About Me

Emma Y. Lai (she/her) is a freelance Director, Producer, and Playwright originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota.

• Recent projects include:

  • Directing the world premiere of Somewhere Over the Pacific by Sabrín Diehl, a one-person radio play about Amelia Earhart’s mysterious disappearance into the magical world of Dykeinland.

  • Assistant Directing the world premiere of An American Tail by Itamar Moses, Michael Mahler and Alan Schmuckler at Childrens’ Theatre Company (MN), directed by Taibi Magar

  • Directing a workshop of Liqing Xu’s Yellow Mirrors at Playwrights’ Center (MN)

She is a frequent Associate of Annie Tippe (Cowboy Bob, Your Own Personal Exegesis, The Hombres) and Joe Chvala (Heaven, Pippin, Man of la Mancha).

She is currently the Artistic Director and one of the Founders of Picnic Basket Theatre, a non-profit theatre company based in Minneapolis that focuses on producing and workshopping new work by marginalized communities and supporting early-career artists in their growth and development.

Things she finds fascinating: afterlife, large scale world building, religion, deities, the water, deep sea creatures, horror movie concepts, poetry, sound design, sex culture, projections, Asian stories, and intimacy.