Word: hwang
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...combined experiences show that we have what it takes to initiate and carry out our ideas," Hwang said. "Those two aspects come from our diverse backgrounds...
Face Value, the much-awaited world premiere written by David Henry Hwang, promises "a place to start building your world." In fact, what the author of M. Butterfly offers us is in this play is a place not exactly in our world, but in a different, utopian world, where race is recognized as a mythic construction and an obstruction to human relationship. The progression from reality to fantasy is both the strongest and weakest point of the play. That the play starts as realistic political narrative and ends up as utopian romance signals the unlikelihood of racism disappearing anytime soon...
...desire to be programmatic in giving us "a place to build our world," its insistence on dropping reality-checks in the middle of farce, borders dangerously on didacticism. Not only is the art better without the straight political messages, the politics are also more interesting. At his best, Hwang lets his characters embody race relations in America today: A white supremacist declares deadpan, "I consider myself on the cutting edge of racism"; a white actor declares empathetically, "I know what it's like to hate all white men," to which a bigoted professor responds, "What else does it take...
...other times, Hwang forgets the cardinal rule and lets his characters tell rather than show; Randall spells out, "This change in appearance has somehow changed the inner man." In impeding the otherwise rich evolution of plot and character with soapbox monologues, Face Value underestimates its audience. Hopefully, much of the speechifying will be cut as Face Value continues its pre-Broadway engagement at the Colonial Theatre, so that nothing detracts from the attention the plot and characters deserve...
...play begins on the opening night of a controversial Broadway musical entitled The Real Manchu, in which a white actor in yellow face plays the lead instead of an Asian. If this sounds familiar, that's because Hwang has found a forum to wreak delicious vengeance on Miss Saigon. The offensive and not very creative British extravaganza is only the point of departure for Face Value, however, which goes backstage at The Real Manchu to explore the interactions between self-absorbed actor, self-absorbed producer, wise-cracking stage manager, disguised Asian protesters and undercover white supremacist terrorists. The cast...