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Guide to the Elizabeth Wong Papers
CEMA 16
CEMA 16
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Table of contents
Title: Elizabeth Wong Papers
Identifier/Call Number: CEMA 16
Contributing Institution:
UC Santa Barbara Library, Department of Special Collections
Language of Material:
English
Physical Description:
20.5 linear feet
45 document boxes, 2 oversize boxes, 1 diskette box
Date (inclusive):
Abstract: Elizabeth Wong is an award winning Chinese American playwright and a television screenwriter specializing in Asian American
issues. The Elizabeth Wong Papers consists of personal and professional materials generated by Wong during the period 1980-2003.
The collection consists of seven series contained in 48 archival boxes occupying approximately 21 linear feet of space. The
bulk of the collection contains Wong’s literary works in journalism, television and particularly theatre and related correspondence,
publicity and professional files
creator:
Wong, Elizabeth, 1958-
Conditions Governing Access note
Service copies of audiovisual items may need to be made before viewing or listening. Please consult Special Collections staff
for further information.
Copyright has not been assigned to the Department of Special Collections, UCSB. All requests for permission to publish or
quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections. Permission for publication is given
on behalf of the Department of Special Collections as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply
permission of the copyright holder, which also must be obtained.
Immediate Source of Acquisition note
Donated by Elizabeth Wong, July 14, 1998
[Identification of Item], Elizabeth Wong Papers, CEMA 16. Department of Special Collections, UC Santa Barbara Library, University
of California, Santa Barbara.
The Elizabeth Wong Papers consists of personal and professional materials generated by Wong during the period 1980-2003. The
collection consists of seven series contained in 48 archival boxes occupying approximately 21 linear feet of space. The bulk
of the collection contains Wong’s literary works in journalism, television and particularly theatre and related correspondence,
publicity and professional files. Also included are several folders of correspondence from fellow writers, friends, students,
and the public.
The second largest component of the collection,
Series VI: Subject Files, includes material about specific individuals and subjects as well as a large collection of scripts by notable writers in
the fields of television and theatre. Also contained in this collection are 42 diskettes on which Wong saved drafts of scripts
and correspondence; due to the significant differences between versions, the scripts have been printed and made available
here. However, due to the considerable number of correspondence, it will be printed out as needed at the request of the researcher.
Altogether, the Elizabeth Wong Papers provides critical insight into Wong’s creative, personal and professional life as a
prominent contemporary Asian American playwright.
Elizabeth Wong is an award winning Chinese American playwright and a television screenwriter specializing in Asian American
issues. Wong's plays include the Playwright's Forum Award winning play,
Letters to a Student Revolutionary (1991), which premiered off-Broadway and has been produced both abroad and in numerous U.S. cities. Wong also was a staff
writer for the ABC sitcom
All- American Girl, the first network series to feature an Asian- American woman as its central character. Her plays have been published by
Dramatic Publishing Company, and are included in anthologies such as
Contemporary Plays by Women of Color, Women on the Verge: Seven Avant-garde Playwrights, and
Unbroken Thread: Six Asian American Playwrights.
Letters is about two women -- one Chinese, one Chinese American --whose lives converge around the Tiananmen Square massacre. It was
produced by Pan Asian Repertory in New York and by theaters in Los Angeles and Seattle.
Letters to a Student Revolutionary has toured both nationally and internationally, and was the only U.S. invitee to the 1992 Singapore Arts Festival.
Among Wong's latest plays are
The Happy Prince (1997) and
The Play Formerly Known as The Happy Prince (1996), which are both adaptations of an Oscar Wilde short story, commissioned by the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Among her other works are the
Explorator-yum (1997),
China Doll (1995),
The Concubine Spy (1992), and
Kimchee and Chitlins (1990). Kimchee and Chitlins is a play concerning relations between Korean Americans and African Americans. It was premiered
at the Victory Gardens Theater in Chicago. Wong described her work best when she stated, "my work is about response." Every
play Wong has written was in itself a response to issues she felt were ignored or needed attention. Through her plays she
was able to bring to light issues ranging from the tragic events in China and the way women seek political meaning in today's
society to the Black boycott of Korean stores in Brooklyn. Raised in Los Angeles’ Chinatown, Wong's childhood was harsh. She
always dreamed of the world outside the ghetto and as a result, undertook as her role model Anna May Wong, America's first
Chinese American actress. Hoping to learn from Anna May's journey as an artist, she began researching her extensively. She
soon became intrigued in the Broadway success of a graduate from her high school, David Henry Hwang, and as a result, moved
to New Haven. She started attending Katz's dramaturgical course and was encouraged to write by many Yale School of Drama graduate
students. Determined to pursue her interests, she moved to New York and was accepted to NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, where
her career as a playwright began.
