WRITER
"Like many actors of color, I began writing because I wasn’t seeing stories about people who looked like me on stage or screen. I never imagined that I would fall so completely in love with it, but all these years later, I cannot fathom my creative life without writing being in it. Being a generative artist as well as an interpretive artist presents the best of all creative worlds to me."
For theatre, Christine’s first play, THE NEW DEAL, was the inaugural play to be developed in Charles Randolph-Wright’s "Different Voices" program at the Roundabout Theatre Company in NYC and subsequently developed through Ensemble Studio Theatre’s Going to the River Playwriting Unit (featured in Applause Books' "She Persisted: Best Monologues by Women Over 40"). Other plays and musicals include A LITTLE MORE BLUE (a solo play with music, winner of the 2022 inaugural Alvin Epstein Memorial Solo Performance prize and multiple grant awards from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance), FUSONG (based on "The Lost Daughter of Happiness" by Geling Yan, book & lyrics with composer Cecilia Lin, commissioned by the novel's author), BROKEN GROUND (book & lyrics with composer/lyricist Jason Ma, a commission from Village Theatre, O'Neill National Theater Conference Finalist, Musical Theatre Works New Works Festival, Goodspeed Opera House Johnny Mercer Writers Grove), EMPRESS MEI LI LOTUS BLOSSOM (Abingdon Theatre Company's New Works Festival winner, Women's Theatre Festival Fringe 2020 "Outstanding Short Form Play", Greater Boston Stage Company), THE SECRET WISDOM OF TREES (featured in Applause Books’ LATER CHAPTERS Anthology, developed in residence at The Barrow Group Theatre Company and Florida Studio Theatre), TILL SOON, ANNE (book and lyrics with composer Bobby Cronin, honorable mention Jonathan Larson Grant Awards (libretto), developed in residencies at the O’Neill Theater Center), ADVENTURES OF A FAUX DESIGNER HANDBAG (National Women's Theatre Festival #OccupyTheStage2020, Leviathan Lab, part of the “Playwriting”
curriculum at Wesleyan University),BARCELONA (libretto and lyrics with composer/lyricist Jason Ma, developed at residencies at the Weston Playhouse, CAP 21 and as part of Village Theatre’s Festival of New Musicals), GUILTY UNTIL PROVEN INNOCENT (starring GRIMM’s Reggie Lee and Bree Turner, featured in Applause Books'"She Persisted: Best Monologues by Women Over 40"), TRUTH AGAINST THE WORLD: THE LIFE AND LOVES OF FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT (developed in a residency at the O’Neill Theater Center, world premiere at the Kennedy/McIlwee Studio Theatre in Raleigh, NC), DIARY OF A DOMESTIC GODDESS (with Kevin Duda), MY BOYFRIEND IS AN ALIEN (AND I’M OKAY WITH THAT) (book & lyrics, with composer Bobby Cronin, commissioned and produced by Prospect Theater Company and Theatre Elision), AMERICA'S BFF (book & lyrics with composer Bobby Cronin), PAPER SON (Diverse City Theatre Company, Queens Theatre in the Park, part of the “Multi-cultural Drama” curriculum at the University of Michigan/Flint and the “Playwriting” curriculum at Wesleyan University), INTERNAL BLEEDING (Atlanta Black Theatre Festival, ReImagined World Entertainment’s 2011 workshop starring Daryl “Chill” Mitchell,Crossroads Theatre Company), “EVER SEE A FAT CHINESE?” (New Perspectives Theatre Company), HALO HALO BIRTHDAY (Leviathan Lab, soon to be featured in Applause Books' "She Persisted: Best Monologues by Women Over 40"), PEACE PLAZA (Leviathan Lab, featured in Applause Books' "She Persisted: Best 10 minute Plays by Women Over 40), WELCOME TO TELEVISION (Barrow Group Theatre Company), TANFORAN (Barrow Group Theatre Company), DO THESE GENES MAKE ME LOOK FAT? (A-Squared Productions), EXPRESSION OF REGRET (365 Women a Year Playwriting Project, Towne Street Theatre, Putnam Theatre Alliance) and WHO WE ARE (Women's Theatre Festival Fringe).
Screenplays include NO WAVE (with Charles Randolph-Wright), RIDING OUT THE STORM (screenplay & lyrics with composer Michael Mott, and Executive Producer with Moongate Productions), JUMPING THE THIRD RAIL (winner, 2016 Meryl Streep/IRIS Writers Lab Fellowship, now titled LOOK UP), WINNING NEW YORK (Screenplay and lyrics with composer Bobby Cronin, produced by New York Film Academy), FOOD LIKE LOVE (screenplay and lyrics with composer Bobby Cronin, produced by New York Film Academy), AMERICAN DREAMIN’ (screenplay, produced by New York Film Academy) and OLD, FAT & UGLY. An anthology of her work was inducted into the Library of Congress Asian Pacific American Performing Arts Collection in 2010 and is published by NoPassport Press, Smith & Krause, Rowman & Littlefield, and Applause Books. She is an alumna of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop and the founder of The Asian American Theatre Artists Collective and The Asian American Musical Theater Writers Project. She serves as Treasurer of the Dramatists Guild of America, and is host of the Guild's podcast "Talkback" on the Broadway Podcast Network.