Young Jean Lee is an American playwright, director, and filmmaker. She was the Artistic Director of Young Jean Lee's Theater Company, a not-for-profit theater company dedicated to producing her work. She has written and directed ten shows for Young Jean Lee's Theater Company and toured her work to over thirty cities around the world. Lee was called "the most adventurous downtown playwright of her generation" by Charles Isherwood in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' and "one of the best experimental playwrights in America" by David Cote in Time Out New York. With the 2018 production of '' Straight White Men'' at the

Hayes Theater The Hayes Theater (formerly the Little Theatre, New York Times Hall, Winthrop Ames Theatre, and Helen Hayes Theatre) is a Broadway theater at 240 West 44th Street in the Theater District of Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Named for actres ...

, Lee became the first Asian American woman to have a play produced on

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...

Background

Lee was born in South Korea and moved to the United States when she was two years old. She grew up in

Pullman, Washington Pullman () is the largest city in Whitman County, located in southeastern Washington within the Palouse region of the Pacific Northwest. The population was 29,799 at the 2010 census, and estimated to be 34,506 in 2019. Originally founded as Thr ...

and attended college at

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of Californi ...

, where she majored in English and graduated

Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal a ...

. Immediately after college, Lee entered UC Berkeley's English Ph.D. program, where she studied Shakespeare for six years before moving to New York to become a playwright. She received an MFA from Mac Wellman's playwriting program at

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls about 15,000 undergraduate and 2,800 graduate students on a 35-acre campus. Being New York City's first publ ...

Works

Theater

Lee's plays have been presented in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

at,
The Public Theater
('' Straight White Men''), ''the

Baryshnikov Arts Center The Baryshnikov Arts Center (BAC) is a foundation and arts complex opened by Mikhail Baryshnikov in 2005 at 450 West 37th Street between Ninth and Tenth Avenues in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. The top three floor ...

(''Untitled Feminist Show''), LCT3/

Lincoln Center Theater The Vivian Beaumont Theater is a Broadway theater in the Lincoln Center complex at 150 West 65th Street on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. Operated by the nonprofit Lincoln Center Theater (LCT), the Beaumont is the only Broad ...

('' We're Gonna Die''),

Joe's Pub Joe's Pub, one of the six performance spaces within The Public Theater, is a music venue and restaurant that hosts live performances across genres and arts, ranging from cabaret to modern dance to world music. It is located at 425 Lafayette St ...

(''We're Gonna Die''), Soho Repertory Theater (''Lear''), ''The Appeal'',

The Kitchen The Kitchen is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary avant-garde performance and experimental art institution located at 512 West 19th Street, between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was founde ...

(''The Shipment'')

The Public Theater The Public Theater is a New York City arts organization founded as the Shakespeare Workshop in 1954 by Joseph Papp, with the intention of showcasing the works of up-and-coming playwrights and performers.Epstein, Helen. ''Joe Papp: An American Li ...

(''Church''),

P.S. 122 Performance Space New York, formerly known as Performance Space 122 or P.S. 122, is a non-profitable arts organization founded in 1980 in the East Village, Manhattan, East Village neighborhood of Manhattan in an abandoned public school building. ...

(''Church''), ''Pullman, Washington'',

HERE Arts Center HERE Arts Center is a New York City off-off-Broadway presenting house, founded in 1993. Their location includes two stages specializing in hybrid performance, dance, theater, multi-media and puppetry in addition to art exhibition space and a cafe ...

(''Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven''), and the

Ontological-Hysteric Theater Richard Foreman (born June 10, 1937 in New York City) is an American avant-garde playwright and the founder of the Ontological-Hysteric Theater. Achievements and awards Foreman has written, directed and designed over fifty of his own plays, b ...

(''Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals''). Her work has toured venues in Paris, Vienna, Hannover, Berlin, Zurich, Brussels, Budapest, Sydney, Melbourne, Bergen, Brighton, Hamburg, Oslo, Trondheim, Rotterdam, Salamanca, Graz, Seoul, Zagreb, Toulouse, Toronto, Calgary, Antwerp, Vienna, Athens, London, Chicago, Chapel Hill, Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, San Francisco, Philadelphia, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Boston, New Hampshire, Williamstown, and Minneapolis. Lee is currently under commission from

, and the

Oregon Shakespeare Festival The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) is a regional repertory theatre in Ashland, Oregon, United States, founded in 1935 by Angus L. Bowmer. The Festival now offers matinee and evening performances of a wide range of classic and contemporary pla ...

Plays

* '' Straight White Men'' (2014) * ''Untitled Feminist Show'' (2011) * '' We're Gonna Die'' (2011) * ''Lear'' (2010) * ''The Shipment'' (2009) * ''Church'' (2007) * ''Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven'' (2006) * ''Pullman, WA'' (2005) * ''The Appeal'' (2004) * ''Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals'' (2003) * ''Yaggoo'' (2003)

Film

Her first short film, ''Here Come the Girls'', had its world premiere at the

Locarno International Film Festival The Locarno Film Festival is an annual film festival, held every August in Locarno, Switzerland. Founded in 1946, the festival screens films in various competitive and non-competitive sections, including feature-length narrative, documentary, sh ...

, its U.S. premiere at the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...

, and its New York premiere at BAMcinemaFest.

Music

Her band, Future Wife, released their debut album,
We’re Gonna Die
', in 2013. The band features members of various New York projects, including Cloud Becomes Your Hand, San Fermin, Field Guides, and Landlady. Young Jean Lee and Future Wife performed the show,
We're Gonna Die
'' with

David Byrne David Byrne (; born 14 May 1952) is a Scottish-American singer, songwriter, record producer, actor, writer, music theorist, visual artist and filmmaker. He was a founding member and the principal songwriter, lead singer, and guitarist of ...

at hi
Meltdown Festival
in London (Southbank Centre) in August 2015.

