Second Stage Theatre is presenting the world premiere of Chisa Hutchinson’s SOMEBODY’S DAUGHTER, directed by May Adrales in the 2017 Uptown Series. The cast features Vanessa Kai, Collin Kelly-Sordelet, Michelle Herra Kim, Rodney Richardson, David Shih and Jeena Yi.
SOMEBODY’S DAUGHTER will begin previews on Tuesday, May 23, 2017 and will officially open on Tuesday, June 6, 2017. SOMEBODY’S DAUGHTER is presented at Second Stage Theatre’s uptown home, the McGinn/Cazale Theatre on Broadway at 76th Street. The play is commissioned by Second Stage as part of the Time Warner Commissioning Program. Click here to purchase tickets and for more information.
Alex is a fifteen year old Asian-American girl going to extremes to get her own mother to notice her. She’s a dream child– except to her parents who wish she was a boy. Luckily she finds a sympathetic ear in Kate, her irreverent guidance counselor who knows all too well what it’s like to walk in Alex’s shoes. As three generations of women find their identity in question, each needs to decide who makes the rules and what happens when you break them.
VANESSA KAI (Millie Chan) is thrilled to make her Second Stage debut! Most recent credits include The Christians (as the Wife) at Riverside Theatre, Florida. Favorite New York Theatre: The Architecture of Becoming (Women’s Project Theater @ NY City Center Stage II), What We Know (One Year Lease Theater), Soot and Spit (Our Voices Theatre). Regional: Brownsville Song (B-Side for Tray) (Seattle Repertory Theatre), The Christians (Wife) (Riverside Theatre, Florida), Far East (Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Debut by Connecticut Critics Circle) and An Infinite Ache (both Stamford Theatreworks). Vanessa has also helped develop new works at the Lark Play Development Center, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, The Civilians, The Working Theater, Center Stage Baltimore, TheatreWorks USA and Flux Theatre Ensemble. TV: “The Blacklist,” “Gotham,” “The Mysteries of Laura,” “Orange Is The New Black,” “The Leftovers,” “Law & Order: SVU.” Film: Off The Rails, Old Acquaintance Be Forgot, Behind The Mirror. Special thanks to Chisa Hutchinson, Christopher Burney, May Adrales, and Karyn Casl.
COLLIN KELLY-SORDELET (Russ Mitchell) most recently starred in the independent feature Radium Girls, directed by Virginia Mohler. He also starred opposite Bel Powley in Fritz Bohm’s Wilding. As a freshman at Juilliard, Collin was cast in the lead in The Last Ship on Broadway, for which he won a Theatre World Award and was nominated for the Clive Barnes Award. On TV, Collin has appeared on Hulu’s “The Path”.
MICHELLE HEERA KIM (Alex Chan) is thrilled to be making her professional debut at Second Stage Theater. Recent graduate from Drew University, where her credits included Top Girls and Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them. Endless gratitude to her family and friends for their love and support and to the creative team for taking a chance.
RODNEY RICHARDSON (Reggie Ward). Theatre: Squash (The Flea),The Tempest (The Public/Delacorte – Dir. Michael Greif), Pulse (The Guthrie – Dir. Marcela Lorca), The Broken Record (New York Fringe Festival). TV/FILM: “Elementary” (CBS), “Law & Order: SVU” (NBC), Cubby (Dir. Ben Mankoff), “Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll” (FX), The Good Wife (CBS), Three Sisters Film Project, The Instrumentalist, Kings to You. MFA, New York University, Tisch School of the Arts.
DAVID SHIH (Richard Chan) recurs as Isiah on “The Path” (Hulu). Recently: Tiger Style! (La Jolla). Off-Broadway: Awake and Sing! (The Public/NAATCO), The World of Extreme Happiness (MTC), Bike America (Ma-Yi), Crane Story (Playwrights Realm), Dojoji (Pan Asian Rep), Sake with the Haiku Geisha (Gotham Stage). Film/TV: The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Fan Girl, Old 37, Saving Face, “Madam Secretary,” “The Blacklist,” “Mozart in the Jungle,” “Unforgettable,” “Blue Bloods,” “Law & Order: SVU.” Voice of Eddie Toh in Grand Theft Auto V (Rockstar Games). Performs with Only Make Believe for kids in hospitals and care facilities.
JEENA YI (Kate Wu) is thrilled to make her Second Stage Theatre debut. She was recently seen playing Tong in Vietgone at The Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Seattle Rep. Other credits include Adriana in Comedy of Errors (Classic Stage Company), Emilia in The Winter’s Tale (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), Grace in Lights Rise on Grace (Woolly Mammoth Theatre Co.), Bo in The Hard Problem(Wilma Theater), Brin in Chairs and a Long Table (Ma-Yi Theatre Co.) TV: “Royal Pains”. MFA, Columbia University.
