David Henry Hwang will be collaborating with Jeanine Tesori on Soft Power, to receive its world premiere in Los Angeles next year.
(© Joseph Marzullo / Tristan Fuge)
"With Asian-American theater off to a fairly strong start in 2017, we put together a list of the productions (from New York to Los Angeles and places in between) to look for throughout the rest of the 2017-18 season."
Read the full story at Theatermania.com
Courtesy photo) Kandyce Marie as Aida, Casey Elliott as Radames, and Amy Shreeve Keeler as Amneris in Hale Centre Theatre's new production of "Aida."
On many levels, Hale Centre Theatre’s new production of “Aida” has a full-circle sensibility.
The Elton John/Tim Rice Broadway musical will be the first show performed on the company’s new high-tech, arena-style Centre Stage. The 900-seat house is one of two new theaters in Sandy’s $80 million Mountain America Performing Arts Centre. The show opens with a gala preview Nov. 16, and the run continues through Jan. 20.
Read the full story at the Salt Lake Tribune website.
Jin Ha as Song Liling. Photo by Matthew Murphy.
When M. Butterfly premiered on Broadway in 1988, audiences were stunned to discover that the central character, Song Liling, was actually a man. Nearly 30 years later, as the revival runs at the Cort Theatre, the cat is out of the bag.
The story of M. Butterfly, which won three Tony Awards including Best Play, is now more well known than the real-life story it was based on — the affair between French diplomat Bernard Boursicot and Peking opera singer Shi Pei Pu. The culture has also progressed, and with it our language and sensitivity surrounding gender identity: The reveal of a character’s gender as a surprise twist, once a feature of M. Butterfly, now seems like a dangerously regressive relic.
That’s something playwright David Henry Hwang was well-aware of when he set about revising his play for a new production directed by Julie Taymor. In revisiting his seminal work, Hwang undertook a heavy rewrite, one in which Song’s gender is addressed early on — and the themes of toxic masculinity and Asian gender stereotypes are as clear as ever.
Read the full story at Buzzfeed.
On November 3rd, Asia Society presented an illuminating conversation with Tony Award-winning playwright David Henry Hwang and director Julie Taymor, moderated by Asia Society Director of Global Performing Arts Rachel Cooper.
Check out photos from the event at Broadwayworld.com
Clive Owen and Jin Ha star in Julie Taymor's 2017 Broadway revival of M. Butterfly by David Henry Hwang.
(© Matthew Murphy)
A rare species of theatrical achievement can be discovered in New York City this month by the most intrepid of audience members. On Friday, November 17, spectators at the Metropolitan Opera will see one of the most popular operas ever written: Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly. A day later, on November 18, the same viewers can watch two Broadway shows, back-to-back, that are inspired by this foundational work: David Henry Hwang's Tony-winning drama M. Butterfly and Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schönberg's musical Miss Saigon.
Read the full story at Theatremania.com
On November 5, 2017, Tony Award-winning playwright David Henry Hwang presented the 2017 Kesselring Prize to rising young playwright Lauren Yee at the National Arts Club. Ms. Yee earned the Kesselring for her play THE GREAT LEAP, to be produced this season by Denver Center, Seattle Rep and Atlantic Theater Company. The Prize includes a $25,000 award and a two week residency in the historic clubhouse of the National Arts Club in order to develop her work.
Read the full story and see the photos at Broadwayworld.com
photo by Lia Chang
Nearly 30 years after its debut, M. Butterfly is back: A new revival, featuring an updated script by Hwang and direction from Julie Taymor, debuted on Broadway on Thursday. Though much of the story remains the same, the America of 2017 — one in which Donald Trump is president and conversations about race and ethnic identity dominate the national discourse — has changed. So, too, has the world, one in which China's ascendance to superpower status was scarcely assured in 1988.
Asia Blog recently caught up with Hwang to talk gender, ethnic identity, and explore why the election of President Trump has given M. Butterfly fresh relevance.
Read the interview at asiasociety.org.
The cast of Slow Burn Theatre's “Tarzan The Stage Musical” in the Amaturo Theater at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale, performing from through Nov. 5.
