by Linda Chin
“Vietgone” – Written by Qui Nguyen. Michelle Aguillon, Director; Kadahj Bennett, Music Director; Misha Shields, Choreographer; Jessie Baxter, Dramaturg; Jasmine Brooks, Assistant Director; Jessica Scout Malone; Assistant Dramaturg & Intimacy Coach; Izmir Ickbal, Scenic & Projections Designer; Debra Kim Sivigny, Costume Designer; Jennifer Fok, Lighting Designer; Aubrey Dube, Sound Designer; Kelly Smith, Properties Designer; Nate DeMare, Technical Director; Jadira Figueroa, Assistant Stage Manager. Presented by Company One at the BCA Black Box Theater, 539 Tremont St., Boston in partnership with Pao Art Center through May 25.
Once upon a time shortly after the fall of Saigon in 1975, a strong and handsome 30-year old Vietnamese man named Quang and a strong and beautiful 30-year old Vietnamese woman named Tong fled their war-torn country and journeyed over 8000 miles to a land in the “middle of nowhere” called Arkansas, crossing paths for the very first time at a relocation center for evacuees. Except for their respective travel companions-turned-bunkmates (Quang’s best bud Nhan and Tong’s martyr-ish mom Huong) everything and everyone seemed foreign. Even though the meals included “too much meat” and the environs were not as “super nice” as “what was advertised” they came to accept that navigating and adapting to unfamiliar territory was part of their journey. For refugees, however, the stress-inducing immigration and assimilation processes are compounded by traumatic memories of violence, persecution and what they left behind. Tong, Huong, and Nhan are determined to give it a go but Quang, devastated about losing his family and country and wary of Americans’ negative attitudes towards “refugees who look like me/peeps reminding them of their enemy,” is determined to get home.
Forty years later a smart and talented thirty-something man named Qui Nguyen asks his elderly parents, Quang and Tong, to tell all about their lives (before they met, before they settled in Arkansas, before they became his parents) before it was too late. Like most children, Qui was curious about his roots and what was inherited from previous generations. Like many children of immigrants, he was interested in first-generation elders’ histories. Lucky for us, Nguyen inherited his parents’ resiliency, courage and determination, and became a stereotype-busting superhero himself, specifically a young Vietnamese American man who (1) was a published American playwright and (2) had the balls to ask his parents about personal matters and their painful pasts (subjects Asian elders are typically reluctant to talk about) and to make their private lives public. Nguyen’s parents were the source material and inspiration for his biographical “kinda true” play Vietgone, now enjoying its New England premiere by Company One (in collaboration with Pao Arts Center) at the BCA.
Nguyen uses pathos and humor and a mash of theatrical devices to reveal the answers to the questions he posed to his parents, What was the war like, Why did they leave, and why did they stay, and How, with so many obstacles, they did it? Like David Henry Hwang in Soft Power and Celine Song in Endlings Nguyen writes a role for himself in Vietgone, At the top of show the Playwright (Jude Torres) delivers the pre-curtain remarks and the other four cast members introduce their characters. Quang (Quentin Nguyen-duy) is charming from the get-go with his opening line, “S’up, bitches.” Tong (Christina Mei Chen) peers into the audience and observes “Damn, there’s a lotta white people up in here” (only kinda-true because the audience the night I attended was not predominantly white, like many other theater companies, but a mix of black, brown, white, and a lot of yellow). Rob Chen and Kim Klasner each play several characters and play around with the way they speak English; as Asian Man and Asian Woman they use very heavily accented English (“Herro,” “some flied lice?”), as Nhan and Huong they speak in eloquent English, as Redneck Biker/Hippie Dude and American Girl/Flower Girl they speak in cliches. Nguyen also makes the point that these small, often heavily stereotyped roles are the ones that actors of Asian heritage are usually relegated to.
While these bits are funny, they get repetitive and sometimes seem superficial. When Nguyen delves more deeply into the more serious subject matters he asked his parents about (and gets closer to the truth), he delivers more. In the epilogue, Quang (now a septuagenarian) impassionedly tells his son that his life is more than the eight years he fought, and if he wants to learn more about the Vietnam War, he should watch a movie. Regarding Quang and Tong’s motivations, we learn that he was an Air Force pilot who intended to return after he flew a group of evacuees to safety, but his plan got derailed and he had to readjust. Tong’s ticket out came from her employer (US Embassy) and she left in search of independence and better opportunity, never intending to return to life in a leaf hut or a society that undervalued women. And as for how they overcame the obstacles, they did it to Marvin Gaye’s Lets Get It On and other Motown tunes (though given that Quang was married with kids and Tong had a fiancé, the 70s hit Love the One You’re With would have been appropriate. This more subtle manner of stereotype-busting, of portraying Asian American actors as smart and sexy (not emasculated nor fetishized) romantic leads, was much more satisfying.
Vietgone is a refreshing rom-com as billed, but it is much more. It is also a buddy story, with delightful scenes of Quang and Nhan traveling west on a motorcycle, experiencing the joy of free joints, free love and new foods (burritos!) and fending off bullies in kickass fight sequences. And it is a story about filial piety, and intergenerational respect. Under Michelle Aguillon’s experienced and thoughtful direction and music director/composer/rap coach Kadahj Bennett’s masterful mentorship of the young cast, the loud scenes pop, but the dialogues between parent and child (Huong and Tong, Huong and Tong’s younger brother Khue – another role poignantly played by Rob Chen, and Quang and Qui) are welcome pauses in Nguyen’s often over-revved script and are as, if not more, powerful. Vietgone encourages us to bridge communication gaps to build cross-cultural understanding. Hopefully it also inspires us to engage our elders in dialogue so their/her/his-stories are not lost nor forgotten. For tickets and information, go to: https://companyone.org/production/vietgone/
