Chinese Republicans

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David Mamet’s 1983 Glengarry Glen Ross exposed the cutthroat world of male salesmen in the real estate racket. Alex Lin, author of this season’s Laowang: A Chinatown King Lear, has now given us a scathing contemporary view of the distaff side: Chinese Republicans depicts four executive women trying to climb the corporate ladder in the world of Wall Street finance to achieve partner. Making their journey towards breaking the glass ceiling more difficult, all four of the members of Friedman Wallace, “NYC’s finest investment bank north of 14^th Street,” are of Asian descent and appear to be the only Asians working at the firm. Each of the women represent a different level of success and we follow them for nine months in 2019, before the Covid pandemic changed a great many things.

We meet the women of three generations at their monthly “affinity meeting” at Chinatown’s upscale Golden Unicorn Restaurant (every third Tuesday of the month) to network as the only Asians at Friedman Wallace. However, they are as much in competition as they have interests in common. Ellen, age 48, has climbed the corporate ladder to become the Managing Director of South American Trading, a job she took away from the legendary Phyllis, aged 65, who mentored her as the first Asian woman managing director in the entire city, now an executive consultant. Ellen is mentoring Katie, aged 24, the newly minted Senior Research Associate in Wealth Strategies. She is up for a promotion to regional manager of the Asia Pacific market and boning up on her Mandarin to add to her credentials for the job. However, Iris, age 31, a Chinese immigrant on an H1B visa which is soon to expire, a lead software engineer, resents that as she was born in China and is fluent in Mandarin she has not been put up for the job.

Over the next few months of lunches, we learn the sacrifices they have had to make (Ellen couldn’t take off time to have a child and lost her husband as a result), several of them have become Republicans to fit in at the office, Phyllis has subsumed her Chinese identity as much as possible and had advised Ellen to do the same going so far as to change her name from Ailin to the more American Ellen.) However, when Katie does not get the job which goes to the white male colleague whom she was tutoring in Mandarin and with whom she was dating, she snaps and becomes a Libertarian Socialist Conservative. Her future subversive behavior affects the other three Chinese women and leads to a very ironic ending for all of them.

Unlike Glengarry Glen Ross which also begins at luncheon meetings in a Chinese restaurant but then took us to the office in its second act, Chinese Republicans is mostly set at the monthly luncheons with one flashback to Ellen’s first interview with Phyllis years before and a dream sequence. Each scene reveals new pieces of information but the play seems too schematic finding no other way to reveal what we need to know. The title needs to be taken on faith as very little is made of their all being Republicans (probably to fit in at the office.) Nevertheless, the language of the play is raw, the insults cutting and the humor biting. The play covers many women’s issues found in other fields: sexual harassment, corporate culture, prejudice and racism against Asians, generation gap, social justice, and the treatment of women in the business world. Chinese Republicans is a tight exposé of how women particularly Asian American women are treated in the work place in the 21^st century.

Working with a production made up almost entirely of Asian women, director Chay Yew (a man) keeps the play moving expeditiously along as the women insult each other and reveal various secrets over time. Most memorable is Jodi Long as the sharp-tongued Phyllis who has paid her dues and won’t take anything from anyone. As the rising young Katie who learns the hard way about the corporate world, Anna Zavelson is bright, keen and ambitious, the sort of person we assume will get ahead. Jennifer Ikeda as Ellen who has made the most sacrifices to get where she has ended up holds her own in this company though she seems the weakest one of all, willing to make the most compromises. As the embittered Iris who doesn’t know why she is passed over, Jully Lee is hilarious making one rude but true remark after the other. In his one scene as the white waiter, Ben Langhorst with the best Chinese accent is hilarious giving another entirely different point of view.

The ingenious revolving set by Wilson Chin offers an almost all-red Chinese restaurant (with a black and white abstract painting behind the table), two offices at Friedman Wallace and a pantry at the Golden Unicorn. The costumes by Anita Yavich create an entire array of attractive but conservative business suits for the women. The subtle gradations of lighting by Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew add to the visual elegance. Fabian Obispo’s sound design is memorable for realistic noises heard off stage from other rooms.

Alex Lin’s Chinese Republicans, very different from her Laowang, is both a satire and a study of the corporate world as experienced by women, particularly Asian Americans. While the structure of the play is too schematic, Chay Yew’s production moves fast enough to be a comedy, as well as a trenchant drama with an unforeseen ending. Jennifer Ikeda, Jully Lee, Jodi Long and Anna Zavelson give incisive performances you won’t soon forget. This play is also another step along the way for a very talented quickly rising playwright.

Chinese Republicans (through April 5, 2026)

Roundabout Theatre Company

Laura Pels Theatre at the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre, 111 W. 46^th Street, between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, in Manhattan

For tickets, call 212-719-1300 or visit http://www.RoundaboutTheatre.org

Running time: one hour and 45 minutes without an intermission