I was thrilled when I saw the trailer for Chil Kong’s “The Mikado Project,” because it is so rare that you get to see Asian Americans on film being THEMSELVES. Usually Asian Americans, if they are fortunate to get film or television roles, are performing in a scripted sense of a story written about the general population and they are only a small voice in it.
In the Mikado Project, we get to see Asian Americans as they are, as real people, multidimensional, full of vim, vigor, aspirations, and all the same problems that you see others on television and the big screen experience.
This is from their website:
| MAKING OF THE FILM |
| The Mikado, one of the most beloved comedy operas by legendary collaborators, Arthur Sullivan and W.S. Gilbert, first opened on stge in 1885 in London. The story was set in Japan (considered an exotic land to the British during that era) which allowed Gilbert & Sullivan to satirize British politics. However, by doing so, Asians around the world and Asian Americans today have found this opera hard to embrace-making the notion of Asian American actors performing The Mikado controverisal and palatable only through a comedic reconstruction.
The story begins with the news that The Angry Buddha Theater Ensemble, has lost its leading male actor, Jace (David McInnis, (Never Forever, TYPHOON), to a primetime TV gig. Without Jace’s star power the company faces imminent demise. Lead by Lance (Allen Liu, Broadway revival of Flower Drum Song), a scrappy artistic director secretly living out of the back office of the theater, the members of the group fight over the idea of putting on The Mikado, which to some in the company is the equivalent of reviving “Charlie Chan” or “Kung Fu”. “We are using the story of this Asian American theater company in the same way Gilbert & Sullivan used a Japanese story to comment on their society,” says Producer Quan Phung. “Hopefully, we can laugh at ourselves while shedding light on the challenges facing Asian American actors or any actor of color in Hollywood today.” “This story came out of my very own personal experience in the Asian American artist,” says Director Chil Kong. “I am the Artistic Director of an Asian American theater company called Lodestone, based in LA, and we went through 10 years of introspection about the landscape of Asian Americans in arts and cinema. The one thing I know for sure is that history is evolving and my goal is to create a really good and entertaining story. For me, a musical comedy was the best way to go to address anything we had to say about being Asian American or The Mikado.” With such positive reviews from the press, it was a simple choice for Mr. Kong to select The Mikado Project as the subject of his first feature. “I wanted to, as I closed Lodestone, play tribute to the world I had come from, even as I was moving on in my own career. For me, it is a Valentine to the various generations of Asian American Artists and the small theater companies around the country that continue to operate in this economic climate.” “We are using the story of this Asian American theater company in the same way Gilbert & Sullivan used a Japanese story to comment on their society,” says Executive Producer, Quan Phung. “Hopefully, we can laugh at ourselves while shedding light on the challenges facing Asian American actors or any actor of color in Hollywood today.” “This film came out of my personal experiences,” says Kong. “As an Artistic Director of Lodestone, we had 10 years of introspection about the landscape of Asian Americans in arts and cinema. The one thing I know for sure is that our history is evolving and my goal is to create an entertaining story. For me, musical comedy was the best way to go to address anything we had to say about being Asian American or The Mikado.” The Mikado, one of the most beloved comedy operettas by legendary collaborators, Arthur Sullivan and W.S. Gilbert, first opened in 1885 in London. The story was set in Japan (considered an exotic land to the British during that era), and the “foreign-ness” allowed Gilbert & Sullivan to satirize British politics. Names such as Nanki Poo & Yum Yum, who reside in the mythical town of Titipoo, and elaborate costumes that bear little resemblance to feudal Japan, were meant to lambaste Victorian England, but the result has been one of cultural insensitivity to Asians and Asian Americans, no different than the prosthetic Asian eye make up and “yellow face” donned by Jonathan Pryce in the Broadway production of Miss Saigon. Without intending to, The Mikado has since become one of the worst examples of racism towards another people on stage – and it continues to thrive, even in our new politically astute culture. |
Chil Kong and Erin Quill are two dynamos of the Asian American theater scene in both LA and NYC, and in my book, this film is a capstone for anyone who is familiar with Asian American history in this country, and wonders, “Where do we go from here?” It looks like the answer is, “moving and shaking things up,” in a good way.
I didn’t see any scheduling of this indie film for Chicago, but you can check on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/themikadoproject. In the past, films from the Asian American Film Festival have been shown at the Gene Siskel Film Center in downtown Chicago.
