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F.O.B. and The House of Sleeping Beauties: Two Plays
F.O.B. and The House of Sleeping Beauties: Two Plays
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Author: David Henry Hwang Publisher: Dramatists Play Service (cover may change) Format: Softcover # of Pages: 84 Pub. Date: 1983 Edition: Acting ISBN-10: 0822204134 ISBN-13: 9780822204138
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About
the Play:
FOB has long been a favourite of acting teachers for Female Monologues, Male Monologues, Female/Male Scenes, and Three-Person Scenes.
FOB and The House of Sleeping Beauties contains two one-act
dramas by David Henry Hwang. FOB explores
the conflicts and similarities between two Chinese Americans and a
Chinese exchange student still steeped in the customs and beliefs of
the old world. The House of Sleeping Beauties is
based on a short story by the famed Japanese novelist Yasunari
Kawabata. Set in a very different kind of brothel, this brilliant
fantasy is both touching and revealing as it probes gently, but ever
deeper, into the needs and emotions of its characters.
FOB is
an early play that
explores the intra-cultural tensions between "fresh-off-the-boat"
Chinese-Americans and ABCs (America-born Chinese) who don't want to
be reminded of their origins.
It
is told in a style that moves quickly between myth and reality, with
the characters occasionally speaking directly to the audience. Grace
and Dale are cousins, living in the Los Angeles area and attending
college. Dale is fully American, second generation. Grace is first
generation and holds the customs of China in higher regard. The
arrival of Steve, an exchange student and a newcomer from China,
fresh off the boat, forces them to confront a number of conflicting
feelings about America, China and themselves. Dale is very
confrontational with Steve, mocking his English and manner. And in
turn Steve is defiant and even provocative. Grace tries to keep the
conflict from escalating but finds herself increasingly drawn to
Steve. Grace decides to go with Steve to a school dance and an uneasy
truce, of sorts, is reached between Dale and Steve. FOB
has become a favourite scene study vehicle in acting classes and
workshops. (Premiered
at the Public Theater in 1980 and won the 1981 Obie Award for Best
New American Play; Cast: 1 female, 2 male)
In The House of
Sleeping Beauties a well-known novelist, Kawabata, visits a
brothel in order to learn why older men frequent it. However this
establishment is quite different from what he expected. Here the men
simply sleep in the same bed with the beautiful young women provided,
and the women never awaken or see them. The madam who runs the home
carefully screens all of her potential guests and only accepts men
who she deems worthy. Kawabata intends to write about the house, but
slowly falls under its spell and finds himself unable to write the
piece. He is troubled by thoughts of his own mortality and the
suicide of his friend, the author Mishima. But the madam soothes him
and with the aid of a mild sleeping potion, Kawabata finally sleeps.
In the end he is able to write the story and has achieved an inner
peace. With his newfound tranquility, he asks the madam to make him
some tea, but instead of the sleeping powder, he wants her to add a
poison to it. Both the novelist and the madam drink the tea and
slowly drift off to sleep. (Premiered at the Public Theater in 1983;
Cast: 1 female, 1 male)
What people say:
"David Henry Hwang
knows America – its vernacular, its social landscape, its
theatrical traditions. He knows the same about China. In his plays,
he manages to mix both of these conflicting cultures until he arrives
at a style that is wholly his own. Hwang's works have the verve of
the well-made American stage comedies and yet, with little warning,
they bubble over into the mystical rituals of Asian stagecraft. By at
once bringing West and East into conflict and unity, this playwright
has found the perfect way to dramatize both the pain and the humor of
the immigrant experience." — The New York Times
About the Playwright:
David Henry Hwang is a Chinese American playwright,
librettist, and screenwriter, described by The New York Times
as "a true original" and by TIME magazine as
"the first important dramatist of American public life since
Arthur Miller." Throughout his career, he has explored the
complexities of forging Eastern and Western cultures in a
contemporary America. His extraordinary body of work, over the past
30 years, has been marked by a deep desire to reaffirm the common
humanity in all of us. He is best known as the author of M.
Butterfly, which won the 1988 Tony, Drama Desk, John Gassner, and
Outer Critics Circle Awards, and was also a finalist for the 1989
Pulitzer Prize. In 2012, he won the $200,000 US Steinberg
Distinguished Playwright Award, the richest theatre prize in the U.S.
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