Rick Shiomi's Book Tour Logbook

Last week, Mu Artistic Director hit the road to spread the word about Mu's latest venture. Here's what he had to say about his trip!

My East Coast book launch tour for the new anthology Asian American Plays for a New Generation, published by Temple University Press, began in Philadelphia on July 24th. I went directly from the bus depot to InterAct Theatre for a reading of a new play by Lauren Yee at the PlayPenn New Play Development Conference. It was so packed it might have been 110 degrees in the dark (I can’t imagine what it felt like for the actors on stage under the lights). The play, titled A Man, His Wife and His Hat, is a very clever, absurdist play about life, love, and marriage when things don’t work out very well but there’s always time to recover. As usual with Lauren Yee, there is always wacky humor, like talking to walls and golems in this piece, but there’s also a humanist point to be considered in a surprising way.

The next day, I attended a meeting with Gayle Isa of Asian Arts Initiative, Seth Rozin of InterAct Theatre, Margie Salvante of the Theater Alliance of Greater Philadelphia, and several others to discuss the possibility of having the next National Asian American Conference/Festival hosted in Philadelphia in 2013. Asian Arts Initiative is a member of the board of CAATA (Consortium of Asian American Theaters and Artists), which produces the event, and Gayle, the executive director of AAI, is holding exploratory meetings to see whether there would be broader support for such an event. Both Margie and Seth were very supportive of the project and I thought there was real support for hosting the convention.

That evening, an anthology book launch event was held at InterAct Theatre. It was co-hosted by InterAct and AAI, and about thirty people showed up. The event included short talks by Josephine Lee, the senior editor of the anthology, Lauren Yee, the playwright for Ching Chong Chinaman in the anthology, and myself. We also had short scenes read by four actors, Bi Ngo, Justin Jain, Victoria Chau, and Catzie Vilayphonh. The cast was terrific and the audience really responded to the readings. The whole presentation was a big hit and I told several people that the cast for the readings would be a good mix of actors to start an Asian American theater company in Philadelphia (no more need to bring in actors from the Big Apple!).

The next day I boarded the Greyhound (I spent a lot of time on Greyhound Express buses and want to recommend them to people touring east coast cities, though I don’t recommend any overnight trips!). The next stop was Washington DC where I spoke on a panel at the Library of Congress for a book launch event at the Mary Pickford Theater, sponsored by the Asian Division of the Asian Pacific Islander Collection. Franklin Odo, the new chief of the Asian Division at the Library of Congress, introduced the event. It was a smaller gathering of employees and members of the public, but so many important results came from that event. Reme Grefalda, the curator of the AAPI Collection and organizer of the event, proposed that Mu Performing Arts and I as an individual playwright archive our production and script materials there as part of the Asian American Pacific Islander Collection. The Library of Congress’ goal is to establish a national Asian Pacific American holding with a nationwide outreach. I was honored and ecstatic to have both Mu’s and my records kept at the Library of Congress and felt that alone made the whole trip worthwhile!

But the most fun part of the event was having Lia Chang read a monologue from one of the plays in the book. With only a few minutes of time to think about it, Lia beautifully performed a wild speech by an imaginary character, Queen Elizabeth II, and got instant applause. Lia was also on the panel and spoke about her work as a photographer, referring to her exhibit of 36 photos on display at the Asian Reading Room titled In Rehearsal, the Lia Chang Theater Portfolio. It’s a beautiful exhibit of photographs covering the backstage and rehearsal process for such productions as Chinglish by David Henry Hwang, Heading East by Robert Lee and Leon Ko, Disney’s The Lion King Las Vegas, and Samrat Chakrabarti and Sanjiv Jhaveri’s pop opera Bakwas Bumbug!, along with images from her other theater work. Lia also took a number of wonderful photos of us in the Asian Reading Room. Here you can see her article with photos on the book launch and her exhibit at the Library of Congress.

Then it was back on the bus and bound for NYC. The event there was hosted by Tamio Spiegel and Julie Azuma at their apartment in the Chelsea area of Manhattan. It was packed with leaders from the Asian American theater community like Tisa Chang of Pan Asian Repertory Theatre, Jorge Ortoll of Ma-Yi Theater, Carla Ching of Second Generation, old friends from Soh Daiko and my previous life in New York thirty years ago, prominent writers Henry Chang and Ed Lin, fellow theater artists including Raul Aranas, Lia Chang, and Henry Yuk, and many more people involved in the arts. I even met Cathie Hartnett of My Talk Radio in St Paul and Carol Connolly, the poet Laureate of St. Paul, both of whom were visiting New York. It was a special kind of evening and I signed a lot of books!

This time I spoke along with Aurorae Khoo, whose play Happy Valley is in the anthology. We were fortunate to have scenes read again, this time by actors Cindy Cheung, Fay Ann Lee, Amy Chang, and Sean Tarjoto. They did a lovely reading and the response was great again. With all the food and drink supplied by Tamio and Julie, I owed a lot to their support and hospitality. Lia Chang wrote an article about this event and took photos as well.

