Articles by candacekita

Founded in early 1992 by creator Brian Wallos, Bench Warmer created the female trading card category with its first release of 120 cards featuring beautiful women in their favorite sports garb. Since this time, Bench Warmer has produced other fun products including calendars, posters, phone cards and most recently, nostalgic bubblegum trading cards. Since the early days of Bench Warmer, numerous Bench Warmer Models have gone on to stardom after their Bench Warmer appearance including Brooke Burke, Cindy Margolis, Gena Lee Nolin, Charisma Carpenter, Nikki Ziering and Traci Bingham.

This month I had the pleasure of speaking with Darryl Wong of Speed Wong Racing. For the past 7 years, Speed Wong Racing has grown into a successful race car team on the West Coast. Speed Wong Racing started out quietly in 2003. It was simply a father and a son, neither of whom had any racing experience. They purchased one Legends race car on a whim. From that one car to today, Speed Wong Racing has grown to a stable of race cars and heavy transport trucks. I spoke to Darryl about Speed Wong Racing, cars and the business principles that have built this team.

Recently, I had the opportunity to meet high fashion photographer, Edward Duarte. Based in Los Angeles, Duarte has developed a long standing relationship with Japanese fashion and celebrity. Some of his past clients include Ken Watanabe, Rinko Kikuchi, Nobu Matsuhisu and artist Murakami.

This month I had the opportunity to work with celebrity makeup artist, Yoko Nobushi. Yoko was born in Japan and came to the US when she was 25 to pursue her dream of learning special effects makeup. Financially strapped, she worked day and night to save enough money to move to America. She is currently working on the NBC show, "OUTLAW" and is also the subject of a new documentary, "Gutto! Chikyubin". I spoke to Yoko about her new projects and celebrity status as a makeup artist here in Los Angeles.

Last month, I had the opportunity to work with Dutch filmmaker mZiah. A music artist and producer in his youth, mZiah released his first record on one of the leading European electronic music labels, Music Man, at age 18. “This was an excellent start for somebody who couldn’t wait to be old enough to be a real artist,” mZiah told me when I asked him about his emerging career.

After projects with SONY (Germany),Universal (U.K.),EMI(Worldwide) and BMG (Europe), mZIAH decided to try the independent route. He moved to the US and focused on his visual talents.

Several men have told me that, according to God, we needed to be together.

"We were destined to be together." "God wants us to be together."

Wow, God wants EXACTLY what you want. Don't you love it when that happens?

A lot of men have said -- and apparently believed -- that they were my soulmates. I must have a lot of soul. Or maybe it's God's way of telling me that I'm meant for plural marriage -- or a harem of dubious men. Or the soulmate department is falling behind in quality control and empowering way too many dudes with this notion.

I’ve never been a waitress, hostess, bartender or any of the typical side jobs you’d expect an actor to have. This is partly because I’ve always been afraid of dropping plates on customer’s heads. But I’ve had an array of weird jobs to stay afloat when I was starting out. Here are a few:

Last week I visited Chatroulette, a site that brings a random cavalcade of complete strangers into your home, via live webcam, from anywhere in the world. A male friend volunteered to serve as stenographer and virtual security guard.

Recently, Asiance Magazine asked me to write a monthly column on women’s safety. Now you might ask yourself, “Who in the world is Candace Kita and why is she writing about women’s safety?” Believe me, a few years ago the thought of writing about safety issues would have never crossed my mind, either. I mean, what a dry topic. Why couldn’t they have asked me to do a column on fashion or food reviews?

But I guess the saying is true: Necessity is the mother of invention. And while I'm an actor by trade, I needed to become a safety expert. Had no choice, in fact.