M. Butterfly
Sexual subterfuge, gender illusion and geopolitical intrigue are the elements that spin David Henry Hwang’s 1988 existential tale ’M. Butterfly’ in its Philadelphia premiere by Philadelphia Theatre Company. PTC’s gets to show the depth and potential of the Suzanne Roberts Theater stage with Michael Fagin stunning set design and Chris Lee dazzling film noir lighting. Asian stereotypes are shattered through visual templates refracted through Fagin’s outsized fan time-tunnel, alternately concaved and convexed.
Hwang’s uses Puccini’s "Madama Butterfly" as the most damning illustration of toxic East-West relations. The play’s razor sharp politics puncture both Imperialism and Communism as ideological constructs of insecure men with power. Hwang’s embroiled metaphors become a challenging and supple polemic of East West divides.
Set in China and Paris in the 60s, the drama’s layers are both steely and delicate, pointed and specious, hard and soft- all represented in the motives, desires and actions of doomed French diplomat Rene Gallimard (Christopher Innvar) and his fantasia concubine Song Liling (Telly Leung).
Based on a real incident, Hwang is such a potent playwright that his off-handed cultural markers from the Indochina wars of the 50s and 60s bring back the whole cultural landscape. The prevailing sexual mores are the catalyst for Gallimard’s self-deception. He’s in a loving, yet passionless marriage and becomes enchanted by Song after seeing her in a Shanghai production of Madame Butterfly, staged for western diplomats who don’t know the difference between Geisha and Chinese Opera.
His affair becomes an escape from the stuffy functions that descend into boozy men’s clubs. Embassy affairs that are little more than moves on a diplomatic chessboards where puffed up men come don’t realize that they are political pawns.
Hwang is just as cutting exposing the maneuvers of Ambassador Toulon (a chilling performance by Larry Petersen) as he is condemning to Mao’s Communist indoctrination embodied here by Comrade Chin (an equally chilling Doan Ly) who also exploits Song. In a prescient statement that resonates on the world stage today, Chin pronounces that under Chairman Mao "There is no homosexuality in China"
Song’s Geisha dance for Gallimard is a subservient dance and in this scenario a running commentary of deception. Leung gives a lyrical physical performance that is also vocally engaging. He casts stunning stage pictures helped all along by Lee’s lighting and of course, working Helen Huang’s vibrant costumes. An arresting moment comes late in the play when Song invites the audience to leave while he reveals his true identity. His highly untheatrical transformation is riveting.
Director Joe Calarco should step up the tempo in the first act. Hwang’s dense tableaus led to skittish pacing and tangled dialogue during 2nd night performance I attended. The play comes alive during Gallimard’s visit to the Peking Opera where the sword acrobats and dancers (Wen Tao Li and Ying Chun Li) took the stage. Innvar seems to get lost in some of Gallimard’s interior narration, his voiced thoughts should drive the story forward more than slow it down.
Act II is more cohesive and as the intrigue increases, Innvar and Leung are hypnotic together. M. Butterfly’s dénouement is a shatteringly melodramatic a cross between Puccini’s opera and Samuel Beckett. Leung’s intricately calibrated performance is not to be missed.
Suzanne Roberts Theatre
Broad and Lombard Streets.
Through Feb. 24.
Tickets: $46-$58.
215-985-0420
www.philadelphiatheatrecompany.org.
