TERRI: Is that what you think? (Beat) Tell me more . . .
MARK: You went out—into the world . . . I dunno, after college maybe—I think you went to college . . .
TERRI: Doesn’t matter.
MARK: But the world—it didn’t turn out the way you planned . . . rejection hung in the air all around you—in the workplace, in movies, in the casual joking of the population. The painful struggle . . . to be accepted as a spirit among others . . . only to find yourself constantly weighed and measured by those outward bits of yourself so easily grasped, too easily understood. Maybe you were harassed at work—maybe even raped—I don’t know.
TERRI: It doesn’t matter. The specifics never matter.
MARK: So you found your way here—somehow—back of the Hollywood Star—something—roomfuls of men begging to be punished for the way they act out there—wanting you to even the score—and you decided—that this was a world you could call your own.
TERRI: And so, I learned what it feels like to be a man. To labor breathlessly accumulating power while all the time it’s dawning how tiring, what a burden, how utterly numbing—it is actually to possess. The touch of power is cold like metal. It chafes the skin, but you know nothing better to hold to your breast. So you travel down this blind road of hunger—constantly victimizing yourself in the person of others—until you despair of ever again feeling warm or safe—until you forget such possibilities exist. Until they become sentimental relics of a weaker man’s delusions. And driven by your need, you slowly destroy yourself. (She starts to remove her gloves) Unless, one day, you choose to try something completely different.
MARK: What are you doing? Wait!
TERRI: It’s a new game, Mark. A new ethnic game. The kind you like.
MARK: We can’t play—without costumes.
TERRI: Oh, but it’s the wildest interracial fantasy of all. It’s called . . . two hearts meeting in a bondage parlor on the outskirts of Encino. With skins—more alike than not. (She tosses her gloves away) Haven’t we met before? I’m certain we have. You were the one who came into my chamber wanting to play all the races.
MARK: Why are you doing this to me? I’m the customer here!
TERRI: No, your time is up. Or haven’t you kept your eyes on the clock? At least I know I’m not leaving you bored.
MARK: Then . . . shouldn’t I be going?
TERRI: If you like. But I’m certain we’ve met before. I found it so interesting, so different, your fantasy. And I’ve always been a good student, a diligent employee. My daddy raised me to take pride in all of America’s service professions. So I started to . . . try and understand all the races I never thought of as my own. Then, what happened?
MARK: You’re asking me?
TERRI: C’mon—let me start you off. I have a box in my closet—
(Terri runs her bare hands up and down Mark’s body as he speaks:)
MARK: In which you keep all the research you’ve done . . . for me. Every clipping, magazine article, ethnic journals, transcripts from Phil Donahue. Blacks against Jews in Crown Heights—your eyes went straight to the headlines. The rise of neo-Nazism in Marseilles and Orange County. And then, further—the mass-murderer in Canada who said, “The feminists made me do it.” You became a collector of all the rejection and rage in this world. (Pause) Am I on the right track?
TERRI: Is that what you’ve been doing?
MARK: And that box—that box is overflowing now. Books are piled high to the hems of your dresses, clippings slide out from beneath the door. And you . . . you looked at it . . . maybe this morning . . . and you realized your box was . . . full. And so you began to stumble. You started to feel there was nothing more here for you.
TERRI: If you say it, it must be true.
MARK: Is it?
(Terri starts to unlace her thigh-high boots.)
TERRI: I’m prepared to turn in my uniform and start again from here.
MARK: You’re quitting your job?
TERRI: The masks don’t work. The leather is pointless. I’m giving notice as we speak.
MARK: But—what if I’m wrong?
TERRI: I’m afraid I’ll have to take that chance.
MARK: No, you can’t just—what about your hatred of men? Are you really going to just throw it all away when it’s served you so well?
TERRI: I’ve been a man. I’ve been a woman. I’ve been colorful and colorless. And now, I’m tired of hating myself.
(Pause.)
MARK: And what about me?
TERRI: That’s something you’ll have to decide.