The next day I caught the airporter to LaGuardia and headed home, full of the excitement of so much support for the new anthology, energized by contacts new and renewed, and exhausted by the energy it takes to do a book tour.

by Rick Shiomi

Photo by Lia Chang

Hiroshima mon amour

A few weeks ago, in late September, Hiroshima, the legendary Asian American jazz/pop band, performed at the Hopkins Center for the Arts (view our preview about it here). I say legendary because they've been together since 1980, have received many awards from such respected sources as Billboard, Soul Train Music Awards, and Performance Magazine, and recently received their second Grammy nomination for their most recent CD, Legacy. They have had the kind of artistic success and international renown that most Asian American artists in any field dream about.

Their concert was a terrific mix of their classic and newer songs. For me, it was a trip down nostalgia lane. Hiroshima was a part of the exciting times in the 1980s when many other Asian American artists were emerging, like David Henry Hwang and Philip Gotanda. It was exciting because the band has had the same leaders, Dan and June Kuramoto, through all those years, but have been open to involving a new generation of players like Shoji Kameda of On Ensemble, who Mu Daiko members know very well having worked with him as a taiko performer.

But the most fascinating part of seeing Hiroshima again was the discussion Dan and June led on the night before their concert. It was an open forum where Dan and June donated their time to share their experiences and perspectives on being Asian American artists. They were hungry to contribute and to learn about our community here in the Twin Cities. It was so enlightening to hear them talk about the challenges they've faced over the years, from agents and others thinking they couldn't succeed, to the problems of the music business. They talked about agents trying to put them in coolie hats and ninja outfits, even though their major audience base is actually African American. They talked about how they once toured with Miles Davis. They spoke of famous mentors encouraging them when they were down and of standing ovations in response to their music. They shared stories of how they have faced resistance in Japan, because the very name of their group conjures up so much painful history. Their long journey, like so many of ours, took them from the ridiculous to the sublime, from the worst stereotyping to the finest artistry.

The most inspiring part of the evening was seeing how truly enthusiastic and energized both Dan and June were about Asian Americans working together to deal with the issues facing us all. After the concert, Dan spoke to me about a project he is working on to create a national calendar website for Asian American arts events. I told him Mu would love to be a part of any such planning and was amazed that after all these decades he continues to burn with a deep and palpable passion for the cause of Asian American culture. I realize that not only do we need more talented and passionate leaders like Dan and June Kuramoto, who have had great success in their field and are anxious to share their stories, but we also need more often to celebrate them and their contribution to our culture.

by Rick Shiomi

A weekend in the life of Rick Shiomi

One of the advantages of being the Artistic Director of Mu Performing Arts is traveling and sharing the experience of Asian American theater in other artistic communities. My latest three-day trip to California was a whirlwind of shows, workshops, and meetings that proved how vibrant Asian American theater is in that part of the country.

The first event was a Stories Program workshop sponsored by the Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance. It was a small gathering, but with the assistance of LA-based actor Ryun Yu, I was able to run the workshop based upon the stories of the participants. It was a powerful experience, revealing very deeply emotional stories about their own lives. We finished up the workshop the next morning with Ryun directing a short presentation of one of the stories.

Then I was off to San Diego to see a production of David Henry Hwang's Yellow Face (a show that Mu produced last season) by Mo'olelo Theater. The artistic director, Seema Sueko, directed the production and though it was still a preview, I was very impressed by both her creative direction and the cast of the show. The lead, David Henry Hwang's alter-ego DHH, was played by Greg Watanabe. I know Greg from back in the 1990s when he was starting out in San Francisco as a member of the comedy troupe 18 Mighty Mountain Warriors (check out the terrific documentary on the group), so it was especially fun to see him in action again. The audience gave the performance a standing ovation and I knew they had a hit on their hands.

(On a side note, one other fun moment at Mo'olelo involved seeing an image of our own Eric Sumangil from his performance in their 2007 production of Cowboy Versus Samurai, which also happens to be Mu's next production. It's thrilling to see how Mu actors are making names for themselves around the country!)

On that same day, I met with Lauren Yee, the playwright for Ching Chong Chinaman and for a new commission by Mu (stay tuned!), Native Voices artistic director Randy Reinholz, Mo'olelo's Seema Sueko, and Greg Watanabe. It was a jam-packed day!

But there was still more to do. The next morning, I met with Farrell and Sandra Foreman of the new Bear Arts Foundation, which sponsored Colorfest, a multicultural theater festival and conference this past summer. They are trying to set up a new service network for theaters of color, with which Mu would be intimately involved. It's an exciting prospect that will be an invaluable way for our theaters to connect with one another.

After that meeting, I got back in the car and drove back to LA, where I'd started my trip, to do a video interview of Michael Golamco, the playwright for Cowboy Versus Samurai. It's a part of a series of behind-the-scenes interviews and footage that will be featured on Mu's YouTube channel, and is a great way for audiences to get extra insight into the show that they might not get just from their playbill.

My trip ended with the final performance of Mysterious Skin by Prince Gomolvilas at one of the country's largest Asian American theater companies, East West Players. It was quite a terrific performance. After the show the whole cast and crew gathered for their post-show reception and I had an extended discussion with Tim Dang, the artistic director at EWP. After all that, it was off to the airport to catch the red eye flight back home to Minneapolis.

All in a weekend's work.

by Rick Shiomi