Set in a beauty pageant as three young contestants vie for the title of Miss Pearl of the Orient, Miss Orient(ed) gently satirizes the struggle between conflicting cultural identities and beauty ideals. Do beauty contests ever go beneath the surface to their contestants’ hearts and minds? How do questions of ethnicity and culture fit into the mix? Carrie fights to fit in with a box of blond Clairol #5. Jennifer discovers that she isn't white on a road trip to New York, and Twinkle survives the new immigrant experience by watching Survivor. Each girl asserts her right to fill the shoes of the reigning Miss Pearl of the Orient (aka the “Beauty Icon”), and go to battle over who is more Filipino-Canadian than the other. The big question is: Who wins?

Visit www.carlosbulosan.com/missoriented for more information.

Miss Orient(ed) had a workshop production in 2001 and was further developed through the Cahoots Theatre Projects play development program in 2002.