"Waiting for Tadashi," George Street Playhouse, 2001. Photo by Kate Raudenbush, Calligraphy by David Arthur Heinlein.
2009 Women in Theatre Red Carpet Award
2009 USC Visions and Voices Arts & Humanities Initiative grant, Calligraphy: Fading Ink, Fading Memories
2009 Inaugural Recipient, USC Provost's Mentoring Award
2008 New Directions Fellow, Center for Feminist Research, University of
Southern California
2008 Made in America Award, East West Players
2007 USC Visions and Voices Arts & Humanities Initiative grant in
collaboration with Carol Muske Dukes
2007 Ivey Award for Messy Utopia
2007 American Theatre Critics Association Steinberg New Play Award, Finalist,
for Calling Aphrodite
2007 Semi-finalist, The New Harmony Project, for The Last Resort
2007 Semi-finalist, The Playwrights' Center of Minneapolis PlayLabs, for The Last Resort
2007 USC First Contact Initiative Undergraduate Programs Breaking Bread
Mini-Grant
2007-2008 USC First Contact Initiative Undergraduate Research Grant
2006 Semi-finalist, The Playwrights' Center PlayLabs, for Calling Aphrodite
2006-2007 Who's Who of American Women
2005-2006 Who's Who in American Education
2005 Semi-finalist, Playwrights' Center, for The Peculiar and Sudden Nearness of the Moon
2003 Silver Medal, Pinter Review Prize for Drama
2002-2003 James Zumberge Fellow (interdisciplinary collaborative grant with Dr.
Dorinne Kondo)
1999-2000 James Zumberge Fellow (individual grant)
1999-2000 Japan Foundation Fellow (individual grant)
