Stuck Elevator is a comic-rap-scrap metal musical prompted by the real life experience of a Chinese restaurant delivery man trapped in a Bronx elevator for 81 hours. The musical follows his experience living in New York, where he has been working at Happy Dragon Restaurant struggling to repay a $60,000 debt to smugglers for his passage from China to the United States. His journey is from one country touted as the next global economic superpower to another founded on the ideals of democracy and freedom.
Seattle-based Byron Au Yong and New Haven native Aaron Jafferis are two exciting and resonant new voices in American theater today: Stuck Elevator returns to the Festival in a full production, after a workshop version was performed at Festival 2010 as part of the Yale Institute for Music Theatre. A complete production premiered at American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco this spring.