TuQuyen Pham is a Vietnamese-American actor and writer originally from Pennsylvania. She is a recent graduate of Columbia University’s MFA Acting Program. She has also received training from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. She is currently Assistant Directing a production of Henry VIII at Columbia University. Recent credits: 2nd Murderer (The Flea), Fish Meat (The Connelly), Fifth of July (Columbia), & Cymbeline (RADA). As an AAPHI advocate, she is honored to be performing alongside her peers, representing the greater Vietnamese diaspora! www.tuquyenphamactor.com / @tmpham10

Lennox T. Duong was born and raised in Fresno, CA. Off-Broadway: Hannah understudy for SHIT. MEET. FAN. at MCC. OOB: Felicity in MIDWEST P*RN (Tent Theater), Ella in WE DRIFT IN AND OUT for New York Theater Festival. Sean in Hello Kitty Must Die (2023 Edinburgh Festival Fringe). Regional: Love’s Labour’s Lost (Moth). Juilliard: Indecent (Chana), Three Sisters (Masha), Cymbeline (Imogen), References to Salvador Dali Make Me Hot (Cat), Dance Nation (Amina). (Training: Juilliard, M.F.A.)

MICHAEL THANH TRAN was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. Regional: KING LEAR with André De Shields, MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING(St. Louis Shakespeare Festival); PRIDE & PREJUDICE, MURDER ON THE ORIENT EXPRESS (Repertory Theatre of St. Louis); HAY FEVER (Peterborough Players, 2025 Outstanding Performance Nomination from NH Theatre Alliance), NOISES OFFandOUR TOWN (Lyceum Theatre); AIDA (The Muny). Film / TV: “Treading (Vùng Vẫy)”, “Resident Dreams”, and “Good Grief”. Featured in nationwide ad campaigns for Logitech G and Edward Jones Financials. Educational: ALL MY SONS, ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE, CYRANO DE BERGERAC, and WITCH (NYU Grad Acting). He is a member of Theatre Producers of Color and a producer with the Action Art Collaborative. AEA-e. MFA: NYU Grad Acting. @michael.thanh.tran

Jessica Lưu Pelletier (“loo pell-ih-tee-ay”; she/her) is a Queer biracial Vietnamese-American performer, writer, producer, and organizer. Born in Hà Nội, Việt Nam, raised in Guam, and now based in Brooklyn, NY, she brings a breadth of multicultural lived experience to her work and believes no story, role, or person is too intersectional, nuanced, or niche. As a writer, she has produced and/or developed work with STAGES Theatre Company, Theater Mu, the Sống Collective, Asian American Theatre Artists of Boston (AATAB), Chuang Stage, and Pao Arts Center. As a performer, she has worked across film, theatre, and commercial with organizations including but not limited to, La MaMa, Hoi Polloi, Ma-Yi Theatre Company, New Ohio Theatre, Theatre Resources Unlimited, Fault Line Theatre, and Williamstown Theatre Festival. BFA NYU Tisch.

Belle is a Vietnamese-American artist based in nyc. She is a graduate of the University of North Carolina School of the Arts with a BFA in acting. Belle has recently been seen in Sex and The Abbey at the Brick and EXTRAO1DINARY ALIENS and Jack. She is eternally grateful for her family and friends, especially the Viet community in New York. Belle-le.com.

Grateful to be a part of something different. Thank you David, Michael, Jessica and Alexis for allowing me to be a part of this funky fun journey. Credits include: nothing you've probably seen. But if you did: SUMO and ROMEO AND BERNADETTE (NYC), VIETGONE (3X REGIONAL). TV/FILM: LAW&ORDER: SVU, MANIFEST, LOST, BLUE BLOODS, TALES FROM THE CITY, THE BLACKLIST

Tuânminh A Đỗ (he/em) is an actor, writer and director based in NYC. Writing: NYSCA Individual Theater Award (prəˈlifik.); Sống Collective Việt Writer’s Lab (Pale Car(â)mel). Directing: Nothing More Precious (Dixon Place), University Settlement Artist-In-Residence (Payaṇam alMuhajir), Theater Mitu Artist-At-Home Program (Lới Ru). Acting: The Monkey King (Queens Theatre); Emojiland (3Below); Darshan (Mabou Mines); How to Succeed (NAAP). NYU Tisch BFA in Drama. Uściski dla rodziny, ôm thật chặt gia đình của tôi. @tuanminhalbert