1997 PEN Center USA West Literary Awards,Top Five Plays, Best New Play Award
finalist for Ikebana
1997 Honorable Mention for Ikebana (Living Flowers) Jane Chambers
Memorial Playwriting Award
1997 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Sixteenth
Anniversary Celebration
1997 Profiled in UCLA Magazine
1996 Po'okela Award, Best Original Script,
Hawaii State Theatre Council, for Hula
Heart
1996 Kokoro
(True Heart), The Best of the Weekend, Los
Angeles Times
1996 Who's Who in Asian America
1996 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Fifteenth
Anniversary Celebration
1995 Kokoro (True Heart), Critic's
Pick, Backstage West magazine
1995 Best Play, Santa Monica Theatre Guild,
for Tea
1995 Best box office record in 50-year history, Morgan-Wixson Theatre, Santa
Monica Theatre Guild for Tea
1995 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Fourteenth
Anniversary Celebration
1994 Asian American Studies Association National Book Award, The Politics of Life: Four Plays...
1994 Best Original Script nominee, San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics'
Circle Awards for Kokoro
1994 Who's Who in Asian America
1994 Keynote Speaker, Phi Beta Kappa Regional
Banquet, Kansas State University
1994 Guest Speaker, KCRW-National Public
Radio's Which Way L.A. Program
1994 Guest Speaker, The Colored Museum Project: Multiculturalism and Theater in
the 21st Century, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor
1994 Guest Speaker, "Women, Writing, Herstory and Representations"
panel on the topic of "The Japanese International Bride: History's Refugee
and Theater as History," University of Hawaii at Manoa, East-West Center
1994 Guest Artist, The Asia Society (New York) for its "Out of Asia: Asian
American Artists Explore Issues of Identity in America" symposium for
which I performed on National Public Radio Japanese
and Multicultural at the Turn-of-the-century
1994 Guest Speaker, Japan Society, New York
1994 National Judge (along with several nationally recognized playwrights,
including Edward Albee), 21st Century Playwrights Festival sponsored by The
Gypsy Road Company, New York, to award excellence in student playwriting
1994 Panelist, The Center for Multiethnic and Transnational Studies, University
of Southern California; discussion of Asian American and Asian immigrant issues
along with Trisha Murakawa, president of the Los Angeles Chapter of the
American Civil Liberties Union; Phyllis Murakawa of the Asian Pacific Women's
Network; and Los Angeles County Public Defender Phyllis Shabata
1994 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Thirteenth
Anniversary Celebration
1993 Necessities, Finalist in Julie
Harris Playwriting Awards
1993 Necessities,
Finalist in Jane Chambers Memorial Playwriting Awards
1993 Initiated into Phi Beta Delta
International Honor Society for international scholars
1993 Playwrights' Advisory Committee, Audrey
Skirball Kenis Theatre
1993 Tea honored by Smithsonian
Institution as kick-off event for Asian Pacific American Heritage Month
1993 Keynote Speaker, Mayor Tom Bradley's Asian Pacific Heritage Month banquet,
Los Angeles
1993 The Matsuyama Mirror, John F.
Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, excellence in theater for young
audiences
1993 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Twelfth
Anniversary Celebration
1992 Inaugural Recipient of the Remy Martin New Vision Award from Sidney
Poitier and the American Film Institute for recognition of literary
accomplishment and work that "contributes to the culture of our society
and our world"
1992 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Eleventh
Anniversary Celebration
1991 Top 100 Asian Americans by Transpacific
magazine
1991 Profile of career featured in Los Angeles Times Sunday Calendar
section, July
1991 Kalito in "Celebrating
Women's Work" by Northern California Women in Film and Television
1991 California Arts Council Performings Arts Fellow for Contributions to Arts
in the State
1991 Honorary Co-Chairperson for New York Asian Women's Center Tenth
Anniversary Celebration
1991 James Zumberge Fellow
1991 VESTA Award for positive female images
in the arts, The Women's Building, Los Angeles
1991 Critic's Choice, Los Angeles Times, for Tea
1991 Critic's Choice, DramaLogue, for Tea
1991 Los Angeles Endowment for the Arts
Fellow for Broken English
1990 Japanese American Women of Merit 1890-1990, National Japanese American
Historical Society. Recognition of women of Japanese ancestry who have made
significant contributions to the Japanese American feminine experience over the
last century. Only Amerasian selected.
1989 McKnight Foundation Fellow (selected and honored, but declined due to
family responsibilities)
1989 Tea, Best Ten Plays of 1988,
Sylvie Drake, Los Angeles Times
1989 DramaLogue
Outstanding Achievement in Theatre Award forTea
1988 Sidney Brody Literature Fellow,
California Community Foundation
1988 San Diego Drama Critics Circle Award for
Tea
1987 U.S.-Soviet Cultural Exchange, Theater Roundtable Member, The Mark Taper Forum.
Selected by The Mark Taper Forum as playwrights' representative on the
roundtable.
1987 Rockefeller Foundation Playwriting Fellow
1986 National First Prize, American
Multicultural Playwrights' Festival for Tea
1986 Tea, Top Ten List, Best Plays by
Women Worldwide, Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, London.
1985 LA Weekly Drama Critics' Award
for Asa Ga Kimashita 1985 DramaLogue Outstanding
Achievement in Theatre Award for Asa Ga
Kimashita (Five Awards).
1985 Who's Who in American Women
1984 Rockefeller Foundation Playwriting
Fellow
1984 Author of the Year, Friends of Little
Tokyo, Los Angeles
1982 National First Prize, Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award (John F.
Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival)
1982 National First Prize, The David Library Playwriting Award for American
Freedom (John F. Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival)
1982 Best New Plays of 1982 for Petals
and Thorns, by Los Angeles' Company of Angels
1979 Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society
1979 Phi Beta Kappa National Honorary
1979 Blue Key National Honor Society
1978 Kansas
City Star Scholar
1976-1979 Mademoiselle
Magazine Honorary College Board
1976 Commendation for Regional Excellence,
John F. Kennedy Center/American College Theatre Festival Regional, St. Louis,
for Switchboard
1975 Outstanding Young Women of America
1973-1975 National
Honor Society
GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS AWARDED:
Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship 1984
Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship 1987
Sidney F. Brody Fellowship 1988
Los Angeles Endowment for the Arts Fellowship 1989
McKnight Foundation Fellowship 1989
California Arts Council Performings Arts Fellowship 1991
James Zumberge Research and Innovation Fund Grant 1991-1992
All-University Pre-doctoral Merit Fellowship 1994-1996
James Zumberge Research and Innovation Fund Grant 1999-2000
Japan Foundation Fellowship 1999-2000
James Zumberge Research and Innovation Fund Grant 2002-2003
USC Visions and Voices Grant 2007-2008 with California Poet Laureate Carol
Muske Dukes
USC Undergraduate Research Grant 2007-2008
USC First Contact Initiative Breaking Bread Grant 2007-2008
USC Visions and Voices
Grant 2009-2010 for Calligraphy
