Christopher Chen
"In the broadest possible terms, I want people to come away having been activated over the course of it. My most profound moments as a consumer of art is when my own mind and soul are fully engaged and challenged, and working through their own journey in concert with the journey of the actual play. That in itself - the individual's journey in the moment (which hopefully carries on after the experience itself) - is what I value. That's what I think adds to our humanity-making. So sometimes I think of my plays simply as tools for activation. "
-C. Chen, June 2020
BIOGRAPHY
Christopher Chen is an award winning, Chinese-American playwright who has had his work produced in theaters all over the country, including the Guthrie, American Conservatory Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, San Francisco Playhouse, and Lincoln Center. He received his BA from UC Berkeley and his MFA in playwriting from San Francisco State. Before Chen discovered playwriting to be his preferred medium of artistic expression, he dabbled in film, music composition, directing, acting, and was part of a UC Berkeley Asian American theatre group called Theatre Rice. Awards/Nominations include: Obie Award (Caught), Paula Vogel Playwriting Award, Glickman Award (The Hundred Flowers Project), and a Drama League Nomination (Caught).
FEATURED PLAY
CAUGHT
SYNOPSIS
Lin Bo, a Chinese artist, stands before the audience and gives context to his art exhibit by recounting the story of his internment in a Chinese political prison for more than two years and his relation to famed performance artist Yu Gong. The New Yorker freelancer and editor that broke Bo’s story confronts him about seeming irregularities and plagiarisms in his story, and Bo admits that everything he’s said, right down to his nationality, is a lie. It is then revealed by a curator that the first two scenes are, in truth, an exhibition constructed by performance artist Wang Min, who becomes a near-hostile contrarian to the curator’s questions, and drives the poor woman to physical duress. But we then see that all three scenes are actually the work of the actors playing Lin Bo and Wang Min, who in conversation discover that their mentor, Yu Gong, was involved in a romantic relationship with each of them simultaneously. These two actors then reveal to the audience that the entire show has been a fabrication, based on the works of a “real” political artist named Yu Gong and thank the audience for coming.
Photo credit: Carol Rosegg, New York Times
APPLICATIONS
Educational: The piece is a great leaping off point for explorations of Fake News, journalistic and academic integrity, and national perspective on international events.
Artistic: The play is an excellent model for creating theatre in ‘non-theatre’ spaces.
Applied: The play and its source material is a solid foundation for explorations and discussions surrounding empathy and perspective, the relativism of truth, and how truth and falsehood are intrinsically tied to perspective.
*Using the piece as a base for all these explorations provides huge potential for working, cross-curricularly, interdisciplinarily, and with a mindset toward intersectionality.
SAMPLE DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
What do you think Chen’s objective is in layering his show like he does? What is the audience reaction he is seeking? Where is he trying to take us?
In Scene 4, Lin Bao reads a letter from Yu Rong.
“I was born in a village of no lies. In this village, nothing was anything but the thing that it was… In my life, I’ve searched for a return to my home village. I have looked for truth but have only seen lies. Within others, within myself. So I began negating all I saw… In my life I’ve searched for the truth. To what end? I negated this question too. Because if we are alive there is no end. There is only waiting. Waiting to return to this village of no lies.”
What do these statements suggest about Chen’s nature of lies and truth?
3. The figure of Yu Rong is the only consistent “truth” underpinning all five episodes of this piece, but he himself is a total fabrication. What do you think Yu Rong represents for Chen, and what idea does he then embody throughout the play?
SAMPLE ACTIVITY
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Truth
Groups of three students research topics that are not very well known (A brief history of Uzbekistan, The rules of the Mesoamerican Ball game, etc.). Each student then presents a monologue or presentation of their findings, presenting everything as real and factual. However, each of their monologues or presentations present slightly different essential details.
These details can:
Contradict the other presentations
Be different but not contrary
Present the same information from a different perspective
The rest of the students must determine if 1.) one student is telling the truth and the other two are lying or 2.) the truth is relative and none were lying or 3.) all three students were lying.
ADDITIONAL PLAYS
PASSAGE
SYNOPSIS
Q, a citizen of Country Y, moves to Country X to be with her fiancé, R, and on the boat over, meets F, who she agrees to explore the country with. R, with his friend J, are anxious about Q’s explorations, and insist if she goes deeper into the “real Country X” that she be protected. Q and F, along with B, recently named “Country X’s best doctor,” go together to explore sacred caves, and in a hallucinatory panic, Q draws a gun and shoots at B, thinking she’s an animalistic version of R attacking her. On this false report, B is arrested for assault, but is released when F challenges Q on the details. Throughout, and at the end of the play, these characters and the ensemble struggle to answer the question of whether people from two different countries can ever truly be friends.
Photo Credit: Julieta Cervantes, SoHo Rep
APPLICATIONS
Educational: This play is a wonderfully elaborate version of a ‘blank scene’ used in many acting classes, and therefore is a great source for activities and exercises relating to multiple interpretations, ‘mining a text,’ and artist adaptation.
Artistic: The show is a great subject for making topical commentary on any set of current or historical geopolitical issues between nations or demographics through creative technical and context choices.
Applied: This piece is a great gateway for discussions about prejudice and bias, as well as empathy relating to opposing or multiple perspectives. In addition, it can be used as allegory and a ‘stepping stone’ to participants’ real life experiences a la Theatre of the Oppressed.
SAMPLE DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Do you think Country X and Country Y reference real-world countries? What evidence from the text supports this opinion?
Can two people from different backgrounds truly be friends if one of those traditions has ever oppressed the other?
What do the sacred caves of Country X represent? Why do they bring comfort and solace to some, a loss of self to others, and panic-stricken terror to a select few?