Jeff Biehl - Broadway: PATRIOTS (Barrymore), MACHINAL (Roundabout). Off- Broadway: THE BURNING CAULDRON OF FIREY FIRE (Vineyard/Civilians), WAITING FOR GODOT (TFANA), THE UNBELIEVING (The Civilians), MERCHANT OF VENICE (TFANA and Lyceum Edinburgh), LIFE SUCKS (Wheelhouse - Drama Desk Nom. Outstanding Actor), CATCH AS CATCH CAN (Page 73), THE RAPE OF THE SABINE WOMEN…. (Playwrights Realm); CHARLES FRANCIS CHAN JR’S EXOTIC ORIENTAL MURDER MYSTERY (NAATCO); 10 OUT OF 12 (Soho Rep), LIVES OF THE SAINTS (Primary Stages), POOR BEHAVIOR (Primary Stages), ISAAC’S EYE (EST); FULFILLMENT (The Flea), BURNING (New Group), A LECTURE ON THE BLUES (Whitney Museum). Select Regional World Premieres: SHIPWRECK: A HISTORY PLAY ABOUT 2017 (Woolly Mammoth); ZOEY’S PERFECT WEDDING (Denver Center), CRY IT OUT (Humana), SCENES FROM COURT LIFE (Yale Rep), THE MOORS (Yale Rep). Film: Wallace Shawn and Andre Gregory’s “A Master Builder”, “Ricki and the Flash”, “Worth”, “Relay”. Television: “The Path”, “Vinyl”, “Mysteries of Laura”, “Forever”, “Southland”, all the "Law & Orders." Training: Juilliard.

Quentin Nguyen-duy is a an actor/writer/content creator who is known for his roles on THE ROOKIE (ABC), BULL (CBS), THE ENDGAME (NBC), S.W.A.T (CBS), LAW & ORDER: SVU (NBC, 7 eps), THE HUNTING PARTY (NBC, 11 eps) and was a series regular on the unreleased Hulu pilot AZNBBGRL (Freeform). In the theatre, he performed lead roles in ANOTHER SHOT (The Signature), VIETGONE (Company One), AMERICAN HWANGAP (Interlochen Shakespeare Festival). He wrote a play called AMPUTEES that was produced in the Boston University season in 2019, belonged to the Song Collective writer's lab, VoltLab at C1, was a Bushwick Star grant and Signpost Fellowship recipient. He was one of two writers to attended UCSD's prestigious MFA playwriting program, but he dropped out a few months ago. quentinnguyen-duy.com | @quentin_nguyenduy (IG)

Broadway: Breakfast at Tiffany’s, A Naked Girl on the Appian Way, Take Me Out (Original Cast). Off-Broadway: Whisper House (The Civilians); The Oldest Boy (Lincoln Center); Durango, Richard III, Take Me Out, etc. (The Public); House Rules, I_NY (Ma-Yi); A Few Stout Individuals (Signature); and Macbeth (TFANA), etc. Regional: Longwharf, South Coast Rep, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Kennedy Center, etc.  International: Singapore Arts Festival, Edinburgh Int’l Festival, Donmar Warehouse, and Taganka Theatre. Film: Civil War, Man on a Ledge, Thomas Crown Affair, etc. TV: Robert Minoru on Marvel’s Runaways, Capt. Tanaka on Mech Cadets, Zero Day, Law & Order OC, Fallout, The Missing, Poker Face, The Blacklist, New Amsterdam, etc. Interactive: GTA series, Bio Shock series, etc. James is also an award-winning filmmaker, a director, translator, and martial artist.  In 2025, he received a Drama Desk nomination for his work on the fight-choreography of Sumo at the Public.

Thi Le (Stage Directions) is delighted to be bringing Ba Chị Em to the Freeplay Festival. Her previous regional acting work includes productions with Circle Theatre, Dallas Children’s Theater, Casa Mañana, Shakespeare Dallas, and many others. An alumna of the University of Texas at Dallas, Thi holds a Bachelor of Science in Global Business - go comets! A lover of creating art and telling stories, Thi is a proud AEA Member. Love to Simon, Sadie, the famiLE, and the Joneses. Follow her on social media: @littleteacup37

MICHAEL THANH TRAN (he/him) is a an actor, director, and producer based in NYC. Born to Vietnamese refugees in St. Louis, he is a proud advocate for Asian American presence onstage and onscreen. Through his work he hopes to cultivate greater intersectional diversity in the performing arts sector, nurture growth within communities, find new ways to foster audience engagement, affect new change through innovative theatrical exploration and connect multi-generational audiences.

Administratively, he serves as an Associate Producer with the Action Art Collaborative in St. Louis and as a Marketing Consultant with Bread & Roses Missouri. He has held administrative positions on the Artistic and Marketing teams at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis (AD: Hana S. Sharif) and the Center of Creative Arts (AD: Jennifer Wintzer).

His current running pace is 7:58/m.

