It’s Cantonese meets culture shock the day Laura arrives in Hong Kong. But that’s okay for this ABC (American-Born-Chinese) because when dinner with a local friend turns into a mad dash about town, Laura’s game on for anything: from black pepper steak set meals to dancing with drunken bankers and a Canadian who may (or may not) be a Gurkha. Tourist Trap: A play for the hopeless adventurer in all of us. About Marie Yuen: Trained at Chicago Dramatists Workshop, the Theatre Building Chicago Musical Writer’s Workshop and Artistic New Directions with Jeffrey Sweet (NY), Marie’s short one-acts Silk Scarf and My Father’s Father were produced by North Avenue Productions in 1996. A 20-minute version of Too Many Cooks (Book: Marie Yuen, Lyrics: Julie Pedersen, Music: Jill Marshall-Work) was workshop produced by Theatre Building Chicago in 2000 and in 2005 she was commissioned by Scott Foresman Publishing to write Dreams Come True and The Boy Who Would Be Famous for their 2007 Reading Series: Readers’ Theatre Anthology (for elementary school students). In 2007, Marie wrote and executive produced Wingmen (a pilot about 5 Asian American men living in Chicago) which was a finalist and runner-up at the 2007 Chicago Comedy TV Pilot Competition and which screened at Chicago’s Music Box Theatre in July, 2007. Most recently in 2012, a 10-minute excerpt from her play “Autumn Moon” was produced as part of A-Squared Theatre Workshop’s sold-out run of “My Asian Mom.” Onstage, Marie has appeared: twice in The King & I (Hong Kong and Chicago); as a platinum blonde tap dancing angel named Virtue in Anything Goes (Chicago); and as Tommy the Cat in Dick Whittington and His Cat (Hong Kong). Backstage she has stage managed for YAMA Works (Hamlet), the Pintig Cultural Group (Nanay Isog and her Children) and offstage she’s been a script reader for Victory Gardens Theatre (2004) as well as a Box Office Associate & House Manager for Lifeline Theatre (2001-2005). Winner of the 1993 South China Morning Post/Radio Television Hong Kong Short Story Competition for “The Audition” and the1998 Dalan Award by CITA for Excellence in Acting, Marie has a Bachelor of Science in Advertising from the University of Illinois-Champaign/ Urbana and is a past copywriter for BBDO Hong Kong. She has been a member of the Dramatists Guild of America since 2000. The New Play Reading Series brings outstanding new and in-progress work by up-and-coming and established playwrights to the UC Berkeley campus. In the monthly New Play Reading Series, new plays are read by TDPS students, followed by a discussion with the playwright. This event is sponsored by the Department of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies.