Women Take Their Place on Stage

First-rate actresses began to appear on Chinese Opera stages around the turn of the century. In the still largely bachelor society of San Francisco Chinatown, they were a great popular success. Breaking the ban imposed by the old society, they brought a new quality to romantic female roles.

Actresses were the first free and independent Chinese professional women to enter the United States after the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act.

An increasing number of operas with women warriors as heroines celebrated and encouraged the emancipation of women in the male-dominated Chinatown communities. The increasing number of women patronizing the theatres ended segregated seating of women there.