Cirrus@Austlit

'An unacknowledged whiteness remains at the center of Australian theater, which prevents a richer cultural and linguistic diversity from taking hold. This essay is driven by two questions: Why, despite genuine efforts to improve access, has there been limited progress for Asian Australians in theater? Could theater in Australia be normalizing whiteness in ways that alienate the very people it seeks to help? Vu draws on concepts introduced by Frantz Fanon, Ghassan Hage, and Audre Lorde, along with her own experience as a playwright, to examine how Vietnamese Australian identity is represented and contested on Australian stages, including the obstacles that preclude cultural diversity from achieving the aspirations that many people hold for it in Australia. The essay has three sections. First is a discussion of the history of Australian theater in the context of colonialism and the white gaze. Second is a case study of a playwrights’ development program aimed at Asian Australians to address the glaring lack of scripts written by members of this minority. Third, the author analyzes her own play Coloured Aliens and its production in order to explicate how the white gaze operates. The essay ends with a brief analysis of critical reviews that the play received, which show that greater ethnic diversity in Australian theater remains an incomplete project because efforts to diversify concentrate on peripheral “inclusion” while leaving the centrality of whiteness intact.' (Publication abstract)

'A new comedy about an interracial couple navigating romance in a racist environment.

'Mai is an Asian-Australian playwright who soon discovers that ‘White Australia’ wants her to write the ‘ethnic’ play, but that’s exactly the kind of story she can no longer tell. Her boyfriend Kevin is a security guard who projects his own frustrated creativity onto Mai’s career; he gives her well-meaning and at times pithy advice. Whilst Mai is away on a meditation retreat, Kevin decides to submit a pitch using her name.

'The fallout threatens both her career and their romantic partnership.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'Steve is a young man with a bright future. When he meets Lola, he develops the ability to contact his long dead twin, who died during war. Steve's parents have a pact not to talk about the twin, but each of them dreams of encountering him.

'The Dead Twin re-imagines the horror genre as an immersive, cyclical, site-specific performance.'

Source: Theatre Works program.