It's Our Time: Final Blog Post

Hello Everyone. First I would like to say thank you for joining me on this crazy journey! I appreciate all the support and positivity that's come my way over the past few months. I am posting my powerpoint presentation as well and I know it may seem very fragmented, but if you come to my presentation (shameless self plug) I promise it will all make sense. Again thank you everyone!


https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1HSfcBBtAVBcuPodXufeQgTcv_6UR_sXpqeBMOWW2c2g/edit#slide=id.p4

Crazier Than You: Damaging Asian Stereotypes

Hello world! This week I finished up my internship and it was amazing! I knew that I wouldn't miss it at all because that is where I will be spending the next four years of my life. I'm so grateful to have found my home through this internship. So this week has been about doing the social analysis and formulating possible solutions for my research questions. Stereotypes permeate every aspect of our lives and especially in casting Asian Americans. But the stereotype that is causing the most harm is the "model minority" stereotype. Many Asians do come to America to find a better life and many of those people are highly educated and push their children to also be highly educated. But many Asians who come to America live near or below the poverty line. They do not fit into the "model minority" stereotype even thought they want their children to be successful. Even the people who do fit into the "model minority" mold do not want to characterized as one dimensional, academically driven robots who care about nothing else. I love the arts and so do many other Asians but we are not afforded that opportunity because of this stereotype and because we were never exposed to it. 

Pictures from my New York trip!

Along with my previous post, I just wanted to include some of these fun pictures from my trip!

Wonder Of Wonders: New York Adventures

Hello everyone! I took my spring break last week to travel to New York and see Fiddler On The Roof, Disaster, and most importantly for my project HAMILTON! It was quite a whirlwind of a trip and I spent the majority of my time walking around the theatre district and Times Square as I marveled at the light up marquees and munched on wonderful New York goodies (seriously I will never forget the pizza as long as I live). The day after I touched down in New York, my mother and I went to see Fiddler On The Roof and Hamilton, both in the same day. What is special about Fiddler is that it is musical theatre mother's milk. The music and lyrics touch such an emotional core it's impossible to get it out of your head for at least a week. It was my mother's first time seeing the show live so it was incredibly moving to see her react to the musical that spurred my love for musical theatre. Fiddler is as relevant today as it was 50+ years ago. People are still being expelled from their homes because of who they are, what they practice, or what their circumstances maybe. With so many people becoming refugees in our world and being turned away by the countries that should be protecting them, it is important to be telling their story in a way that reaches audiences who otherwise would pay no attention to this issue.

Next up was Hamilton. Simply seeing those doors and that marquee proudly displaying the Hamilton poster filled me with immense joy and excitement. When I stepped into the theatre and saw that stage for the first time, I started crying. I couldn't even believe that I was actually just moments away from seeing the show that defines all of my research. From the opening beat to the gentle final chord that fizzled out like a candle being gently snuffed, I was completely hooked. Once I left the show and finally recovered from the emotional rollercoaster I had just completed, it began to dawn on me why this show defined my research. I identified with every single person on that stage: Black, White, Asian, Hispanic. Race did not define anyone on that stage. They were actual people with hopes and dreams and fears and regrets and that could not have made me happier.

Never Ever Getting Rid Of Me: Asians in non-Asian roles

Hello everyone! As I progress with my research, I have delved deeper into the world of casting and casting Asian actors in non-Asian roles. Of course after some pretty extensive and in depth research, I came up with very little. First of all, the only roles that Asians have been cast in are written specifically for Asians and stories they are telling don't reflect the Asian-American experience. Some key musicals are trying to break that mold and show that ethnicity shouldn't be a problem in casting. Let's start with the musical that is highlighting strong women of all ethnicities and backgrounds, Hamilton. 

Philippa Soo plays Elizabeth Hamilton nee Schuyler, Alexander Hamilton's wife. Of course Elizabeth Schuyler was a white woman of high standing in her community but she is portrayed on stage by Ms. Soo, who is of Asian descent. She bucks the trope of the Asian woman being shy and meek and instead plays a strong female character who has to go through so much loss in her life. Elizabeth's eldest son Phillip died in a duel when he was very young and soon after that Hamilton also dies in a duel. Many of her children also died before her and she outlived her sister, Angelica, as well. Seeing an Asian woman portray such a strong, complex, and dynamic woman on stage really shows that stereotypes do not define women of color and if we can continue on this trajectory in theatre, the results can be truly beautiful.

Next up we have Alice Lee who portrays Heather Duke in Heathers the Musical. What is unique about Ms. Lee's performance is that she portrays a mean girl. A truly horrendous and absolutely ruthless mean girl. That trope is another that is never explored or given to Asians. Alice Lee brings a lot of bravado and sass to her performance as Heather Duke and explodes on the stage from every move she makes to every note she sings. She is truly unapologetic and flaunts her Asianness on stage proudly.

