TheatreFIRST :
Beneath the Tall Tree by Adrienne Walters and Jeffrey Lo with dramaturge Oona Hatton
A world premiere T1 Commission directed by Joy Carlin

February 27, 2017 to March 25, 2017

Caught in the anti-Japanese prejudice of WWII and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s executive order 9066, Frederick Tetsuo Fujikawa, a teenage Japanese American boy, was forced from his Palo Alto home to an internment camp away from the rest of the country. Before the government imposed relocation, Fred decided to bury the family samurai sword in the backyard. By the time the war was over, he would come back to find their home demolished and life changed forever. To this day the sword has not been found. The Palo Alto Samurai is the story of what happens when Fred’s archaeologist granddaughter decides to dig up her grandfather’s history and look for a connection to her culture that she fears she’s lost.