Actor and singer Utkarsh Ambudkar has appeared in the movie “Pitch Perfect” and television’s “The Mindy Project.” This fall, he’ll star on Broadway in Lin Manuel Miranda’s “Freestyle Love Supreme.” But despite these high-profile performances, Ambudkar, who is South Asian, hasn’t found it easy to avoid casting cliches. He shares his brief but spectacular take on making up his career as he goes.

For Aml Ameen, entertaining was a passion from childhood. At his request, the English actor's father sent him to drama school for 10 years. But it was a chance encounter with movie star Idris Elba that opened a path to honoring his Jamaican heritage -- while further developing his career. Ameen shares his brief but spectacular take on finding his own identity while portraying a character.

Although Prosanta Chakrabarty grew up in Queens, he always loved nature. The wonder of the world's creatures inspired him to study biology, a field that illuminates which of Earth’s beings are related to one another -- and how an event in a single location of this interconnected planet can cause global repercussions. Chakrabarty offers his brief but spectacular take on life on Earth.

The documentary “Hale County This Morning, This Evening,” about a community in the Alabama Black Belt, received an Academy Award nomination for best documentary earlier this year. RaMell Ross spent more than five years making the film, exploring the South as a black American from the North. He offers his brief but spectacular take on the black experience in documentary film.