Grace, Deborah and Shu-Ling are trapped in Times Square. Will they find the World’s Largest Applebee’s before it’s too late? In Tourist Trap, three Asian-American mothers reckon with identity crises, a creeping sense of dissociation…and a seedy, off-brand Elmo who won’t leave them alone.
Tix to this show are Name Your Price starting at $5, meaning you decide what you pay! We pass on 100% of the single ticket revenue directly to the show’s lead artists. You can learn more about What’s Ars Is Yours: Name Your Price Tix by visiting our How We Do It page.
Tourist Trap will stream live from Ars Nova on June 12 @ 7pm on Ars Nova Supra. Following the live stream, you’ll be able to watch the show on-demand for up to a year. Get a cancel-anytime $15/mo subscription to stream live or on-demand.
Elijah Guo (any pronouns) is a writer, actor and musician. His playwriting credits include Button Lake Band Camp (Clubbed Thumb Winterworks), Birdigo (self-performed at The Brick’s ?!: New Works) and Time and Materials (a collaboration with Poet Laureate Robert Hass). Elijah is an alum of the Clubbed Thumb Early Career Writers Group. His TV pilot My Friend Will premiered at Tribeca and streamed on The Roku Channel, and his series Stand-Ins premiered at the Emmys-sponsored Catalyst Story Institute. His favorite acting roles include High Maintenance (HBO) and Law & Order: SVU (NBC). MFA: American Repertory Theater at Harvard University.
Dylin Taylor (she/her) is a director and multidisciplinary artist based in NYC. She is interested in work that challenges our assumptions of who we share the world with. Theater directing credits include The Marie Show: or How to Get a Wh*te Boyfriend, Little Heaven, Agoraphobic/Claustrophobic, and the short film Dark Mornings. Dylin has also created and shown work at Theaterlab, The Chain, Williamstown Theatre Festival, La Mama’s CultureHub, Onboard XR Theatre Festival, The Asian American International Film Festival, and Playwrights Horizons Theater School. BFA: NYU Tisch School of the Arts.
Marsha Yuan @mashasha is an American-born Chinese actress who has spent most of her career in Hong Kong. She is known for her role in the hit TVB sitcom “War of the Genders” and Anytime Pictures’s Men Suddenly in Black. She fought against Jean Claude Van Damme in Initiative Media’s Pound of Flesh. Manhattan Short Film Festival nominated her for Best Actress in acclaimed director Roseanne Liang’s Do No Harm. She is happy to join Tourist Trap for another performance on stage and return to her theater roots.
@eurekanakanogrimes is an actor, dancer, model, instructor, choreographer and Japanese sword fighter. TV/film: Succession (HBO Max), Raising Kanan (STARZ), I Wish I Could Give You An Answer (Netflix), Not Approved for Cancer Treatment (Chelsea Film Festival), Still Life (Asian American Film Festival), Time to Pause (Purpose Award Winner). Theater: Assistant choreographer – Transformations Glenn Close, Wynton Marsalis Jazz at Lincoln Center, Dancer Cosmos from Within (Raindance Award Winner). Plays: The Tank, NY Theater Festival, Players Theatre, Chain Theatre, Brooklyn Art Haus, Headwall Theater. Commercial: Lancome, Estee Lauder, Glow Recipe, Oatly. Other: John Woo Flick, Conway the Machine music video, Philadelphia Ballet, Broadway Dance Center faculty.
Misako Yamagishi is thrilled to play the role of Shu-Ling in this Tourist Trap Production. As a NYC based actor/singer, she has appeared in commercials, films, cabaret shows and theater productions, including The Sketch of New York, The Sketch of New York – Holiday Edition, Urbanstages Winter Rhythms – Celebrating 100 Years of Disney Magic, as Namgal in We, the Invisibles with The Barrow Group, Missy Hart in 9 to 5: The Musical with AfterWork Theater, and Robin in Something Rotten! with AfterWork Theater. She thanks her friends and family for their support.
