Yellowface persists on Broadway despite industry claims of diversity, data shows.
In the 2026-27 season, only one production in Boston could be called Asian-themed and none were at leading theaters. Of 22 new productions slated to debut on Broadway this season, none appear to focus on the lives of Asian-Americans. Theater leaders style themselves as champions of diversity while presenting a vacuum of Asian-American narratives, according to The Boston Globe.
Donatella Galella coined the phrase “feeling yellow” to describe the anger and racial alienation Asian Americans feel when encountering yellowface, according to UCR News. The practice began as early as the 16th century in European plays depicting “Oriental” or “barbarians,”. The first notable theatre depiction involving yellowface was the 1898 play Madame Butterfly. In 2012, scholar Donatella Galella felt discomfort seeing white characters impersonate Chinese characters in a Broadway revival of “Anything Goes,” according to UCR News. Galella coined the phrase “feeling yellow” to describe anger and racial alienation Asian Americans feel when encountering yellowface, according to UCR News. Yellowface relies on ethnocentric perceptions rather than realistic depictions of East Asian customs and behaviors. Unlike blackface, yellowface is considerably normalized even into the 21st century. Recent controversies regarding yellowface include the 2017 film Ghost in the Shell and the 2015 film Aloha. In the 2026-27 season, only one production in Boston could be called Asian-themed and none were at leading theaters, according to The Boston Globe. Of 22 new productions slated to debut on Broadway this season, none appear to focus on the lives of Asian-Americans, according to The Boston Globe. In Boston, Asian-Americans constitute more than 10 percent of the city’s population, and in Massachusetts overall, 8.5 percent, according to the US Census Bureau. Nationally, the Census found that the number of Asian-Americans has reached 7 percent of the population, according to The Boston Globe.
Sources
- Yellowface
- Asian caricatures persist in musicals, scholar argues
- A sorry performance by the theater when it comes to telling the stories of Asian-Americans – The Boston Globe
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