The Firehall Arts Centre is bringing its 2021-2022 Reunion Season to a close with the presentation of, Yellow Fever, more than 3 decades after it was first mounted.
From May 28th to June 12th, Yellow Fever follows hard-nosed private eye ‘Sam Shikaze’ as he investigates the disappearance of the mysterious ‘Cherry Blossom Queen’.
Set on Powell Street in the 1970s, the play navigates complex threads of political intrigue, racism, and police corruption with a sharp wit and fast-paced dialogue. The award-winning comic mystery by R.A. Shiomi, a cornerstone of Japanese-Canadian theatre canon, will be presented in Nihonmachi (Japantown), the neighbourhood in which it is set, for the first time in over 30 years.
This special production of Yellow Fever, presented in the style of a radio play, is directed by Donna Spencer and features performances by Hiro Kanagawa, Craig Erickson, Yukari Komatsu, Henry Mah, Jay Ono, Evan Rien, Agnes Tong and Raugi Yu, with stage management by Caryn Fehr
“In choosing to bring Yellow Fever back to the Firehall for our Reunion Season – 34 years after we first produced it – I was considering how times appear to have changed, but have they really?,” says Spencer. “In creating the work, playwright Rick Shiomi cleverly introduces us to a private detective whose beat is Vancouver’s Powell Street after the Second World War. It seems on the surface that times have changed, and a very determined Japanese-Canadian, Kenji Kadota, has been allowed to join the police force. However, when the Cherry Blossom Queen goes missing, his connection between civic duty and community are put into question. With Associate Director Raugi Yu and the wonderfully talented creative team, we are exploring a staging concept that is part radio drama and part live performance, with audiences taking a role as the studio audience, hearing and seeing the radio drama being created.”
Yellow Fever runs Saturday, May 28 to Sunday, June 12, 2022 at Firehall Arts Centre, 280 East Cordova St. Tickets from $15 are available at firehallartscentre.ca or by phone.