Iron Road

About the show

In 1880s Guangdong, Lai Gwan’s dying mother sends her to Canada to find her father. Disguised as a man, Lai Gwan travels to Canada and meets her father Manli without recognizing him. She is assigned dangerous railway work, and engineer James Nichol discovers her identity and protects her. After a worker dies, Lai Gwan leads a peaceful protest; Manli orders her hanged, but Nichol intervenes and reveals Manli as her father. In act two, Manli learns of his wife’s death and takes dynamite into a mountain. Lai Gwan and Nichol follow and are trapped by an explosion; Nichol dies after they profess love, while Manli survives. Years later, as the railway is completed, Manli and Lai Gwan perform funeral rites for the dead and are blessed to live together in peace.