We (Sort Of) Hold These Truths
When the U.S. ordered more than 100,000 Japanese Americans living on the West Coast to relocate to internment camps after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1942, Gordon Hirabayashi refused to listen. The son of Japanese immigrants and a legal U.S. resident, Hirabayashi challenged the forced detention in the courts — and lost. “My citizenship didn’t protect me one bit,” Hirabayashi told The New York Times in 1985. “Our Constitution was reduced to a scrap of paper.” Hirabayashi’s life and fight for justice are the subject of the play Hold These Truths now being presented by New Century Theatre in Northampton. Featuring Broadway actor Greg Watanabe as Hirabayashi, the play by Jeanne Sakata looks at the activist’s 50-year battle for the Constitution and against prejudice.
Hold These Truths: Thursday-Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday, 7:30 p.m., with an additional 2 p.m. show on Sunday. $32. Pioneer Valley Performing Arts Charter Public School, 15 Mulligan Dr., South Hadley. (413) 587-3933. infor@newcenturytheatre.org, newcenturytheatre.org.
— Kristin Palpini
