Towards Reconciliation: Immigration in Marty Chan’s The Forbidden Phoenix and David Yee’s lady in the red dress

Abstract

When Prime Minister Stephen Harper offered a public announcement of redress to acknowledge the early mistreatment of Chinese immigrants, he turned a new chapter in Canada’s legislative history. Postcolonial theatre offers a window into the lives of late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries immigrants, many of whom were subjected to exclusionary policies while attempting to become Canadian citizens. This article offers a comparative analysis of two plays: The Forbidden Phoenix by Marty Chan and lady in the red dress by David Yee. Such plays actively encourage readers and audiences to move towards reconciliation, a term used to describe the process of featuring immigrant characters onstage in order to challenge the roots of stereotypes and race-based policies. These plays, though contrasting in style and tone, gesture towards the importance of immigrants to Canadian history, and, more specifically, how theatre artists are attempting to understand the legacy of race-based policies and prejudices on the cultural relations of the twenty-first century.