Joan Osato has played a pivotal role in local and national theater for well over a decade and has been an indispensable part of Youth Speaks since 2002. She served as Youth Speaks' Managing Director from 2002-2007 and has been an Assistant Director, Stage Manager, Production Manager, and Lighting Designer with the Living Word Project. She is currently Producing Director for Youth Speaks and the Living Word Project and directs Foundation Development for both organizations. She served as director of the Asian American Theater Company from 1997 - 2000 and currently sits on their advisory board. She has brought her multiplicity of production and design talents to Living Word Project Repertory works such as Fear of a Brown Planet, Word Becomes Flesh, Scourge, and new work-in-progress Regarding Women. She has independently produced critically acclaimed theater works such as The Cure by Joel Tan and Ginu Kamani (author of Junglee Girl), and Begum Sumroo with Project Artaud Theater and director Vidhu Singh. She is the inaugural recipient of the San Francisco Arts Commission Artist and Communities Partnership Grant for a project she is conducting through Asian American Recovery Services of San Francisco. Joan is unstoppable. We would have trouble breathing without her.