E-mail a friendMia Kirshner
airdate December 16, 2008
Mia Kirshner started acting in her teens. The Toronto native's work in the Canadian film Exotica attracted the attention of American casting agents and, since then, she's had lead and supporting roles in features, including The Black Dahlia, and on such TV hits as the Fox series 24 and Showtime's The L Word. Kirshner has also spent the past seven years working on her first book. I Live Here has been described as a portrait of individuals living in difficult situations, and all royalties go to Amnesty International.
The L Word star tells what she took away from each country she visited while writing her book on human rights issues. (3:39)
Full interview. (11:41)
Mia Kirshner
Tavis: Mia Kirshner stars on the acclaimed Showtime series "The L Word," which begins its sixth and final season next month. She's also out now with a unique project focusing on displaced women and children in some of the world's poorest places. Her new book is called "I Live Here." Mia, nice to have you on the program.
Mia Kirshner: Oh, very nice to be here.
Tavis: I don't know what it is -- I've been so fortunately lately. Quincy Jones was -- music impresario -- in this seat a few weeks ago, and Quincy had a book that's just a wonderful presentation about his life and legacy. And I get so turned on -- I'm a sucker for packaging; I love really unique packaging. So Jonathan, you know, got this?
This it he book, and it opens up like this -- oh, there's a shot -- they got a shot of it. I love my team, they got a shot already.
Kirshner: Oh, wow, that's very organized.
Tavis: And it opens up again. I love this. So it's a book -- I'm going to hold this for a second -- so there are four books in this packaging. All right, Jonathan, I got you, and I'm going to pull this out. So there are four books, and the books come out of these pockets.
Kirshner: That's right.
Tavis: So it's beautiful packaging. So you tell me what these four things are, and we'll talk more about it, but there are four books here about displaced women and children in four parts of the world, and these are what?
Kirshner: Each book is its own country, so --
Tavis: This is?
Kirshner: This is Chechnya, so this is a book about the displacement in Chechnya and the war in Chechnya, which has been raging for many, many, many years. This book here is about the ongoing genocide of the Burmese, the ethnic Burmese groups. And this is about the killings in Juarez and the Mexican government's lack of responsibility they've taken to find out who the killers are. And the last book is HIV in Malawi, as told through a children's story.
Tavis: Wow.
Kirshner: And kids in prison -- kids in a juvenile prison in Malawi, who've been lost.
Tavis: Let me go back to the beginning now, to the genesis. This idea for a project like this generates how?
Kirshner: Well, I think I was -- well, not I think; I was working, and I just found myself, that I was just disconnected -- kind of just not connected to my life. I was going to work, I knew that I was fortunate, I knew that I was lucky to have a job, but I just felt like I wasn't contributing anything to my community.
And September 11th happened, and I just thought that I can't continue living like this. Because I was frightened at the level of my own ignorance in terms of the fact that I didn't -- I don't think I knew about many of the events that led up to September 11th and I just thought things had to change, and the idea of the book came through that.
Tavis: Help me understand the juxtaposition -- the connect between terrorists hitting our country on September 11th and your doing a text about displaced women and children.
Kirshner: Because I think that -- this is a very complicated issue to talk about, but I believe that compassion needs to exist in all areas of life, and --
Tavis: What's complicated -- I agree with that, what's complicated about that?
Kirshner: Well, because we're talking about September 11th and the issue of terrorism, which is very complicated. But I think the roots of it lie in poverty, and I think that when people feel ignored, they don't feel heard, I think that that leads to violence and I think that this book was very much about capturing lost stories and stories that might perhaps vanish if people didn't find them.
And so I certainly -- my own instinct was just to go into these places and have the displaced write for themselves, because everyone has something to say. You don't have to be in university, you don't have to be a great writer, you just have something to say, and I think that by telling your story it's a form of empowerment.
Tavis: Pardon my -- how do I want to put this, Mia? Pardon my deliberate naïveté as a preface to this question -- my deliberate naïveté -- but why is it do you think that we cannot get traction on a real conversation about poverty and about its eradication in this country, or anywhere else, quite frankly?
Kirshner: Because it's such an overwhelming issue, and I mean for -- I certainly found that in terms of --
Tavis: So is the auto industry bailout, but we're talking about it.
Kirshner: Yeah, but I mean, like, I think that the issue of poverty and violence and sadness is an overwhelming issue, so certainly in doing the research for the book I was overwhelmed by the amount of just these dry country reports that I was reading from very good human rights organizations, and I think that the only way to engage with this subject matter is to do it on an emotional level, which is how the book was put together.
So it was about telling stories that perhaps (unintelligible) we can relate to on a very personal level that will engage people to do something about it.
Tavis: I love books. I suspect, obviously, you do too. I love it as a medium. Talk to me about the contrast, the comparison, between the medium that you're so good at -- film, television, stage -- and putting something on the pages of a book. You're used to telling stories visually, and this is visual, but it's a book. Can you just --
Kirshner: Yeah, look, in terms of the acting, I sort of feel like Forrest Gump in the whole thing -- like I just sort of was lucky, and I sort of -- I think there are a lot of women who are a lot better than I am at those jobs, and I'm really lucky to have a job. In fact, my training is in that, and I would say that is what --
Tavis: This is closer to you than what we see on "The L Word."
