playwright keiko green and director jesca prudencio discuss bringing the theatricality of exotic Deadly: or the msg play to the stage and their personal connections to the story.
Interview by Sonia Desai
How did this play develop? What was the inspiration?
Keiko Green: This play grew from a few different impulses. One was my grandpa: my Japanese grandpa was a food scientist for a major MSG manufacturer, which we talk about in the play, and I always wanted to write a play about that. Especially because Americans—not just white Americans but also Asian Americans—for a really long time thought that MSG was scientifically proven to be bad for us. I always had that idea in my mind. And then when the pandemic hit, I decided that I needed to write something that would make me laugh. So I started to write this play that became a kind of escape. I was no longer writing what I thought theatres wanted—I just wanted to write something that brought me joy, that made me laugh.
As I was figuring out the voice of the play, it became clear that it wanted to be a coming-of-age story. I love coming-of-age stories. I love the fantasy that can exist in that, the fun and humor, and how we can have storytelling through someone’s perspective that might be a little bit unreliable.
The play contains some very fantastical elements, which you use to open up a discussion about hard emotions. Where did those elements come from?
KG: I grew up in the South—I’m a five-foot-nine Asian gal who grew up in Georgia—so I’ve always felt a little bit like an outsider. And I think the question that I always ask myself when I’m writing a play is: instead of telling an audience what something feels like, how can we show them? How can people experience it? How can people experience the flavor of MSG, the essence of eating a delicious ramen, or a Dorito? One of the themes in the play is depression, so instead of just telling people the character is depressed, how can we show them what depression can feel like? I love bringing collaborators a first draft that’s full of crazy ideas and stage directions and seeing what sticks.
Jesca, how are you approaching a text filled with so much theatricality? What are your thoughts about the “impossible” stage directions in the play, especially ones that encapsulate such profound ideas?
Jesca Prudencio: That’s exactly why I wanted to direct the play. I only direct things that I feel are impossible! If I read something and think, “I don’t even know how that can happen on stage,” that means I need to direct it. Because it sparks something within me, it’s calling me theatrically. You can solve anything in the theatre, even more than in other art forms. We just need to create our own world with its own rules and trust that the audience will meet us there. And what’s been really exciting for me and the design team is how we approach each impossibility with creativity and collaboration. How do we create a flavor explosion? How do we travel to the bottom of the ocean? How do we time travel? These are things that excite me. I love that we never know what’s going to happen next in this journey, because even Ami, our main character, doesn’t know where her mind is going.
Would you talk a bit about the family relationships in the play?
KG: The relationship between Ami and her mother is definitely modeled after me and my mom. I went to a private Japanese-language school in Atlanta until the fifth grade, and for a long time my mom drove me there. We became really close on those rides, we listened to a lot Broadway soundtracks, singing along, which is how my love for theatre started. I have a great relationship with my mom. But I also wanted to write about the conflicts that exist in a family, even when everyone is actually trying their best. Even when Ami is rebelling against her mom, even when she’s snapping at her, those moments are always filled with love.
JP: One thing that really connects me to this piece is thinking about how we love. How do we love our family? I feel myself and my family very clearly in the play. There’s so much love between these people, but how they’re showing love is not being received in the way they want. So that helps me understand these characters—and it helps me understand my family, knowing that they’re just trying to love me, but not in the way that I want, or the way I think they should.
Do you have any questions you would like to ask each other?
KG: Is there any part of the play that scares you or makes you nervous, Jesca?
JP: I never want anyone to be confused about where we are and who each actor is playing. So the thing that scares me—or the thing that I’m going to be watching throughout—is clarity when it comes to character and place. It’s precision: I’m really going to be watching for precision.
KG: I love that.
JP: My question for you is about what you want to leave the audience with. I loved what you said about joy earlier. Post-pandemic, joy is essential to everything I work on, and I think a lot about what we hope our audiences walk away with, whether that’s feelings or images or thoughts or questions.
KG: This is probably the most personal play I’ve ever written. After I switched from my Japanese school to the public school down the street, my mom continued to make me these Japanese lunch boxes, which play a huge part in the play as well. She would try to make them more Western: she would try to make pasta, but it would have shiso powder on it, so it would be purple; or she’d make Japanese fried chicken, which is delicious, but there would be a smell. Just like Ami, I was always so sensitive about how my lunch smelled, because other kids were having, you know, turkey sandwiches and Cheetos, and they would react to my lunch with an instinctual “ew.” It’s that casual dismissal of your culture that makes you start to be embarrassed of who you are. So when I think about the audiences, I hope they will walk away feeling moved, and but also thinking a little bit more about how they engage with other cultures moving forward.
