The prolific director, 37, who has a new show opening at Seattle Public Theater (SPT) this week, is hesitant to ascribe too much responsibility for social change to the theater.
Thursday, October 05, 2017
Desdemona Chiang’s theater directing spans genres and geographies
The prolific director, 37, who has a new show opening at Seattle Public Theater (SPT) this week, is hesitant to ascribe too much responsibility for social change to the theater.
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Another great artical about diversifying the theatre community. If you think that we have a problem with representing black people in the industry the realization that we have even less Asian dramas is astonishing. But even as Desdemona Chiang states there are just less Asian stories, right now, so it makes more since to create theatre for entire groups of minorities. She also makes a good point to, in a way, keep moving. She means this somewhat literally. She describes how she felt like she might get stale, and that we [artist] need to change invierments, and get now perspectives. I definitely relate to this. I have a record of not staring in the same organization for more than 5 years. And while it all ways feels accidental or opportunist, it always feels nessisary and right. For me changing pace is essential.
Desdemona Chiang reminds me, strangely, of a Steven Universe esque fusion of this couple I know in Ithaca, New York. One half of the couple, Chris, is an English Professor (who specializes in Shakespeare and does really interesting research at the Folger Library every year) at Ithaca College, and the other half, Ding Xiang, teaches Chinese and Chinese studies in the East Asian Department at Cornell University. Both have this wonderful little quality that gives you the impression that both of them grew wise, but never grew up. I get the same impression from Desdemona Chiang. I love that Chiang wants to use theatre not only to reflect the community and the current event that affect us all, but also to connect with the Seattle community. Seattle, like many large west coast cities, has an especially large population of Asian Americans, and to have accurate representation, especially in theatre where Asian Americans are often reduced to stereotype, is extremely important.
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