TABLE OF CONTENTS
Rhonda Shook: On Translations and Adaptations
It is the summer of 2008. I am holed up in a tiny hotel room in Mae Sot, Thailand, mainlining Diet Coke and feverishly scribbling an adaptation of The Lion and the Mouse. My actors are 25 high school-aged refugees from Burma who wish to perform a musical in English. Their native languages are Karen, Thai, Burmese, Shan, and Kachin. Not one of them speaks English fluently, but they are convinced that they can learn. I can neither write nor read music, but I am convinced that I can create a musical. We may be collectively delusional, but we are intrepid.
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