The Far Country

BY LLOYD SUH
DIRECTED BY JENNIFER CHANG
WEST COAST PREMIERE
PEET’S THEATRE

MAR 8–APR 14, 2024

The script crackles…Gorgeous.

San Francisco Chronicle

A beautiful tale that resonates with history…put The Far Country on your must-see list

BroadwayWorld

Dazzling…A glorious historical epic!

SFist

Following a critically acclaimed debut in New York, Pulitzer Prize finalist Lloyd Suh brings The Far Country back to its roots in a triumphant West Coast premiere. In the wake of the Chinese Exclusion Act, Moon Gyet has arrived at San Francisco Bay’s Angel Island Immigration Station with an invented biography and a new name, both given to him by a man who made the same arduous crossing several years earlier. But passage to San Francisco — and the dream of a better life for future generations — commands a very high price. Spanning two countries and three generations, Lloyd Suh’s breathtaking account of immigration, identity, and memory has been called “Artful…an act, loving and sorrowful, of reclamation” by The New York Times.

Production information

Runtime: Two hours and 10 minutes including intermission

Stage effects advisory: Haze/fog effects, occasional loud noise, and the aroma of chicken soup

Content advisory: None

Author’s note

I’m grateful to honor an extraordinary book that served as a critical and primary source for my research process on this play: Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, 1910–1940, Lai, Him Mark, Genny Lim, and Judy Yung, eds. © 2014, Reg. No. TX 8-066-082 (University of Washington Press listing).

The book is not just a wide-ranging account of the Exclusion Era and the history of Angel Island Immigration Station, it is also a compilation of the extraordinary poetry found on the walls in the detention center, and an important, remarkable document of a pivotal and under-examined period in Asian American history.

I’m deeply grateful to Genny Lim, not only for her generous permission to include excerpts from her English translations of the Chinese poems written on Angel Island in the text of the play, but even more for the extraordinary and comprehensive work she has done over many years to unearth, illuminate, and share the history and stories of those incarcerated at Angel Island. I’m also deeply sorry for not including this acknowledgement during the first two productions of the play — because without Genny’s work, along with her colleagues Him Mark Lai and Judy Yung, this history would still be completely hidden from the world. Their passion and commitment to sharing the voices and experiences of the poets of Angel Island were not only of critical importance to the play, they are of critical importance to the history of Asian America. I hope you will take a deeper dive into this history through this groundbreaking book, and I can’t thank Genny and her colleagues enough for all they’ve done to give voice to the poets and people of Angel Island.

Lloyd Suh

Cast
(in alphabetical order)

Moon Gyet | Tommy Bo*

Gee/Three | Feodor Chin*

Dean/Inspector | John Keabler*

Yip/One | Whit K. Lee*

Low/Two | Tess Lina*

Yuen/Four | Sharon Shao*

Harriwell/Interpreter | Aaron Wilton*

Understudies
(in alphabetical order)

Moon Gyet/Yip/One | Andrew Ge

Gee/Three/Yip/One | Alex Hsu*