Works by Jesse Jae Hoon:
SOMEBODY IS LOOKING BACK AT ME
I’VE GOT A SINKING FEELING IN THE PIT OF MY STOMACH
DO YOU THINK I’M ANNOYING?
BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH, AM I IRREDEEMABLE?
12 CHAIRS
DONG XUAN CENTER
ON THE CLOCK
THE SHORT LIFE OF SOPHIE SCHOLL
Synopses:
Somebody is Looking Back at Me – In this time-jumping fever dream satire, bestselling Asian American author Olivia returns to the Chinatown she wrote about, but the only thing that feels welcoming in the rapidly gentrifying neighborhood is a group of successful old college classmates who have recently moved in and are suddenly very excited to hang out with her. Olivia believes she has finally found her community — but the more she learns about her new friends’ role in transforming the area, the more she feels like she has to choose between the lifestyle her career has afforded her and the values she preaches in her writing.
I’ve Got a Sinking Feeling in the Pit of My Stomach – The Great War is over. The Kaiser has abdicated. Chaos rules in 1920 Berlin. Communist Greta and Liberal Christa spend their days on opposite sides of the boxing ring and their nights cuddling in a disheveled Neukölln apartment. But they will soon find themselves on opposite sides of a building coup d’etat in this tragic romantic thriller about loyalty, courage, the rise of the far right, and the fight to stay alive.
Do You Think I’m Annoying? – Kayla and Brenna have it all together – as long as Kayla knows you don’t hate her and Brenna has an exacting plan to anticipate your needs. They don’t need to think about the adoption agency they keep saying they’ll go to for information about their first family or the codependent ticking time bomb of their friendship! EVERYTHING. IS. FINE. It is, right? You’d tell them if it wasn’t, right?
Benedict Cumberbatch, Am I Irredeemable? – Best friends Irene and Mandip can’t focus on their jobs at the nameless national coffee chain and want to change the horrifying shit around them – not knowing where to turn, they seek answers from their personal moral compass: actor Benedict Cumberbatch. A dark satire and a riff on Bertolt Brecht’s JASAGER and NEINSAGER, BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH, AM I IRREDEEMABLE? teaches about the dangers of seeking change through rugged individualism and consumption. A Lehrstück created in collaboration with Ma-Yi Theater Company as part of Creatives Rebuild New York’s Artist Employment Program.
12 Chairs – Former nobleman Ippolit Mateyevich Vorobyaninov’s dreary life in the early Soviet Union is about to change forever when he discovers his spiteful mother-in-law hid the family jewels in one of their dining room chairs before the Revolution. Together with a dashing con artist, Vorobyaninov must embark on an epic quest across Russia to recover the lost riches. Based on the 1928 novel by Ilya Ilf & Evgeny Petrov, 12 CHAIRS is an epic adventure satire exploring glory, greed, and a country desperate for the advancement of the collective good. It is a commentary on the Soviet Union and nothing else. Yeah, nothing else. You can’t prove otherwise, you haven’t even seen it. Wow, maybe you should see the play before contradicting us, you ever think about that? Wow. There’s always one. Do better.
Dong Xuan Center – In the newly created center of Berlin’s Northern Vietnamese community, Lili, a 14-year- old Vietnamese middle school student, and her sister Nathalie struggle to repair their relationship after the death of their late mother. When Lili befriends her German former bully – who has a dark secret of his own – the sisters’ relationship to their adopted country and to each other will be pushed to the brink.
On the Clock – A Philadelphia reporter is laid off from her newspaper job and tumbles down the nerve- wracking rabbit hole of an Amazon Warehouse, a Convergys call center, and a busy downtown McDonald’s. Adapted from journalist Emily Guendelsberger’s gripping nonfiction account, On the Clock is a non-linear nightmare that explores the unending mental torture of low-wage work in America.
The Short Life of Sophie Scholl – The War is over. Hitler is dead. The Nazi war criminals are on trial in Nuremberg. Germany lies in ruin. In 1946 Munich, former secretary Traudl Junge discovers the short life of a national hero, Sophie Scholl, who gave her life in 1943 to denounce the late Führer. But as she learns more about the heroine who seemed to be an average girl like herself, Traudl will have to face up to her own past and her relationship to the National Socialist dictatorship in this tragedy about conscience, responsibility, and the danger of comfort.
Bio:
Jesse Jae Hoon is a playwright, organizer, and actor. He’s a hopeful cynic whose work combines raucous comedy with a deeply felt sense of urgency to investigate power, class, hope, and our responsibility to the collective good. 2022-2024 CRNY Resident Artist at Ma-Yi Theater Company; 2023-2025 member, Public Theater Emerging Writers Group; Winner, 2023 Ollie Award; 2024 MacDowell Fellow; 2022-2023 Writing Fellow, The Playwrights Realm; under commission from Theater J; 2023 Radio Roots fellow, The Parsnip Ship; inaugural member, Orchard Project Adaptation Lab; member, The TANK NYC’s LIT Council, Page Break. MFA in Playwriting from Hunter College, BFA in Drama from NYU Tisch.
Website: www.jessejaehoon.com