Dear Mama, There’s Something Maybe I Should Tell You…

Li-Ting (Lansy Feng) has fallen in love – but only online - with a Frenchman, Charles (Anthony Pontonio).  She escapes Taiwan and her fearsome Mama (Sasha Leong) for… Melbourne – of all places.  She and Charles plan to meet up at Flinders Street Station.  But after two hours, Charles doesn’t show and he’s unreachable on any platform.  Li-Ting is desperate.  She plays her ukulele and sings.  Is she a busker or just cheering herself up?  Someone (Michael Chan) steals her ukulele.  Luckily a bunch of Aussies happen by and rescue her.  And so begins Li-Ting’s Aussie adventures – moving into a share house with exuberant Sam (James Lau), Jordan (Sonia Marcon) who’s facing a divorce, pub singer Ash (Meg Farrough) who’s developing a relationship with opinionated Alex (Georgia Radley) – and all under the rule of tough landlady Franki (also Sasha Leong) with her very long list of house rules.  Still no sign of Charles.  So, Li-Ting avoids her Mama’s phone calls and text messages and while she waits, she becomes Aussie-fied at the pub, parties, a barbeque, karaoke, singing herself, taking party drugs, heading for stardom, and developing a very strong taste for Aussie beer. 

In its way, Dear Mama is rather like They’re a Weird Mob but with a naïve – albeit musically talented – girl from Taiwan at the centre.  It’s a scenario ripe for comedy and bursting with ambitious ideas about culture clashes, Aussie mores, Asian versus Aussie morality and traditions, fraught love affairs, the misery of divorce, love on the internet, identity, the search for a home and for success.  But whether all those ideas come together in a coherent narrative here is another matter. 

Lansy Feng’s script is a bit too much ‘one damn thing after another’ – and that’s emphasised by the awkward transitions between scenes with blackouts and scene re-sets with rumbling screens.  There are, certainly, some very well-performed songs, and song and dance numbers, but they too seem incidental. 

As for comedy, unfortunately most of the cast seem to be all too aware that they’re in a comedy – so there’s much over-acting, mugging, and shouting.  James Lau is the chief offender: his Sam so exuberant, and loud, that he’s difficult to understand.  Meanwhile Sonia Marcon’s Jordan, the alcoholic Strine sheila, is so underplayed as to be almost inaudible.  The Alex-Ash combo has friction and potential but there’s not much inherent humour and, although they do get together, it doesn’t impinge on Li-Ting’s story – in fact, she doesn’t even seem to notice. 

Whether these things are due to the script, directorial decisions, or those of the individual cast members, we can’t say.  Sasha Leong stands out here because she plays it straight, like a real person; her Franki and, later, Li-Ting’s (underwritten) Mama do not think they’re in a comedy and consequently are funny – and touching.

By the way, the play’s title suggests that Li-Ting makes a confession to dear Mama, and that there’ll be a reaction, but that never happens.

Lansy Feng, the playwright and the lead, even while succumbing to being funny, does succeed in holding the centre of things while these other characters and sub-plots swirl unnoticed around her.  Her Li-Ting is sweet but irritating, confused but stubborn, loosening up with the help of lots of beer, but still bound by her culture and upbringing.  When (spoiler alert) Charles does show up and his delay is plausibly explained, the show takes on a softer, more romantic tone… until Li-Ting’s Mama-sanctioned fiancé (Michael Chan) bursts in.  (How he found her not plausibly explained.)  Scenes back in Taiwan, with Mama and Baba (also Michael Chan), Li-Ting’s father, have more reality, emotion, and force, making us see that running away to freedom isn’t as easy as it might look.  

Dear Mama leaves the audience well-disposed but somewhat bemused; the play is well-intentioned, and the culture clash themes are potentially worthwhile, but the script needs a rigorous dramaturg, and some discipline and consistency from the cast.

Michael Brindley     

Images: Sarah Clarke Photography.