Kirshner: Well, "The L Word," I'm lucky to have been given -- that job paid for this book, and the show is very meaningful to a lot of women so I'm fortunate in that sense, but I think that my skill set is much more appropriate to do books. But I'm clear that I'm lucky to act, and I enjoy it.
Tavis: Take each of these four places and tell me -- and obviously, the book details this, but in the time we have here for this television conversation give me one story that best illustrates what you took away from each of these four places, and we'll start with Chechnya.
Kirshner: I think the lack of psychological support that exists in communities that are living sort of suspended, waiting to go back to their homes. That was the thing that I saw that was neglected.
Tavis: Burma?
Kirshner: The issue of child soldiers. The fact that Burma employs one of the highest numbers of child soldiers in the world, and what is the international community doing about that? I realize that it's funny that I'm an actor sitting up here, and what do I know about it?
But sitting in front of these kids who had just escaped from the Burmese army, and they're looking at me and they're telling me that they want to go home and they can't, and what are we doing about it? And I can't answer that question. Finally, Amnesty is now releasing some kind of an action against the use and employment of child soldiers in Burma, but more needs to be done.
Tavis: Malawi?
Kirshner: Malawi was the most surprising trip. Malawi changed everything for me. I met a woman named Miriam, and Malawi is one of the poorest countries in the world, and I think the issue -- people have heard a lot about the issue of HIV/AIDS in Africa, but not enough is being done.
So I think I was sort of daunted by how to tackle this, and I met this woman who was not out about her status, and while knowing her, she discovered that her daughter has HIV and she herself is positive, and she changed the way I thought about all of it.
Because it was the last trip I went on, and she taught me about grace. She taught me that nobody wants your -- they don't want your pity. We don't want -- I am dignified, I'm proud, I have something to say, I am educated. I have something to contribute. And she taught me about the grace in which she handles the extremities that she lives within, and because of her, and because of my experience with these boys in a juvenile prison in Malawi, most of whom are HIV/AIDS orphans, I decided to set up a creative writing program in that prison.
Because I saw first-hand that these kids had a lot to say. One of the kids wrote, which is the back of the Malawi book, "My goodness is my wisdom, which is my strength and my future." Now, a kid writes that, how can you not respond to that? So Rachel is -- or Miriam is now -- I changed her name, but she's now going to be running the program in Malawi. We got funding from Causecast, we launch in March.
Chris Abani did the curriculum, who's a wonderful writer, and my sister is finishing the curriculum, and I'm going to do my best for those boys.
Tavis: The last stop I didn't mention was Juarez, Mexico.
Kirshner: It's terrible. It's just terrible. The women who worked in factories who were chosen and picked to be killed were young, attractive women, and they were chosen because they were poor, and it's just outrageous that the Mexican government has done nothing to stop it.
Tavis: Let me move toward my exit question here, and I want to preface it by going back to the first part of our conversation, when you suggested to me that you did this book, "I Live Here," in part because you just felt like you weren't contributing enough a few years ago.
So you do a project like this -- I could interpret this text one of two ways; that you now feel like you've made a contribution, or now you're even more overwhelmed about the challenges the world faces.
Kirshner: Oh, no, I'm not overwhelmed.
Tavis: That you've been so close to.
Kirshner: No, I've just started. My goal now, I'm going to get that book into as many universities as I can. This book needs to be taught, so I have a whole plan out there. MIT asked me to teach there, so I'm teaching a course on the book in January.
Tavis: That's high cotton, to be asked by MIT.
Kirshner: I was a special ed kid. (Laughter.) No, seriously.
Tavis: And now you're teaching at MIT.
Kirshner: You know what? And I said it when I went on the book tour. I said, "You know what? I was considered one of the dumb kids at school." You know how they put you on the at-risk list at school? And I was one of those kids -- I can't spell, I'm terrible at math, but I did it, and MIT asked me to teach there, and I finished the book. And I feel like if I can do this, anybody can do something like that. That makes me proud. So yes, I've just begun and I'm excited. I feel like I have a lot to do.
Tavis: It's a wonderful feeling.
Kirshner: Yeah, it is.
Tavis: To know that you're making a contribution and to know that you can even do more than you've already done.
Kirshner: Yes, yes, it's beginning.
Tavis: Well, that's a good -- there's a moral for all of us, I think, in that whatever it is that you are doing, you can do more. And my grandmother used to always tell me, "The more you do, the more you can do."
Kirshner: Yeah.
Tavis: The more you do, the more you can do. The book, by Mia Kirshner, is called "I Live Here." It will move you -- I'll just leave it at that. "I Live Here" is the book. Mia, nice to have you on the program.
Kirshner: Thank you for having me.
Tavis: All the best to you in your work.
Kirshner: Thank you.
Back to December 16, 2008