MARK: I’m not sure I can leave you. Not after all this time.
TERRI: Then stay. And strip. As lovers often do.
(As Terri removes her costume, Mark turns and looks away.)
MARK: I worry when I think about the coming millennium. Because it feels like all labels have to be rewritten, all assumptions reexamined, all associations redefined. The rules that governed behavior in the last era are crumbling, but those of the time to come have yet to be written. And there is a struggle brewing over the shape of these changing words, a struggle that begins here, now, in our hearts, in our shuttered rooms, in the lightning decisions that appear from nowhere.
(Terri has stripped off her costume, except for her hood. She wears a simple bra and panties. Mark turns to look at her.)
I think you’re very beautiful.
TERRI: Even without the metal and leather?
MARK: You look . . . soft and warm and gentle to the touch.
TERRI: I’m about to remove my hood. I’m giving you fair warning.
MARK: There’s . . . only one thing I never managed to achieve here. I never managed to defeat you.
TERRI: You understand me. Shouldn’t I be a lot more frightened? But—the customer is always right. So come over here. This is my final command to you.
MARK: Yes, Mistress Terri.
TERRI: Take off my hood. You want to—admit it.
MARK: Yes. I want to.
TERRI: The moment you remove this hood, I’ll be completely exposed, while you remain fully covered. And you’ll have your victory by the rules of our engagement, while I—I’ll fly off over the combat zone.
(Terri places Mark’s left hand on her hood.)
So congratulations. And good-bye.
(With his right hand, Mark undoes his own hood instead. He takes it off. He is an Asian man.)
You disobeyed me.
MARK: I love you.
(Terri removes her hood. She’s a Caucasian woman.)
TERRI: I think you’re very beautiful, too.
(Mark starts to remove the rest of his costume.)
At a moment like this, I can’t help but wonder, was it all so terribly necessary? Did we have to wander so far afield to reach a point which comes, when it does at last, so naturally?
MARK: I was afraid. I was an Asian man.
TERRI: And I was a woman, of any description.
MARK: Why are we talking as if those facts were behind us?
TERRI: Well, we have determined to move beyond the world of fantasy . . . haven’t we?
(Mark’s costume is off. He stands in simple boxer shorts. Mark and Terri cross the stage toward one another.)
MARK: But tell the truth—would you have dated me? If I’d come to you first like this?
TERRI: Who knows? Anything’s possible. This is the 1990s.
(Mark touches Terri’s hair. They gaze at each other’s faces as lights fade to black.)
END OF PLAY
TRYING TO FIND CHINATOWN
(1996)
Production History
Trying to Find Chinatown received its premiere at the Actors Theatre of Louisville (Jon Jory, Producing Director), as part of the 20th Annual Humana Festival of New American Plays, in Louisville, Kentucky, on March 29, 1996. It was directed by Paul McCrane; the set design was by Paul Owen; the costume design was by Kevin R. McLeod; the lighting design was by Brian Scott; the sound design was by Martin Desjardins;
the original violin music was composed by Derek Reeves; the dramaturg was Michael Bigelow Dixon; and the stage manager was Julie A. Richardson. The cast was as follows:
BENJAMIN Richard Thompson
RONNIE Zar Acayan
Characters
BENJAMIN, Caucasian male, early twenties. RONNIE, Asian-Amerian male, mid-twenties.
Time and Place
A street corner on the Lower East Side, New York City. The present.
Note on Music
Obviously, it would be foolish to require that the actor portraying Ronnie perform the specified violin music live. The score of this play can be played on tape over the house speakers, and the actor can feign playing the violin using a bow treated with soap. However, in order to effect a convincing illusion, it is desirable that the actor possess some familiarity with the violin or another stringed instrument.
Darkness. Over the house speakers, sound fades in: Hendrix-like virtuoso rock ’n’ roll riffs—heavy feedback, distortion, phase shifting, wah-wah—amplified over a tiny Fender pug-nose.