Anthony is a New York Native. After seven years of competitive Ballroom dancing, he studied Theatre with The New Group, The Stella Adler Studio, and Elmira College where he trained under John J. Kelly and earned an Irene Ryan Award nomination. Earlier this year, he was seen in Tourist Trap at the Chain Theatre’s Winter One Act Festival and he is thrilled to reprise his role for the Ars Nova ANT Fest. TV credits include Ayyan in Rule of Three and Carlo in Discovery Channel’s Street Justice: South Bronx. Previous roles include Scapino in Scapino!, Tom in Dinner with Friends, and Rev. T. Lawrence Shannon in The Night of the Iguana opposite the great Ann Morrison.
Melvin Ningyao Yen (all pronouns!), a theater producer/director/writer/administrator, is renowned for her original production AWAKE, a testament to her diverse talents in the theater world. Her rich experience includes stints at Playwrights Horizons, Broadway’s TBD Theatricals, and Taiwan’s U Theatre. Melvin is the creative force behind A Stage Theatre, bringing innovative Mandarin stories to life. Discover her journey and creations on Instagram: @melvinfgood.
Qingan Zhang is a multidisciplinary producer and scenic designer based in New York. Her works explore narratives through layers of materials, objects, multimedia and body movements. Qingan recently co-founded the non-profit interdisciplinary theatre company Cellunova Productions. Her scenic design works have been staged at Boston Center for the Arts, Chain Theatre, Central Square Theater and University Settlement. Her co-devising puppetry pieces have been showcased at New Ohio Theatre Ice Factory, Dumbo Six Foot Platform, Rattlestick Theater GFTF, HERE Arts Center SUBLETSERIES: CO-OP! and The Center at West Park Object Movement Festival. Qingan received her MFA degree in interior design from the Pratt Institute and graduated from Boston College with dual BA degrees in Theatre and Psychology.
Jason Wang is a playwright from Queens that played 12-year-old Owen in Untitled Waifu Play at ANT Fest ’22 where he fantasized about an imaginary dragon girl and is now back in this theatre as a dramaturg to do smart Asian-American things whatever that may be. He is a big fan of Elmie from Sesame place + big luvr of Asian-American theatre woo Asia (gong noise)
Current: FABNYC LES Artist of color fellow! + Flushing Town Hall Grantee + NYFA QAF Grantee + Correspondent for GO SEE A SHOW!! Past: Workshop Theater WG (’24), HEAR US Fellow (23), NYU BFA (’23), EmergeNYC Fellow (’21)
Alicia (she/they) is a sound designer, director and illustrator based in NYC. Their audio work spans across films, plays, podcasts, and music and have aired on NPR and featured in Apple’s Best 2021 Podcasts. Alicia cares about creating stories that span cultures and generations, and is incredibly excited to be sound designing Tourist Trap!
Sally Chen (they/she/he) is a queer, non-binary, second-generation Chinese (specifically Taishanese!) American multidisciplinary artist who’s born, raised, & based in NYC. They graduated from Parsons School of Design with a BFA in Illustration and Psychology minor in 2022. In the past, they’ve costume designed for Untitled Waifu Play at ANT Fest (2022), Stuy or Die at NYU Tisch (2023), and set designed for Untitled Gamer Play at NYU Tisch (2022).
This show will take place at Ars Nova, located at 511 W 54th Street, New York, NY 10019.
Seating is general admission and first-come first-served. So, the earlier you arrive at the theater, the more choice you’ll have about where you sit! (Bonus: cheapest drinks in Midtown are at Bars Nova!)
The only way to guarantee you reserved seats is to become a Super Nova. Super Novas never hear “sold out,” get reserved seats in prime locations, and make fair wages and accessible tickets possible. Learn more about becoming a Super Nova here!
Tix to this show are Name Your Price starting at $5, meaning you decide what you pay! Best of all, when you name your price, 100% of the single ticket revenue is passed on directly to the show’s lead artists! You can learn more about What’s Ars Is Yours: Name Your Price Tix by visiting our How We Do It page.
If a performance is sold out, you can join a standby line for day-of-show tix made available by minute cancellations and no-shows. Standby will begin 1 hour prior to curtain and will form outsideFolks from the standby line will be admitted into the show on a rolling basis as availability is confirmed. Standby tix are name-your-price starting at $5 + fees.
