Kang's genius lies in genuinely asking the audience to listen: major plot points pass in only a word or two, encouraging a close attention to even the smallest details. A bitingly incisive script about how we justify circumstances that fate pushed us into – turning them retroactively into personal decisions, in order to live with a difficult past. How our understanding of the present shapes our judgement of history, and who benefits when a rich culture deems a poor culture worth preserving.

This play is exact and insightful while still living next to the real world. With bright, fantastic imagery and dreamscapes, we're still unable to escape empathizing with every single character in this play. Xiaoyan lets you settle into an opinion for only a second before changing your perspective. It's brilliant.

This play is full of beautifully rendered characters with urgent needs, wants, and friction with one another and forces larger than themselves/each other. I appreciated the intimate/epic scope of it; such huge themes related to the inheritance and ownership of culture, gender roles in society, and generational conflict and legacy are explored through characters painted with gentle and hyper-specific brushstrokes. This is true in form, as well--realism mingles with big, exciting theatricality.