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Home > Prizes > Prize Recipients > Shih-Ching Tsou

Shih-Ching Tsou

2009 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise Honoree in Filmmaking

Location

New York, NY

Title

Filmmaker; producer; actress

Education

The New School (MA, media studies); Fu Jen Catholic University

Country of Birth

Taiwan

Tags
film
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A photo of Shih-Ching Tsou
Photo courtesy of Shih-Ching Tsou

Born and raised in Taipei, Taiwan, Shih-Ching Tsou came to New York to do graduate work in media studies at the New School. There she met Sean Baker, with whom she would work on his first feature film, Four Letter Words. A partnership developed with Acts of Worship, a behind-the-scenes featurette. It was their next project, the full-length feature Take Out, that brought co-directors Tsou and Baker to the attention of the film industry.

Take Out is a day-in-the-life rendering of an illegal Chinese immigrant, Ming Ding, who delivers Chinese take-out in New York City. He is counting on the tip money he earns from Upper West Siders to pay back a huge debt he owes to the smugglers who brought him to the United States — money he has been told he must deliver by day’s end. The film’s realism is thanks to interviews that Tsou and Baker conducted with illegal immigrants in New York and time spent observing the action in the storefront restaurant where they shot Take Out.

Take Out debuted at the 2004 Slamdance Film Festival and has been screened at more than 25 other festivals. It won the Regal Cinemas Dreammaker Award and Best Feature award at the Nashville Film Festival. Tsou and Baker are teaming up again to co-direct their second feature, Left-Handed Girl.

Tags
film

Jury Members

2009 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise Honoree in Filmmaking

Sheril D. Antonio

Associate Professor, Associate Dean of Film, TV, and New Media, New York University

Rick Kinsel

Executive Director, The Vilcek Foundation

Ysa Le

Executive Director, Vietamese American Arts and Letters Association

Wesley Morris

Film Critic, The Boston Globe

Lisa Schwarzbaum

Film Critic, Entertainment Weekly

Janet Yang

Film Producer
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