Tavarus Blackmon (M.F.A., art, ’18) has been making art his entire life. First comics as a kid, then experimental music, tattoos, video and film, short stories, poetry, painting, and now art that brings it all together. His work gives viewers a noisy, candy-colored, loop-the-loop ride that journeys to darker places, and tackles issues of poverty, labor, and violence.

A movie directed by Ben Wang (B.A., Asian American studies, '04) is streaming on The World Channel during July 2019. Breathin': The Eddy Zheng Story tells about a Chinese immigrant teenager tried as an adult. The documentary follows Eddy Zheng as immigrant, son, prisoner and activist on his journey to freedom and rehabilitation. Wang is co-director of the Asian Prisoner Support Committee. Read more about Wang. 

Todd Calvin (B.A., political science, ’86) was recently elected vice president of the Opera League of Los Angeles board of directors. He has served on the board for nine years. Calvin has been vice president for business and legal affairs for Viacom Media Networks (Nickelodeon and TV Land) for nearly eight years. He worked for the Walt Disney Company in business and legal affairs for seven years and also held jobs at the San Francisco Opera and Showtime.

Comedian Hasan Minhaj (B.A., political science, '07) has been named to Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people of 2019.  He came to prominence as senior correspondent on The Daily Show starting in 2014 and in 2018 began hosting Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj on Netflix. His first stand-up comedy special, 2017’s Homecoming King won a Peabody Award. 

Christopher Markus (M.A., English, ’96) was co-writer, with Stephen McFeely (M.A. English,’96), of the just-released movie "Avengers: Endgame.” The two met at UC Davis in the creative writing program. They've written scripts for the "Captain America" films, the "Chronicles of Narnia" movie franchise, and won an Emmy for their screenplay of HBO movie, "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers."

Stephen McFeely (M.A. English, ’96) was co-writer, with Christopher Markus (M.A., English, ’96), of the just-released movie "Avengers: Endgame.” The two met at UC Davis in the creative writing program. They've written scripts for the "Captain America" films, the "Chronicles of Narnia" movie franchise, and won an Emmy for their screenplay of HBO movie, "The Life and Death of Peter Sellers."

The debut novel by Maria Kuznetsova (M.A., English, '11) was published in March 2019 by Spiegel & Grau/Random House. OKSANA, BEHAVE! is a coming-of-age story about a young woman whose family has emigrated from Ukraine to Florida. Kuznetsova, a native of Ukraine, also received an M.F.A. from the Iowa Writers' Workshop. Her writing has been published in The Threepenny Review, The Normal School, The Bennington Review, The Iowa Review and Indiana Review.

Rene Olivas (B.A., anthropology, '97) is a special agent with the fraud detection office in the U.S. Office of Inspector General, Department of Justice. Last year, Olivas won the Inspector General’s Award for Fraud Prevention and completed an investigation of a former Department of Justice trial attorney accused of stealing and attempting to sell sensitive, sealed court documents. In November he received a Law Enforcement Award from the U.S.