Lights fade up to reveal that the music’s being played over a solid-body electric violin by Ronnie, a Chinese-American male in his mid-twenties; he is dressed in retro-’60s clothing and has a few requisite ’90s body mutilations. He’s playing on a sidewalk for money, his violin case open before him; change and a few stray bills have been left by previous passersby.
Benjamin enters; he’s in his early twenties, blond, blue-eyed, a Midwestern tourist in the big city. He holds a scrap of paper in his hands, scanning street signs for an address. He pauses before Ronnie, listens for a while. With a truly bravura run, Ronnie concludes the number and falls to his knees, gasping. Benjamin applauds.
BENJAMIN: Good. That was really great. (Pause) I didn’t . . . I mean, a fiddle . . . I mean, I’d heard them at square dances, on country stations and all, but I never . . . wow, this must really be New York City!
(Benjamin applauds, starts to walk on. Still on his knees, Ronnie clears his throat loudly.)
Oh, I . . . you’re not just doing this for your health, right?
(Benjamin reaches in his pocket, pulls out a couple of coins. Ronnie clears his throat again.)
Look, I’m not a millionaire, I’m just . . .
(Benjamin pulls out his wallet, removes a dollar bill. Ronnie nods his head and gestures toward the violin case as he takes out a pack of cigarettes, lights one.)
RONNIE: And don’t call it a “fiddle,” OK?
BENJAMIN: Oh. Well, I didn’t mean to—
RONNIE: You sound like a wuss. A hick. A dipshit.
BENJAMIN: It just slipped out. I didn’t really—
RONNIE: If this was a fiddle, I’d be sitting here with a cob pipe, stomping my cowboy boots and kicking up hay. Then I’d go home and fuck my cousin.
BENJAMIN: Oh! Well, I don’t really think—
RONNIE: Do you see a cob pipe? Am I fucking my cousin?
BENJAMIN: Well, no, not at the moment, but—
RONNIE: All right. Then this is a violin, now you give me your money, and I ignore the insult. Herein endeth the lesson.
(Pause.)
BENJAMIN: Look, a dollar’s more than I’ve ever given to a . . . to someone asking for money.
RONNIE: Yeah, well, this is New York. Welcome to the cost of living.
BENJAMIN: What I mean is, maybe in exchange, you could help me—?
RONNIE: Jesus Christ! Do you see a sign around my neck reading “Big Apple Fucking Tourist Bureau”?
BENJAMIN: I’m just looking for an address, I don’t think it’s far from here, maybe you could . . . ?
(Benjamin holds out his scrap of paper, Ronnie snatches it away.)
RONNIE: You’re lucky I’m such a goddamn softy. (He looks at the paper) Oh, fuck you. Just suck my dick, you and the cousin you rode in on.
BENJAMIN: I don’t get it! What are you—?
RONNIE: Eat me. You know exactly what I—
BENJAMIN: I’m just asking for a little—
RONNIE: “13 Doyers Street”? Like you don’t know where that is?
BENJAMIN: Of course I don’t know! That’s why I’m asking—
RONNIE: C’mon, you trailer-park refugee. You don’t know that’s Chinatown?
BENJAMIN: Sure I know that’s Chinatown.
RONNIE: I know you know that’s Chinatown.
BENJAMIN: So? That doesn’t mean I know where Chinatown—
RONNIE: So why is it that you picked me, of all the street musicians in the city—to point you in the direction of Chinatown? Lemme guess—is it the earring? No, I don’t think so. The Hendrix riffs? Guess again, you fucking moron.
BENJAMIN: Now, wait a minute. I see what you’re—
RONNIE: What are you gonna ask me next? Where you can find the best dim sum in the city? Whether I can direct you to a genuine opium den? Or do I happen to know how you can meet Miss Saigon for a night of nookie-nookie followed by a good old-fashioned ritual suicide? Now, get your white ass off my sidewalk. One dollar doesn’t even begin to make up for all this aggravation. Why don’t you go back home and race bullfrogs, or whatever it is you do for—?
