The criminal Shrimp Boy (David Shih, center) persuades Lauren (Kelly Marie Tran, left) and a member of the Ma family (Jon Norman Schneider) to join his tong.
King of the Yees, playwright Lauren Yee’s most recent play, packs a comic punch that rattles the mind into a state of confusion. If the objective is to pack as much comedy as possible into a two-hour play about a daughter’s appreciation of her father, then well done. However, Joshua Kahan Brody’s direction sets such a frantic pace that one frequently finds oneself asking: What is happening now, and who is that? And because three of the actors play no fewer than six characters each, the production has the feel of a madcap comedy. It is a silly and sentimental story.
Lauren haggles with a shopkeeper (Maureen Sebastian, right) to get good, cheap liquor for free. Photographs by HanJie Chow.
Set in San Francisco’s Chinatown, the play opens with two actors (David Shih and Maureen Sebastian) rehearsing a new play at the Yee Fung Toy building. The playwright, Lauren (Kelly Marie Tran), enters, followed shortly by her father, Larry (Francis Jue), who proceeds to take over the conversation and the scene.
Larry, the King of the Yees, stresses the importance of community, family, and political involvement. He is an avid supporter of local politician Leland Yee. He strives to educate his daughter about the Yees and Chinese history in Chinatown, introducing her to traditional characters such as the lion dancer and the face changer. The work could easily have been titled Elderly Man Hijacks Play.
Correcting Larry’s ideas about what the play should be, Lauren (Kelly Marie Tran) tries to maintain her artistic vision by explaining what her play is actually about:
I am trying to tell the story of two people. And you’re trying to make it about everyone else.
Most of the visual merriment happens in the latter half of the play; the first half consists largely of setup scenes. The setups might have benefited from a slower pace to allow the audience to catch up to the frenetic dialogue. Yee’s script explores her relationship with her father and his relationship with his own father, but we don't fully understand her intentions until much later.
Father Larry (Francis Jue) shares his play notes with his daughter Lauren, who meets them with skepticism.
The play features an ambitious menu of comedic bits: actors embedded in the audience, broad ethnic typecasting, loud objections to the lack of cultural sensitivity, thunderous sound effects following every mention of “Shrimp Boy,” comic callbacks, a slow-motion gun battle, a fictional ancestor performing a RuPaul homage, and a dance party featuring the actors line dancing to familiar wedding-playlist favorites, including “Put a Ring on It” and “Thriller.” So many plotlines are introduced in the first half that it's difficult to recall them all when they resurface after intermission.
Setting aside the busy script, there are many genuinely joyful and funny moments throughout the play. The actors, other than Lauren and Larry, take over the stage with inspired lunacy.
David Shih’s Shrimp Boy is not what one might expect of a hardened criminal. This self-proclaimed “dragonhead” of one of Chinatown’s most notorious tongs arrives wearing a white Armani suit, beret and sunglasses. While in prison, he befriends Charles Manson, whom he later name-drops to his mother:
My mom come visit, say, “Raymond, why you go to jail so much, why you don’t come see me?” And I say, “Ma, you embarrass me in front of good friend Chuck Manson!”
Maureen Sebastian, as one of the actors in the play-within-a-play, is hysterically funny as she attempts to perfect a Chinese accent. The closer she gets to perfection, the more she contorts her face into ridiculous shapes to produce simian sounds. She also recounts childhood memories of being adopted, in a story that bears a striking resemblance to the plot of Miss Saigon.
Model Ancestor (Schneider, right) imparts wacky wisdom to Lauren (left) while his associate (Sebastian) listens intently.
Jon Norman Schneider performs as a demented RuPaul runway escapee playing a fictional ancestral monster. One of the evening's clearest visual highlights is his appearance in towering platform high heels.
In an attempt to solve a riddle that will allow Lauren to locate her father, she encounters the Lum Elders (Jon Norman Schneider, Maureen Sebastian, and David Shih). Much like the riddler guarding the bridge in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, these three demented characters desire only one thing: acceptance to a University of California campus for their grandchildren.
Lauren: You want your grandkids to go to UCLA over Yale?
Lum Elders: Yes. (Go, Bruins!)
Lauren: That makes absolutely no sense.
Lum Elders: You leave California, you go East Coast, and you never come back again.
Well, Lauren does come back to the Yee Fung Toy building to write a play about her father, expressing her love and appreciation in a sentimental soliloquy. It is a tender moment after two hours of silliness.
King of the Yees runs through Nov. 22 at the Signature Theatre (480 West 42nd St.). Evening performances are at 7 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturday; matinees are at 2 p.m. Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. No Wednesday matinee on Nov. 18. For tickets and more information, visit signaturetheatre.org.
Playwright: Lauren Yee
Director: Joshua Kahan Brody
Scenic Design: Krit Robinson
Costume Design: Michelle J. Li
Lighting Design: Jiyoun Chang
Sound Design: Fan Zhang
Wig, Hair & Makeup Design: Tommy Kurzman
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