Disney writer captures Vietnam War love story with 'Vietgone' in Cincinnati

Ask Americans about the Vietnam War and you'll get a variety of responses. Those under 30 may glaze over a bit. After all, the war ended more than two decades before they were born. It’s ancient history to them.

But the older the person you ask, the more detailed and visceral the response is likely to be. They’ll conjure up memories of political and social chaos, a time that rivaled the present day for divisiveness and anger.

When playwright Qui Nguyen set out to write a play about the era, though, he called on a very different set of emotions. Certainly, conflict and all manner of moral dilemmas are part of “Vietgone,” as his play is called. But this is not a chest-thumping political diatribe.

Rather, as Nguyen explains in the opening scene, “Vietgone” is a story about falling in love. And it’s currently playing in the Playhouse in the Park’s Rosenthal Shelterhouse Theatre through June 2.

“I wanted to tell my parents’ story,” said Nguyen in a recent conversation. “But I wanted to tell it the way I would tell it.”

So what does that mean, exactly? What is his way?

To Nguyen, the Vietnam War – “The American War” to Vietnamese – is the stuff of family lore. His parents came of age during the war and were evacuated to the United States as Saigon fell into the hands of hostile North Vietnamese forces. But they didn’t know one another until they crossed paths in 1975 at a refugee resettlement facility at Fort Chaffee, Arkansas.

Nguyen was born a year later. He’s 47 now, born and raised in El Dorado, Arkansas, a town of 17,000 in southernmost Arkansas, just 15 miles from the Louisiana border. Though he was thoroughly immersed in Vietnamese culture, he is in every way the all-American kid. He’s become the all-American success story, as well.

He’s one of those rare writers whose work you may have actually heard of. He writes for the Disney Company. He co-wrote the screenplay for “Raya and the Last Dragon” and wrote and co-directed “Strange World.” He shared a daytime Emmy for his work on PBS’ “Peg + Cat.”

But don’t be misled by that mainstream bio. He has a slightly anarchic side, too. He’s the co-founder of the Vampire Cowboys, a noted off-Broadway theater company he and a friend began in 2000 when they were graduate students at Ohio University. The last line of the group’s mission statement is “To be a theatre that is soaked in the cultural bloodstream of the now.”

If that line didn’t raise your eyebrows, skim through the titles of the plays Nguyen’s written and you may get a better idea – “Alice in Slasherland,” “Living Dead in Denmark,” “Aliens Versus Cheerleaders” and his hip-hop musical, “Krunk Fu Battle Battle.”

“I guess you’d say that even though I’m working for Disney, I have an indie spirit,” he said.

And “Vietgone” is chock-full of Nguyen’s more mischievous and impudent sides. The dialogue is filled with sexual banter. And the language is often coarse. But there is nothing mean-spirited about any of it. Indeed, there is so much action on the stage that the five-person cast sometimes feels like it has pulled us into the vortex of a three-ring circus.

At one moment, we find ourselves racing across the country on a “rusted-out death bike,” meeting weed-puffing flower children and racist bikers. Moments later, Nguyen’s characters become hip-hoppers and B-boys. There’s disco, too. And ghostly nightmares. And ... well, it takes everything you have to keep up with the delightfully frantic pace of the play.

Talking to Nguyen is a similar experience. It’s a little like fast-forwarding through an audio file. He has so much to say and not nearly enough time to get it all out. You don’t really have a chance to react before he’s raced off in another direction. His play is like that, too – hilarious, profound, absurd and sometimes tear-jerking. And that might all happen in the space of two minutes.

At Nguyen’s request, the production was directed by Playhouse associate artistic director Joanie Schultz. She came to Cincinnati in 2021, the same year that Nguyen’s wife, Abby Marcus, became the Playhouse’s managing director. He was impressed with the work Schultz did directing the theater’s 2022 production of “Frida…A Self Portrait.” And besides, Schultz has roots in the same sort of daredevil theater he does.

“I’m honored to be doing it,” said Schultz earlier this year. “It’s a family story, a personal story, so I want to do it really well.”

When he was very young, Nguyen was surrounded with the Vietnamese language. He picked up English so slowly that a counselor recommended the family stop speaking Vietnamese to him.

That didn’t work for his grandmother, though.

“She was in her 80s and didn’t speak a lick of English,” said Nguyen. “So whenever I had a chance, I spoke with her. In Vietnamese. So she started telling me stories. When she left Vietnam, she left in such a hurry that the only things of value she could bring with her were her stories. ‘If I can’t give them to you, what are they for?’ she told me.”

Nguyen’s father had hopes that his son would grow up to become an engineer.

“But my parents had no idea that my grandma had basically turned me into an artist,” said Nguyen. “Being the oldest son, I would be the one responsible for telling their stories. I’ve never forgotten that. It’s a responsibility I honor.”

'Vietgone'

• When: Through June 2.

• Where: Rosenthal Shelterehouse Theatre, Playhouse in the Park, 962 Mount Adams Circle, Mount Adams.

• Tickets: $33.50-$91.

• Information: 513-421-3888; www.cincyplay.com.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: 'Vietgone': A love story by writer of Disney's 'Raya,' 'Strange World'