BENJAMIN: Brother, I can absolutely relate to your anger. Righteous rage, I suppose, would be a more appropriate term. To be marginalized, as we are, by a white racist patriarchy, to the point where the accomplishments of our people are obliterated from the history books, this is cultural genocide of the first order, leading to the fact that you must do battle with all of Euro-America’s emasculating and brutal stereotypes of Asians—the opium den, the sexual objectification of the Asian female, the exoticized image of a tourist’s Chinatown which ignores the exploitation of workers, the failure to unionize, the high rate of mental illness and tuberculosis—against these, each day, you rage, no, not as a victim, but as a survivor, yes, brother, a glorious warrior survivor!
(Silence.)
RONNIE: Say what?
BENJAMIN: So, I hope you can see that my request is not—
RONNIE: Wait, wait.
BENJAMIN:—motivated by the sorts of racist assumptions—
RONNIE: But, but where . . . how did you learn all that?
BENJAMIN: All what?
RONNIE: All that—you know—oppression stuff—tuberculosis . . .
BENJAMIN: It’s statistically irrefutable. TB occurs in the community at a rate—
RONNIE: Where did you learn it?
BENJAMIN: I took Asian-American studies. In college.
RONNIE: Where did you go to college?
BENJAMIN: University of Wisconsin. Madison.
RONNIE: Madison, Wisconsin?
BENJAMIN: That’s not where the bridges are, by the way.
RONNIE: Huh? Oh, right . . .
BENJAMIN: You wouldn’t believe the number of people who—
RONNIE: They have Asian-American studies in Madison, Wisconsin? Since when?
BENJAMIN: Since the last Third World Unity hunger strike. (Pause) Why do you look so surprised? We’re down.
RONNIE: I dunno. It just never occurred to me, the idea of Asian students in the Midwest going on a hunger strike.
BENJAMIN: Well, a lot of them had midterms that week, so they fasted in shifts. (Pause) The administration never figured it out. The Asian students put that “They all look alike” stereotype to good use.
RONNIE: OK, so they got Asian-American studies. That still doesn’t explain—
BENJAMIN: What?
RONNIE: Well . . . what you were doing taking it?
BENJAMIN: Just like everyone else. I wanted to explore my roots. And, you know, the history of oppression which is my legacy. After a lifetime of assimilation, I wanted to find out who I really am.
(Pause.)
RONNIE: And did you?
BENJAMIN: Sure. I learned to take pride in my ancestors who built the railroads, my Popo who would make me a hot bowl of jok with thousand-day-old eggs when the white kids chased me home yelling, “Gook! Chink! Slant-eyes!”
RONNI
E: OK, OK, that’s enough!
BENJAMIN: Painful to listen to, isn’t it?
RONNIE: I don’t know what kind of bullshit ethnic studies program they’re running over in Wuss-consin, but did they bother to teach you that in order to find your Asian “roots,” it’s a good idea to first be Asian?
(Pause.)
BENJAMIN: Are you speaking metaphorically?
RONNIE: No! Literally! Look at your skin!
BENJAMIN: You know, it’s very stereotypical to think that all Asian skin tones conform to a single hue.
RONNIE: You’re white! Is this some kind of redneck joke or something? Am I the first person in the world to tell you this?
BENJAMIN: Oh! Oh! Oh!
RONNIE: I know real Asians are scarce in the Midwest, but . . . Jesus!
BENJAMIN: No, of course, I . . . I see where your misunderstanding arises.
RONNIE: Yeah. It’s called, “You white.”
BENJAMIN: It’s just that—in my hometown of Tribune, Kansas, and then at school—see, everyone knows me—so this sort of thing never comes up. (He offers his hand) Benjamin Wong. I forget that a society wedded to racial constructs constantly forces me to explain my very existence.
RONNIE: Ronnie Chang. Otherwise known as “The Bow Man.”
BENJAMIN: You see, I was adopted by Chinese-American parents at birth. So, clearly, I’m an Asian-American—
Trying to Find Chinatown: The Selected Plays of David Henry Hwang Page 22