Broadway’s lack of diversity, in regards to both race and gender, has not gone unnoticed. Splinter News reports, “during Broadway’s 2015-2016 season, only two plays were written by women. Therefore, Young Jean Lee’s play, Straight White Men, is all the more important to acknowledge.
Lee has made history by being the first playwright that is both Asian American and a woman to appear on Broadway. The New York Times explains that although she is proud of her accomplishment, it is unsettling to acknowledge that no other Asian American women has gotten this opportunity.
“On the one hand, that’s great, but it’s also like, ‘Oh, why hasn’t there been another Asian American female on Broadway?”
Straight White Men made its debut in 2014, but its run was confined to public theaters. Critical acclaim and positive feedback from the public, however, gave it a spot on Broadway.
The play, according to the New York Times, “depicts three brothers confronting angst and stagnation during a visit to their widowed father in the Midwest over the holidays.”
Straight White Men opens July 23, 2018 at the Helen Hayes Theatre.
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