DramaLondonReview

Summer Rolls – Park Theatre, London

Writer: Tuyen Do

Director: Kristine Landon-Smith

Reviewer: Maryam Philpott

While the social and cultural legacy of the Second World War has fundamentally shaped our nation, we too easily forget the more remote twentieth-century conflicts that have had a lasting impact on modern Britain. Tuyen Do is making history at the Park Theatre with the first British-Vietnamese play examining two generations of a community searching for identity and security in a country that became their home.

Arriving in Britain after the Vietnam War, Father and Mother work for fellow immigrant Mr Dinh making clothes. With a plan to open her own restaurant business, Mother tries to instil some discipline and respect for their heritage into photographer daughter Mai who is torn between the British culture she has grown up with and the more restrictive homelife. As another war begins in the Middle East, the family struggle to align their past and future.

Do’s play, Summer Rolls, has a lot to say about the experience of living within and between two different cultures. There are several themes that recur throughout the story including the effect of war as both a barrier to and inspiration for changing your life, the traditional expectations placed on female family members and the attempts to crush unrealistic dreams versus clinging to self-belief.

Like its central female character, Mother, Do’s play almost has too much to say, setting itself so broad a scope that is doesn’t have time to delve more deeply into some of the more throwaway references that hint at domestic violence, PTSD, Christianity and the division between north and south Vietnamese refugees living together as one in the UK. Yet at the same time, Do’s writing is a tad verbose, so scenes often last a fraction too long without adding any new information. Some judicious edits to the pacing and content could create the slick family saga that Summer Rollswants to be.

Do excels in the creation of character connections and frustrations borne of years of living together and the numerous domestic clashes that eventually lead to a major breach. Linh-Dan Pham as Mother is a really interesting creation, seemingly harsh to her daughter and unforgiving of weakness. It’s still a rarity to see a female character drive the action so purposefully as Mother does here, and not only does she have all the best comic lines, but as the play unfolds her complexity increases creating greater empathy for her own transitional experience.

Anna Nguyen plays daughter Mai over a number of years, growing from a sulky teenager forced to speak Vietnamese at home while being pushed aside when the family don’t need her. Mai enjoys all the usual rebellions – smoking, drinking and a supposedly unsuitable boyfriend – but Nguyen has a very natural stage presence which makes her actions credible and her growth into a determined young photographer is well managed.

The male characters are far less rounded and while Kwong Loke’s Father has lots of potential storylines including the effect of his dominant wife, his war record and some family surprises, these aspects of his character never quite come together. Likewise, Michael Phong Le’s son Anh and David Lee-Jones as friend Mr Dinh feel thinly sketched, a reflection of Mother and Mai’s experiences, but with no psychological depth of their own.

There is enough content here for a couple of plays and a little simplification will help Do to streamline ideas and help the central human story to shine through the wider drama. Full of ideas about displacement, entrepreneurial determination and individual development – themes that all kinds of communities have in common – Summer Rollsis a step forward in the multicultural representation of modern Britain.

Runs until: 13 July 2019 | Image: Danté Kim

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