By J.K. YAMAMOTO
Rafu Shimpo
East West Players will be presenting the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical “Flower Drum Song” from April 16 to May 31 at the Aratani Theatre in Little Tokyo, featuring both EWP veterans and newcomers.
One of the veterans is Emily Kuroda, who has extensive stage, film and TV credits and is best known for playing Mrs. Kim on the TV series “Gilmore Girls.” In her 47th show with EWP, she will be playing Madame Liang, a talent agent and businesswoman.
The play opened on Broadway in 1958 and a film adaptation was released in 1961. Although the songs have remained the same, Tony-winning playwright David Henry Hwang wrote a new book for the Broadway revival in 2002 and has written another new book for this year’s production.
Kuroda remembers watching the movie on TV as a girl. Miyoshi Umeki, who played Mei-Li, “became my idol.”
The movie also featured James Shigeta, Jack Soo, Benson Fong, Juanita Hall and Nancy Kwan as Linda Low, the showgirl played by Pat Suzuki in the Broadway production.
Although the musical has been criticized in the past by Asian American activists for promoting stereotypes, more recently it has been seen in a more positive light as a showcase for Asian Ameican talent.
“Having grown up in the climate of post-World War II with strong anti-Asian sentiment, I was raised to become more American and deny my Japanese heritage in order to survive, and here comes ‘Flower Drum Song,’ with people who looked like me not afraid to be Asian in America, and, in fact, celebrating our culture with dance, music and love,” Kuroda said. “They were real human beings!”
Kuroda played Mei-Li, the female lead, in San Francisco Musical Theater’s production in 1979, and she recalls being mentored by Alvin Ing, who played Wang Ta, the male lead, in the touring production and a different character, Chin, in the 2002 revival.
“When I auditioned, Alvin Ing was in the waiting area and he coached me on my song right before I went in, and I got the job! Alvin went on to do many ‘Flower Drum Songs,’ and remains an inspiration to me for his pure love of music, art, and most of all, the meaning of friendship. And man, was he funny!”
While the story is still set in San Francisco Chinatown and many of the same characters appear, Kuroda noted, “David has added so many layers to the characters. By intertwining the often painful journey from imported railway workers, the Cultural Revolution, the Exclusion Act, the Chinese Massacre, decades of violence and racism to the 1960s – Chinatown, San Francisco, USA.
“The show celebrates our ancestors, our history, our struggles, our strength and, most importantly, our community. We don’t give up.”
Kuroda says of her own character, “Madame Liang was an often-single woman in the ’50s and ’60s — she couldn’t keep a husband because she didn’t fit the ‘wife mold.’ Not only was she Asian American, but she was a woman, so she had to work three times as hard, be five times as clever, and learn to play the game, but she never, ever, loses her heart and her passion. And she always likes a good laugh.”
Although many more Asian American stories are being told on stage and screen compared to the ’50s and ’60s, she feels that “Flower Drum Song” still has value for today’s audiences. “If you want to move forward, you have to look back.”
A Musical Every Year
Kuroda started out doing dinner theater, then moved to EWP in 1978. “We did a musical every year – Paul Wong and I share many musicals over the decades.” Wong is a member of the ensemble and an understudy in the upcoming show.
“After 15 years I concentrated on non-musicals, often working plays from early workshops to national productions (‘Woman Warrior,’ ‘Happy Pleasant Valley,’ ‘Tiger Style,’ ‘Today Is my Birthday,’ ‘The Endlings,’ ‘Canton Jazz Club,’ and many more), and now I’m doing musicals again,” she recalled. “This is my ninth musical project in the last five years.”
While playing Mrs. Kim, mother of Lane Kim (Keiko Agena), on “Gilmore Girls” for seven years has been memorable, Kuroda said, “There is something in each project I do that becomes an integral part of my being. I have been diving in Jeju, surfed in Santa Cruz, interned at Manzanar, suffered the Cultural Revolution, was the femme fatale (in more ways than one) at a senior center, a nun in the U.K., and a housewife who fights dinosaurs with her bare hands, just to name a very few.”
Kuroda’s recent screen credits include the TV series “The Power,” “Baymax!,” “All Rise” and “The Good Doctor,” and the movies “Strange World, “ Kimi” and “Adopting Audrey.”
Upcoming projects include “The End of Oak Street” (formerly titled “Flowervale Street”) with Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor, in which a cosmic event transports a suburban neighborhood to someplace unknown. “I have a small part, but it’s so much fun,” Kuroda says.
“I am also doing a concert at Joe’s Pub in New York and am later going to the Edinburgh Festival (‘Right Before I Go’ by Stan Zimmerman) in August, and, I hope, a London presentation after that,” she added.
The cast of “Flower Drum Song” also includes Mark Oka as Wang, Scott Keiji Takeda as Da, Grace Yoo as Mei-Li, Krista Marie Yu as Linda Low, Kenton Chen as Harvard, Cooper Bennett as Chao, and Gedde Watanabe as Chin.
The Aratani Theatre is located at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center, 244 S. San Pedro St. in Little Tokyo. Preview performances begin April 16, with Opening Night set for Thursday, April 23, at 7:30 p.m. Regular performances take place on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, with additional select weekday shows and matinees on Saturdays and Sundays.
Tickets are available online at eastwestplayers.org or by calling (213) 625-7000. Preview performance tickets start at $59, and regular performance tickets start at $99. Group discounts are available by calling the box office or emailing boxoffice@eastwestplayers.org.