The 2019 season is the first in the Oregon Shakespeare
Festival’s history to feature plays by living playwrights of
color in all three slots in the Thomas Theatre. Cambodian Rock
Band by Lauren Yee, Between Two Knees by the 1491s, and How
to Catch Creation by Christina Anderson are all revolutionary
in myriad ways, some blatant and others subtle. But there is
one revolutionary aspect all three share: the playwrights are
all telling stories of their own communities, in these cases the
Asian American, Native, and African American communities,
respectively.
Perhaps that seems simple—that a writer from a certain identity
group would be the best person to interpret that group’s
narrative. Unfortunately, historically marginalized peoples have
long been subjected to having their narratives rewritten by the
conquerors, the oppressors, the dominant group. The stages of
American theatre have seen far more productions of The King
and I or Miss Saigon than plays written by Asian American
writers; far more productions of Porgy and Bess or Once on This
Island than plays by Black playwrights (or at least this was so
before August Wilson); and few, if any, Native or Indigenous
stories at all, save for cameo appearances of Native characters
in stereotype roles like Chief Bromden in One Flew Over the
Cuckoo’s Nest or Tiger Lily in Peter Pan.
OSF has been working to dismantle these inequities for years,
producing plays by writers of color every season as well as
inviting directors and actors of color to interpret Shakespeare
and other Western classics. That said, producing a full slate of
stories about communities of color written by playwrights who
identify as part of those groups is significant because it fosters
authenticity, challenges stereotypes, celebrates the beauty and
humanizes the pain. It also creates visibility in order to empower
future generations. Thus the 2019 Thomas season represents a significant milestone on the organization’s journey toward
fulfilling its mission to “reveal our collective humanity.”
What does it mean to foster authentic representation? Not
every playwright will have personally experienced everything
they write about—what a limited field the theatre would be if
that were required. Like a playwright who has never practiced
law preparing to write a courtroom drama, a writer portraying
a community to which they do not belong can do research and
conduct interviews—can even
do so with the utmost respect.
However, there are certain nuances
that they will never understand
as an outside observer, even if the
approach is absolutely empathetic.
Furthermore, there is room for
some plays written by someone
outside of the community, but a
vastly disproportionate number of
them have always been produced,
and it is, quite simply, past time for
communities of color to have the
opportunity to have agency over
their own narratives.
As August Wilson said in his
historic address, The Ground on Which I Stand, “We cannot allow
others to have authority over our
cultural and spiritual products. We
reject, without reservation, any
attempts by anyone to rewrite our
history so to deny us the rewards
of our spiritual labors, and to
become the culture custodians of
our art, our literature and our lives.
To give expression to the spirit that
has been shaped and fashioned by
our history is of necessity to give
voice and vent to the history itself.”
Wilson deftly summarizes the
historical, spiritual and political
significance of authentic representation, not only for African
American art (about which Wilson was speaking specifically) but
also as it applies to other communities of color and marginalized
groups. Christina Anderson’s play How to Catch Creation is such an
example of a playwright asserting her own cultural custodianship,
to borrow Wilson’s apt words. Anderson authentically explores
the wide breadth of human experience that her characters
encounter, from love to sexuality to art making to re-entering
mainstream society after imprisonment to parenthood and legacy.
That nuanced, fulsome and robust investigation of the human
experience comes from the writer’s own deep connection to the
people about whom she writes.
On the other side of the authenticity coin, producing plays by
writers of color sharing their own cultures’ narratives offers
an opportunity to dismantle harmful stereotypes about those
groups. Some of these stereotypes appear in plays and other
media maliciously in order to damage and control, others appear
out of ignorance or lack of exposure, and still others perhaps out
of a misguided sense of humor or irony based on the erroneous
assumption that ours is a post-racial society.
For an example of the first malicious style of stereotyping, one
must look no further than Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice.
Even if the Bard’s original motivation
behind the writing of Shylock, the
greedy Jew whose only salvation is to
convert to Christianity, is not known
for certain, it is well documented
that the play received more than 50
productions in Nazi Germany between
1933 and 1939. There can be no
confusion as to why the title was so
popular—the stereotypical portrayal
of a Jewish person reinforced the
Nazis’ political agenda to dehumanize
Jewish citizens and assisted in making
them a common enemy.
While other examples might not be so
overt in their malevolent intentions,
the barrage of media portrayals
of Black people as slaves, maids or
criminals; Asian people as doctors
and math geeks (or prostitutes for the
American military); and Natives as
magical medicine people or alcoholics
have real-world ramifications on how
people are perceived and treated.
