The Four Immigrants at Musical Cafe

The Four Immigrants Manga reading team! From L to R: Leslie Martinson (director), Lindsay Hirata (Ensemble), Carina Salazar (Ensemble), Will Dao (Frank), Sean Fenton (Fred), Benjamin Nguyen (Henry), Brian Palac (Charlie), Dana Shew (Ensemble), Lawrence-Michael Arias (Ensemble), Min Kahng (book, music, lyrics), Frederik L. Schodt (translator)

At the end of January, I had the opportunity to present a 25-minute segment of The Four Immigrants Manga: An American Musical Extravaganza at the inaugural Musical Cafe Showcase presented by The Alchemy Works and Play Cafe. I had the joy of working with Leslie Martinson as the director of the project (Leslie is also my mentor via the Titan Award, and the Associate Artistic Director & Casting Director for TheatreWorks in Silicon Valley) and with eight amazing actors who infused energy and life into the project! Fred L. Schodt, translator of Henry Kiyama's The Four Immigrants Manga, was also in attendance. After the reading, he mentioned to me that I was staying true to the spirit of Kiyama's work - which pretty much made my evening! The evening consisted of four other musical writing teams presenting portions of their work as well - all in various stages in their creative process.

I learned so much through this rehearsal process and performance. After last year's presentation at the TheatreWorks Writers Retreat, I have moved cautiously forward with a vaudeville style to match the original text's "Sunday funnies" nature. I was unsure as to whether the dated feel of the work would translate to contemporary audiences. It was great to see the showcase audience respond to specific moments in the script/score that 1) worked for humorous effect, but more importantly 2) helped bridge the gap between an old-fashioned style and a modern audience.

Working with actors is always a treat because once I've explained the traits of each character, it's fun to then see actors at play, discovering internal and relational dynamics that I had not yet considered. I came away from the showcase not only feeling like the four titular characters stood strongly as four personalities whose journeys I'm interested in, but that the rest of the ensemble shown through with a presence of their own.

Of course, there are still so many questions to consider. One thing I need to consider moving forward is the idea of Japanese-ness, American-ness, and Japanese-American-ness. Because Kiyama wrote the comic book in a very imitative, American comic-book style, I have gone in the direction of a very American-feeling vaudeville. And yet, thanks to some valuable feedback, I realize that there is a danger then of not having the characters feel "Japanese" enough. This is further made difficult because of the fact that at this time, Japan itself was split on its approach toward the West, and, in particular, America. There were many who passionately claimed that following the ways of Western democracy, individualism, and economics was the way forward for Japan. And others just as passionately fought for a return to traditional Japanese ways. It seems that Kiyama was, at least in part, of the former mentality. He came to America to study the Western styles of art (though it should be noted that he was adept at Japanese artistic styles and techniques as well), and he made the decision to capture the history of the Four Immigrants in a form that was distinctly Western - the frame-by-frame comic strip. What does that mean for my interpretation (as a non-Japanese-but-still-Asian-American) of his work? The good news is, I am still early enough in the process to really grapple with this question and even explore these issues in the script/score itself. As of right now, I don't know if the final show will have anything definitive to say about the topic, but I do see many opportunities to weave it into the work and perhaps show a variety of perspectives. All this to say, these are the types of incredibly rich questions/dialogues that have arisen from the showcase, and I'm excited for this next phase of research and writing!

Next step: complete an entire first draft.

Creativity Quotation #8

"Life is not the finishing of events. It is a continuation. Each day you do what needs to be done with the understanding that there is no end to the doing. You find pleasure in the doing or you live in a tornado." - Isaac from HIR, a play by Taylor Mac.

Thoughts on History - Japan's Victory in the Japanese-Russian War

Previously posted on Facebook

Two years ago, I couldn't have cared less what the Japanese-Russian war of 1904-1905 was and what it meant.

While reading and researching Four Immigrants Manga, however, I learned that the Japanese victory in the war meant a great deal of pride for an Asian nation that was trying to prove its might in the face of Western super-powers. And I thought, "I get that. How cool for the Japanese at that time to feel proud of that victory." A sort of "We've finally arrived; we'll finally be taken seriously" kind of moment.

But while reading Quiet Odyssey, a first-hand account of Mary Paik Lee - a first-generation Korean immigrant who came to the US in 1904, that thought has been colored differently. In her memoirs, Lee explains that her family fled Korea in order to escape the Japanese in the aftermath of the Japanese-Russian war. The Japanese victory had opened the door for Japanese occupation of the Korean Peninsula, thus leading to nearly half-a-century of devastating violence against and oppression of the Korean people. This leads to the Pacific events of World War II, which leads to the splitting of Korea along the 38th parallel, which leads to the Korean War, which leads directly to the hardships of my parents - both born just a year before the Korean War began.

Which leads eventually to their desire for a better life in the States, which somehow, oddly enough, leads to my existence.

(Incidentally, all this also leads to the recent Sony Pictures fiasco - not my parents' hardships or me being born, but the stuff before that.)