Jessica Lưu Pelletier (“loo pell-ih-tee-ay”; she/her) is a Queer biracial Vietnamese-American performer, writer, producer, and organizer. Born in Hà Nội, Việt Nam, raised in Guam, and now based in Brooklyn, NY, she brings a breadth of multicultural lived experience to her work and believes no story, role, or person is too intersectional, nuanced, or niche. As a writer, she has produced and/or developed work with STAGES Theatre Company, Theater Mu, the Sống Collective, Asian American Theatre Artists of Boston (AATAB), Chuang Stage, and Pao Arts Center. As a performer, she has worked across film, theatre, and commercial with organizations including but not limited to, La MaMa, Hoi Polloi, Ma-Yi Theatre Company, New Ohio Theatre, Theatre Resources Unlimited, Fault Line Theatre, and Williamstown Theatre Festival. BFA NYU Tisch.

Đavid is an award-winning first-generation Vietnamese-American Theatre artist. His writing has been supported by Ma Yi Theater Company, Second Generation Productions, LIT Council, Yangtze Repertory Theatre of America, Ozark Living Newspaper, and others. | www.davidleehuynh.com | @huynhsome | "không phải tôi. chúng ta"

Alexis Kulani Woodard (she/her) is a Princess Grace Award Winning Director, Directing Fellow at Rattlestick Theater, and the Associate Artistic Director of Compagnia de' Colombari. As a Spelman Leadership Fellow at the Alliance Theatre, Alexis served as the Co-Artistic Director of The Alliance’s inaugural Digital Season. Her work on HANDS UP at The Alliance earned the production six Suzi Bass Award Nominations, including Best Direction, and a win for Outstanding Social Justice Production. Her production of Lungs played at “I.L. Caragiale Bucharest” and other venues around Romania. MFA: David Geffen School of Drama at Yale. Learn more about her work at https://alexiskwoodard.squarespace.com

With this adaptation, we bring a fresh cultural lens to a classic, well-loved and well-known text. Audiences will experience a powerful, rarely-seen perspective: the Vietnamese-American experience through the language of Chekhov. This adaptation would engage with the complexities of identity, migration, and what it means to be an American–themes that are deeply relevant in America today. It invites Asian American communities, artists of color, and broader audiences into meaningful dialogue about what we carry from our past to how we reimagine and shape our futures.

The adaptation is currently in process, however, the vision of this play will follow to Chekhov’s original structure, but characters, relationships, and key scenes / monologues will be reinterpreted through a Vietnamese lens, grounded in the universal themes of yearning, disillusionment, and familial duty. The question we are pursuing is: “How do collective traumas shape private dreams?”

For Ba Chị Em, we will be studying and reading different adaptations of Three Sisters that have been published. From there, we will be holding story circles, informal readings, invited workshops, and discussions with members within the Vietnamese theatre community to ensure that this piece feels authentic to members of the community. Below is a loose timeline of the process:

• Aug 2025 - Oct 2025 | Read Ruhl, Schmidt, Senelick, Letts Adaptations + Notes

• Nov 2025 | Create ‘Skeleton Draft’ of Adaptation 

• Nov 24, 2025 | First Read-Thru of Draft w/ 15 Vietnamese Actors 

• Dec - Jan 2025 | Writing Sessions + Freeplay Writing Time

• Feb 2025 | Act I Public Presentation

The adaptation will be shaped by a team of Vietnamese producers and a writing team. Ultimately, Ba Chị Em is envisioned as a collaboratively authored piece. Centering the idea that no single voice can represent the full complexity of the Vietnamese diasporic experience. As a result, we are committed to a process that honors collective authorship and ensemble, where dramaturgical decisions and language choices will emerge from shared dialogue among Vietnamese artists. This approach reflects the intergenerational and polyvocal nature of diaspora and ensures the piece speaks from, to, and across a plurality of lived experiences. 

If you're interested in supporting the 3CE Team for the next stage of this play’s development, connect with the us by visiting the CONTACT tab or by sending an email HERE.

Michael Thanh Tran is a member of NYU Grad Acting’s Class of 2026.
He will be graduating his May with his Master of Fine Arts in Acting from this Program.

He is presenting Ba Chi Em as part of NYU Grad Acting’s FreePlay Festival, a festival of work created, developed, and performed by graduating 3rd year students. For his FreePlay slot, he wanted to bring the Vietnamese community together to celebrate and to meet those he hasn’t met yet as he prepares to graduate. If you are in the arts, whether as an actor, administrator, agent, manager, casting director, whatever it may be—he’d love to get to know you. Reach out and let’s get coffee. He knows a great place.

Learn more about him and his class with the button below.