Wong is a graduate of the University of Southern California and New York University. During the 1980's she worked as a field
producer at
KNXT-TV Channel Two News, and as a reporter for both
The San Diego Tribune and
The Hartford Courant. In the early 1990's, she worked as a writer for Walt Disney Studios, a dramaturg at the Actors Theater of Louisville, a
playwriting teacher at David Hwang Playwriting Institute and as an op/editorial columnist for the
Los Angeles Times, commenting on social issues and cultural experiences. Most recently, Wong has been an assistant professor at Bowdoin College
and teaches playwriting at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Santa Barbara. She also
serves as a member of the Circle Repertory Theater Playwright's Project, the Women's Project Lab, the Dramatist's Guild and
is an advisory board member of Theatre Emory, Atlanta. She resides in Los Angeles.
Series I: Biographical, 1991-2001, contains articles and profiles from various periodicals, such as
USC Alumni,
Chicago Sun Times,
Asian Pacific Alliance for Creative Equality,
Pararasis Magazine and the
Los Angeles Theater Magazine. Also included are resumes and curriculum vitaes, personal calendars and a televised interview on Dateline. The material
in this series is arranged chronologically, then alphabetically by title.
Series II: Awards, Fellowships and Residencies, 1990-2003, have been grouped together on the basis that these are experiences
that are exclusive to Elizabeth Wong (as opposed to
Series IV: Festivals, Retreats and Workshops, events that are particularly focused on multiple writers). Included here are two awards (Jane Chambers Award including drafts
and recordings of Wong’s acceptance speech and Kennedy Center’s American College Theater Festival Award), three fellowships
(Bush Foundation, Catawba College and Walt Disney Studios) and two residencies (Bowdoin College and University of Southern
Maine). At Catawba College, Wong’s play
China Doll was rehearsed and re-worked; both rehearsal and final drafts from this residency are located here (see also Series V for
more material relating to
China Doll). While at Walt Disney Studios, Wong worked on scripts for
Roseanne,
Colors United, and
Seinfeld, drafts of which are also located here (see also
Series V for more of Wong’s television scripts). This series is arranged alphabetically by title then chronologically within the same
years.
Series III: Correspondence, 1990-2004, contains personal and business correspondence to and from Elizabeth Wong. Included
is correspondence with various theater companies, as well as correspondence with various potential agents. In some cases correspondence
grouped based on an event or organization (Women Who Write Plays, Center Theater Group) however a majority of the material
here was grouped according to year. It is important to note here that Elizabeth Wong maintained correspondence in both analog
and digital form. This series contains a large amount of correspondence still in the original digital format (3 ½” diskettes)
with no corresponding analog version. This material will be made available to researchers upon request. This series is arranged
chronologically then alphabetically within the same years.
Series IV: Festivals, Retreats and Workshops, 1992-2003, have been grouped together on the basis that these are events exclusive
to playwrights (as opposed to
Series II: Awards, Fellowships and Residencies, events exclusive to Elizabeth Wong). Included here are materials relating to two major festivals: Humana Festival of New
American Plays and Kennedy Center’s American College Theater Festival (for material relating to the KCACTF Cohen Award, see
Series II) as well as documents from retreats and workshops. This series is arranged alphabetically by title, then chronologically
within titles.
Series V: Writings, 1980-2004, is the largest series in this collection. The series has been grouped into four sub series
as follows:
Journalism/Periodicals contains articles written for the
Los Angeles Times,
Headline Muse (a quarterly online magazine or “e-zine”) and
Courant Paper (the first newspaper for which Wong wrote);
Television contains materials (including reviews, story ideas, writer’s notes and drafts of scripts) relating to
All American Girl (the first television sitcom to focus on an Asian-American family, it was produced by Walt Disney Studios and starred Margaret
Cho and Amy Hill),
Cybill and
Divas Las Vegas (a collaborative project between Wong and Rodney Vance which never aired);
Theater is comprised of materials (including correspondence, drafts of scripts, publicity, research, reviews and writer’s notes)
relating to 21 different theatre productions including to 16 published works (such as
China Doll,
Letters to a Student Revolutionary,
Kimchee and Chitlins,
Dating and Mating in Modern Times,
Amazing Adventures of the Marvelous Monkey King);
Miscellany contains two handbooks, a small selection of poetry and a speaking engagement at Pepperdine University in 1999. These sub
series are arranged alphabetically; materials within sub series are arranged alphabetically and then chronologically by title.
Series VI: Subject Files, Bulk dates 1991-2004, is grouped into four sub series and is comprised of Wong’s collected research
files including
actor biographies and headshots,
periodicals and
scripts (for more scripts see
Series VII: Teaching). Those materials that do not fall into one of these three categories have been grouped together at the end of the series
and titled
miscellany. Each sub series is arranged is arranged alphabetically; scripts are listed in bibliographic form and are therefore alphabetized
by author’s last name.
Series VII: Teaching, 1988-2002, contains class handouts, teaching notes, and other teaching materials from classes Wong has
taught at Bowdoin College, the University of California at Santa Barbara and the University of Southern California. Also included
here are a number of television sitcom scripts that Wong had obtained specifically for the purpose of teaching (as opposed
to those scripts in
Series VI: Subject Files which Wong collected for her own research). These materials are arranged chronologically then alphabetically within the year.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
African American theater
African Americans -- playwrights
American drama -- Chinese American authors.