Ch’ing-lish, David Henry Hwang’s play about cultural misrepresentation is brought to life in a funny, engaging and highly entertaining production at the Longacre Theatre this season. Ch’ing-lish is a highly relevant, if slightly expected, comedy in the current age of rapid globalization. A spectacular cast under the capable direction of Leigh Silverman, with help from David Korins’s creative set design, make for an enjoyable evening of theater.
The play opens as American businessman Daniel Cavanaugh, played by Gary Wilmes, presents to the udience various examples of hilariously outrageous English translations of Chinese signs to the audience. If Mr. Hwang intended to impassion and educate his audience about the dangers of cultural misunderstanding, this was perhaps a bit detrimental in its sitcom humor. Nevertheless, the prologue effectively aims to ensconce the audience in a comfortable atmosphere of light-hearted humor and sets the tone for the rest of the evening. Ultimately, Ch’ing-lish delivers the humor promised in this prologue.
Gary Wilmes is highly convincing as Daniel Cavanaugh, the hapless and lost American businessman. Cavanaugh is the owner of a sign making company, Ohio Signage and he travels to China with dreams of starting a sign translation project there. The well intentioned but naïve Mr. Cavanaugh instead becomes entangled, to hilarious effect, in the complex politics of Guiyang, a town headed by corrupt party official, Minister Cai Guoliang (played by Larry Lei Zhang) and his Vice – Minister (also the female lead) Xi Yan.
Jennifer Lim is remarkable as the smart, calculating Chinese Bureaucrat Xi Yan. Ms. Lim displays commendable range; she is alternatingly tender, passionate and conniving at different times thus making Xi a thrillingly complex character. Her chemistry with Gary Wilmes, who plays Daniel Cavanaugh is palpable and adds an aura of authenticity to their love story. Ch’ing-lish is more successful in portraying this doomed love story than it is in exposing the difficulties of doing business in China (the premise originally set up by Cavanaugh in the prologue). This is in part due to the laugh-out-loud humor that, while hilarious, did not exactly inspire any serious contemplation about international business relations.
Stephen Pucci plays the role of Peter Timms, a Westerner who is exceptionally knowledgeable about and captivated by Chinese culture. He is ostensibly Mr. Cavanaugh’s business consultant but his character appears to have been crafted more to explore the difficult question of whether race limits one’s choice of culture. Mr. Pucci delivers a moving performance as the confused Westerner, who after years of living in China feels closer to Chinese culture than to the one he was born into.
One of the more noteworthy aspects of the production is sound designer Darron L West’s intelligent music. Contemporary Chinese music echoed around the theatre at each scene change adding a whole new level of excitement to the otherwise very grounded action. The production was also greatly served by its well-executed set design. Doors, chairs, tables and even an elevator move in and out of the stage creating an entirely different mood for each scene. Set designer David Korins has envisioned and executed superbly a fluid set design that, combined with the riveting music, makes Ch’ing-lish thoroughly exciting to follow through successive scenes.
The use of supertitles, I felt, was the defining element in Ch’ing-lish. The supertitles, in a way, are the play. In an environment of mistranslation and misrepresentation that is portrayed through the supertitles, the characters are puppets to cultural and linguistic barriers. That is, after all, the theme of Ch’ing-lish – the ways in which our understanding/misunderstanding of each other’s culture defines intercultural relations and interactions. Also, Ch’ing-lish is primarily a comedy and the humor is almost entirely derived from the translation in the supertitles. In one scene for example, Cavanaugh hopelessly mangles the Chinese phrase for “I Love You.” Different translations ranging from “My Fifth Aunt” to “Dirty Sea Weed” are flashed onstage as supertitles, eliciting loud and appreciative laughter from the audience.
Unfortunately, the supertitle-based humor also comes off as too tightly plotted at times. The audience is guided through the story with very little room for personal interpretation. The miscommunications and mistranslations are funny but restrictive because the audience always possesses more knowledge than the frustrated characters. Thus, I was only able to sympathize and not empathize with the characters. The situation is salvaged however, by the superb acting especially on the part of Mr. WIlmes and Ms. Lim. The cast conveys enough emotional depth to make the overly narrative plot more moving.
The protagonist, Daniel Cavanaugh, ends the play urging any potential businessmen in the audience looking to invest in China to have “realistic expectations.” Similarly, it is unwise to expect Ch’ing-lish to offer any particularly stunning insight into cultural interaction. Instead, it is best viewed as the highly successful comedy that it is.
Ch’ing-lish is currently playing at the Longacre Theater: 220 West 48th Street. Manhattan
