Eclectic, Uneven Look at Asian Identity

In 1994 Dan Kwong started a performance group called Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Asian Men . . . in Los Angeles. A year later, Gary San Angel established a similar group in New York called Peeling the Banana.

The two groups have joined forces to present almost two dozen short performance pieces under the equally cumbersome title “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Peeling the Banana.” The show is the first in Treasure in the House, the sixth annual Asian Pacific American performance and visual art festival at Highways.

The pieces in “Everything”--which ranged from an interpretive dance tribute to one man’s grandmother, to a symbolic wrestling match between father and son--were generally thoughtful and mostly humorous in content. The quality of presentation, though, varied by performer.

Kwong’s “All for One, One for All” exposes the most overlooked athletes in all of high school sports: the cross-country team. They are, Kwong says, an “oddball nerdish lot,” who think football players don’t know what real pain is. Jogging in place throughout, Kwong dissects the amusing nature of bonding and competition between runners.

San Angel’s hilarious piece, “The Right Stuff,” unfortunately was only on the program Thursday and Friday night. Standing inside a PCV tube frame, San Angel holds three candles near his face, which contorts silently with some sort of pain or ecstasy, we’re not sure which at first--until he begins his narrative about masturbation.

A scene in the movie “The Right Stuff” brings altar boy San Angel to a point of intense arousal, which is then nearly quashed by guilty visions of the Virgin Mary and Jesus. The frame becomes a wonderfully effective prop, shifting from a Catholic confessional, to a bathroom mirror, to a bed.

Other pieces focus more on Asian American identity--though it quickly becomes clear that there is no one such identity. The members are first- to fourth-generation Americans, whose families hail from India to the Philippines. What seems more unifying is their relationship to pop culture.

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Mark Jue’s “Carrying the Torch” begins and ends with references to the ‘70s TV show “Kung Fu.” In a deadpan voice, Kwong parodies David Carradine: “Leave me alone. I’m just an actor who makes a lot of money trying to be Chinese.” Royd Yukio Hatta cleverly uses “Star Wars” references to explain his relationship to Asian women in “Sssister.” And Bertrand Wang wrestles with the positive role model and inescapable stereotype provided by Bruce Lee.

Alex Luu’s excerpt from “Three Lives” is a potent examination of the forces of assimilation. Repeatedly told by his father to fit in, he realizes just how much he has adjusted to America when his cousin arrives from Vietnam. The monologue has a nice arc, though the postscript about how the cousin winds up in a gang feels unneeded.

Other pieces seemed to be closer to workshop level. Darrell Kunitomi’s “Barrio Japan” is too wandering to be an effective improvisation. In “Color of Innocence,” Ngo Thanh Nhan is too hesitant as he tells his infant son (really a Cabbage Patch doll) about Vietnamese culture through colors.

“Babylon Men,” a four-part abstract piece, had men wearing only towels around their waists (and sometimes not even that) as its primary motif. Paul Park’s nonverbal piece garnered more giggles than understanding from Thursday’s audience.

To close the program, the entire ensemble sang “Roads to Travel.” Nothing against San Angel’s songwriting, but it left the show with a summer-camp talent show feel. All of the performances deserved better than that.

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* “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Peeling the Banana,” Highways, 1651 18th St., Santa Monica. Tonight at 8:30; Sunday, 2 p.m. $12. (213) 660-8587. Running time: 2 hours 30 minutes.