Kitty Mei-Mei Chen is a playwright and actress and the author of five full-length plays and numerous short plays and children’s stories. She received the 1992–93 NEA Fellowship in Playwriting.
Chen earned a BA degree in mathematics from Pembroke College (Brown University) in Providence, R.I.. After graduation, Chen went to New York City to study at the Martha Graham School as a scholarship student, acted professionally for many years before becoming a playwright. Chen resides in New York City.
Chen’s received an NEA playwriting fellowship for her first play, Eating Chicken Feet. It had a first public reading at East West Players in Los Angeles, was workshopped at Playwright’s Theatre of New Jersey, and subsequently was co-produced at Westside Theatre by Women’s Project and Pan Asian Repertory. Blending the absurd and playful with the dark and painful, the play examines the effects of divorce on a Chinese-American family. “Ms. Chen’s dramatic imagination is obviously unusual. More important, it is always unpredictable,” writes The New York Times. It was also produced in Hawaii at Kumu Kahua Theater.
An actor since 1973, she appeared on the legitimate stage in leading roles in four early Pan Asian productions and many other plays. She is a member of The Dramatists Guild, Women’s Project Playwrights Lab, and the three actors unions. Chen made her movie debut in ‘’Static’’ in 1986. Since then, she has appeared mainly on television, with featured roles in two daytime dramas ‘’All My Children’’ and ‘’As the World Turns.’’ She is a frequent guest on ‘’Law & Order,’’ produced by her fellow Brown University graduate, Jeffrey L. Hayes, and ‘’Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.’’
| Credit Type | Production | Season |
|---|---|---|
| Actor | Paper Angels | 1981-82 Season |