Norman is a multi award-winning actor, writer, and producer who has gotten the most acclaim for playing genuine, lonesome outliers hiding past suffering who mask with humor but are eventually pushed by their inner morality to rebel/fight for truth (The Conscientious Rebel). Some have called Norman’s acting style as Pedro Pascal meets Ed Helms with a dash of Five Spice.
His latest lead film role as Eric in THE METAMORPHOSIS PROJECT (directed by Kaylen Ng) won the 2024 Deutsche Bank Frieze L.A. Film Jury Award.
Norman plays the title character in the feature film SUN KING, which won BEST ILLINOIS FEATURE at its premiere at the Beloit International Film Festival and streams on Amazon and TubiTV.
THE TRAFFICKER, in which Norm plays the title character Ren, was well-received at film festivals worldwide and is about two Chinese immigrants who find their lives intertwined when a human trafficker gets ready to pass off his latest target. Take a look at the trailer here:
Norman played Wen Chang in the NY Hangar Theatre and Portland Stage co-production of The Great Leap by Lauren Yee which closed in October 2022. Reviewers praised the show as “brilliant…funny…heart-wrenching…scores big-time” and Norman’s performance as “the play’s pivot…subtle, comically ingenuous…a wry coolness, all of them supplied in Norman’s adroit performance…Underlying the surface is an incompleteness that waits to be pierced, and Yap moves brilliantly into that moment…gives this evolution great poignancy”
Norman completed a major 80-performance run playing the lead role of Zhang Lin in TimeLine Theatre’s Jeff-Recommended Chicago premiere of the award-winning play CHIMERICA by Lucy Kirkwood, directed by award-winning director Nick Bowling. Reviewers hailed Norman’s performance in this “near-three-hour running time” epic story as “Gutsy…deftly handled…alternatingly charming and heartbreaking…one of the truest things I’ve seen on stage in a long time.”
PC Laura Goetsch
Norman is grateful to have played roles on popular TV shows such as NBC’s CHICAGO MED and MAYDAY/AIR EMERGENCY. He has played principal roles in national commercials, industrials, and voiceovers. He has been invited on panels featuring other prominent Asian Americans, given speeches on how his unique experiences as a career artist can be applied to other walks of life, and been invited multiple times as a guest performance artist and co-creator at The Art Institute of Chicago. He is also an Artist Grant Award recipient of the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.
With over sixty roles on Film, TV, and hundreds of performances and hours spent in lead roles on Stage, Norm is truly a veteran actor. Combining with his roots in classical theatre, advanced Meisner as well as Second City and IO improv, Norman is a highly versatile and collaborative actor who specializes in grounding unconventional characters in truth no matter how extreme the circumstances.
On the personal side, Norman is a husband and a father, and highly enjoys traveling, having visited dozens of places such as New Zealand, Australia, Iceland, and Dubai. He is a PADI certified open water scuba diver who has dived along the Great Barrier Reef and he has also jumped out of a perfectly good plane at 4000 ft by himself, not attached to anyone, and lived to tell the tale. He is a Reelworld E20 Alum and McGill University and Robbins Research Mastery University graduate.