Diane Paragas wears many hats as an award-winning writer, director, editor, cinematographer, and producer of features and documentaries. It’s hard to believe it was only two years ago she presented her debut feature film, Yellow Rose, and made history in doing so as the first Filipino-American film theatrically distributed by a major Hollywood studio. She tells HFPA journalist Janet Nepales about realizing her life’s dream which took 15 years in the making.

“Back then, I think people didn’t believe there was an audience for a story that featured a Filipino protagonist. But then what changed over the years was movies like Crazy Rich Asians, which proved that everyone can enjoy a movie where the principal cast is Asian.”

Yellow Rose is about a Filipina teen from a small Texan town who fights to pursue her dreams as a country music performer while having to decide between staying with her family or leaving the only home she has ever known. There are obvious similarities between the protagonist and Paragas. “I wrote it because I grew up in Lubbock, Texas, but it’s not directly my story because I didn’t play country music but I definitely played music. I was in a kind of alt-punk rock band and music was one of my outlets. So that’s the source and I think the soul of Rose,” she says.

What Rose Garcia is going through in that period of her life was based on Paragas’ memories of feeling like an outsider growing up in Lubbock, Texas. “But at the same time I had experiences with racism, I also had experiences with allies, and that’s another kind of theme that I show in the film. And yeah, it’s very much based on my childhood.”

The Texan-born Filipina talks about the challenges of overcoming obstacles and against the odds, forging a career in Hollywood as a woman of color. “I don’t know that I’ve overcome them. On all of my shoots, from commercials to documentaries, I was always very much alone as a woman. A lot of times I would go on the set and the crew would be like, ‘You are the first female director we have ever worked with, much less a person of color.’  So, for me, it was just cracking the ceiling on everything I did, from commercials to documentaries to narratives. And now I am just starting to get my feet wet in Hollywood. It’s been a long time coming but for the most part, since Yellow Rose has been released, I’ve been welcomed in a very great way.”

Paragas’ work has not gone unnoticed. In fact, she’s been honored by the Philippine Consulate as a Distinguished Filipino Woman in New York. This is, of course, only one of many awards she has received recently. “I think the biggest award that I have received is just the voices of gratitude that I get after a screening or people that write to me directly, telling me how the film made them feel seen. It’s endlessly gratifying when I get that.”

Listen to the podcast to hear how she became a filmmaker; the importance of music in her life and her career; how was it playing in a band; her artistic influences; what it was like growing up an offspring of two doctors; how she experienced racism; how was her time in Hong Kong; and what is her next project, pop music opera Lizards about and her documentary, The Three Lies of David Wong.