Humanities Hour With Heidi Kim, ‘The Dark Side of the Flower Drum Song’

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Flower Drum Song was a popular (though not critical) hit and started some of its Asian American stars on the road to lasting fame. However, its very contradictory story taps into a Cold War backdrop of paranoia about Communist infiltration and fraudulent immigration. This lecture will discuss the political context and difficult revision process of this musical.

Heidi Kim is a professor in the English and Comparative Literature department at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Kim earned her doctorate in English from Northwestern University.

Humanities Hours are free and open to the public. All are welcome. Free food is provided by the Institute for the Arts and Humanities., a sponsor of the event along with Carolina Public Humanities.