Theatre Director · Los Angeles & Orange County
Shinshin Yuder Tsai
I direct plays, sketch comedy and new work — the kind that can be very funny and very sad in the same breath.
More than twenty productions since 2016, built in rooms where people feel safe enough to try the idea that might not work.
Selected work
Recent productions
- 2022
A Lovely Day for a Boating TripStaged reading
Long Beach Playhouse - 2021
Kvetcher in the WryFilm–stage hybrid
OC-Centric, Orange CA - 2021
Sock Town: A Film Noir Sock Puppet MusicalFilm–stage hybrid
Long Beach Playhouse - 2021
Yellow FaceStaged reading
Morgan-Wixson Theatre, Santa Monica - 2020
She Kills MonstersMain stage
STAGEStheatre, Fullerton - 2018
Alice in SlasherlandMain stage
A Place Called Home, Los Angeles
“A director you should know and hire — a theatre artist of great talent and great integrity.”Eric Eberwein
How I work
Three things collaborators keep saying
A room that is safe to fail in
Rehearsals run on consent and check-ins, not pressure. Actors try the swing that might not land, because nobody is punished for missing.
Funny and sad in one breath
Comedy and grief live in the same scene. The work moves between gut-busting bits and heart-wrenching turns without flinching at either.
Process-driven, and on time
Designers get a clear destination and the room to get there. Rehearsals stay focused and concise, and the show opens on schedule and on budget.
Sketch comedy
No MSG Added
Co-founder and artistic director of an all-AAPI sketch comedy team, formed in Orange County to fill a gap nobody else was filling. Since 2019 the group has played Second City Hollywood, Chance Theater, STAGEStheatre, The Improv Collective and more — eighteen shows and counting, plus a run of online comedy shorts.
The writers get one instruction: write whatever you want. Whether or not a sketch is about being Asian American, the work is coloured by the people making it — and the audience does not have to look like us to find it funny.
Profiled in Orange Coast magazine, September 2019. Read the press →
Currently booking
Available for plays, new work, devised pieces, staged readings and sketch across Los Angeles and Orange County. Scripts, seasons and half-formed ideas all welcome.