Ying, a Chinese-Canadian data scientist, returns home to Beijing after a disturbing episode that showcased the destructive power of Oracle Jane – the machine learning tool she created. Although with noble intentions, Oracle Jane unearths secrets and unleashes calamity on Ying’s family.
Produced at Alumnae Theatre, Toronto ON, March 2018
Keywords: Artificial intelligence, China, machine learning
Genre: Drama
Suitable for students 14+
Acts: 1
Run time: 35 minutes
Cast size: 3 actors
Male roles: 1
Female roles: 2
Casting notes:
(YOUNG) YING: A Chinese-Canadian woman in her 30s.
MAMA/OLD YING: A Chinese woman in her late 50s/early 60s.
SECURITY OFFICER: preferably a man, age unspecific. It is possible to use a pre-recorded voice to represent this character.
ORACLE JANE: a machine learning software. It may be a pre-recorded female voice - a young woman’s voice but with a robotic quality.
A MAN’s MENACING VOICE: a pre-recorded male voice.
MAMA/OLD YING: A Chinese woman in her late 50s/early 60s.
SECURITY OFFICER: preferably a man, age unspecific. It is possible to use a pre-recorded voice to represent this character.
ORACLE JANE: a machine learning software. It may be a pre-recorded female voice - a young woman’s voice but with a robotic quality.
A MAN’s MENACING VOICE: a pre-recorded male voice.
"While I stressed parts of the play dealing with the ethics and politics of AI applications, this play very much is also a play about home or the impossibility thereof, when the main character is confronted with a number of violent options... What all these homes have in common is the neoliberal global capitalist framework that produces so much destruction, violence and exploitation on this planet – all manmade... Oracle Jane is at the same time extremely concise/surprising in its dramaturgy and subject matter while offering maximum opportunity for a conceptual and political performance/theatre artist like myself. "
- Professor Antje Budde, Center for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies, University of Toronto.
- Professor Antje Budde, Center for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies, University of Toronto.