Sneak-a-peek: Behind the Scenes of the making of Truer History!
Help us bring the Truer History of the Chan Family free-to-the public!
In September 2023, we finished principal photography on The Truer History of the Chan Family, a film to be streamed online free-to-the community -- and experienced in singalong watch parties with our community partners!
Truer History brings together the past and present of four generations of my San Francisco Chinese American family through stories about my grandfather and me as we try to reach for respectable society’s highest echelons and try to break free from their family’s history as Gold Rush sex traffickers – complete with song, dance, and lotsa variety acts.
In 2019, ECTP presented the first public reading of Truer History (formerly called Chan Family Picnic) with songs by composer Byron Au Yong (Stuck Elevator, A.C.T.) and Eugenie at the Chinese Historical Society of America Museum, San Francisco.
What do viewers want to experience these days?
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Stop Hate Against Asian American Pacific Islander Communities
Taken of a citizen artist display on the Great Highway, Ocean Beach, San Francisco, May 19, 2021. Unidentified artist. #stopasianhate
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ECTP stands strong against hate and violence of any kind towards our AAPI communities. Speak out. Tell your story. You are not alone. Click on Stop AAPI Hate's website to learn what to do if you experience or witness hate, how you can empower yourself and your community, and support individuals and organizations working for racial equity and justice. Work in solidarity. Tell Our Stories. |
Black Lives Matter. ECTP stands in solidarity.
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Asian Americans owe so much to black activists who led the struggle for Civil Rights and inspired us to rise up and stand for our equal rights as Americans. Before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Asians were barred by covenant laws from buying homes in neighborhoods of their choice. Here's my family's story of their search for a home in the 1960s. They had been looking for ten years.
Don't worry. The story has a happy ending. Support Black Lives. Click on blacklivesmatter.com |
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News
March 2-5, 2023: Sojourner ZY by Eugenie Chan, at the Presidio Theatre, San Francisco
September 2022: ECTP receives a Gerbode Foundation Special Awards in the Arts, Theater!
April 29, 2022: ECTP Covid Impact Response Survey
April 1-23, 2022: Songs About Trains by Beto O'Rourke (lead), Eugenie Chan, Reginald Edmund, Rebecca Martinez, and Jay B Muskett at Radical Evolution/The Working Theater, NYC
January 6, 2022: Insurrection by Eugenie Chan, Giovanni Rodriguez, Tanya Shaffer, and Michael Gene Sullivan at Remote Theater
Thank you for telling us why community performances matter --
We received powerful feedback on Madame Ho, performed at Cameron House in October 2017.
“I'm grateful for the opportunity to attend Madame Ho. It evoked emotions that I needed to surface, and in the familiar surroundings of Cameron House, my second home in Chinatown in the 1940s, during the Q & A my tongue was freed to say '#metoo.' Thank you all for making history come alive and reinforcing my feelings to continue giving back, to help make positive differences as a resident of the community.”
-- Dorothy G.C. Quock, 86-year old Chinatown native and activist
“I'm grateful for the opportunity to attend Madame Ho. It evoked emotions that I needed to surface, and in the familiar surroundings of Cameron House, my second home in Chinatown in the 1940s, during the Q & A my tongue was freed to say '#metoo.' Thank you all for making history come alive and reinforcing my feelings to continue giving back, to help make positive differences as a resident of the community.”
-- Dorothy G.C. Quock, 86-year old Chinatown native and activist
Courtesy Bancroft Library
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"Chinese sex slaves' origin in Gold Rush"San Francisco Chronicle columnist Gary Kamiya's 2018 article "Chinese sex slaves' origin in Gold Rush" in Portals of the Past, is personally relevant to my family as it mentions the now defunct Hip Yee Tong, the first organization to infamously traffic sex slaves in San Francisco in 1852 -- and the subject of The Truer History of the Chan Family, my Gum Saan Trilogy's second play. |
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The Chinese Historical Society of America toured their in-depth exhibit on the historical impact of racial restrictions in housing on Chinese and other people of color in the Sunset. I contributed an oral history about my parents struggle to live there. My parents tried to buy their first home in the Sunset in the early 1960s, but covenant laws prevented that from happening. Doors were slammed in their faces. "We don't sell to your kind," they were told. The Sunset is also the setting for Kitchen Table, the third play of the Gum Saan Trilogy. Thanks to the activism of our forbears, San Francisco has changed. You can read about the exhibit in Chronicle writer Carl Nolte's 2018 Native Son column, "Lee the face of a new, enlightened SF". |
"Chinese in the Sunset"an exhibit by the Chinese Historical Society of America
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Ho (Bonnie Akimoto) and Bo (Mimu Tsujimura) whoop it up!
