Biographical sketch of Masayo Nishimura as a playwright :

Masayo Nishimura is a Japanese-born playwright who lives in New York City since 1986. In 1995, she graduated from CUNY Hunter College as a theatre art major, where she studied playwriting with a playwright Tina Howe. In fall 1995, she studied in Dramatic Writing program at NYU with a playwright David Greenspan. At Hunter, she was awarded playwriting awards includes the Walter Prichard Eaton Award from the Theater Department of Hunter College. She also received an Honorable Mention at the Wichita State University National Student Playwriting Contest in 1996. Masayo is an associate member of Dramatist Guild, Inc.

From 1994, some of her plays are produced in off-off theaters through out New York City. In 1994, her one act play, I love New York was produced by the Theater department of Hunter College at the Sylvia and Danny Kaye Playhouse. Her other one-act play, A Surprise Visit was produced by the American Theatre of Actors. In 1997, her first full-length play, Under the Moon was produced at the Synchronicity Space in SoHo, directed by Karin Bowersock. In 2005, her new play Itadakimasu - A HAPPY MEAL had a staged reading/workshop at the West End Theatre, New York City.

Besides writing plays, she is also active as a visual artist/photographer who often exhibits subway themed art works. Her computer animated subway love story - Dream has been screened worldwide and won various awards. In 2000, Dream was screened at the Museum of Modern Art, as an official selection of the "New Directors/New Films festival" sponsored by the Cinema Society of Lincoln Center and MOMA. The Connection makes her first theater work with her favorite New York subway setting.

About Multisoup Productions:

Playwright/ Company Director Masayo Nishimura is a Japanese woman who moved to New York City from Tokyo in 1986. Since she is an Asian, a foreigner as well as a woman, her plays often reflect the life of contemporary Asian women who live in the US, away from their families, native culture and traditional value. Through her plays, she hopes to help the American audiences to gain understanding about people from varied cultural background.

In 2005, she established her independent company Multisoup Productions to conduct reading/workshops of her plays for visualization and development of scripts. In December 2005, she finished her first venue of such a workshop production of her comedy Itadakimasu - A HAPPY MEAL at the West End Theatre.