This show was one of the highlights of my career. First, I got to be in it with my daughter. Second, the director Matt Neves was, for me, one of the finest and most talented I had ever worked with. Third, the score, written by the same team that penned Les Miserables, was such a pleasure and a challenge to tackle each night, never a dull moment. And then last but not least, I got to work with one of the most talented casts from top to bottom. An added bonus (and curse for those friends and family who did not get to see it) was that the run was completely sold out. Granted we only had 70 seats per night and it ran all of 9 performances, but it was still fun to say, "Ah man, you can't come to the show, it is SOLD OUT!" Pretty Cool!
I had double duty in this production and got to play in the ensemble as well as one of the principle roles, Ellen, the American wife of the male lead, Chris. I loved playing Ellen and getting to sing some of the best songs of the night, "I Still Believe" and "Now That I've Seen Her". For all of our YouTube fans, the show was not recorded so those performances are gone, but maybe I can work up some video of me singing the latter song in my living room or something. haha. My scenes as Ellen were incredibly emotional and it became a polished technique to cry and then pull back so I could sing, cry, pull back, cry, pull back. The most valued comment I got for this portrayal was that people who had seen past productions never liked Ellen. She always came across as witchy and unsympathetic. From the feedback I got the audience could finally like her and understand that her anger and hurt was placed more towards Chris than Kim.
The ensemble work was awesome! We got to work with masks, first to convince the audience that the Caucasian cast was Vietnamese and then to bring forth a theme that the director had going, that of people wearing 'masks' in life to hide how they really feel and what they really want. Kim rarely wore her mask, she is as sincere as they come. The Asian prostitute character that I played in the first few scenes only takes her mask off during a moment in "Movie in My Mind" to reflect the true desire of leaving this awful life behind, finding an American G.I. to marry and move to America with. Joel who played the Engineer in an inspiring performance has his mask on the entire show, except in his big final production number "The American Dream". At first the mask idea seemed weird and a lot of us were skeptical. But Matt was completely committed to the idea and never wavered. Eventually we all jumped on board and were just as committed as he was. Because of that commitment the concept worked beautifully.
I loved how this production was taken from a lavish Broadway stage where the audience leaves only remembering the helicopter that flew the G.I.s out of the Embassy to a black box space where people left talking about the relationships of the characters, the history of the Vietnam war and what they learned from their experience. The helicopter scene was brilliantly done in our production, but it seamlessly blended in and didn't scream out to the audience, "Look what we can do with modern technology!" The audience felt that helicopter leaving and was left in devastation with the ensemble on stage who were desperately yelling out and crying because they had been left behind and would now face a certain death in their country because they had helped the Americans...
In short our production took away the spectacle and focused on the story as it needed to be told. I am very proud of this production and my work in it. Vocally I grew, physically I buffed up and mentally I learned more about a war that I knew little about. This will always be a fond memory for me. I feel privileged to have been a part of it. (Pictures: 1. Ivy as Tam and me as Ellen 2. Brodie Perry as Chris and Me as Ellen 3. Me in my Asian mask 4. Alexa Thompson as Kim and Ivy as Tam 5. Me on closing night, tears and all, with Ryan Norton as John, Alexa and our director Matt Neves)
This show was one of the highlights of my career. First, I got to be in it with my daughter. Second, the director Matt Neves was, for me, one of the finest and most talented I had ever worked with. Third, the score, written by the same team that penned Les Miserables, was such a pleasure and a challenge to tackle each night, never a dull moment. And then last but not least, I got to work with one of the most talented casts from top to bottom. An added bonus (and curse for those friends and family who did not get to see it) was that the run was completely sold out. Granted we only had 70 seats per night and it ran all of 9 performances, but it was still fun to say, "Ah man, you can't come to the show, it is SOLD OUT!" Pretty Cool!
I had double duty in this production and got to play in the ensemble as well as one of the principle roles, Ellen, the American wife of the male lead, Chris. I loved playing Ellen and getting to sing some of the best songs of the night, "I Still Believe" and "Now That I've Seen Her". For all of our YouTube fans, the show was not recorded so those performances are gone, but maybe I can work up some video of me singing the latter song in my living room or something. haha. My scenes as Ellen were incredibly emotional and it became a polished technique to cry and then pull back so I could sing, cry, pull back, cry, pull back. The most valued comment I got for this portrayal was that people who had seen past productions never liked Ellen. She always came across as witchy and unsympathetic. From the feedback I got the audience could finally like her and understand that her anger and hurt was placed more towards Chris than Kim.
The ensemble work was awesome! We got to work with masks, first to convince the audience that the Caucasian cast was Vietnamese and then to bring forth a theme that the director had going, that of people wearing 'masks' in life to hide how they really feel and what they really want. Kim rarely wore her mask, she is as sincere as they come. The Asian prostitute character that I played in the first few scenes only takes her mask off during a moment in "Movie in My Mind" to reflect the true desire of leaving this awful life behind, finding an American G.I. to marry and move to America with. Joel who played the Engineer in an inspiring performance has his mask on the entire show, except in his big final production number "The American Dream". At first the mask idea seemed weird and a lot of us were skeptical. But Matt was completely committed to the idea and never wavered. Eventually we all jumped on board and were just as committed as he was. Because of that commitment the concept worked beautifully.
I loved how this production was taken from a lavish Broadway stage where the audience leaves only remembering the helicopter that flew the G.I.s out of the Embassy to a black box space where people left talking about the relationships of the characters, the history of the Vietnam war and what they learned from their experience. The helicopter scene was brilliantly done in our production, but it seamlessly blended in and didn't scream out to the audience, "Look what we can do with modern technology!" The audience felt that helicopter leaving and was left in devastation with the ensemble on stage who were desperately yelling out and crying because they had been left behind and would now face a certain death in their country because they had helped the Americans...
In short our production took away the spectacle and focused on the story as it needed to be told. I am very proud of this production and my work in it. Vocally I grew, physically I buffed up and mentally I learned more about a war that I knew little about. This will always be a fond memory for me. I feel privileged to have been a part of it. (Pictures: 1. Ivy as Tam and me as Ellen 2. Brodie Perry as Chris and Me as Ellen 3. Me in my Asian mask 4. Alexa Thompson as Kim and Ivy as Tam 5. Me on closing night, tears and all, with Ryan Norton as John, Alexa and our director Matt Neves)
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