Dual Compliance and the Model Minority Myth: Capitalist Labor and Sexuality in Chay Yew’s Wonderland and Julia Cho’s Durango

Abstract

This article examines the intersection of labor, sexuality, and the model minority myth in Asian American drama, focusing on Chay Yew’s Wonderland (1999) and Julia Cho’s Durango (2006). While the model minority myth is often understood as a racialized construct that disciplines Asian Americans into economic compliance, this study argues that it also enforces heteronormative ideals, positioning the heterosexual, reproductive family as essential to maintaining Asian American respectability. Through close readings of Wonderland and Durango, this article explores how both plays depict Asian American fathers and sons negotiating—and resisting—this dual compliance with capitalist labor and heteronormative domesticity. In Wonderland, Man’s strategic embrace of the model minority ideal leads to his ultimate alienation, while his son’s rejection of both work and heterosexuality leaves him vulnerable to economic and social marginalization. Durango extends this critique across generations, portraying a father who suppresses his sexuality and internalizes his alienation, only to pass the same burdens onto his children. By analyzing these dramatic texts, this article demonstrates how the model minority myth functions not only as an economic imperative but also as a sexual and familial construct that shapes Asian American identity across generations.