Change of Heart & Mind (See Kian's Most recent Update)

Kian Jaabu Mehrmanesh Way is my Sun. My only Sun. ...and so I’m making this big ask for him because I believe in him and his journey.

I know it’s weird to celebrate things right now and a lot of us have guilt around it (I do). The world is on fire and we all spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to exist in our mundane lives while others are being bombed, starved and oppressed. A lot of us have survivors guilt. Those of us who’ve been on the planet for a while have the privilege of remembering simpler times of our youth...whether real or imagined, where we could daydream a world for ourselves and be fearless and take risks for our dreams. Meanwhile our children still have dreams and it’s even harder for them to actualize them. Obligation, existential dread, global and local catastrophe weighs on their hearts and bank accounts in a way many of us didn’t experience until we were adults. The world is not built for them to succeed without a village. So I’m asking my village to gather together for my Sun.

When Kian was little he would always be directing the imaginary playtime with his sisters. He was in his first play in kindergarten and just beamed with pride. ..and then he started to get taller and taller and taller and so tall so young that he was typecast into sports. It was ok for a time because he enjoyed it and he was always the “big man” at 6’6’’ (by the time he was 15) and part of it was also stifling his spirit, because there was a weird expectation for him to only exist in that one way. When he found theater his senior year in high school, his coach was like “oh hell nah… you have to pick varsity basketball or theater, cus you can’t do both!”. I think his coach imagined that the ultimatum would be a no brainer and Kian surprised us all and chose Theater. We saw him come back to life that year and he’s never looked back. Since then he’s attended and graduated from the Colorado Film School, he’s been in lots of small theater productions. He’s done some musicals and voice acting and studied with some big names in our city. But there’s a ceiling to what he can learn and do here and he’s hit it. For the last couple years he’s been auditioning to schools of Theater and the Dramatic Arts all over the world. These schools are hard to get into and so many times he’s come so close but this year was different! and y’all… he was accepted into the American Academy of the Dramatic Arts in NYC!! Its a program that feeds into Broadway and Film acting and he’s ready y’all! And because these schools are few and far between and very intensive programs they have price tags very much like an Ivy League School would (which is a whole other soap box for sure). There are caps to how much student assistance he can receive because the Arts are not valued in the same way as other “essential” sciences and so we are asking for any assistance you can offer for his first year at AADA. These money’s will go to his tuition and housing. Feel free to look up the program at https://www.aada.edu to see the long list of alum and the programs etc. Also feel free to ask us any questions or help us find scholarships. Ha! (we’ve been applying and applying and applying).

If you’ve gotten this far, thank you thank you and I’ve also attached some photos from the last few years of acting in our great city.