The Supermuses of Stage and Screen: Vietnam's Female Dramatists

Abstract

According to Catherine Diamond's survey, Vietnam's contemporary theatre has an unusually large number of women participating in playwriting and directing. Several, as well as performing, are involved in both. Moreover, the plays being presented in the two largest cities, Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, have female characters dominating the stage. The women dramatists exert an unusual amount of creative control in the theatre. Some work in close collaboration with male colleagues or have spouses in the theatre; others have been at odds with male management and prefer to work with other women artists. The predominance of successful women playwrights and directors may be the result of severalfactors: the centuries old tradition offemale-oriented theatre; the recent activities of women in military theatre troupes; the Communist Party's attempts to legislate equality in a society with lingeringfeudalistic attitudes; and women's transmission offamily traditions in theatre. Catherine Diamond is a professor of theatre in Taiwan, where she is a director with Thalie Theatre, Taiwan's only English-language troupe. Also a dancer, she has published several times in ATJ and has written fictional accounts of dancers in Asia in Sringara Tales.