Four notable actors will participate in the awards celebration of the 12th annual Imagine Little Tokyo short story contest.
The hybrid event will be held on Saturday, June 7, at 3 p.m. at the Tateuchi Democracy Forum at the Japanese American National Museum’s Democracy Center, 100 N. Central Ave. in Little Tokyo.
Christopher Sean, whose acting skills were in full display on performance capture projects like “Ultraman: Rising,” and “Gotham Knights,” will emcee the free event, which will be available both in-person and online.
The contest is presented by the Little Tokyo Historical Society in partnership with JANM’s Discover Nikkei project.
Winners and honorable mention awardees will be publicly revealed at the celebration. Three actors — Ji-young Yoo, Toshiji Takeshima and Rosie Narasaki— will provide dramatic readings of the winning stories in the categories of English Adult, Japanese and Youth.
This year submissions were received from several diverse locations, including Canada, Nagoya and fire-torn communities in California.
Ji-young Yoo, who won a Gotham Award nomination for her performance in the Amazon Prime Video miniseries “Expats,” played a main character in the horror film “Until Dawn” and was the voice of Zoey in “K-pop Demon Hunters.”
Rosie Narasaki is a second-generation actor and playwright. As an actor, recent stage highlights include “This Is Not a True Story” and “Two Mile Hollow” with Artists at Play and “Little Women” with Playwright’s Arena. A play that she wrote, “Unrivaled,” recently had its world premiere production with Boston Court Pasadena and Playwright’s Arena.
Toshiji Takeshima’s reading of the Japanese-language winner will be recorded with English subtitles. Takeshima, who will be attending the event, has had an illustrious career in film, television and stage. His film work includes “Sniper G.R.I.T.,” “Yakuza Princess,” and “We Said No No,” the latter of which premiered at JANM. On TV, he has played Inspector Kento Mori in “NCIS: Hawai‘i” and yakuza boss Nozawa in “SWAT,” as well as appearing in many other series, including “MacGyver,” “Hawaii Five-0” and “True Blood.” He has performed at the Pan Asian Rep and various international festivals.
The celebration, which will include book giveaways, will conclude with a book-signing featuring contest judges, including Scott Shibuya Brown (“Story by Erasmus Yang”) and Sharon Fujimoto-Johnson (picture books “The Mochi Makers” and “Shell Song”).
To register, go to the events calendar on www.janm.org (https://www.janm.org/events/2025-06-07/12th-annual-imagine-little-tokyo-short-story-contest-celebration). Registrants for the virtual program will receive a dedicated Zoom link.