SAMPLE ACTIVITY
Defining the Undefined.
Students, in groups of four, must assign two real-world countries to be Country X and Country Y, and then must select a scene from the play to rehearse and perform from that perspective. This leads to a full class discussion, moderated by the instructor, extrapolating on the single-scene example, and perhaps providing counter-examples from other scenes in the play.
THE HEADLANDS
SYNOPSIS
On her deathbed, Henry’s mother, Leena, reveals striking information surrounding the burglary-homicide of his father, George, that causes Henry, an “amateur sleuth,” to take it upon himself to reinvestigate the details of his father’s mysterious death. Henry tracks down his father’s business partner and finds out George was embezzling money from their company and receives surveillance footage from a detective that reveals a strange man who Henry recognizes as someone with whom he now believes Leena may have been having an affair. He then goes to his mother’s best friend to find out about the affair, only to find out that the strange man is actually his long lost brother. The perspective of the narrative shifts to that of Tom, Henry’s brother, as he tells the audience that the money George embezzled was to bail Tom out of his debts with dangerous people. Because George refused to allow Tom back into the family’s life as an adult, Tom came to the family’s home with the intention of killing himself in front of George, but shot him instead, an act that Leena dutifully covered up.
Photo credit: Kyle Froman, LCT3
APPLICATIONS
Educational: This play allows students to explore the importance of context. It also allows students to find immediate applications for context as it relates to “cancel culture” and social media.
Artistic: This play gives actors, directors, and designers an opportunity to experiment with theatrical form and style as a film noir memory play. This also presents a rich playground for design artists to play with incorporating digital technology in the production via video screens and projection design.
Applied: When applied on a greater scale, this play provides opportunities to explore how context, biases, perspective, and memory all are relative to each other and how that affects the truth of an individual.
SAMPLE DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
How does The Headlands disrupt the Asian stereotype?
How does this play highlight the importance of context?
How does this play highlight how memory and perspective influence truth?
SAMPLE ACTIVITY
Snapshots
Show students a series of video clips or photos that each capture a moment. Ask the students what they think is happening in each of the video clips or photos. Then show the complete video clip or explain the context of the photos to put each of those moments in perspective.
How did past experiences, memories, and biases influence how each student determined what was happening in the snapshot moments?
In what ways were they correct or incorrect when the moments were given context?
How does a lack of context and information affect the world today?
COMPREHENSIVE BODY OF WORK
The Headlands (2020)
Passage (2019)
Into the Numbers (2018)
You Mean to Do Me Harm (2018)
Caught (2016)
Home Invasion (2016)
The Late Wedding (2014)
Mutt (2014)
The Hundred Flowers Project (2012)
Aulis: An Act of Nihilism in One Long Act (2012)
The Window Age (2009)
Photo Credit: The New School
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
BIBLIOGRAPHY
CHRISTOPHER CHEN PLAYWRIGHT. (n.d.). http://www.christopherchen.org/
Write Ups/Features/Press Releases:
Schiffman, J. (n.d.). Cunning Sociopolitical Tale Premieres at Crowded Fire. https://sfarts.org/feature.cfm?featureID=511
Tran, D. (2016, August 18). Truth, Lies and Chinese Art Inspire 'a Puzzle Box of a Play'. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/21/theater/caught-christopher-chen.html
Interviews:
B. (2016, June 16). WEEK 1 SUBVERSIONS: Q&A with writer Christopher Chen. https://playco.org/week-1-subversions-qa-playwright-christopher-chen/
Chen, C., Guha, D., Uzoh, A., & Leonard, S. R. (2017, January 23). The Creative Careers panel: Pen to Paper, A Discussion with Professional Playwrights. https://howlround.com/happenings/creative-careers-panel-pen-paper-discussion-professional-playwrights
Spector, J. (2020, January 28). Unraveling Realities with Christopher Chen. https://brooklynrail.org/2020/02/theater/Unraveling-Realities-with-Christopher-Chen
Studio, 2. (2019, May 09). Playwright Christopher Chen shares how his identity influences his writing. https://www.srt.com.sg/article/interview-with-christopher-chen/
Wolf, M. (2017, January 05). What's This Sneaky Play Up To? https://www.americantheatre.org/2016/02/24/whats-this-sneaky-play-up-to/
Reviews:
Hofler, R. (2019, May 5),’Passage’ Theater Review: Provocative Drama Asks If the Cultural Divide Can Ever Be Bridged. https://www.thewrap.com/passage-theater-review-christopher-chen-drama-em-forster/
Miller, D. (2017, November 7), Review: An immersive theatre piece that will have you ‘Caught’ up in ideas, Los Angeles Times. https://www.latimes.com/entertainment/arts/la-et-cm-caught-christopher-chen-theater-review-20171107-story.html
Source information for Caught:
Glass, I. (2012, January 6),Transcript: 454: Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory, This American Life, National Public Radio. https://www.thisamericanlife.org/454/transcript
Glass, I. (2012, March 16), Transcript: Retraction, This American Life, National Public Radio. http://podcast.thisamericanlife.org/special/TAL_460_Retraction_Transcript.pdf
Academic articles on relative truth:
Caso, R. (2015, October 9), A Second Opinion on Relative Truth, SciELO. https://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0100-60452015000200065
MacFarlane, J. (2014),Making Sense of Relative Truth, University of California. https://www.johnmacfarlane.net/makingsense.pdf
O’Shea, J. (2011), Objective Truth and the Practice Relativity of Justification in the Pragmatic Turn, European Journal of Pragmatism and American Philosophy. https://journals.openedition.org/ejpap/839
Information for this web page compiled by Michael Kimm and Daniel Nakawatase (2020)