book, music, and lyrics by ian yan

Re-Orient tells the story of a young, Asian writer suddenly commissioned by a prestigious organisation to write an original musical that will best represent “Asianness” to the world. Visited upon by a zany troupe of Asian bodies who all have their own ideas on what “Asianness” is, the writer gets to work. Amidst lots of infighting and two outrageous and wildly different musicals-within-a-musical, they must confront the multitudinous perspectives on the importance of tradition, postmemory, and individuality, all in reflection on the continued work of being Asian in America.

I wrote this show during the pandemic while in my senior year at Columbia. I submitted it to the 2022 season of the National Musical Theatre Conference (NMTC) at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Centre, where it was a semi-finalist.

selected demos

Orchestrations by Ian Yan and Simon Broucke
Demos performed by Samantha Seiff and Russell Graviet