Study Guides
Mainstage Study Guides
View and download our study guides from past Mainstage productions.
Spring Awakening
2023
The revolutionary Tony Award winning best musical that took the world by storm. In 1891 Germany, repressed, adolescent students stumble into adulthood as clumsily as they do into each other’s arms. With obstinate parents unwilling to guide them, young Melchior and Wendla explore their desires for each other, while Melchior’s dear friend Moritz fumbles dangerously through his own coming-of-age. This generation-defining musical is a rock anthem to all the “guilty ones,” poignantly exploring the dark, passionate, and twisting journey from adolescence to adulthood.
Assassins
2022
A darkly comic Tony-award winner that examines the motives of the nine notorious Americans who took their shot at the President of the United States. This wickedly subversive spectacle explores the national fixation on celebrity and its violent intersection with the American dream. Directed by Snehal Desai with music direction by Marc Macalintal, this production was originally set to premier March of 2020. The original production performed its invited final dress rehearsal before having to be postponed due to the pandemic. Assassins made its return two years later, premiering March 17, 2022 and safely closing April 2.
The Sitayana
2021
The Sitayana is an artful transposition of the Hindu epic The Ramayana told from Sita’s point of view. Part epic tale, part coming of age story, The Sitayana is the ultimate breakup play. Audiences attending the livestreamed viewings were given the choice of one of three unique incarnations of Sita from whom they will hear her story (Amar Chitra Sita, Sita’s Mehndi Party, and Sita’s Slumber Party) which questions traditional gender roles, subverts idealized views of femininity, and ultimately centers Sita as a hero within her own epic journey.
East West Players in partnership with San Francisco’s EnActe Arts and New York City’s Hypokrit Productions presented The Sitayana as livestream and on-demand viewings from September 25 – October 17, 2021.
Allegiance
2018
Inspired by true events, the Broadway musical Allegiance is the story of the Kimura family, whose lives are upended when they and 120,000 other Japanese Americans are forced to leave their homes following the events of Pearl Harbor. An uplifting testament to the power of the human spirit, Allegiance follows the Kimuras as they fight between duty and defiance, custom and change, family bonds and forbidden loves. George Takei reprised the role he originated on Broadway for East West Players’ production. A co-production with the Japanese American Cultural & Community Center, this production directed by Rumi Oyama, music directed by Marc Macalintal, and choreographed by Rumi Oyama ran from February 21 to April 1, 2018.
Theatre for Youth Study Guides
View and download our study guides from past Theatre for Youth productions.
Sama Sama Solidarity in the Fields
2023
Sama Sama: Solidarity in the Fields is a story that infuses narration, poetry, music, movement & Eskrima told through the lens of Tonantzin, Araw and Uriel, three high school students who are finding themselves and their cultural identity by learning about the “Manongs” and “Bracero Program.”
When Yuri Met Malcolm
2022
This play, written by Rosie Narasaki and directed by John Miyasaki, takes a look into the radical relationship between civil rights activists Yuri Kochiyama (1921-2014) and Malcolm X (1925-1965). Kochiyama, who was interned during World War II, befriended Malcolm after moving to Harlem and witnessed his assassination. The two shared a birthday, May 19 (also Ho Chi Minh’s birthday).
The Fantastic Kim Sisters
2020/2021
Inspired by a true story, “The Fantastic Kim Sisters” explores the meteoric rise to fame of three talented Korean singers who are thought of as the original influencers of K-pop music. Leaving their home in South Korea in 1959 as teenagers to live in the US, the sisters quickly became loved for singing their renditions of American songs on the stages of casinos and, eventually, performing on the Ed Sullivan Show during the 1960s. This is not a typical American dream story but about Korea-US relations, enculturation, and the slippery nature of identity and gender.
Scrimmage
2019
Benny and Han are Asian-American brothers in high school. Benny wants to pursue his dream of being a professional football player, while Han has a passion for the medical field. The two worlds collide as the brothers come face to face with bullying, stereotypes, and personal responsibility.
Tam Tran Goes to Washington
2018
A "Right to Dream" TYA touring show about undocumented students, activism, and the Dream Act. Tam Tran, a graduating student at UCLA, is a filmmaker, Radiohead fan, and she's shy. She and her vivacious best friend, Cinthya, have become student activists, thanks to their undocumented status and constant threat of deportation. When Tam is asked to testify on behalf of the DREAM Act before Congress in Washington DC, she's petrified because she is usually behind the camera, not in front of it. And she's worried the national exposure might endanger her family. But with the help of her friends, her teachers, and her mother- she gathers the courage to speak her truth to the Senate about the right to dream. Inspired by a true story of courage. Two Actors play multiple roles, expandable to four.
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