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For making ECTP's run of Madame Ho at the Exit Theater and Cameron House this fall such an enormous success! With sold-out houses and moving, vibrant post-show discussions, we couldn't ask for anything more.
Inspired by the life of Eugenie’s great-grandmother, Madame Ho tells the story of a formidable Barbary Coast, San Francisco brothel madam, single mother, Chinese immigrant, and ghost. A tale of of survival and complicity. Madame Ho by Eugenie Chan Directed by Jessica Heidt Exit Theater 156 Eddy St. San Francisco, CA 94102 October 5 - 21, 2017 Starring Bonnie Akimoto, Rinabeth Apostol, Lily Tung Crystal, Lisa Hori-Garcia, Christine Jamlig, Keiko Shimosato Carreiro, Mimu Tsujimura, and erhu musician Alan Yip Songs by Byron Au Yong |
Free community performancesof Madame Hoin Chinatown at Cameron House!October 28 - 29, 2017
ECTP was honored to be able to provide free community performances at Donaldina Cameron House, a bilingual social service agency empowering San Francisco's Chinatown community to live healthy, thriving lives.
Cameron House originally began in 1847 as the Occidental Mission Home for Girls, to help exploited Chinese immigrant women sold into prostitution. In 1942, it was renamed in honor of Donaldina Cameron, a young Presbyterian woman who made it her mission, along with founder Margaret Culbertson, in the 1890's to help, educate, and house these vulnerable women. It is likely that my great-grandmother, being a madam, had to confront the zeal of Miss Cameron. History comes full circle with this production. |
Donaldina Cameron on a rescue mission in SF Chinatown.
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Madame Ho is a
San Jose Mercury News Critic's Pick of the Week,
San Francisco Chronicle Fall Theater Pick,
and 2017 Rella Lossy Award winner!
Check out what Broadway World is saying about her.
San Francisco Chronicle Fall Theater Pick,
and 2017 Rella Lossy Award winner!
Check out what Broadway World is saying about her.
"Behind Asian Eyes"...
Read what author and San Francisco Chronicle columnist Vanessa Hua has to say about race and representation in America in her article, "Behind Asian Eyes, A World of Possibility."
Tune into KPFA'S APEX EXPRESS: Miko Lee interviewed Eugenie on
Madame Ho, trafficking, and the making of San Francisco.
KPFA 94.1 FM Berkeley, California. Archived at www.kpfa
Madame Ho, trafficking, and the making of San Francisco.
KPFA 94.1 FM Berkeley, California. Archived at www.kpfa
Daisy (Lisa Hori-Garcia), Mui (Christine Jamlig) tempt fate.
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At rehearsal, Alan Yip, Madame Ho's musician and sound effects magician (no computer-generated sound for Ho!) demos his erhu. We are all spellbound. (L-R: Jessica Heidt, Leanna Keyes, Mimu Tsujimura, Bonnie Akimoto, Alan Yip, Byron Au Yong)
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The Laborer's monologue from Madame Ho is one of 97 monologues from this anthology culled from the Kilroy's List of new plays by women and trans writers. What an honor to be in such inspiring company.
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Who are these crazy vaudevillians?
Click here and find out!
Chan Family Picnic begins its vaudeville life at Berkeley Rep's 2017 Ground Floor Theater Lab.
Chan Family Picnic begins its vaudeville life at Berkeley Rep's 2017 Ground Floor Theater Lab.
My playwright peers John Bernson, Sharon Bridgforth, Amy Freed, Anne Galjour, Garret Jon Groenveld, Dipika Guha, Lauren Gunderson, Mark Jackson, Geetha Reddy, Andrew Saito, Jonathan Spector, and I tell it like it is in the Bay. "How the San Francisco Bay Area Affects the Playwrights who Live There" by SF native and fellow scribe, Peter Nachtrieb.
Eugenie and New York playwrights Julia Jarcho, Jorge Ignacio Cortiñas, and Deborah Stein talk about the challenges and rewards of writing and producing plays with Andy Bragen in a podcast from ND: In Depth.
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Word for Word and LitQuake present Selections from The Woman Warrior and China Men by Maxine Hong Kingston Directed by Eugenie Chan 7 p.m. Monday, October 10, 2016 Z Space Main Stage Admission is Free An Off the Page Reading |
The original Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston, and the wannabe warrior, Eugenie Chan, at Word for Word and LitQuake's reading, to honor Maxine as a Barbary Coast Awardee.
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With thanks to the many individuals and foundations that support us.
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We are a member of Intersection for the Arts. Intersection for the Arts is a historic arts nonprofit that provides people working in arts and culture with fiscal sponsorship and resources to grow.