21:34, 24-May-2018
Cultural Power: David Henry Hwang's play explores issues of ethnicity and identity
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David Henry Hwang is considered to be one of the most famous Chinese-American playwrights. Over the decades, Hwang has had a string of successful award-winning plays and musicals, many of which examine the issues of ethnicity and identity. Let's take a look.
One of Hwang's best-known works is M Butterfly, loosely based on the true story of a French diplomat who has a long love affair with a Peking Opera star whom he thinks is a woman, but is actually a man. The play was recently revived on Broadway. Hwang won the Tony award for M Butterfly in 1988, becoming the first Asian American to win in that category. He was also nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
In 1998, Hwang was nominated for another Tony Award for "Golden Child", a play about an early 20th-century Chinese family facing westernization. And in 2007, Hwang, again was nominated for a Pulitzer prize for "Yellow Face", a semi-autobiographical play that examines questions of race, representation and politics.
MAY LEE LOS ANGELES "There's a new David Henry Hwang production that just had its global debut right here in LA. It's called "Soft Power", an over the top musical that takes a serious look at China's rise to global dominance using soft power and America's decline. It's part fantasy, part reality and 100 percent from the creative mind of David Henry Hwang."
MAY LEE LOS ANGELES "'Soft Power' will run in Los Angeles through June 10th. It then heads to San Francisco. I did ask David Henry Hwang if he would like the play to go to China, he said he would love to take it there, if it's permitted."