This simultaneously blows my mind and hurts it. Because we want these things to be easy narratives. We want things to be obviously good or obviously bad. Or at least mostly one or the other. But it almost feels like cause-and-effect just goes on automatic, and it doesn't come with a predetermined meaning. I read into it the meaning I can gather, and the danger is that I will fail to realize that every story doesn't just have another side, but has perhaps an infinite number of sides.

There's also a danger in forgetting that I am not an objective observer of history's chains of events. That I come to it with my well-thought reasoning, my less-well-thought speculations, and my unconsciously active prejudices.

For the record, this is not me being angry at the Japanese or trying to place blame ("After all, I have Japanese friends!" wink-wink). I think it's just another instance of awe in the face of history's complexity.

Now... if I could just make a musical out of all this...

Creativity Quotation #7

“When we become expert in something, our tastes grow more esoteric and complex.” - Malcolm Gladwell, author of Blink

The TYA Multicultural Connection to Children’s Books

I was recently invited to write a blog post for the Theatre for Young Audiences Blog. Here is the text of the blog:

The TYA Multicultural Connection to Children's Books

As a writer of musicals, I am often drawn to books or written stories for inspiration. My first show Tales of Olympus was based on Greek mythology, my second show The Song of the Nightingale used a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale as its source material, and my last show was a musical adaptation of Grace Lin’s Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. My next two projects also pull their inspiration from books. Books are the most appealing source material for me because, unlike visual media such as film, there isn’t already an idea of what the universe of the story should look like. Even though vivid illustrations might accompany certain written stories, for me they serve primarily as a starting point for what a theatrical adaptation of that work could look like.

Looking at the season line-ups of many non-profit TYA companies in America, it is clear that books and written stories are the source of most of the work that we produce. This makes sense because our audiences often want to see something that is familiar, even beloved, on our stages. And yet, oddly enough, this is part of the problem we face as theatres trying to embrace multiculturalism. Earlier this year, I heard a KQED Forum discussion on the topic of diversity in children’s books. The Cooperative Children’s Book Center reported that of the 3200 children’s books that were published in 2013, only 6% featured a character of color. Read that again: 6%. This does not reflect the diversity of America. This means that books from which TYA companies want to create new works skew towards the ethnic majority in our culture. If only 6% of children’s books feature characters of color, then that percentage will most likely be transferred to our stages.

This troubles me for two reasons. One: It limits the level of empathy that we can introduce to children. Two: It keeps children who don’t identify as belonging to the majority in the realm of the “other.”

On the first point, theatre companies of all stripes tout empathy as one of the most important experiences we offer our audiences. I would argue, though, that this is only as true as the diversity of stories we choose to tell. If the stories we tell in our theatres are “about-the-majorities-for-the-majorities,” we are missing opportunities for children to relate to cultures other than their own. The depth of empathy we encourage them to experience will be limited to the culture they already know. If, however, we give them an opportunity to relate to characters from different cultures, it can help broaden their knowledge of the human experience. This not only teaches them the richness of cultures that exist outside their own, but that the people within those cultures experience hopes, obstacles and emotions just like any other human being.

On the second point, if our stories remain in the realms of the majorities, those who do not self-identify as part of those majorities are unintentionally sent the message that they are an outlier, an “other.” They merely get to observe the stories of the “main culture” on our stages, but are not encouraged to think of themselves as the leads in our stories. Personal example: As an Asian American, I have grappled with feeling like a career in musical theatre was not an option for me. There were (and still are) very few examples of musicals about or starring Asian American men, and musical theatre’s pantheon of writers remains overwhelmingly white. Thankfully, I have forged a career for myself despite this dearth of predecessors. But I know first-hand how a lack of seeing myself on-stage led to a profound internal struggle about what I “was allowed” to aim for and accomplish.

One thing we do to address this is to practice open casting, where characters who are white in book-form are played on-stage by actors of a different ethnicity. While I think this is a great way of getting multicultural representation in our casts, it does not get at the question of “Whose stories are we telling?” In light of this question, the idea of open casting merely becomes a short-term solution to an on-going problem.

In order to see multiculturalism more accurately reflected on our TYA stages, we need to start by supporting multicultural story-generators, namely, writers. Again, TYA organizations have already begun doing this by commissioning new works written by playwrights and composers from a variety of backgrounds (myself included). But I think we can go even one step further. TYA organizations should be actively supporting multicultural children’s book authors, since they often provide the source materials for TYA writers to adapt.

There are at least two ways TYA producers can do this.

1. Support the development and promotion of diverse children’s book authors. The good news is that there is already a movement within the children’s book community toward promoting multiculturalism (check out the We Need Diverse Books campaign). We could partner with such movements knowing that supporting them will directly affect the stories that will come to our stages.
2. Focus in on that 6% of stories that actually featured a character of color. Get to know these authors who are already creating multicultural stories. Find which of their stories excite us, and adapt them into new TYA works. Express to their publishers and/or agents that we are interested in seeing the future work of these authors.

I know the problem of bringing more multicultural stories to our stages can seem insurmountable. But I don’t think it’s about solving the problem in one fell swoop. It’s finding what small steps we can take to eventually find traction toward solving the problem in the long-term. And a very tangible step we can all take is supporting the creation of multicultural children’s books, the birthplace of so many of our amazing works.