(Rodrigo Balfanz/Courtesy)
Slow Burn Theatre Company stages the venue's first sensory-friendly performance in Fort Lauderdale at the Broward Center. The adaptive production of "Tarzan The Stage Musical" is specially designed for individuals with sensory processing and autism spectrum disorders.
It will include special seating arrangements, pre-curtain preparatory activities, modifications to stage and auditorium lighting, lower sound volumes and the use of noise-cancelling devices as well as the availability of a quiet room for those experiencing sensory overload.
Read more at Sun-Sentinel.com
Photo by Tom Millward
The New York Theatre Guide recently caught up with Academy Award nominee and Golden Globe winner Clive Owen. The British actor is currently starring as Rene Gallimard in the first-ever Broadway revival of David Henry Hwang's Tony Award-winning play M. Butterfly, directed with a stylized, Brechtian touch by Tony Award winner Julie Taymor. Mr. Owen made his Broadway debut in September 2015 as Deeley in the Roundabout Theatre Company's revival of Harold Pinter's Old Times at the American Airlines Theatre. We were curious to find out what keeps bringing him back to the stage and how he developed the intimate connection with his co-star Jin Ha...
Read the interview at NewYorkTheatreGuide.com
Frank H. Wu, Contributor
Author, Yellow: Race in America Beyond Black and White
"Playwright David Henry Hwang is not aware of this, but as a journalist I have long looked up to him as an older brother type figure. That would be appropriate in the Chinese culture from which we both are descended, and even in the American culture to which each of us has assimilated. He is not only a bona fide writer; he is a commercially successful one. Hwang’s big hit, M. Butterfly, has been revived on Broadway with a touched-up script, directed by Julie Taymor of Lion King fame and Spiderman infamy, starring Clive Owen, the cerebral action hero in movies such as Children of Men and the BMW short ads. I saw it immediately, and I was impressed. What follows is an appreciation, not a proper review. Hwang and I have had maybe a half-dozen conversations since as a student a decade younger I invited him to speak on campus, and he told me as I drove him from the airport that his parents had wanted him to become a lawyer. We are friendly enough I would not presume to evaluate his work. His achievement deserves admiration though: he has expressed what many of us have thought halfway but not been able to put into words clearly. There is nobody else doing what he does."
Read the full article at Huffingtonpost.com
Bruce Glikas/Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic - From left, playwright David Henry Hwang, Jin Ha, director Julie Tamor and Clive Owen
M. Butterfly has transformed for a new generation.
The first major New York revival of the Tony-winning play stars Clive Owen as a married French diplomat who has a 20-year relationship with a beautiful opera performer who spies on him for the Chinese government. Directed by Julie Taymor, the staging has an updated script by original playwright David Henry Hwang.
“It’s an amazing play, but it was written 30 years ago and things have changed,” Clive Owen told The Hollywood Reporter after Thursday’s opening night performance at the Cort Theatre. “It’s still a story about two people who created a world for themselves that worked for them, and when it became public, everything came crashing down and they were vilified. The heart of the play is still there — it had a huge impact and hopefully it still will.”
Read more at Hollywoodreporter.com
Photography: Daniel Seung Lee
There are Broadway debuts, and then there are Broadway debuts that merit their own reaction GIF. Enter Jin Ha. Two years ago, he was studying acting at NYU, and now he’s been chosen by Julie Taymor to star in her revival of M. Butterfly, one of the most anticipated shows of the year.
“Trust me, it’s unbelievable,” says Ha, sitting at a French bistro in Manhattan’s theater district. “If I were to hear this third-person, I’d be like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ "
Read more at Out.com
Clive Owen, left, and Jin Ha in "M. Butterfly." Photo Credit: Josef Astor
"Nearly 30 years later, after turning down various offers to revive it, Hwang has updated the script, and a new production — directed by Julie Taymor (“The Lion King”) and starring Clive Owen as the diplomat, Gallimard — will open at the Cort Theatre on Thursday, Oct. 26."