A truly unique performance is Ann Sanders in The King and I. Ann Sanders is the understudy for Kelli O'Hara who plays Anna Leonowens and she made her Broadway debut back in February. She is the first ASIAN Anna in Broadway history and her performance means a lot to the Asian theatre community. This bold casting choice proves that casting can be ethnically non-specific and still convey an important and relevant story. By casting an Asian actress as Anna, the focus is taken off of the racial aspect of the story and is placed onto the cultural conflict, which is the true emotional center of the show. The conflict is not about Anna being white and her whiteness clashing with the Asians. The true conflict is between Western and Eastern values and how those values can be reconciled.

- Fun Fact: The King and I is based on the true story of an English governess named Anna who goes the court of the King of Siam to teach them English values. Interestingly, Anna was not completely white. She was born in India to a British father and an Indian mother. She actually took the job in Siam after her husband's death because she no longer had his status to protect from pariah status in British society because she was mixed-race.

P.S. This week's musical reference is the song "Never Ever Getting Rid Of Me" from the new musical Waitress 

I'm Willing to Wait For It: A Statistical Disadvantage

Hello all. This week was my week off from my internship because ASU was on spring break. So I delved into the research side of my project and came up with some fairly interesting results. First, I looked up the US census data from 1950-2010 to see what percentage of the population identified as Asian, Asian-American, or Pacific Islander. Now we must take census data from 1950 with a grain of salt because so many Asian-Americans had been displaced from their homes due to the Internment Act during World War II. The data is shows below.

• 1950
• Population of US- 152.3 million 
• Asian population- 321,033
• Percentage- 0.2%

• 1960
• Population of US- 180.7 million 
• Asian population- 980,337
• Percentage- 0.5%
• 1970
• Population of US- 205.1 million 
• Asian population- 1,526,401
• Percentage- 0.8%
• 1980
• Population of US- 226.5 million 
• Asian population- 3,500,439
• Percentage- 1.5%
• 1990
• Population of US- 249.6 million 
• Asian population- 7,273,662
• Percentage- 2.9%
• 2000
• Population of US- 282.2 million 
• Asian population- 15,359,073
• Percentage- 3.8%
• 2010
• Population of US- 309.3 million 
• Asian population- 19,107,368
• Percentage- 4.9%

In the 2010, 4.9% of the US population identified as Asian and the census bureau goes further to provide a racial breakdown of the Asian community in America. Of the 19,107,368 Asians in America, the largest reporting ethnic groups were Chinese (3.79 million), Filipino (3.41 million), Indian (3.18 million), Vietnamese (1.73 million), Korean (1.7 million), and Japanese (1.3 million).

If we look at the break down of musicals that tell Asian stories since 1950, the trend seems to be that every decade less new musicals about Asians are being made. In 1950, the five "Asian" musicals produced were The King and I, Flower Drum Song, Kismet, Shangri-la, and South Pacific. Of those musicals, only Kismet focused on a non East Asian story. Until 1980, not a single new musical was produced that focused on an Asian story. In 1980, Miss Saigon hit the Broadway stage and took the Great White Way by storm. It also earned the leading lady, Lea Salonga, her first Tony award and made her the first Asian woman to win a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical. 

So, what needs to change so that more Asian stories are produced and successful? And why can't the Asian story evolve into something modern and more relatable? More to explore and contemplate next week!

P.S. This week's musical reference is from the song "Wait For It" from Hamilton 

Wedding Bells Will Ring: Stepping into the Production side.

Hello all. This week has been so amazing and rewarding. I have started working with the wonderful people at ASU Lyric Opera on their production of The Drowsy Chaperone. The rehearsals just started and everything is already going swimmingly. Sitting in on the first music rehearsal made my heart fill with joy and I never wanted to leave. The cast comprised on undergraduate and graduate students from the theatre program and they can't be more than 24 years old. But the level of professionalism astounded me. Every single person came into that first rehearsal completely ready with their music, a smile on their face, and an open mind.

Over the next few weeks, I will be spending the majority of my time at Drowsy Chaperone rehearsals and learning more about the production process and learning about the rehearsal process through a backstage perspective as opposed to the actor's perspective. So far I have met the stage manager, set designer, costume designer, and musical director and they are all amazing people and incredible artists. ASU is going on spring break this week so I will not be working but I will continue my independent research and keep you all updated on that.

P.S. This post's title is a reference to the song Wedding Bells in The Drowsy Chaperone.