Advance Theatre Festival - I Have a Dream in Chinese Monday, January 26, 2026 at 7:30 PM PST

× Ruby Slippers Theatre in association with The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts and Playwrights Guild of Canada present The Advance Theatre Festival: Advancing the Radically Inclusive Stage. Five Staged Readings over Five Days

I Have A Dream In Chinese

Playwright: Irene (Fan) Yi

*READING OF PLAY ONLY*

I Have A Dream In Chinese is a one-woman theatrical journey through borders, bodies, and names. Set a board a long-haul flight from Hong Kong to Vancouver, a Chinese immigrant navigates the turbulence of micro aggressions, state surveillance, workplace erasure, and the haunting grief of a city left behind. As she oscillates between “Song” and “Ivy,” Mandarin and English, belonging and exile, her inner fracture deepens. Blending poetic monologue, surreal memory, and bureaucratic absurdity, the play explores what it means to carry two names, two histories, and the unbearable silence of trying to belong. Stark, intimate, and unflinching, it asks: how do you start over when you are still arriving?

Playwright’s Bio: Irene (Fan) Yi is a bilingual playwright, dramaturg, and performer whose work explores diaspora, identity, and the dissonance between language and belonging. With a background in Theatre Studies (MA, University of Ottawa) and Arts Administration (MA, Indiana University), she creates interdisciplinary works that blend poetic text, projection, and sound to examine how systemic violence shapes the body and memory. Irene has worked as a director, dramaturg, and performer in productions such as The Reaper and The Whale (Davis Shakespeare Festival), The Pillowman (Indiana University Bloomington), Night, Mother, Twelfth Night, and A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Location: Room 103

All tickets $15.00

SUBSCRIPTIONS
Purchase 3 different “Shadbolt Presents” shows for the same Patron and receive a special subscription price of $5.00 off per ticket. This show does not qualify for a discount but you can add it to your 3 shows for a subscription. . Available by phone only. Arts Club on Tour, Jazz @ the Bolt and shows $25 and under can be included as one of the three required for subscription however they will not receive the $5.00 discount. Not included: Arts Club on Tour and Jazz @ the Bolt

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