MU Tang Clan Vol. 3

APPLY TO THE MU TANG CLAN

In 2021, Theater Mu’s Mellon Foundation playwright-in-residence, Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay, created the Mu Tang Clan (MTC) playwrights incubator program in partnership with Theater Mu as part of several initiatives to develop more Asian and Pacific Islander American playwrights. For our third cohort, we’ve partnered with New Native Theatre to provide playwrights the space, time, and support to create a new full-length play (unproduced).

Funded by the Jerome Foundation, we invite early-career playwrights with 2-10 years of experience to apply to the intensive four-month program. Through nine in-person weekly sessions, co-facilitators Rhiana Yazzie and Saymoukda Duangphouxay Vongsay will guide playwrights as they workshop and discuss new pages and topics related to playwriting and the influences that impact their work. Playwrights will also receive 1-1 dramaturgical support of their new draft at the end of the nine sessions. Additionally, through a partnership with the Playwrights’ Center, playwrights will receive a year-long Playwrights’ Center membership.

Four playwrights will be selected for MTC Vol 3. The weekly three-hour sessions will be held at Theater Mu in Saint Paul, MN, from July to October 2026. Playwrights will emerge with a first draft of their play and will receive 1-1 sessions with a dramaturg to help sharpen the script's structure, deepen character motivations, and ensure the playwright’s artistic vision is clearly realized. Cohort members must attend all sessions to deepen the community and relationships they will build together.

THE INCUBATOR PROVIDES:

$1,000 unrestricted stipend
1-1 dramaturgy session(s)
a yearlong membership to The Playwrights’ Center
time each week to receive feedback and guidance on new pages
a safer space for playwrights to be bold, vulnerable, and supported
career guidance session with the artistic directors of Mu and New Native
greater local and national visibility and artistic autonomy

ELIGIBILITY REQUIREMENTS

Identify as an early-career generative playwright with a minimum of two years of experience and a maximum of 10 years.
Commit to work on a new unproduced play.
Resident of Minnesota and able to attend all nine sessions in person in the Twin Cities.
Legally able to receive a stipend from Theater Mu. We are a 501(c)(3) and will require a W9.

TIMELINE

Mon, Mar 16, 2026: MTC Vol 3 is open for submissions
Fri, Apr 3, 11:59 pm CT: application deadline
April: panel review
May: all applicants will be notified
June: public announcement of MTC playwrights
July- October: program period, exact session dates + time will be determined by consensus of MTC playwrights

How to apply

Applications are due by 11:59 p.m. CT on Fri April 3, 2026.

Submissions that are late and/or missing required application materials will not be considered.

REQUIRED MATERIALS

Cover Page
Artist Statement
Artist Resume
Writing Sample

A. Cover Page

Include your name, phone number, email, address, website, and/or social media handles.

Please include any dates that will not work for you between July 6 and August 31. For example:

Monday and Tuesday evenings do not work for me in July.
I am out of town from Aug 1-4.
I have a part-time job from 9 am to 5 pm, Mondays and Wednesdays.

B. Artist Statement (1 page max)

Tell us about yourself, your artistic background, and your experience with playwriting. We want to know what inspired you to pursue playwriting, the questions that guide your work, and what keeps you connected to playwriting.
What is your relationship to/with the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, Native, and Indigenous communities?
Tell us about the new play that you plan to work on during the program. What is it about, and what stage is the script currently in?
The incubator program is intended to be a community. How do you see yourself contributing to the Mu Tang Clan community of playwrights?

C. Artist Resume (2 pages max)

Please include all relevant information connected to your experience as a playwright.

D. Writing Sample (15 pages max)

Prepare up to 15 pages of an excerpt from a script. Share writing that best represents you, the work you do, and the stories you’re excited to tell. You may include a synopsis if the excerpt is from a full-length play.

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

Email your application packet as a single PDF to saymoukda@theatermu.org by 11:59 pm CT on Apr 3, 2026.
For the email subject, use: “MTC Vol 3”
Name your file as: FIRSTNAME_LASTNAME_MTCV3APP

If you have multiple PDFs, you can merge them using a free online PDF merger service such as smallPDF.com.

Theater Mu and New Native Theatre will not be able to provide feedback for your application. If you have questions about the program or these guidelines, please contact Saymoukda at saymoukda@theatermu.org.

