Set in 1950's small town Kansas, Tea tells the story of four women who come together to clean the house of a fifth after her tragic suicide upsets the balance of life in their small Japanese immigrant community. The spirit of the dead woman returns as a ghostly ringmaster to force the women to come to terms with the disquieting tension of their lives and find common ground. Her destiny requires she escape the limbo between life and death, and move on to the next world in peace, carving a future passage for the others.
Political idealism, personal desire, and economic pragmatism all wrestle in Mohsen Yalfani’s Guest of a Few Days. Two friends, separated by divergent paths, and the woman who binds them reunite in post-revolutionary Iran. A love triangle ensues amidst painful truths and political fallout, as dreams are rekindled and ridiculed.
Performed as part of Saving Face Festival
The Gempei War: A Cycle of Noh Plays investigates the messy aftermath of war, as told in three classic Japanese plays. Tomoe tells the story of a female samurai, unable to forgive her master’s final betrayal. In Atsumori, a war-weary samurai is changed forever after being forced to kill a young musician. And in Ataka, a great general is brought to self-degradation by his brother’s paranoia. Long overlooked in the cannon of classic theatre, these ancient but timeless texts are given new life by a vigorous adaptation for the modern stage.
In a series of 36 interlocking scenes, Naomi Iizuka’s new play explores the relationship between the imaginary and the real. Iizuka’s story unfolds into a progression of visual symbols, objects, and human relationships that reveal the power of perception. Set in the Asian art world, the story focuses on the discovery of a one-of-a-kind Japanese pillow book, a diary of a court lady, that turns the academic field of Asian antiquity upside down. As scholars, art dealers and reporters clamor over the finding, we realize that everything is not as it seems.