CREATIVE TEAM
CHISA HUTCHINSON (Playwright) is the current recipient of the 2016 Tow Foundation grant for the creation, development and production of this new play through Second Stage Theatre. Hutchinson’s socially probing plays, which include She Like Girls, Sex on Sunday, The Subject, Dead & Breathing, and Somebody’s Daughter among others, have been presented by such venues as City Parks’ Summerstage, the Lark, the National Black Theater, the Contemporary American Theater Festival, the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, and Atlantic Theater Company. She’s won a GLAAD Award, the John Golden Award for Excellence in Playwriting, a Lilly Award, a New York Innovative Theatre Award, the Paul Green Award, a Helen Merrill Award, the Lanford Wilson Award, and has been a finalist for the highly coveted PoNY Fellowship. She’s also been a Lark Fellow, a Dramatists Guild Fellow, a resident at the William Inge Center for the Arts a New York NeoFuturist, and a staff writer for the Blue Man Group. Currently, she is a Humanitas Fellow, Resident Playwright at Second Stage Theater, and a proud fourth-year year member of New Dramatists. (B.A. Vassar College; M.F.A NYU – Tisch School of the Arts).
MAY ADRALES (Director) has helmed several world premieres including Qui Nguyen’s Vietgone (Manhattan Theatre Club, South Coast Rep, Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Seattle Rep); Chisa Hutchinson’s The Wedding Gift (Contemporary American Theater Festival); JC Lee’s Luce (LCT3); Katori Hall’s Whaddabloodclot!!!(Williamstown Theater Festival); A. Rey Pamatmat’s Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them (Actors Theatre of Louisville) and after all the terrible things I do (Milwaukee Rep); Thomas Bradshaw’s Mary (The Goodman Theatre) and The Bereaved (Partial Comfort Productions); Zakiyyah Alexander and Imani Uzuri’s girl shakes loose her skin(Penumbra); In This House (Two River Theater Company); Richard Dresser’s Trouble Cometh (SF Playhouse); Qui Nguyen’s Five Days‘Til Saturday (NYU Tisch) and Tommy Smith’s The Wife (Access Theater). She directed David Henry Hwang’s The Dance and the Railroad at Signature Theater; Kimber Lee’s Tokyo Fish Story (Old Globe); Stefanie Zadravec’s The Electric Baby (Two River); Katori Hall’s The Mountaintop (Milwaukee Rep); Chinglish (Portland Center Stage, Syracuse Stage); Everything You Touch, (CATF); In the Next Room, or Vibrator Play and Disgraced (Syracuse Stage); and Breath and Imagination (Cleveland Playhouse). She is a Drama League Directing Fellow, Women’s Project Lab Director, SoHo Rep Writers/Directors Lab and NYTW directing fellow, and a recipient of the TCG New Generations Grant, Denham Fellowship and Paul Green Directing Award. She proudly serves as an Associate Artist at Milwaukee Rep. She is a former Director of On Site Programs at the Lark Play Development Center and Artistic Associate at The Public Theater. May has directed and taught at Juilliard, ART, ACT, Fordham, NYU and Bard College. May is on faculty at the Yale School of Drama and Brown/Trinity MFA program. MFA, Yale School of Drama.
Created as a program to help develop and provide exposure for the voices of a new generation of theatre artists, Second Stage Theatre UPTOWN (Christopher Burney, Curator & Associate Artistic Director), seeks to develop the skills of emerging playwrights, to provide early-career artists with the support of a major artistic institution, and to create new plays for the American Theatre. Each show has a limited rehearsal period, as well as a streamlined budget. Lead funding for Second Stage Uptown Series is provided by the Time Warner Foundation.
The series was among the first established by a prominent Off-Broadway institution to help nurture and advance the careers of young up and coming playwrights. Since its founding in 2002 the Uptown Series has showcased the works of several established playwrights including Rajiv Joseph (Gruesome Playground Injuries and Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, “Nurse Jackie”), Leslye Headland (Bachelorette), Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (Good Boys and True, HBO’s “Big Love” and “Looking,” “Glee”), Adam Bock (A Small Fire, The Drunken City), and Brooke Berman (Hunting and Gathering); actors Gavin Creel, Ari Graynor, Marin Hinkle, Halley Feiffer, Rosemarie Dewitt, Lorenzo Pisoni, Tracie Thoms and Tracee Chimo, among many others; and directors Davis McCallum, Trip Cullman, Carolyn Cantor, Evan Cabnet and Jackson Gay.
Backstage Pass with Lia Chang 