Ra Chapman is changing the Australian arts scene, one production at a time
We had SO MUCH FUN with this guest and we think you will too. Korean-Australian adoptee Ra Chapman is a writer, actor and dramaturg. She has strong ties with the adoption community and works closely with Asian-Australian and diverse artists.
Ra is one of those people who has been on our list of guests to invite for a long time, but we were just waiting for the right moment—and here it is! Ra’s debut play, K-BOX, which won the 2021 Patrick White Playwright Award, will premiere at the Malthouse Theatre next month (and we are so freakin’ proud of her!).
K-BOX is a surreal comedy with an Australian Korean adoptee main character named Lucy. Lucy has just quit her job, dumped her boyfriend, and turned up on her adoptive parents' doorstep needing somewhere to crash. She's depressed, she's a mess, and she's stumbled across an old cardboard box that was once full of childhood memories but is now completely empty.
Lucy and her parents haven’t always seen eye to eye on everything, but when a K-Pop star mysteriously wanders into their lives and starts asking destabilising questions about her Korean roots, new fault lines are exposed in the family unit that become impossible to hide.
In this episode Ra talks about the inspiration for K-BOX, as well as her transition from acting to writing. Then Ra shares her experience as an Asian Australian actor and writer, and her thoughts on diversity and representation in the Australian arts scene. Plus, we make our acting debut reading a short excerpt from K-BOX, we learn some industry lingo, such as “meat puppet”, and much more.
K-BOX opens at the Malthouse Theatre, in Melbourne, Australia on 2nd September 2022. Book tickets here! https://www.malthousetheatre.com.au/tickets/malthouse-theatre/k-box/
