Thoughts on Diversity in Broadway Musical Storytelling

Travelers on diverted planes in the wake of 9/11 find themselves in and around the town of Gander, Newfoundland.

In an attempt to fit in, a high schooler tells a lie that gets completely out of control.

A zoom lens is taken to a section of Tolstoy's War and Peace as we follow the romantic story of two outsiders who find each other.

A weatherman is forced to relive the same day over and over again.

These are very roughly (very, very roughly, since I haven't seen any of them!) the plots of the four Best Musical Tony 2017 nominees, which are also the four nominated for Best Original Score and Best Book: Come From Away; Dear Evan Hansen; Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812; and Groundhog Day. I love how different these stories are from each other. It's evidence that musical theatre as an art form has really branched out beyond any particular template of storytelling. And it has been like this for a few years now. Book of Mormon, A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, Grey Gardens, Fun Home, Hamilton, Waitress - the subject matter of contemporary musicals is so varied from show to show — even on Broadway, which can often be seen as a purely commercial venture with great potential to fall victim to cookie-cutter producing. This trend is heartening to me, because it shows that commercialism need not win over storytelling. Or even, that good and diverse storytelling can lead to commercial success on Broadway. Something that doesn't seem to ring true for Hollywood blockbusters.

Yet, amidst this diversity of stories is something worth noting: All of the musical theatre writing teams (and even the directors) of the four musicals listed above are white. Of course, I acknowledge that "white" is a largely diverse group in and of itself. The writers come from different countries, and undoubtedly bring different perspectives to musical theatre. But if you look over the Best Musical, Best Score, and Best Lyrics Tony nominees over the past twenty years, you'll see that writing acclaimed musical theatre is a very white thing to do (and more often than not, white male). Writers like Lin-Manuel Miranda and Stew are the exceptions, not the norm. And as an Asian American, it's not particularly encouraging that the few times that Asian Americans are heavily featured during the Tony Awards ceremony is due to revivals of South Pacific, The King and I and, this year, Miss Saigon - all stories written by white men. (For the record, I view those shows as simultaneously beneficial for Asian American actors in the industry AND problematic for the perception of Asian Americans in musical theatre as a whole.)

I don't write this to place blame. Or to inflict guilt. The point is observation. All but two of the actors and actresses nominated for performances in a musical this year are white. Who gets to write the stories affects who is represented on the Broadway stage. Who gets to write the stories influences the kinds of stories that get told. I don't necessarily have any magical solutions to this problem, other than to buckle down and write, compose, get better at my craft, learn from other musicals, collaborate with amazing people, and keep advocating for diversity in storytellers as much as diversity in storytelling. Maybe I'll make it to Broadway, maybe I won't. But I hope that no matter where my work gets performed, I'm tilting that dial of representation to better reflect the actual diversity in the US.

Calafia Begins

In December 2013, I learned that the State of California was probably named after a mythical Island of California which appears in 15th and 16th century Spanish lore. In the most popular story by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo, the island is occupied by an Amazon-like race of dark-skinned, warrior women whose queen is Calafia. I found myself fascinated by this fictional woman - the leader of her female-only tribe. I was fascinated that someone who was both a woman and a woman of color was presented in such a mighty, awe-inspiring, and typically masculine way.

Unfortunately, the story of Calafia doesn't end the way I would like. She converts to Christianity in the end and marries a man, ultimately showing that the ways of the Lord can subdue even the most brutish of savages. No. Thank. You.

Fortunately, Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo himself gives me a way around. The backdrop of Calafia's story is the battle for Constantinople between the Byzantines and the Ottomans in the 1400's. History tells us that the Ottomans defeated the Byzantines in 1453 and took back this important city. However, in Montalvo's story, it is the Byzantines who are victorious. Read: it is the Christians who defeat the Muslims in his version.

I figure, if Montalvo thought it fit to change history in order to suit his storytelling desires, then I don't particularly feel the need to stay absolutely true to his story. Read: In my adaptation of Calafia, she will not be submitting to a man or converting to Christianity. I actually don't yet know what Calafia will be doing in my adaptation. But one thing I do know: I want the show to feature a "wall of women" as its primary musical source.

So what does that mean? A month ago, I had only vague notions. But in May 2016, I invited eight incredible female actors to join me for what I called a "voice and sound exploration workshop." Thanks to support from the Playwrights Foundation, I was able to get time and space to conduct the workshop. Since this will be a story about a race of isolated women who never actually existed, I was intrigued by how to find sounds that were simultaneously primal and other-worldly.

We often typify women's voices as higher-pitched, softer and sweeter. But women's voices are so much more dynamic than we give them credit for. Sure they can soothe, squeal and scream, but they can also shriek, groan, grunt, moan, command and overpower. And let me tell you, these actors did not hold back in exploring all of these sounds unabashedly and freely. I found myself utterly speechless at moments as I beheld what the eight of them could bring out from within them. I am utterly thankful to these colleagues for being willing to experiment, be vulnerable and weird, and to let me listen to them for three hours.

I'm not entirely sure what this all means for the next steps of Calafia. I only know that I've now taken a huge creative step forward by having this sound workshop. Calafia is officially my next musical theatre project.