About the Play:

Falling In Time is a full-length drama by C. E. Gatchalian. The play tracks the intense culture clash experienced by four characters with radically diverse backgrounds and perspectives: an embittered American Korean War vet, an unfeeling ESL teacher, a Korean ESL student who is radically anti-Western, and a Korean woman attempting to survive against all odds.

Falling In Time is an epic exploration of armed conflict, masculinity, sexuality, unqualified forgiveness and unexpected love. Set in Vancouver in 1994, at the time when North Korean dictator Kim Il-Sung had died and there was brief hope of a reconciliation between the Koreas, the play criss-crosses two hemispheres and spans more than forty years. Through all this, four distinctly different lives intertwine. Steve is an aging American redneck, an outrageous, bisexual Korean War vet who embodies the sadistic tendencies of Western imperialism that polite society has too often tried to sweep from view. Jamie is an aloof, repressed ESL teacher haunted by a troubled childhood. Chang Hyun is a young Korean ESL student brimming with anti-Western sentiment and still reeling from a traumatic experience in the military. In the middle of it all is Eun Ha, a woman who lives through the Korean War and, against all odds, finds the will to survive. One of the most controversial and uncompromising Canadian plays in recent memory, Falling In Time is a brutally honest depiction of war, rape, racism and animal sexuality that asks the question, "why do men fear the feminine?" And "how do we let go?"

Falling In Time premiered in 2011 at Playwrights Theatre Centre in Vancouver and was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award.

Cast: 1 female, 3 male (with doubling)

What people say:

"Gatchalian is well on his way to making his mark in contemporary drama." — CBC Radio

"In moving from theatre of the oppressed into a 'post-gay' model, the trick for playwrights will be to craft characters whose sexuality doesn't define their character so much as add to it ... With his latest work, Falling In Time, local playwright C.E. Gatchalian comes as close as anyone to reaching that goal ... Who knows how well it will hold up, but for now, Falling In Time appears timeless." — The West Ender

"Falling in Time is, eventually, an unlikely love story....Very poignant. A full house – even on a rare, sunny Sunday afternoon in November – attests to [Falling In Time's] relevance." — The Vancouver Courier

"Strong narrative bones and lots of muscle in the writing ... A powerful play...." — The Vancouver Sun

"Beyond our roles and histories, Falling In Time seems to be saying, compassion is still possible. The characters are nicely complicated...and playwright Gatchalian leavens his thematic ambition with humour." — The Georgia Straight

About the Playwright:

C.E. Gatchalian is a Filipinx-Canadian playwright, fiction writer, poet, editor, and teacher. Born and raised in Vancouver, he is an alumnus of the University of British Columbia's Creative Writing program. He has been Playwright-in-Residence at the Playhouse Theatre Company and the Firehall Arts Centre in Vancouver, and Writer-in-Residence at the Berton House Writers' Retreat in Dawson City, Yukon. His plays have appeared on stages nationally and internationally, as well as on radio and television.