Additionally, Supra is never sold out! If you can’t make the show in-person, you can always stream online for only $15/mo, which gets you unlimited streaming access to performances from the last year. You can cancel your membership anytime by emailing contact@arsnovanyc.com.
Once you’ve selected your performance date and time at check-out, you’ll see a number of ticket price options ranging from $5 to $100. Select the price point you want to pay and the number of tickets you’d like to purchase and they’ll be added to your cart. After that, continue through the check-out process and you’ll be all set!
Yes. The processing fees are charged by our ticketing and credit card processors, and increase along with the base price of your ticket.
Yes! Ars Nova Supra is our digital platform where you can live stream all of our one-night shows and watch premieres from the past year on-demand. For the low price of $15/mo, you can access an entire seasons worth of comedy, music and theater from our groundbreaking artists, and additionally you can cancel your subscription anytime!
All sales are final – there are no refunds or exchanges.
If you’re unable to use your tickets, you may donate them in exchange for a letter of tax credit by emailing tix@arsnovanyc.com.
We ask that you stay home if you aren’t feeling well or are awaiting the results of a COVID test. Please let us know prior to your ticketed performance, and we will work with you to find a solution if you’re unable to attend.
We welcome and encourage mask-wearing to protect yourself and others. However, as mask mandates have lifted and city, state and federal guidelines have changed, we will not be requiring them at performances.
We no longer require proof of vaccination, but we strongly encourage all audience members to get vaccinated and boosted in accordance with public health guidelines.
Our staff will clean and sanitize the theater and common areas and we’ll continue to provide hand sanitizer for your personal use.
Signage is posted in all spaces encouraging washing or sanitizing hands frequently.
Ars Nova is uncensored. We provide content advisories — to the best of our ability — to inform audiences when shows contain racial violence, racist language, sexual violence or nudity. We provide information about this type of content in advance, based on our core values, so that each audience member can make an informed decision about if and how they’d like to engage with that content. We welcome artists to share additional information about their shows based on their own core values.
Ars Nova is wheelchair accessible. If you wish or need to remain in your wheelchair throughout the show, our staff will remove the theater chair. This can be done by letting us know your needs/plans in advance; just email Declan Zhang. It can also be done without prior notice when you arrive! If you wish to transfer to the theater seat from your wheelchair, we are happy to store your wheelchair or motorized mobility aid in the lobby during the performance. The House Manager will return your mobility device to you at the end of the performance as this show has no intermission.
About 25% of the seating is on the ground floor of the theater and does not require using stairs to access. There are five six-inch steps to get into the building.
All remaining seats require no less than one and no more than three steps to access.
Licensed service animals (any dogs that are trained to do work or perform tasks for people with disabilities) are welcome at Ars Nova. They must rest in your seating area throughout the performance and are unable to occupy the aisle. Please bring proof of certification or a license for your service animal and be prepared to present it to the House Manager upon request. You can send advance notice to Declan Zhang, which is appreciated, but not required.
Our bathrooms are stalled, all gender restrooms – everyone is welcome to use any bathroom of their choice. We have two single-person restrooms in the lobby; with the wheelchair accessible option located right outside the theater on the first floor (doors 7 feet 10 inches x 3 feet 10.5 inches).
We have space that can be made to offer privacy for feeding should you need at any time. See the House Manager onsite and they will arrange a comfortable space, with storage and refrigeration for your materials.
The audience seating locations could be in, around and throughout the playing area. Performers will be within 3’ of you.
The seating is a combination of chairs.
Black Chairs with back: 19” wide x 32.25” high x 21.75” deep with a 500lb capacity
Black Counter height: 16.5” wide x 38” high x 18” deep with a 500lb capacity
The doors for entry into the building are 7 feet 10.5 inches x 3 feet 7 inches (external) and 7 feet 10 inches x feet 10.5 inches (internal).
Box Office height is 3 feet 6 inches and the Bar height is 3 feet 8.5 inches.
ANT Fest is our annual festival of All New Talent showcasing new work from New York’s most adventurous emerging artists. Learn more and get into our other 2024 ANT Fest shows here!
Franco Giacomarra, Matt Coakley, Marc David Wright
Madison Fiedler, Francesca Sabel
