During rehearsals for a play about Mao Tse-Tung, events from the actors’ real lives become the subject of their own epic propaganda play. The Hundred Flowers Project, a story of self-generating narratives, is at once a cautionary tale of history and a parable of media’s role in the politics of today.
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2012, Crowded Fire Theater, California
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Unpublished
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Playwright's website: http://www.christopherchen.org/plays.html
Playwright's website: http://www.christopherchen.org/plays.html
Realistic
A bride motors down a highway in her wedding dress, struggling to make sense of what led her to this moment. Her veil lies crumpled on the back seat. Her cellphone keeps ringing, and the car in her rear view appears to be following her. Could it be Mathiew, her groom?
Historical
Viola Davis Desmond (July 6, 1914-1965) was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. She was an African- Canadian who ran her own beauty parlor and beauty college in Halifax. She has been referred to as a Canadian version of Rosa Parks. Desmond’s story was one of the most publicized incidents of racial discrimination in Nova Scotian and Canadian history. On November 8, 1946, Viola Desmond refused to sit in the balcony designated exclusively for blacks in a New Glasgow theatre. Instead she took her seat on the ground floor where only white people were allowed to sit. After being forcibly removed from the theatre and arrested, Desmond was eventually found guilty of not paying the one-cent difference in tax on the balcony ticket from the main floor ticket.
