Lela Lee

Lela Lee is a cartoonist, writer, and actress. In her second year of college at UC Berkeley, she made an animated short titled “Angry Little Asian Girl.” She was ashamed of the anger expressed in the episode, so she hid it in a drawer and promptly forgot about it. She went on to receive a bachelor’s degree in Rhetoric. After graduating college in 1996, she worked at her parents’ dry cleaners. It was there that Lela doodled four more episodes. She submitted her animation to the American Cinematheque, which screened her shorts for the first time in 1998. Critics from the LA Times and LA Weekly gave “The Angry Little Asian Girl” glowing reviews. People began asking to read comics that did not yet exist. Because of this suggestion, Lela taught herself how to draw comics. Soon after, she launched a website as a self-publishing platform. She also took to selling t-shirts out of her car and met many women who also harbored angry sentiments. The website became a destination for young adults to read comics about gender and race. Studios heard of this buzz and invited Lela to meet with them. But the reaction was disheartening. A TV executive asked Lela to take the Asian girl out. Another told her there was no market for Asians. Angered by the feedback, Lela created more characters and used "Angry Little Girls" as the umbrella name for the comic strip. She also made a goal to publish a book. She wanted the characters to be well-known by her fans so that no studio would ask her to take out the Asian character again. The first "Angry Little Girls" book was published in April 2005. Two months later, it had gone into its fourth printing. Six more books were published and translated into Korean, French, and German and the products were sold into malls all over the US and abroad. During this time, Lela also became a working actress, landing guest spots on shows such as Friends, Will and Grace , Scrubs , Grey’s Anatomy, Shameless and Better Call Saul . She was also series regular “Jodi Chang” on the short-lived television show Tremors . Lela lives in Los Angeles with her husband, two sons, and a very well-fed cat.