In the wake of America’s entry into World War II, more than 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry were forced to leave their homes, possessions, and communities and report to relocation centers and internment camps. This federal action, authorized by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on February 19, 1942 through Executive Order 9066, led to the suspension of many civil rights of Japanese Americans. Every February 19, the internment of Japanese Americans is remembered both for the hardship it caused and the lessons that can be learned with the hope that history will not repeat itself.

One lasting legacy of the internment experience was the so-called "loyalty questionnaire," which was designed to test the loyalty of the incarcerated Japanese Americans. Two questions, #27 (willingness to serve in the U.S. Armed Forces) and #28 (willingness to swear unqualified allegiance to the United States and forswear allegiance to any other nation or government), were both disturbing and confusing to the internees.

Using these questions as a focal point to reveal the unfair treatment of the internees, Chay Yew’s Question 27, Question 28 vividly brings to life not only the experiences of the imprisoned Japanese Americans, but also of their non-Japanese, Caucasian contemporaries and how some of them reacted to this violation of their rights. Told exclusively through the perspectives of women, this play is based on verbatim excerpts from oral histories and interviews

Chay Yew's plays include Porcelain, A Language of Their Own, Red, Wonderland, As If He Hears, A Beautiful Country, Malaya, and Question 27, Question 28. He also adapted Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba; his performance text includes Home: Places Between Asia and America. His work has been produced by the New York Shakespeare Festival's Public Theater, Royal Court Theatre (London), Long Wharf Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, La Jolla Playhouse, Intiman Theatre, Portland Center Stage, East West Players, Dallas Theater Center, Cornerstone Theatre Company, The Group Theatre, and TheatreWorks (Singapore), to name a few. He is the recipient of the London Fringe Award, George and Elisabeth Marton Playwriting Award, GLAAD Media Award, APGF Community Visibility Award, Drama-Logue Award, and the Robert Chesley Award, among many other honors and grants. Mr. Yew has produced the Mark Taper Forum's Taper, Too season from 2000 to the present. A member of New Dramatists and The Dramatists Guild, he is concurrently the Director of the Asian Theatre Workshop at the Taper and the Artistic Director of Northwest Asian American Theatre/The Black Box in Seattle.

Shannon Holt is honored to once again be a part of Question 27, Question 28, having previously performed it at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. and in Los Angeles at the Japanese American National Museum.  In Los Angeles, she has performed in many critically acclaimed productions playing lead roles Electra, Woyzeck, The Good Woman of Setzuan, She Stoops to Comedy, among others garnering acting awards and nominations from LA Weekly, Backstage West, LA Drama Critics Circle, and LA Stage Alliance Ovation Awards.  She has also performed regionally at the Mark Taper Forum, Trinity Rep, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Laguna Playhouse, and the Public Theatre in New York and in European theater festival in Edinburgh and Antwerp, as well as the prestigious Humana Festival for New Plays in Louisville, Kentucky.  Upcoming film roles include: The Mark Pease Experience; Elsewhere; and Otis E.  Other TV and film roles include: Love, Lisa; Bob Roberts; and guest star roles on ER; Seinfeld, That 70s Show, The Unit among others.

Dian Kobayashi was born on the Big Island of Hawaii. Her family later moved to the San Joaquin Delta in Stockton. She now makes her home in Los Angeles.  Her most recent appearances were in the productions of Yohen at the Pan Asian Rep in New York City and Winchester House at the Theatre @ Boston Court in Pasadena.  She has performed for theatres across the country, including the International City Theatre (Long Beach), A.C.T. (San Francisco), Sacramento Theatre Company, Sundance Children’s Theatre (Utah), Barrington Stage Company (Massachusetts), Long Wharf Theatre (Connecticut), Public Theater (New York), Seattle Rep, South Coast Rep (Costa Mesa), Berkeley Rep, Doolittle Theatre (Los Angeles), Huntington Theatre Company (Boston), Syracuse Stage, Arizona Theatre Company, Mark Taper Forum (Los Angeles), and East West Players (Los Angeles).  Her T.V. and film credits include The William Coit Story, Donor Unknown, Baby M, California Dreams, The Tracey Ullman Show, Dynasty, General Hospital, Sibling Rivalry, Hot Shots! Part Deux, Drinking Tea, and Ophelia Learns to Swim.

She dedicates her performance to all of the internees, who met adversity with courage and dignity.

Emily Kuroda has been a member of East West Players since 1978 and has performed in more than 30 plays, including The Maids, Follies, and Chay Yew's Red.   Other L.A. productions include Luis Alfaro's Straight as a Line at Playwrights Arena, directed by Jon Rivera, The Winter People at the Boston Court.  She has also performed at the Kirk Douglas Theatre, South Coast Rep, New York's Public Theater, La Jolla Playhouse, Seattle Rep, Singapore Repertory Theater, Berkeley Repertory Theater, Doolittle Theater, Huntington Theater  (Boston), Los Angeles Theater Center, Zephyr Theater, LA Women's Shakespeare Company, and the Los Angeles Shakespeare Festival.  Emily Kuroda has completed her 7th year as Mrs. Kim in Warner Brothers' Gilmore Girls.  Other television credits include In Case Of Emergency, Six Feet Under, King Of Queens, and Curb Your Enthusiasm. Feature films include The Sensei, Shop Girl, Minority Report, Stranger Inside, Two Days in The Valley, Dad, Broken Words, About Love (Emmy nominated) and Worth Winning.  She is the recipient of five      Dramalogue Awards, a Garland Award for outstanding performance, Playwrights Arena's Award for Outstanding Contribution to LA Theatre, and East West Players' Rae Creevey Award.

Tamlyn Tomita made her screen debut as “Kumiko” in The Karate Kid, Part II with Ralph Macchio and Pat “Noriyuki” Morita and has since appeared in numerous feature films, television, and theatre projects.  She is perhaps best known for her roles as “Waverly” in Wayne Wang’s The Joy Luck Club and as “Kana,” a Hawaii plantation worker in the early 1900’s in Kayo Hatta’s Picture Bride and in Alan Parker’s Come See the Paradise.  Tamlyn will be appearing in the Eye opposite Jessica Alba and in Two Sisters opposite Yun –Jin Kim and directed by Margaret Cho.  Her list of film credits include such highlights as The Day After Tomorrow, Robot Stories, Four Rooms, Living Out Loud, Only the Brave and Gaijin 2 – Ama me Como Sou .  On television, Tamlyn has appeared in recurring roles on “JAG” and “24”, and other credits include: Eureka, Pandemic, Twenty Good Years, Supreme Courtships, Commander in Chief, Stargate:SG-1.  She was a cast member of the series The Burning Zone, Santa Barbara, and also appeared in PBS’s Storytime, Hiroshima Maiden, To Heal a Nation, and Hiroshima: Out of the Ashes.  Tamlyn has also appeared in several stage productions including the world premiere of  A Distant Shore, Question 27, Question 28, The Square, Summer Moon, Day Standing on its Head, Nagasaki Dust, Don Juan: A Meditation, and Winter Crane  for which she received a Drama-Logue Award.  A resident of Los Angeles, she is always ready to lend her support to community events and organizations, and she keeps her life simple, focusing on love, work and family.