By Arlene McKanic
David Henry Hwang’s “Yellow Face,” presented by The Outrageous Fortune Company and now at Queens Theatre in the Park, examines — tackles would be too strong a word for this funny, humane play — the dilemma faced by Asian actors who, even in the recent past, had to watch as one white actor after another took over Asian roles.
We see examples of these roles on the back of the set — here are stills and posters of Warren Oland as Charlie Chan, Paul Muni as Wang Lung the farmer and Louise Rainer as his bovine wife, and Linda Hunt as Kwan from “The Year of Living Dangerously,” a case of not only yellow face but gender bending. Even Katharine Hepburn appears as someone in a conical rattan hat. But the photos are dominated by a poster of Anna May Wong, a real Asian−American actress who had a nice four−decade−long Hollywood career. Yes, this nice girl from L.A. played slinky and exotic characters, but she did at least play.
“Yellow Face” begins with the fracas, which no one remembers now, over Jonathan Pryce playing the Eurasian pimp in “Miss Saigon.” Hwang, who wrote the Broadway hit “M. Butterfly,” led a protest to put a real Asian actor in the role and keep Pryce from coming over from England to Broadway with the rest of the cast. Actors Equity first opposed and then grudgingly accepted Pryce.
Hwang was humiliated — in this play full of self−deprecating humor, Fenton Li’s Hwang is always humiliated by something. His greatest humiliation is his unwitting promotion of a white actor, Marcus G. (played earnestly by Tom Ashton) as an Asian star. Hwang cast him in a flop of his, claiming that Marcus was a Siberian Jew. Siberia, after all, is in Asia and Jews aren’t, well, quite as white as other white people. Much of the comedy comes from Hwang watching this nice young man get one plummy Asian role after another, and much acclaim from the community of Asian actors, while not one person seems to realize he’s a fraud. Marcus, to his credit, is never cynical but embraces his adopted community wholeheartedly, to the point of trouble.
Another thread that runs through the play is Hwang’s relationship with his father, a wealthy banker from Shanghai who came to America to fulfill his dreams of being Jimmy Stewart and Frank Sinatra (“My Way”) and all those other iconic, wildly successful white guys. Ray Chao plays Henry Hwang with a boyish enthusiasm and an innocence that seems improbable for a man who handles millions of dollars every day, yet Chao makes him thoroughly believable. Henry is a man, after all, who always believed his “real life” was in America. Later, after being fingered for some kind of financial hanky panky by the U.S. government, Chao is heartbreaking when Henry’s idealism is shaken.
Save the engaging Li, who plays Hwang as a loveable dope and the charming and bright eyed Ashton, the six other actors play several roles, many based on real people. We hear from everyone from Ed Koch to Frank Rich (who doesn’t lisp that much in real life!) to Margaret Cho (who doesn’t squint that much in real life) to the higher ups in Asian civil rights societies, to Hwang’s ex−girlfriend, who takes up with Marcus and then is astonished and hurt when he reveals who and what he really is. (The play does have a twist at the end that really tells you what Marcus is about).
Chao, Scarlette Ahmed, Jennifer Gegan, Jade Justad, Anastasia Morsucci and Howard L. Wieder are all excellent in their varying roles. Sofia Landon Geier directs, and Glenn Rivano lights the simple and elegant set — just chairs and cubes on a low platform, much like the set of a talk show. Dayle Vander Sande’s sound design features, now and then, the songs of the simple people of Guizhou Province in China. We learn those songs are mandated by the government of China to entertain the tourists.
“Yellow Face” is funny and engaging, and does make you think about the malleability of American identity — and family.
If You Go:
Yellow Face — An award−winning comedy about racial identity by David Henry Hwang
When: Nov. 20−22, 8 p.m.
When: Nov. 23, 3 p.m.
Where: Queens Theatre in the Park, Flushing Meadows Corona Park
Contact: 718−760−0064
