Mario Van Peebles

Actor-director Mario Van Peebles has listed a wooded compound in the Hollywood Hills at $1.675 million. The nearly half-acre lot includes a main house, patio space and a guest house. Custom details include stairway handrails made from recycled metals, a double wooden entry door, mosaic tile accents, a glass ceiling in the master bathroom, a rope swing for children in the master bedroom and an outdoor brick barbecue. There are four bedrooms, four bathrooms, a fireplace and 4,255 square feet of living space.

Writer-director Mario Van Peebles' hectic version of a coming-of-age romp, the L.A.-set "We the Party" depicts a multi-ethnic group of friends and acquaintances at a fictional Baldwin Hills high school, who have sex, grades and an uncertain future on their minds. Van Peebles' son Mandela stars as Hendrix, a smart charmer with an eye for studious babe Cheyenne (Simone Battle) but a disdain for education that worries his hectoring dad (director Van Peebles), a teacher at his school.

The mean streets of America's urban ghettos are suddenly teeming with filmmakers. "Boyz N the Hood," "New Jack City," "Hanging With the Home Boys" and "Straight Out of Brooklyn" have all told basically the same story of trapped teen-agers steamrollered by an unforgiving environment. "Juice" (citywide) is the latest entry in this particular sweepstakes, and though it is a vivid, promising piece of work from first-time director Ernest R.

As a third-generation Asian-American, I was shocked and extremely offended by the April 12 episode of "Sonny Spoon" in which Mario Van Peebles appeared in repulsively ugly "yellow-face" and spouted idiotic stereotype-gibberish. And the inclusion of a few insignificant Asian-American extras in the scene did not, in any way, dilute the insult. Bill Shinkai, Carson

Good to see actress Joy Bryant in her true element as fashionista ("Joy," Fall Fashion Issue, Sept. 10). Better to hear her wax philosophical on managing life's issues. Bryant first caught my attention with her performance in Mario Van Peebles' film "Baadasssss!" From that brief but significant role, I envisioned her agent fielding many a phone call requesting all things Joy. You go, girl! R. Amos Los Angeles

Twenty years ago this month, a small, hip-hop infused coming-of-age drama set in South-Central Los Angeles called "Boyz N the Hood" was causing extreme reactions from two very different audiences. Written and directed by John Singleton, a brash 23-year-old just months out of USC's film school, and made for a mere $5.7 million, largely with an unknown and untested cast of African American actors, the film had just played May's prestigious Cannes Film Festival where it received a 20-minute standing ovation.

"He loves her. She loves the white girl." So goes the provocative ad copy for "The White Girl," the first feature directed by Tony Brown--the host of the longest-running black public affairs show on TV, "Tony Brown's Journal." To get this first feature off the ground, Brown said he deferred his producing/directing salaries. His production company, which does "Journal," came up with the "under $2-million" budget.