M. BUTTERFLY by David Henry Hwang

A provocative and captivating story of lust, politics, and betrayal that challenges and explores ideas of gender, culture and sexuality is being presented by GRADS in November.

M. Butterfly, the compelling, award winning play by David Henry Hwang, is being presented by arrangement with Hal Leonard Australia Pty. Ltd, on behalf of Dramatists Play Services, Inc. New York. It runs at the Dolphin Theatre, UWA, on 2, 3, 7 to 10, 14 to 17 November, at 7.30pm.

This imaginative and at times shocking play is one of the most celebrated of recent American plays, and the first by an Asian-American to win universal acclaim.

Bored with his routine posting in Beijing, and awkward with women, French diplomat Rene Gallimard is easy prey for the subtle, delicate charms of Song Liling, a Chinese opera star who personifies Gallimard's fantasy vision of submissive, exotic oriental sexuality. She is to him, the ‘perfect woman,’ yet this Chinese butterfly of his passions is ultimately revealed to be far more than she seems.

Gallimard begins a twenty-year affair with ‘her,’ during which time he passes along diplomatic secrets, an act which brings on his downfall and imprisonment. Weaving into the play many parallels with, and ultimately ironic reversals of, Puccini's opera, Madame Butterfly, Hwang explores the stereotypes that underlie, distort and threaten relations between Eastern and Western culture, and between men and women.

The stunningly theatrical play becomes a powerful metaphor for the exploration of deep themes; the perception of Eastern culture by the West, and the persistent romanticism which clouds and inhibits that perception.

M. Butterfly was first produced in 1988 and won numerous awards, including the Tony Award for Best Play of the Year, the New York Drama Desk Award, the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Broadway play, and the John Gassner Award for the season's outstanding new playwright. Hwang's play enjoyed a popular run on Broadway and when it moved to London's Shaftsbury Theatre in 1989 it broke all box office records in the first week.

M. Butterfly is loosely based on the bizarre but true story of French diplomat Bernard Boursicot who carried on a twenty-year affair with Chinese opera diva Shi Pei-Pu, not realizing that his partner was in fact a man masquerading as a woman. The diplomat apparently became aware of the deception only in 1986, when the French government charged him with treason. It transpired that his companion had been an agent for the Chinese government, and had passed on sensitive political information that he had acquired from the diplomat, an act that brought on his downfall and imprisonment. This almost unbelievable story stimulated Hwang's imagination, and from it he created a drama that plays with ideas on a grand scale and manages at the same time to be witty and entertaining.

The multi-award-winning play is a brilliant theatrical tour de force, which, in its Broadway production, became an immediate critical and popular success.

M. Butterfly is directed by Barry Park, who directed the recent highly successful GRADS productions of All My Sons and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. In the GRADS production, Gallimard is played by Eliot McCann; (Salieri in last years’ Old Mill production of Amadeus.) Song Liling is played by Charles McComb (Simon Zealot in the recent Upstart Theatre Company’s The Last Days of Judas Iscariot.) Comrade Chin / Suzuki / Shu Fang are played by Belinda Wong (Margaret /Maggie / Mei Lin in The Shoemaker’s Daughter, Blak Yak, 2011.) Helga is played by Tiana Morgan (Ann Deever in GRADS’ 2011 All My Sons.) Marc / Counsul Sharpless / Man 2 are played by Neil Cartmell (Bayliss in GRADS’ 2011 All My Sons.) M. Toulon / Judge / Man 1 are played by Peter Nettleton (President Freeman in Cry Havoc, The Blue Room, 2009.) Renee / Woman at Party / Girl in Magazine are played by Tamiah Bantum (Alice in Wonderland, Phoenix Theatre Inc., 2011.) The Kurogo / dancers are Neel Goodwin, Molly Kerr and Yugo Hoshi.

Book at www.grads.org.au