We Are About New Work
Founded in 1989, Ma-Yi Theater Company is a Drama Desk & Obie Award-winning, not-for-profit 501(c)(3) organization whose primary mission is to develop new plays by Asian American writers.
We provide a home for generative artists to take big innovative risks and as they hone individual and collective skills.
We encourage our artists to stake new creative territories by pushing Asian American Theater beyond easily identifiable markers.
We challenge popular prescriptions of what culturally specific theater should be by producing challenging, forward-thinking plays written by today's most exciting playwrights.
We aspire to be exemplars of how theater can be an active local partner to our diverse communities, while participating in larger, global conversations about our roles as artists/citizens.
We are guided by knowing WHY and for WHOM we create.
Our Name:
“Ma-Yi” is the term used by ancient Chinese traders to refer to a group of islands that is known today as the Philippines.
A document written sometime around 1318 and titled Wen Shiann Tung Kuo (A General Investigation of the Chinese Cultural Sources) contains a stray reference to the Philippines that dates back to 982 AD. The text reads: "There were traders of the country of MA-YI carrying merchandise to the coast of Canton in the seventh year of Tai-ping-shing-kuo."
Another pre-Spanish source is the Tao-i-chih-lio (Description of the Barbarians of the Isles) by Wang Ta-yuan, dated 1349 AD, with the following reference to MA-YI: "The people boil seawater to make salt and ferment (molasses) to make liquor. The natural products are kapok, yellow beeswax, tortoise shell, betel nuts, and cloth of various patterns. The Chinese goods used in trading are cauldrons, pieces of iron, red cloth or taffetas of various color stripes, ivory, 'tint' (a Chinese silver coin) or the like."
We chose this name in recognition of the vibrant culture that existed in Ma-Yi, prior to the coming of the colonizers from the West.