East West Players 43rd Anniversary Visionary Awards

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

This is still a couple of months away but wanted to post up on it to get on your radar:

East West Players (EWP), the nation's premier Asian American theatre, celebrates its 43rdAnniversary with its glamorous Visionary Awards Dinner & Silent Auction, which salutes those who have raised the visibility of the Asian Pacific American (APA) community through their artistic excellence and support of Asian Pacific American performing arts.

The award winning event will take place at the Hilton Universal City on Monday, April 27, 2009. Proceeds from the event will benefit East West Players' educational and artistic programs.

"Following the theme of our 43rd Anniversary Season, the evenings theme will be Beyond Presence," announced Producing Artistic Director Tim Dang. "East West Players and the APA community have certainly established a presence on the national landscape, but now it is time to take our presence to the next step and we invite all our supporters to join us."

Nathan Wang will lead the orchestra for the 7th year as the evening's Musical Director. The orchestra will be a combination of professional studio musicians and students of the Olympia Youth Orchestra.

This years Honorees will include:

VISIONARY AWARD

John Cho: At East West Players, John Cho has appeared in several productions including F.O.B. (1997), THE TASTE OF KONO COFFEE (1996) and MY TIRED BROKE ASS PONTIFICATING SLAPSTICK FUNK (2000). He gained attention with a feature role in the 1999 comedy American Pie and its sequels. His career soared to a new level with the release of the 2004 hit film Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle, leading to a sequel Harold and Kumar 2: Escape from Guantanamo Bay, which Cho starred in again. Cho also had a starring role in the ensemble cast of Better Luck Tomorrow, a drama/dark comedy focusing on the travails of a group of Asian Americans living in Southern California. He has guest starred on several TV shows including How I Met Your Mother, Ugly Betty, House M.D. and Grey's Anatomy. He will be starring in the new Star Trek movie as Hikaru Sulu, which opens nation-wide May 8, 2009.
Check out more here.