Affiliations

Outside her own company, Lee has worked with Radiohole and the

National Theater of the United States of America National Theater of the United States of America is a theatre company in New York City. The theatre has no connection with the American government, the name is intended to be humorous. The troupe, founded in 2000, has been lauded by Gothamist as a ...

. She is on the board of

Yaddo Yaddo is an artists' community located on a estate in Saratoga Springs, New York. Its mission is "to nurture the creative process by providing an opportunity for artists to work without interruption in a supportive environment.". On March ...

, is a former member of New Dramatists and 13P, and has been awarded residencies from

, the

MacDowell Colony MacDowell is an artist's residency program in Peterborough, New Hampshire, United States, founded in 1907 by composer Edward MacDowell and his wife, pianist and philanthropist Marian MacDowell. Prior to July 2020, it was known as the MacDowel ...

, the

Ucross Foundation The Ucross Foundation, located in Ucross, Wyoming, is a nonprofit organization that operates an internationally known retreat for visual artists, writers, composers, and choreographers working in all creative disciplines. History Founded in 1981 ...

Hedgebrook Hedgebrook is a rural retreat for women writers on Whidbey Island, Washington, founded in 1988. Hedgebrook's artist-in-residence program accepts up to 80 writers each year, who spend two to four weeks in residence working on their diverse writi ...

, the

Park Avenue Armory __NOTOC__ The Park Avenue Armory Conservancy, generally known as Park Avenue Armory, is a nonprofit cultural institution within the historic Seventh Regiment Armory building located at 643 Park Avenue on New York City's Upper East Side. The inst ...

, Orchard Project,

, and Brooklyn Arts Exchange. Lee is currently an Associate Professor of Theater and Performance Studies at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

Publications

Theatre Communications Group Theatre Communications Group (TCG) is a non-profit service organization headquartered in New York City that promotes professional non-profit theatre in the United States. The organization also publishes ''American Theatre'' magazine and ''ARTSEA ...

has published all 11 of Lee's plays in four books: ''Songs of the Dragons Flying to Heaven and Other Plays''; ''The Shipment and Lear''; ''We're Gonna Die'', and ''Straight White Men/Untitled Feminist Show''. Other publications include: ''Three Plays by Young Jean Lee'' ( Samuel French, Inc.), ''New Downtown Now'' (an anthology edited with

Mac Wellman Mac Wellman, born John McDowell Wellman on March 7, 1945, in Cleveland, Ohio, is an American playwright, author, and poet.American Theatre magazine Theatre Communications Group (TCG) is a non-profit service organization headquartered in New York City that promotes professional non-profit theatre in the United States. The organization also publishes ''American Theatre'' magazine and ''ARTSEA ...

''.

Awards

Lee is the recipient of a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

, two

OBIE Award The Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards originally given by ''The Village Voice'' newspaper to theatre artists and groups in New York City. In September 2014, the awards were jointly presented and administered with the A ...

s, a Prize in Literature from the

American Academy of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqu ...

, a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, a Doris Duke Artist Residency, a

Foundation for Contemporary Arts The Foundation for Contemporary Arts (FCA), is a nonprofit based foundation in New York City that offers financial support and recognition to contemporary performing and visual artists through awards for artistic innovation and potential. It was ...

Grants to Artists award (2006), and the ZKB Patronage Prize of the

Zürcher Theater Spektakel The Zürcher Theater Spektakel (''Zürich Theatre Spectacle'') is an international theatre and performing arts festival, held annually each summer in Zürich, Switzerland. First held in 1980, the festival invites 20-25 different performing arts g ...

. She has also received funding from the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal ...

, the

New York State Council on the Arts The New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) is an arts council serving the U.S. state of New York. It was established in 1960 through a bill introduced in the New York State Legislature by New York State Senator MacNeil Mitchell (1905–1996), ...

, the

Rockefeller Foundation The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, after the Carneg ...

MAP Fund, the

Andrew Mellon Foundation The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation of New York City in the United States, simply known as Mellon Foundation, is a private foundation with five core areas of interest, and endowed with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pitts ...

Creative Capital Creative Capital is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization based in New York City that supports artists across the United States through funding, counsel, gatherings, and career development services. Since its founding in 1999, Creative Capital has commi ...

, the Greenwall Foundation, the

Jerome Foundation James Jerome Hill II (March 2, 1905 – November 21, 1972) was an American filmmaker and artist known for his award-winning documentary and experimental films. Career Hill was the child of railroad executive Louis W. Hill. He was educated at Y ...

, the

New York Foundation for the Arts The New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) is an independent 501(c)(3) charity, funded through government, foundation, corporate, and individual support, established in 1971. It is part of a network of national not-for-profit arts organizations ...

, the Arts Presenters/Ford Foundation Creative Capacity Grant, the Barbara Bell Cumming Foundation, and the

New England Foundation for the Arts The New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, is one of six not-for-profit regional arts organizations funded by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and by private foundations, corporations and ind ...

: National Theater Project Award. She won the 2016 PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award. She won the 2019 Windham–Campbell Literature Prize in Drama.

References

External links

Young Jean Lee's Theater Company Official Website

Young Jean Lee's Theater Company's Press and Publications Archive

2008 ''Bomb Magazine'' interview of Young Jean Lee by Richard Maxwell
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lee, Young Jean American theatre directors Women theatre directors 21st-century American dramatists and playwrights American dramatists and playwrights of Korean descent American writers of Korean descent Brooklyn College alumni Obie Award recipients People from Daegu Postmodern theatre South Korean emigrants to the United States University of California, Berkeley alumni American women dramatists and playwrights 1974 births Living people 21st-century American women writers