AC Petersen
Since the 1990s, Seattle-area artist AC Petersen has been creating stories through dance, movement, and libretti for musical theatre and opera. Most recently, she has been inspired by Japanese American stories, particularly during WWII incarceration.
Petersen’s current project is a new musical based on the life of Mary Mon Toy (working title: Mary Mon Toy), a Japanese American woman from Seattle who was incarcerated in Minidoka during WWII. After she managed to get released to study opera at Juilliard, she found work as a showgirl and singer, and adopted a Chinese surname, Toy, due to anti-Japanese sentiment. She kept her Japanese name a secret her entire life.
Petersen is bookwriter and lyricist for Mary Mon Toy, working in collaboration with New York-based composer Ben Kono. The musical is based on Marnie Mueller’s hybrid biography/memoir The Showgirl and the Writer: A Friendship Forged in the Aftermath of the Japanese American Incarceration, for which Petersen has obtained underlying rights. Both Petersen and Kono have Japanese ancestry and are particularly interested in stories of all generations who have emigrated from Japan.
Petersen’s creative process requires multiple readings and showings on the way to the "final" staging. Fiscal sponsorship by AAF will help cover associated expenses such as stipends for collaborators and crew, rehearsal space fees, and the design and printing of promotional materials.
Mary Mon Toy’s first table reading was held in NY at the Open Jar Studios in May 2026; it will be staged in Manhattan at Pearl Studios as a complete reading with music and singing in November 2026, which will help determine the next steps in its development before a second staged reading in Seattle in February 2027.
AC Petersen is fiscally sponsored by the Allied Arts Foundation.
If you'd prefer to donate by check, please make check payable to "Allied Arts Foundation" and indicate "AC Petersen" in the memo line.
Checks can be mailed to:
Allied Arts Foundation
2212 Queen Anne Ave N #759
Seattle, WA 98109