Thanks to Jeff Chang for pointing out a recent article in the New York Times that discusses David Henry Hwang’s new musical “Yellow Face.” His new play addresses some of the issues of race, ethnicity and stereotypes that he also dealt with in his musical M. Butterfly in response to Miss Saigon.
This reminded me of Julia Eklund Koza’s chapter Unhappy Happy Endings: Cultural Politics in the Broadway Musical Hit Once on This Island (1997; revised 2001) in her book stepping across: four interdisciplinary studies of education and cultural politics. In the chapter, Koza discusses and problematizes the ways in which the musical “Once on This Island” constructs and represents gender and race. She also advocates that teachers engage in cultural critique and encourage their students to do the same.
That being said, it would be interesting to know how students make meaning and sense out of performing Once on This Island or any other musical for that matter. Earlier this year, the After the Storm Foundation helped students from New Orleans stage their own production of Once on this Island. It would be wonderful to learn from these students what the process of putting together the musical and its content meant for them.
With a large number of Broadway musicals being performed in schools across the country that have the potential to present steretoyped roles, and problematic constructions of gender, race and other identities – it might be interesting to consider how these issues could be addressed by music teachers and students. As students are practicing their roles, and their singing how often are we, as music teachers, finding out how they are making meaning from their work with the musical? How would engaging in a cultural critique of the musical play a role in their process and the final product?
With Hwang’s musicals and recent play in mind, perhaps one route is by having students create their own musical responses to original Broadway shows. In doing this they would not only be creating original music and gaining deep involvement with the process and products of putting on a musical but also negotiating the issues that are many times glossed over during the typical musical production.
Has anyone encountered this type of original response to musical theater before?