Asian-Pacific Representation in the Media

#Heritage365 featuring Daniel Mayeda

Daniel Mayeda is the longest serving Member of the Board of East West Players (EWP), the nation’s premiere Asian American theatre organization. He practiced communications law and entertainment/media industry litigation for 35 years, most recently as a partner in the law firm of Leopold, Petrich and Smith. In January 2018, Mr. Mayeda was appointed Associate Director of the Documentary Film Legal Clinic of the UCLA School of Law, where he trains and supervises law students to provide pro bono legal services to independent filmmakers.

Mr. Mayeda has been a longtime advocate for accurate and sensitive depictions of Asian Americans in the media. Since 2000, Mr. Mayeda has helped lead a national multi-ethnic coalition of civil rights and media activism groups to persuade the four major television networks to increase diversity on screen and behind the scenes. He currently serves as Chair of the Asian Pacific American Media Coalition, and recently on the national Diversity Advisory Council for Comcast Corporation. In 2015, working with EWP’s then-Artistic Director Tim Dang, Dan helped draft and promote a groundbreaking initiative called the “51% Preparedness Plan for the American Theatre” to jumpstart the conversation around the fact that most theaters are not ready to serve an American population in which People of Color will comprise the majority by 2042.

Mr. Mayeda has written and spoken extensively on media, intellectual property and Asian American community issues. He has been an Adjunct Professor at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, and has taught media courses at California State University, Los Angeles and California State University, Northridge. Early in his career, Mr. Mayeda worked in Washington, D.C. on the staff of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Consumer Protection and Finance. He has been named numerous times in Los Angeles magazine as a “Southern California Super Lawyer.”