MEET THE co-facilitators

SAYMOUKDA DUANGPHOUXAY VONGSAY (she/her) is a Lao American poet, essayist, and playwright. Her work focuses on creating tools and spaces for the amplification of Southeast Asian refugee voices through poetry, theater, and experimental cultural production. In 2024, she was the first Minnesota artist to receive a direct invitation to be a Kennedy Center artist in residence at the REACH to create her play, Buried by the Garden. She’s best known for her Kung Fu Zombies play cycle. The Smithsonian APAC, Theater Mu, Theater Unbound, InterAct Theatre Co., and Mixed Blood Theater have presented her plays. She has received fellowships from the Bush Foundation (2018, 2021), McKnight Foundation (2021), Center for Cultural Power (2021), Jerome Foundation (2012, 2017, 2021, 2024), Playwrights’ Center (2018), Loft Literary Center (2018, 2019), Twin Cities Media Alliance (2018), and is an Aspen Ideas Bush Foundation fellow (2018). She has received grants from the Knight Foundation, Forecast Public Art, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, MAP Fund, Andy Warhol Foundation, and dozens more. She is currently the Mellon Foundation playwright-in-residence at Theater Mu; a core writer at the Playwrights' Center; a Jerome Foundation AIR at Camargo Cassis, France; and a MN State Arts Board grantee. BA: English, UMN. MLS: public policy + arts and cultural leadership, UMN.

RHIANA YAZZIE (she/her) is a playwright, a director, TV writer, filmmaker, and a 2025 United States Artist Fellow. She is also a Lanford Wilson and Steinberg Award winning playwright. Rhiana wrote on AMC’s Dark Winds seasons 2 & 3 and wrote, produced, and directed her debut feature film, A Winter Love, currently seen in mainstream and Indigenous film festivals globally. She is working on her second feature film, an adaptation of a play called Wounspaye Wankatya, A College Education. She is one of the few women to have written and directed a play for the Kennedy Center: The Other Children of the Sun, which debuted February 2025. A Navajo Nation citizen (Ta’neeszahnii dóó Táchii’nii), she is the artistic director of New Native Theatre, which she started in 2009 as a response to the lack of connection and professional opportunities between Twin Cities theaters and the Native community, and it is the recipient of a 2023 Headwaters Bush Prize for Social Justice. Rhiana’s work in theater has had an important impact on growing the artform in Minnesota for the last 19 years; she has been a Bush Foundation leadership fellow and was recognized with a Sally Ordway Award for Vision.

About the Organizations

THEATER MU (pronounced “moo”) is one of the largest Asian American theater companies in the nation and the largest in the Midwest. Founded in 1992, Mu sits at the intersection of arts, equity, and justice, and it tells stories from the heart of the Asian American experience. Theater Mu’s continuing goal to celebrate and empower the Asian American community through theater is achieved through mainstage productions, emerging artist support, and educational outreach programs. Theater Mu is a member of the Consortium of Asian American Theaters & Artists as well as a member of the Twin Cities Theatres of Color Coalition, proudly standing alongside New Native Theatre, Pangea World Theater, Penumbra, Teatro Del Pueblo, New Arab American Theater Works, and Ikidowin. | theatermu.org

NEW NATIVE THEATRE (NNT) is a new way of looking at, thinking about, and staging Native American stories. Created in 2009 by playwright Rhiana Yazzie, NNT produces, commissions, and devises authentic Native American stories for the stage, which means NNT’s artists are intricately connected to the concerns and voices of their communities. Since inception, NNT has created authentic and transformative plays and events through the lens of the Native American experience. Its focus is on nurturing and developing Native American artists. Its immediate gaze is on the 11 tribes in Minnesota and the urban Twin Cities Native community. NNT’s plays are shorthand meant to be played for its most vital audiences, Native people, because when specific stories are made for Native community itself, they become undeniably powerful for the broader community too, no translations required. | newnativetheatre.org

THE JEROME FOUNDATION, founded in 1964 by artist and philanthropist Jerome Hill (1905-1972), honors his legacy through multi-year grants to support the creation, development, and presentation of new works by early-career artists. Jerome Foundation supports early-career artists and culture bearers who take creative risks, pursue innovative artistic approaches, and demonstrate a clear creative purpose and vision. By prioritizing artists at this pivotal stage, we seek to nurture their creative growth and recognize the dynamic, multi-dimensional impact they have in fostering thriving, evolving communities.

Special thanks to the Playwrights’ Center!