Read more at Newsday.com
BD Wong in 2016, 28 years after his Broadway breakout in “M. Butterfly.”CreditTodd Heisler/The New York Times
Asian-American actors and playwrights describe how David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly inspired their work. They spoke to Laura Collins-Hughes about the lasting effects of this 1988 play.
Read more at the New York Times
Clive Owen as a French diplomat in the Broadway revival of David Henry Hwang’s “M. Butterfly.” Credit Sara Krulwich/The New York Times
Read Laura Collins-Hughes interview with David Henry Hwang about the revival of his Broadway hit M. Butterfly, directed by Julie Taymor, starring Clive Owen.
From the New York Times
Playwright Lauren Yee
Tony-winning M. Butterfly playwright David Henry Hwang will present Lauren Yee with the Kesselring Prize for Playwriting from the National Arts Club at a ceremony at the historic clubhouse in New York City November 5.
The event will kick off at 4 PM with readings of select scenes from Yee’s plays, followed by a gala reception. The readings and award ceremony is free and open to the public. To reserve tickets, contact Kesselring@thenationalartsclub.org.
Silk Road Rising (Chief Programming Officer and Mission Trustee, Jamil Khoury and Founding Executive Director, Malik Gillani) is proud to announce the U.S. Premiere of Wild Boar, written by Candace Chong, translated from Chinese to English by Joanna C. Lee and Ken Smith, adapted by Tony Award winner David Henry Hwang, and directed by Helen Young. The production will run November 9th to December 17th, 2017 at Silk Road Rising located at 77 W. Washington St., Lower Level, Chicago, IL, 60602. The Press Opening is Saturday, November 18th at 4:00pm.
"We love Wild Boar not only because it's smart, sexy, and topical, but because, in a rare combination, it exudes both confidence and self-doubt simultaneously. It builds and unpacks all at once, seemingly unable to differentiate right from wrong without flip-flopping, which is part of the play's inherent strength. At a time when journalism, governance, nation-states, and citizenship all feel in flux, Wild Boar probes those feelings with an air of mystery, flirtatiousness, and whodunit intrigue. " - Chief Programming Officer and Mission Trustee, Jamil Khoury
Read more at Broadwayworld.com
Photo of English opera Dream of the Red Chamber, Photograph by Luo Wei, Guang Ming Daily.
Dream of the Red Chamber is the pinnacle of Chinese literature. But in fact, not many people in the western world have ever heard of it. In a certain sense, this opera is following a grand opera tradition, which began with Puccini's Madame Butterfly and Turandot, by blending eastern and western cultures. Before the English opera Dream of the Red Chamber, when people talk about Chinese-themed opera, they always first think about Turandot and the music Jasmine in that opera. Of course, the DaGuanYuan (Grand View Garden) in the English opera Dream of the Red Chamber is very different from the imagined Oriental world in Puccini's operas.
"In the 19th century of the western world, artists put the Oriental elements from their imagination into their works that were dominated by western values," says the playwright, David Henry Hwang. "But in our work, at least, we treat Chinese and western culture equally. Our work is not a hodgepodge, but a music work with distinctive features."
In the past 30 years, at least two TV shows have been adapted from Dream of the Red Chamber. "The popularity of the 1987 version of Dream of the Red Chamber in China is like BBC’s 1996 version of Pride and Prejudice (in the western world). It's certainly not a bad thing to have people re-discuss the novel because of an opera, in that way many people who have never heard of it now know it.” Hwang said, "It is important to let the world hear the aria of Baoyu."
Read more at Guang Ming Daily.
M. Butterfly co-stars Clive Owen and Jin Ha, photographed in London.Photograph by Julian Broad.
"The succès de scandale of the 1988–89 Broadway season, David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly tells of a French diplomat whose politically ill-advised affair with an androgynous performer in the Chinese opera takes him places he never imagined, including prison. Deftly exploring Western stereotyping of Asians, M. Butterfly won the 1988 Tony Award for best play and ran for an astonishing 777 performances."
Read more at Vanityfair.com
The Tony-winning director transforms David Henry Hwang’s play physically and emotionally for its first Broadway revival.
Read the full story at Playbill.com.
