Weiko Lin's latest play The Best Man stars Lin himself opposite his old friend Leonard Wu (Veronica Mars), Lisa Faiman, and Cathy Shim (Reno 911, MADtv) in a tangled web of jealousy and lies.
Running at East West Players' David Henry Hwang Theater until June 3rd is a guest production entitled The Best Man, written by Weiko Lin and directed by Kevin Lau. Weiko Lin stars as Danny (the best man) and Leonard Wu plays Danny's younger brother Mitchell, who is enjoying (or not) his last night of freedom before his wedding. The two brothers' night is interrupted when Mitchell's fiancé shows up, and her old sparks with Danny threaten to ignite.
Lin's choice to write himself into the play (as he has done many a times before) came from his desire to work with Wu, his old friend from their UCLA theater days.
"I wrote this for [Leonard] because there are so few Asian American roles out there, [so] I decided to write something that would give him a full range of what he could do." Lin explains. "[And then] I wrote it for me so that we could act together again. So I wrote it for both of us."
Not to leave the other two in the dust: this four-person play also features Lisa Faiman as Julia, the ex-wife and soon-to-be-bride that is so busy tyrannizing every situation she probably doesn't realize her true self is not supposed to come out until after the wedding, and Cathy Shim as Misty, a teenager who is very out of place in the Danny-Julia-Mitchell love triangle.
Lin describes his work to be a modern twist on Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and jokingly asserts that it is very common nowadays for a man's ex-wife to end up remarrying his brother. Hopefully, Lin would agree that the other things that happen as the play unfolds aren't as common in real life.
The night passes with the characters confined to a hotel room, leaving only a couple of hours for the audience to witness any character development. Because of the nature of the play's narrow space and scope, the actors had a few of their own challenges to overcome.
"There's only four people, and we're always on stage," says Wu. "That's rare. There's no scene breaks, no intermissions. One 'lights out.' That's it. You just get on stage and do it. That challenge of always being on stage and always being present when you're working off your fellow three actors -- there's nothing like that."
Indeed, for an hour and 45 minutes, Danny, Mitchell, Misty, and Julia try to come to terms with past mistakes and future plans, present decisions and never-going-to-happen dreams. Meanwhile outside of the fictional story of the stage, real life decisions and preparations had to be made.
In putting together The Best Man, Lin had to tackle the issue of funding. The money source largely came from a few private investors and other connections through friends -- people that have a dedication and love for the arts.
"It's like saying, 'Look, we'll cover for what your losses are,'" explains Lin. "In theater, you will lose money. Our goal: if we even break even, it's like 'Yes! We can do it again!' But if we don't, they're kind of prepared to lose that money."
Many of Lin's works have contained very relevant issues in the past. Heavenly Peace was a musical about the Tiananmen Square massacre in China, while Parachute Kid centered around a Taiwanese immigrant living with her parents in a poverty-stricken neighborhood. Parachute Kid was inspired by Lin's volunteer efforts at a nonprofit center in Inglewood. However, when asked about The Best Man, Lin shied away from attaching any heavy social commentary to the play.
"Basically, it pits generation X against generation Y because there's a huge difference in your 20s and 30s," says Lin. "And what's more universal than the relationships people have with each other? The main social commentary is seeing the dynamic between 20s and 30s that haven't really been explored yet."
Meanwhile in real life, as Weiko Lin and Leonard Wu get ready for their own big breaks in Hollywood, the best man is still to be determined. Lin is preparing to write his first major drama script for The Mark Gordon Company, the powerhouse behind Grey's Anatomy and Saving Private Ryan. Of course unable to spill any secrets about the script, Lin comments, "This movie is going to be a big scale film and there will be a lot of opportunities for Asians. It's kind of political and very relevant."
Leonard Wu has recently wrapped up a movie titled While She was Out opposite of Kim Basinger and Luke Haas. On working with Kim Basinger, Leonard gushes: "She's very professional and very sweet. Her intensity might be frightening for some people, but for us it was what she needed to do. It's Kim Basinger! Just working with her, something is going to rub off on you, so I was very fortunate." The movie is due out some time in 2008.
The similar paths Wu and Lin are taking in Hollywood probably stem from their seemingly mirrored responses to Asian Americans in the media today. Weiko suggests that "what Asian Americans need to do to break through is to play roles that are not ethnic specific. If you're really concerned about Asian Americans in the media -- at the end of the day, where do these roles come from? It's from the writing. If you're really interested in making a big difference, go into writing."
Leonard's version goes something like this: "What's sad is that the demographics of viewership, of what Asians enjoy, are the same as Caucasians, so we kind of just blend right in there. They don't really measure our buying power. So we as a community need to come together and say, 'Hey, we want more Asians in the media.' Hollywood will say, 'We don't mind -- as long as it sells.' It's also the people behind it -- the writers, the producers -- they're the ones that have to help break down the doors."
In the meantime, in a difficult industry, Leonard says it's best for actors to take whatever roles they can get and "just make lemonade out of it!" The cast of The Best Man will hopefully be able to sip on their lemonade soon enough.