In celebration of National Pride Month, OppNet is pleased to highlight members of the LGBTQ+ community below for their valuable contributions to broadening and deepening the representation of their lived experiences and communities through comedy, art, and entertainment.
Bowen Yang
Comedian
Bowen Yang burst into public consciousness with his brilliant lip sync videos uploaded to Twitter, miming along to famous movie scenes such as the cerulean rant in Devil Wears Prada performed by Meryl Streep. However, Bowen had long been making his mark on the comedy scene. While a member of the famed Upright Citizens Brigade improv troupe, Bowen began co-hosting his podcast Las Culturistas launched in 2016 which quickly became a cult-favorite and was nominated for a Best Podcast Shorty Award in 2019. As the podcast hit its peak, Bowen was hired as a staff writer at Saturday Night Live and the following year was named as a full cast member—the first Chinese-American cast member in the show’s history, and one of the few who have been openly gay.
Bowen was born in Australia to parents from rural China and, upon his father finishing his doctoral studies, the family moved to Montreal, Canada where Bowen grew up. While popular, and voted by his high school classmates “Most Likely to End Up on SNL, ” Bowen struggled with his parents views on his sexuality, which ultimately resulted in his father sending him to conversion therapy as a requisite for being allowed to attend New York University. With Sandra Oh’s character on medical drama Grey’s Anatomy as an influence, Bowen was a pre-med major, but after graduating, he ended up in graphic design before launching his podcast with a former college classmate.
Having successfully pivoted full-time into comedy, Bowen resides in Brooklyn and is unabashed about his identity. Bowen has quickly become an audience favorite on SNL for his zany, off-the-wall impressions of public figures such as Kim Jong-Un and former presidential candidate Andrew Yang. He has been named to Forbes magazine's 30 Under 30 Hollywood & Entertainment list in 2019, and currently co-stars alongside actress/comedian/rapper Awkwafina in her Comedy Central show Awkwafina Is Nora from Queens.
Mickalene Thomas
Artist
Mickalene Thomas came into fame in 2012 for her show “Mickalene Thomas: Origins of the Universe,” featuring abstract mixed-media collages of black women styled in arrangements reminiscent of French modernist paintings, using photography, paint, fabrics and other materials to create richly hued works. As a black woman who identifies as a lesbian, Mickalene focuses the bulk of her work on female figures, often featuring her friends and romantic partners. Originally shown in Los Angeles, and then at the Brooklyn Museum, Mickalene’s first show was well-attended and critically acclaimed, but ultimately was not accepted to be shown beyond those initial institutions.
In 2019, Mickalene re-emerged with her two-story installation in the Baltimore Museum of Art, an exhibition to which she also invited eight Baltimore-based, black artists to join her. The show, “Mickalene Thomas: A Moment’s Pleasure,” will be open through spring 2021. With roots in the city on her mother’s side, Mickalene has created a space within the exhibit that honors the traditional architecture of Baltimore, and helped to design the sets in which the artists are displayed. She also currently has an exhibit at the Bass Museum in Miami, Florida, and has shown in New Orleans—a reversal of luck from the slower momentum after her prior show..
Mickalene considers her mother her original muse, a former model who ensured her children were exposed to art through programs at the Newark Museum and Henry Street Settlement. Originally determined to be a lawyer, Mickalene got into painting professionally in her twenties, attending Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, and later Yale University for her master of fine arts. Born in Camden, New Jersey, Mickalene currently resides in Brooklyn.
Mj Rodriguez
Actress
Born in Newark, New Jersey, Mj Rodriguez had early dreams of becoming a star. By seven years old, she was already enrolled in the New Jersey Performing Arts Center theater program. At age 14, Mj began to process her sexuality, while also becoming involved in the ballroom scene after being discovered by the head of a house. She found a sense of family in this new community, and also learned how to vogue —a stylized form of house dance—which gained her notoriety throughout the New Jersey ballroom scene. As she deepend her involvement in ballroom, Mj also continued her traditional acting education, attending the Newark Arts High School and the Berklee College of Music.
Mj landed her first role in an off-Broadway production of Rent where she received favorable reviews, and was cast in several small television roles. Her breakout moment came when she auditioned for a role in the hit musical Hamilton. Despite not getting the role, her audition had broken barriers as Mj had recently emerged from transitioning, auditioning for the first time as a female actress. Mj was subsequently invited to audition for and join a number of theater productions in the United States and United Kingdom. Fifteen years after her entry into the ballroom scene, Mj was cast in a starring role on the mega-hit FX series Pose. In the show, which is set against the backdrop of the ballroom scene in New York City in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Mj plays protective house mother Blanca Rodriguez-Evangelista. The role has garnered her extensive praise, bringing attention to her social activism within the LGBTQ+ community, earning her prestigious speaking roles and, in 2019, a contract with Olay Body as a spokesperson for the brand.
