The Arts and Asian America - David Henry Hwang
David Henry Hwang has a prolific career in theatre, television, and opera, from his Tony Award-winning play M. Butterfly to his most recent opera, The Monkey King, and his new rewrite of the book of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Flower Drum Song. Fresh off the premiere of this new piece in Los Angeles, Hwang sits down with Heidi Kim, a Professor of English and Comparative Literature at UNC Chapel Hill, to discuss his work and his assessment of the artistic direction and economic needs of the arts in the United States today.
David Henry Hwang, Professor of Theatre Arts in the School of the Arts, 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 a Finalist for the 1989 Pulitzer Prize. He also sits on the Council of the Dramatists Guild and is a Professor of Theatre at Columbia University School of the Arts. Prof. Hwang is a Tony Award winner and three-time nominee, a Grammy Award winner who has been twice nominated, and a three-time OBIE Award winner.
Heidi Kim, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, served as the founding director of the Asian American Center. Works in progress include Asian American Literature: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press) and Beyond Reparations, a study of the cultural and political history of American governmental apology and repair.