right for shows that don’t deal specifically with Asian storylines or characters. Park has a succinct response: “It’s all bulls—,” she said. “The talent base in Chicago alone is huge. And unless ethnicity or culture is specifically written into a character to help drive a story? There’s no reason you can’t cast someone who looks like me.” [17]
In 2006, Mia co-founded the Asian American theater company, A-Squared Theatre Workshop and ran the Chicago Asian American Acting Industry Group which hosted educational acting workshops and supported local Asian American talent. She currently runs the Our Perspective: Asian American Plays program.[18]
Filmography
[edit]Film
[edit]Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|
2006 | The Lake House | Receptionist | ||
2007 | The Minx | Linnea Chiang | [19] | |
2017 | Signature Move | Bookstore Customer |
Television
[edit]Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
2008 | Pancake Mountain | Miss Mia | 2 episodes |
2011 | Boss | Clinic Volunteer | 4 episodes |
2012 | Shameless | Korean Liquor Store Wife | Episode: Just Like the Pilgrims Intended |
2013–16 | Chicago Fire | Nurse | 4 episodes |
2016 | Chicago P.D. | Nurse Beth | Episode: She's Got Us |
2016–19 | Chicago Med | 28 episodes | |
2017 | APB | Korean Woman | Episode: Fueling Fires |
2018 | Empire | Nurse | Episode: Sweet Sorrow |
2019 | Code-Switched | Kevin's Mom |
Shorts
[edit]Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
2009 | At Last, Okemah! | Record Store Owner | |
2011 | Instant Slapping | ||
The Catastrophe | Mrs. Kimballton | ||
2013 | 4 Seconds: Ricky Hustile's Last Shot at the NBA | Yoga Instructor |
Other activities
[edit]Park has worked as a yoga instructor since 2006.[20]
Works cited
[edit]- Park, Mia Chan Mi (2001). "Waving Fans". In Vickie Nam (ed.). Yell-Oh Girls!: Emerging Voices Explore Culture, Identity, and Growing Up Asian American. Harper Collins. pp. 269–270. ISBN 0060959444.
References
[edit]- ^ "Cast Bios and Photos". A-Squared Theatre Workshop. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ Sharon Steffensen (January 2012). "Mia Park: Yoga Teacher, Actress, and Great Organizer". Yoga Chicago.
- ^ "IMDb Resume for Mia Park". Archived from the original on 2013-06-19. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ a b "Alumni Make News". Shimer College. 2012-04-20. Archived from the original on 2012-12-15. Retrieved 2013-06-17.
- ^ "Curriculum". Shimer College. Archived from the original on 2013-06-19. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ "Chic-A-Go-Go!". Roctober.com. Archived from the original on 2013-06-01. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ Jeff Campbell (2008). Lonely Planet USA. Lonely Planet. p. 563. ISBN 9781741046755.
- ^ Karla Zimmermann (2010). "Cinema & Television". Lonely Planet Chicago (City Travel Guide). Lonely Planet. p. 35. ISBN 978-1741794120.
- ^ a b c Karl Klockars (2007-12-21). "Interview: "Miss Mia" Park, Chic-a-go-go!". Chicagoist. Archived from the original on 2014-07-01. Retrieved 2013-06-17.
- ^ a b Bradley Adita (Winter 2004). "Mia Park". A Day in the Air. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ Anne Ford (2012-03-20). "This Weeks' Chicagoan: Mia Park, Kids' Show Host". Chicago Reader.
- ^ a b Miles Raymer; Mia Park (2012-08-21). "Artist on Artist: Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran talks to Mia Park". Chicago Reader. Retrieved 2013-06-17.
- ^ a b c Park 2001, p. 269.
- ^ "Local Ladies Perform Covers for CAWC". Chicagoist. 2009-12-11. Archived from the original on 2010-10-19. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ Emily Gordon (2012-05-17). "My Asian Mom at A-Squared Theatre Workshop | Theater review". Time Out Chicago. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ Julia Thiel (2012-07-08). "My Asian Mom". Chicago Reader. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
- ^ "Mia Park". Mia Park. Retrieved 2019-10-31.
- ^ "Mia Park Acting". Mia Park. Retrieved 2019-10-31.
- ^ "Michael Smith premieres debut feature "The Minx" before Echelon Entertainment May 15 DVD release". Reel Chicago News. 2007-04-16. Retrieved 2024-06-16.
- ^ Mia Park. "Yoga Resume". Yoga With Mia Park. Archived from the original on 2013-07-22. Retrieved 2013-06-18.
External links
[edit]- Living people
- Shimer College alumni
- Actresses from Philadelphia
- American public access television personalities
- American musicians of Korean descent
- American actresses of Korean descent
- American stage actresses
- American film actresses
- Musicians from Chicago
- American women drummers
- Actresses from Chicago
- American yoga teachers
- Educators from Pennsylvania
- American women educators
- Educators from Illinois
- 21st-century American women