M. Butterfly: With an Afterword by the Playwright

Preview:

Based on a true story that stunned the world, M. Butterfly opens in the cramped prison cell where diplomat Rene Gallimard is being held captive by the French governmentand by his own illusions. In the darkness of his cell he recalls a time when desire seemed to give him wings. A time when Song Liling, the beautiful Chinese diva, touched him with a love as vivid, as seductiveand as elusiveas a butterfly. How could he have known, then, that his ideal woman was, in fact, a spy for the Chinese governmentand a man disguised as a woman? In a series of flashbacks, the diplomat relives the twentyyear affair from the temptation to the seduction, from its consummation to the scandal that ultimately consumed them both. But in the end, there remains only one truth Whether or not Gallimards passion was a flight of fancy, it sparked the most vigorous emotions of his life. Only in real life could love become so unreal. And only in such a dramatic tour de force do we learn how a fantasy can become a mans mistressas well as his jailer. M. Butterfly is one of the most compelling, explosive, and slyly humorous dramas ever to light the Broadway stage, a work of unrivaled brilliance, illuminating the conflict between men and women, the differences between East and West, racial stereotypesand the shadows we cast around our most cherished illusions.

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