Vietgone review: By the time ninjas show up, it’s clear facts weren’t in the way

Vietgone ★★★★½
Playhouse, QPAC, until November 18

By the time the ninjas arrive, it’s clear playwright Qui Nguyen is not one to let the facts get in the way of a good story.

The scene is a racist attack by a redneck on Nguyen’s refugee father in Arizona in the mid-1970s. The way it’s told in Vietgone, the redneck has a gang of ninja henchmen on his side, yet all are handily dispatched by Quang (Will Tran) and his friend Nhan (Aljin Abella) with their mad martial arts skills.

Quang and Nhan (Will Tran and Aljin Abella) tackle their assailants in Queensland Theatre’s Vietgone,.Credit: Brett Boardman

That’s the genius of this 2015 play, first staged in California by a playwright who has gone on to co-write Disney animations Raya and the Last Dragon and Strange World: it embraces the loosey-goosey quality of all storytelling, especially where family histories are concerned.

But first, some certifiable truths: Qui Nguyen’s father was a helicopter pilot for the South Vietnamese army. He rescued several compatriots before the arrival of the Vietcong in 1975, but in the process ended up in America, separated from his family.

Meanwhile Nyugen’s eventual mother, Tong (Kristie Nguy), masterminded her own escape prior to the fall of Saigon, taking her mother Huong (Ngoc Phan) with her. She and Quang met in an internment camp in Arkansas.

Ajin Abella (Khue) and Kristie Nguy (Tong) in Queensland Theatre’s Vietgone.Credit: Brett Boardman

The first impediment to any tale of immigrants is the language barrier, and Nguyen sets out the rules from the get-go via actor Hieu Luong, who addresses the audience directly as The Playwright. The Vietnamese people in the show will speak like streetwise Americans, we’re told, and the Americans will speak a gibberish made up of words such as “cheeseburger”, “French fries” and “prejudice”.

This simple device makes it easy for Hollywood-trained audiences to transfer their empathy to the people who are usually exoticised and othered. (Nguyen has said he was tired of Vietnamese characters being relegated to supporting roles in narratives such as Platoon, Rambo and Miss Saigon.)

And the playwright has no qualms about giving his parents exaggerated American qualities. Thus Quang wears a Marlon Brando leather jacket and rides a motorcycle, while Tong is fiery, lusty and sassy, describing herself as “a warrior bitch”.

Oh, and both of them are rappers.

When Tong and Quang meet, the fireworks are instantaneous, but Quang is determined to get on a boat back to Vietnam and his family, and thus begins an Easy Rider-style road trip across the country with the wisecracking Nhan along for the ride (puckish Abella shines in his sidekick role).

Imagine a potty-mouthed, super-sexy Hamilton set after the Vietnam War and played for laughs, and you’ll get where Vietgone is coming from.

Queensland Theatre’s production easily fills the wide stage of the Playhouse, with Christina Smith’s set consisting of one massive billboard onto which surtitles, dreams and sobering historical photos are projected.

Kristie Nguy tears up the stage with her raunchy performance as the unstoppable Tong, while Will Tran slips easily from alpha-Asian mode to the moving final scene depicting Quang as an old man.

Quang (Will Tran) is a portrait of the playwright’s father with exaggerated American qualities.Credit: Brett Boardman

Patrick Jhanur and Ngoc Phan play 13 roles between them, the latter raising the roof as Tong’s demanding, Tigerish mum. In addition to such deft character work, Phan co-directed the show with Daniel Evans.

In a generous gesture, Queensland Theatre is offering free tickets to high school students, who will no doubt be thrilled to discover that theatre telling such an educational story can be so exciting, funny and just plain naughty. I certainly was.