ANN KANEKO - Writer/Director/Producer/Editor/Videographer
Ann Kaneko is a Los Angeles-based independent filmmaker. She produced Overstay with the generous support of a prestigious Japan Foundation Artist's Fellowship and Post-Production Grant and a Hoso Bunka Foundation production grant. She received the backing of the Pacific Asia Resource Center, a Tokyo-based organization devoted to the betterment of relations in the Pacific Asia region, the UCLA Pacific Rim Studies Center and Asian American Studies Center.

A Shortness of Breath, her candid documentary/narrative short film, which chronicles her aunt's battle with breast cancer, has screened widely at film festivals in Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco and other major cities. It was honored with a Bronze Apple at the 1993 National Educational Film and Video Festival and was televised on Deep Dish TV.

Lucy Goes Shopping features members of the acclaimed comedy troupe, Chicano Secret Service, in a silent, story-book adaptation of a young woman's quest for a new face. Lucy was televised on Philadelphia's "Through the Lens 6" series of independent shorts on WYBE TV 35 and has screened extensively in the U.S. and abroad. Displaced is a lyrical account of a mother and daughter searching for each other at an urban beach and 654 S. Detroit is an experimental short which looks at life from a Los Angeles apartment.

In addition to her film work, Ann has produced several video documentaries. She directed a segment for Kansai Television on the Tonari no Gaipi series, dealing with Japanese Peruvians, working in Japan. Her 90-minute piece on Vietnam and her half-hour segment on Japanese cosmetology students living in Los Angeles were broadcast on Eisei Channel, a Tokyo cable station. In nothin' mo' a poor woman want, she documented women living at Los Angeles' only downtown women's shelter.

Ann has been the cinematographer on several short films, including Soapy, Soapy Samba which screened at the 1994 Sundance Film Festival. Other credits include Jeff Adachi and Tony Bolante's The Slanted Screen; Mike Whalen's hour-length documentary, Another First Step, shot in Ireland and San Francisco; Shonali Bose's Lifting the Veil, shot in India; and second unit work for the ABC documentary, Mothers and Daughters. Ann also is an accomplished photographer and has exhibited her photographs from the Philippines in Tokyo and Los Angeles.

In Japan, where Ann resided five years, she worked on several Japanese and American co-productions, most notably Ridley Scott's Black Rain and Wim Wender's Until the End of the World. She was the 1993 Kobe International Film Festival coordinator for North America. She also was the post-production translator on Regge Life's Struggle and Success: African Americans Living in Japan and Dai Sil Kim-Gibson and Charles Burnett's forthcoming Tears of Silence about Korean comfort women.

Ann received an MFA degree in film production from UCLA. She is an active film scholar and has presented at the Society for Cinema Studies Conference. Her reviews have appeared in Afterimage, International Documentary and The Daily Yomiuri, a Tokyo newspaper. She also has contributed a chapter for the forthcoming book, Feminism and Documentar y (eds. Diane Waldman and Janet Walker) about the process making Overstay.

JENNIFER JEW - Director of photography
Jennifer Jew is a cinematographer and assistant editor based in Los Angeles. Recently, she completed shooting the independent feature film, Signs from God (dir. Greg Watkins), starring cult filmmaker, Caveh Zahedi (dir.I Don't Hate Las Vegas Anymore and A Little Stiff which he co-directed with Greg).

She has shot several music videos and has worked with such labels as Sony Music and Geffen Records. She has also shot numerous film shorts, including Voices and Choices, a CESLA non-smoking project for the UCLA Center for Latino Health, directed by Mia Trachinger, and Ann's award-winning Lucy Goes Shopping.

Jennifer's assistant editorial credits include Pleasantville (dir. Oliver Stone); U-Turn (dir. Oliver Stone); Das Boot: the Director's Cut (dir. Wolfgang Peterson); Executive Decision (dir. Stuart Baird); and Nixon (dir. Oliver Stone).

DANE A. DAVIS - Sound designer
Dane Davis has been the sound designer and supervising sound editor on numerous independent films and commercials. He is the president of Danetracks, Inc., his sound editing company.

Dane's credits as sound designer and supervising sound editor include Boogie Nights (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson); Simon Birch (dir. Mark Steven Johnson); Little Boy Blue (dir. Antonio Tibaldi); Mother (dir. Albert Brooks); Bound (dirs. Larry and Andy Wachowski); Panther (Dir. Mario Van Peebles); The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (dir. Curtis Hanson); Drugstore Cowboy (dir. Gus Van Sant) and A Rage in Harlem (dir. Bill Duke).

Dane is currently designing and supervising the sound on the Wachowski brothers' current feature in production, Matrix. His credits also include several commercials for Lockheed.

He received a 1996 MPSE Golden Reel Award for Best Sound Editing for his work on Gotti (Dir. Robert Harmon). He was also the re-recording mixer for the documentarySick (dir. Kirby Dick) which received a special jury prize at the Sundance Film Festival.

YAMAMOTO HIROAKI - Production sound recordist
Yamamoto Hiroaki is a graduate of the Kamakura Eiga Jyuku (Kamakura Film School and has worked as an assistant sound engineer at Fukushima Onkyo Studio in Tokyo. He also was the assistant producer on Onnazakari (dir. Ohbayashi Nobuhiko) and Godzilla v. Destroyer (dir. Ohgawara Takao) for special effects.

CRISTIAN AMIGO - Composer
Cristian Amigo is a talented composer, musician and scholar. He has scored several commercials and films. He is the primary composer for his funk band, Speak, which performs regularly in the Southern California area. Speak has recently released a CD under an independent label.

Cristian is currently a doctoral candidate at UCLA's Department of Ethnomusicology.

ED BARGUIARENA - Composer
Ed Barguiarena is an accomplished composer, musician and educator. He has composed music for film, television, dance and theater.

His theater credits include "Bocon" (Wr. Lisa Loomer and Dir. Timothy Douglas) for the Mark Taper Theater; "Tree," Los Angeles Opera; "My Alien Abduction" (Dir. Leo Garcia), Highways Performance Space; and several UCLA modern dance projects. He also created "Floating Fast," an electronic collage for dance, combining samples, sound effects, wind chimes and percussion. He is currently collaborating on a Cornerstone Theater piece with Mexican director Martin Acosta, funded by a Ford Foundation grant.

Ed's film credits include Jeffrey Reyna's short film, Now and Again . He regularly performs with various ensembles, whose musical styles span from orchestral to Appalachian. Ed is a key member of Speak for which he also arranges and composes music.

Ed has been a guest lecturer for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Percussive Arts Society International Convention, Center Theater Group, The Los Angeles Opera, Mark Taper Forum, Musicians Institute and the University of Miami. He is also a resident artist with the Los Angeles County
Music Center, teaching music appreciation, composition and creating performances with young people.