Chess

Abstract

Tyran Parke's research addresses issues of racism, homophobia and misogyny in musical theatre revivals. As recently as ten years ago, a significant commercial production of Chess was presented with white actors performing in ‘yellow face’ for the song One Night in Bangkok. The offensive depiction of cultural stereotypes in it have rarely been challenged or reconsidered. The current research navigated issues such as budget constraints and casting to grapple with the creative problem of staging the work without offense to modern audiences. The solution was to use the very underwritten and dramatically questionable role of the Artbiter as a Brechtian role to tell the story and step into differe..