Rosie Malek-Yonan

Rosie Malek-Yonan was born on July 4, 1955 in Tehran. She is an actress, director, producer, published author, documentary filmmaker, a classically trained pianist, composer and a human rights activist. She is a descendant of one of the oldest and most prominent Assyrian Christian families from the Middle-East, tracing her Assyrian roots back nearly eleven centuries. The Malek family had roots in the Assyrian village of Geogtapah in the Urmia region of northwestern Iran. Rosie's father, George Malek-Yonan, was Iran's Champion of Champions with numerous gold medals in track and field and the pentathlon. He became an international attorney and is credited with securing a seat for the Assyrian Christians as a recognized minority in the Iranian Parliament (Majlis). This was a huge milestone for a nation without a country since the fall of the Assyrian Empire. Rosie's mother, Lida Malek-Yonan (1928-2002), was a well known humanitarian and activist who tirelessly worked a lifetime demanding rights for minority Assyrian Christian women in Iran and secured their recognition by establishing the Assyrian Women's Organization, the only Assyrian organization officially recognized as a charter member of the Iranian Women's Association. Rosie's grandparents left their ancestral homeland in Iran, during the Great Exodus from Urmia in 1918 after the Assyrian Genocide. After World War I, her great-great-uncle, Dr. Jesse Malek-Yonan, represented the Assyrians of Urmia, Iran, at the Paris Peace Talks in 1919. Before WWII, the Malek-Yonan family returned to Tehran where her parents met and were married. Her sister, Monica, works very closely with her on most of her projects. The sisters were members of the Iranian 1980 Winter Olympic Team but decided not to compete after the Iranian Revolution made it virtually impossible when the new Islamic Government required them to become Muslim, wear scarves and long skirts, and perform without music. Rosie began studying classical piano at the age of four and attended the Tehran Conservatory of Music. She won first place in many national piano competitions in Iran and was invited by Queen Farah Pahlavi to play at a Command Performance for the Royal Family. After receiving her L.C. degree in English from the University of Cambridge, she moved to America and continued studying classical piano with Saul Joseph at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and acting with Ray Reinhardt at the American Conservatory Theatre. She graduated from San Francisco State University with two degrees in Music. After winning an invitation to study drama at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, she finally moved to Los Angeles. She studied acting at the historic Pasadena Playhouse where she also appeared on the main stage in William Saroyan's "The Time of Your Life". She has directed and written numerous plays that have been produced and performed on stage in Los Angeles to rave reviews. She made her television debut on Dynasty (1981) in 1982, immediately followed by a national commercial for AT&T where she spoke in Assyrian (from the Aramaic), a language that, years later, director Mel Gibson would use in The Passion of the Christ (2004). Since the early 1980s, she has appeared on notable television shows, in films and onstage, opposite many of Hollywood's leading actors. She played Nuru Il-Ebrahim, opposite Reese Witherspoon, in New Line Cinema's Rendition (2007), directed by Academy Award-winning director Gavin Hood. Rosie Malek-Yonan is an outspoken advocate of issues concerning her Assyrian nation, in particular bringing attention to the Assyrian Genocide as well as the plight of today's Assyrians in the Middle-East since the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the United States and its Coalition Forces. She is frequently interviewed on television and radio programs worldwide including Australia's ABC National Radio and publications such as the New York Times, giving her assessment of the current situation of the Assyrians in the Middle-East as well as discussing the topic of the Assyrian Genocide. As a public speaker, she has been invited to lecture on the topic of the Assyrian Genocide. She has lectured at University of California (Berkeley and Merced campuses) and at Woodbury University, among other schools. In 2008, she addressed the topic of genocide, world peace and in particular the Assyrian Genocide of 1914-18 in statements invited to be presented at the House of Lords on 12 March and on 24 April at the UK House of Commons. Rosie Malek-Yonan is the author of "The Crimson Field", an historical and literary epic novel, based on real events and true family chronicles set to the backdrop of the Assyrian Genocide of 1914-1918, in which 750,000 Assyrians were massacred by the Ottoman Turks, Kurds, and Persians in Ottoman Turkey and in the Assyrian inhabited region of Urmia in northwestern Iran. In 2006, Washington D.C.-based Zinda Magazine, selected "The Crimson Field" as The Assyrian Event of the Year 2005 and MAKE, a Chicago Literary Magazine featured it in their 4th edition. "The Crimson Field" has been added to the State University of New York (SUNY) course curriculum. This is the first time that the Assyrian Genocide is recognized and studied at an institution of higher learning. When The Crimson Field was brought to the attention of Congress, on June 30, 2006, Rosie was invited to testify on Capitol Hill before a Congressional Committee of the 109th Congress on religious freedom regarding the genocide, massacres and persecution of Assyrians in Iraq by Kurds and Islamists. During her 30 minute testimony, She compared the events of 1914-18, as depicted in The Crimson Field, to the current plight of the indigenous Assyrian Christians in Iraq. Her passionate testimony and plea to the United States government, ultimately prompted Congressman Christopher Smith (R-NJ) to travel to war-torn Iraq to witness matters for himself. While in Iraq, after meeting with local Assyrians, he turned in Malek-Yonan's report to U.S. Officials in Iraq. One year later, a Congressional Appropriations Subcommittee unanimously voted on and sent $10 million to aid the Assyrians in Iraq. Monica Malek-Yonan's documentary film, My Assyrian Nation on the Edge, was based on her Congressional Testimony. It was released September 2006. On 7 August 2008, the documentary film was screened at the Australian Parliament of New South Wales in Sydney. The Malek-Yonan sisters contributed to "Seyfo: Genocide, Denial and the Right of Recognition" (ISBN 91-972351-2-1 Seyfo Center, Netherlands Publisher), a book which is a compilation of articles and speeches presented at conferences held in the European Parliament. Various media sources including The Annual Report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, and the U.K. Iraqi Study have quoted and used Rosie Malek-Yonan's Congressional Testimony and her various published articles, speeches and interviews regarding the current state of affairs in Iraq concerning its Assyrian indigenous people as well as the Assyrian refugees in Syria, Jordan and Lebanon. In 2006, at the 73rd Annual Assyrian Convention in Chicago, the Board of Advisers of the Assyrian American National Federation, Inc., named and awarded Rosie Malek-Yonan as Woman of the Year. For her numerous contributions as an actress, artist, director, author and activist, in March 2008, Rosie Malek-Yonan was awarded for Excellence in Arts and Entertainment by the Iranian American Political Action Committee (IAPAC). At the Assyrian Universal Alliance 26th World Conference in Sydney, Australia, she was awarded and named the 2009 Assyrian Woman of the Year in recognition of her substantial contribution to advance the Assyrian national cause by promoting international recognition of the Assyrian Genocide, her extensive efforts in conveying the needs of the Assyrians to the United States government, and achievements in providing individual service to the Assyrian community worldwide. She is an ambassador for the Swedish-based humanitarian organization, Assyrians Without Borders, and a founding member of the Assyrian Cultural and Arts Society that has provided scholarships since 2005 to students at Woodbury University's Design School through an annual Assyrian Design Competition.