The sketch-comedy group the 1491s
not only recognizes and subverts that
dynamic, they challenge mainstream
audiences to face those stereotypical
and harmful images and ideas head on.
In Between Two Knees, the writers
highlight mainstream expectations
of what a Native story might look
like, and then turn those assumptions back on the audience to
question, edit and ultimately overturn. Take, for example, the
narrator of the play, who is not a Chief, nor a medicine man, just
simply a person. “Having traveled across the land I have gained
many sacred names from the hundreds of tribal nations I have
met on my journeys,” he says in the opening monologue, “Names
like: Sitting Buffalo. Big Eagle. Punches Kittens. Bad Breath. Tickles
Beaver. And Downward Facing Dog. But today, you can call me by
my most sacred Indigenous name: Larry.”
This signature brand of 1491s comedy is a balancing act—
openly acknowledging and naming stereotypes, but using them
strategically within a crafted framework that calls out the fallacy
of these generalizations, holds perpetrators of them accountable
and also corrects history—all while keeping the tone playful and fun. Walking this fine line is simply not possible for an artist
whose lived experience does not expose them to the nuanced
realities of living that balance in their daily life.
Just as dismantling stereotypes is the careful, surgical work
of those who have the lived experience, so too is the task of
deep and broad expressions of a people or culture. So often,
portrayals of certain groups are
minimized into a limited box that
focuses on only the negative, failing to
celebrate the beauty of that culture,
or on the positive, failing to humanize
the pain of that community. While it
is certainly important never to forget
the dehumanizing history of slavery in
the United States, the disproportionate
appearance of slave narratives and
other depictions of Black pain onstage
and in other forms of media disregards
stories of Black inventors, Black artists,
Black scholars, Black people in love,
Black JOY. Similarly, the portrayal
of Asians as a model minority who
are all mathematicians, doctors and
chemists disregards important stories
of violence, addiction, imprisonment
and traumas large and small. In reality,
of course, all people are subject to both
extremes, positive and negative, of the
human condition, as well as everything
in between.
Lauren Yee’s Cambodian Rock Band captures the full breadth
of humanity in one elegant, painful, joyous, moving story. If
audiences have any preconceived notions of Cambodia, they
are likely rooted in the history of the Khmer Rouge, the regime
of the Communist Party led by Pol Pot, who murdered millions
of Cambodians. Meanwhile, many audiences may not have any
knowledge of Cambodia at all. It is absolutely important that
the history of genocide not be forgotten, ignored or negated.
However, there is much more to Cambodia than the violence
suffered there under the Khmer Rouge. There is glorious natural
beauty, there are resilient people and there is incredible music.
Yee captures all of these aspects and more in her play that
fearlessly addresses genocide as a global phenomenon and as a
human tragedy, yet also celebrates
the beauty of Cambodia, Cambodian
people and Cambodian rock music
with ferocity, playfulness, joy and love.
The importance of featuring writers
who identify with the community
that is the subject of a given play goes
beyond what those artists bring to
the texts themselves. To demonstrate
for the next generation of people of
color that we get to control our own
narratives and tell our own stories is
to empower us with agency that has
effects on every aspect of our lives.
For the young Asian American woman
who might be awakened to new
possibilities by seeing Cambodian Rock
Band running all year, with an Asian
American playwright, Asian American
director and an all-Asian-American
cast; to the Native student who might
be a class clown but never considered
that comedy can be a career until
seeing how the bracing and clever humor of the 1491s five-person
Native sketch-comedy team is celebrated in Between Two Knees;
to the queer Black artist who might never have seen themselves
onstage or on the page before How to Catch Creation, with a Black
playwright, Black director and all-Black cast—these plays will be
life-changing.
To return to August Wilson’s brilliant speech, The
Ground on Which I Stand, “We can make a difference.
Artists, playwrights, actors—we can be the
spearhead of a movement to reignite and reunite
our people’s positive energy for a political and social
change that is reflective of our spiritual truths rather
than economic fallacies. Our talents, our truths, our
belief in ourselves is all in our hands. What we make
of it will emerge from the self as a baptismal spray
that names and defines. What we do now becomes
history by which our grandchildren will judge us.”
May the 2019 Thomas season reignite our positive
energy for political and social change, may it reflect
our spiritual truths and may it contribute to a history
in which the future generations will take pride.
Find tickets and information at Cambodian Rock Band, Between Two Knees and How to Catch Creation.