Present Becoming Past
By Jordan Ikeda
Arts and Entertainment Editor
Monday, Nov. 17, 2008

EWP’s “The Joy Luck Club” bridges the great mother/daughter divide.

Photos courtesy EWP
From left, Emily Kuroda, Jennifer Chang, Deborah Png, Katherine Lee, Celeste Den, Karen Huie, Elaine Kao and Cici Lau gather on stage for the finale of EWP’s “The Joy Luck Club.”

Kuroda as An-Mei Hsu consoles her daughter, Rose (Chang).

There are difficulties that come along with adaptation.

From novel to film—moving pictures lack the subtle details and ability to convey thought that comes naturally in writing. On the flipside, film allows for physical, visual and auditory representation that novels cannot. Books evolve as words and meanings change while movies have a certain permanence, remaining as snapshots in time.

A play offers many of the same obstacles and rewards of both film and literature. Due to its “live” na­ture, plays have the ability to change. And yet, a successful play allows the audience to take away what are often lasting impressions.

Debuting to a near packed house Wednesday evening at the David Henry Hwang Theatre in Little Tokyo, East West Player’s presentation of “The Joy Luck Club,” though beauti­fully performed and acutely directed, at times suffers from the limits of its very medium.

A widely popular novel written by Amy Tan, “The Joy Luck Club” also found success as a feature film.

The story follows the lives of four Chinese-American women and their Chinese mothers. Born in America, the daughters struggle to find com­monality with their mothers who have come from a foreign culture and ex­perience. As parallels in their present lives begin to mirror the pasts of their mothers, a bond of familiarity and family unifies the wholly different, yet fundamentally similar generations.

Playwright Susan Kim does an admirable job of relaying a 300-page novel, 16 chapters, and eight unique individuals, into two hours on stage. Even still, the production seems like it is bursting at the seams with story—like an overcrowded house. This feel­ing is compounded by the miniscule cast of eleven, each actor needing to play multiple roles.

Though perhaps on the busy side, director John Lawrence Rivera’s deci­sion to pare down the cast more often than not works due in great part to the talent of the actors he has chosen. There is a certain continuity in watch­ing one of the mothers act out her past while simultaneously narrating the story. Although, admittedly, watching a full-grown woman running around and talking like a four-year-old has its minuses.

The multiple roles also make keeping track of the names of the characters a near impossible endeavor even for those familiar with the story. A giant scroll set on stage provides the characters’ names and themes of each scene, but is so high up and often blurred by stage light that it is quickly relegated to elaborate scenery.

Regardless, the importance and meaning of the play is not in the names, but rather in the experiences.

When An-Mei Hsu (Emily Kuro­da), face down on the stage, lets out a haunting wail as realization grips her that her son will never come back, the audience feels sympathy despite her own admitted carelessness. When it is revealed later that An-Mei Hsu’s mother was forced to give away her own son, An-Mei’s grief suddenly multiplies and though the emotive shock of her cry of despair has worn away, the knowledge of her past carries weight that lasts beyond the confines of the theater walls.

When Jing-Mei Woo (Elaine Kao) berates her mother, Suyuan (Cici Lau) and accuses her of abandoning her half-sisters in China, the audience can feel the extreme disconnect of two cultures as Suyuan walks off stage without uttering a word. At the end of the play, when Jing-Mei meets those long-lost sisters and gives them their mother’s jade necklace, a bond of family unity is formed—a bond made stronger after being witness to the great divide that was crossed in order to attain it.

Throughout the play, music acts as a phantom-like twelfth actor. Rivera’s decision to incorporate music into the produc­tion helps weave consistency throughout the shifting scenes.

The serene and poignant melodies crafted by Nathan Wang evoke both the ancient culture of China and the new hope of America. The music and other subtle details—how the actors speak perfect English when communicating in their native Chinese tongue, but speak broken English when speaking in their adopted tongue (like subtitles for the stage)—blends the best aspects of novel and film, while creating an experi­ence unique to theater.

And despite the pain and suffering portrayed, there are also moments of laughter and joy: the fussing and babbling of the “aunties” as they prepare dinner; the appalling table manners of Waverly Jong’s (Celeste Den) Caucasian fiancé; the com­munication or lack-there-of between Lindo Jong (Karen Huie) and her Cantonese husband-to-be; the “my daughter is better” competition between Lindo and Suyuan.

In the end, EWP’s “The Joy Luck Club” offers sacrifice and selfishness, evokes smiles and tears, and takes one from the pits of despair to the pinnacle of hope, making it a universal tale of family that not only crosses generational gaps, but cultural and racial ones as well.

After all, a good story speaks loudly in any form.