Finding the man to play the man playing the woman

I first read M. Butterfly two years ago in a Queer Literature course at U of T. As soon as I finished reading it, I knew that I wanted to direct M. Butterfly one day. I also knew that I wouldn't do it while I was still in university.

It wasn't because I didn't have directing experience. I'd just finished co-directing a very successful medley of four one-act plays with a dear friend, and as an actor I'd been around enough directors —some amazing, most okay, and a special few decidedly awful— to know how to run a good show. Granted, I had never directed a multi-act drama that would require several set changes and some more advanced technical requirements, but I was fairly confident that I could handle that.

The two main reasons why I didn't pursue M. Butterfly in university:

- The majority of a university theatre production's audience are friends and family of the actors, and I wasn't confident that they would wish to see their loved ones in a rather sexually explicit play, or that any university theatre group would want to put its reputation on the line for my sake.

- I did not believe that with my limited resources and connections I would find an East Asian man willing and able to play Song Liling with the depth and maturity that the character deserves.

Both are problems that could be solved by putting on a non-university production, but at the time I had neither the means nor the experience to have it done elsewhere (well, I still don't have the means. Yet.)

Anyway. Back to explaining.

Song is a man who is purposefully passing himself off as a woman. He is not a drag queen. He is not a vamp. He is a person whose career and life depend on the illusion that he is a real woman. True, he does exaggerate the "Oriental" qualities that Gallimard believes are paramount to an Asian woman (e.g. subservience, modesty, shame) —but he still operates within those very real bounds. And when in the final act Song sheds his female persona (and his clothes), we must believe in his masculinity as much as we do in his femininity.

(So yes, Song does appear naked on stage. More specifically, he strips in front of Gallimard in an attempt to prove that Gallimard was in love with a person for 26 years, not with a fantasy. Other scenes call for kissing and fondling, while more allude to oral and anal sex. As I said, it's fairly sexually explicit.)

And it's not as if I think that all university-aged people break down into fits of giggles over or are repulsed by sexuality, homosexuality, etc. But I do need someone mature enough to distance personal feelings from the character and the situations —sexual or not— he would be placed in. I need that strength and commitment and, honestly, university students are already juggling school, other hobbies, and personal lives —it makes me nervous having seen how many students take on too many responsibilities and then let important things like passing courses and being healthy fall to the wayside. I don't want to make someone's life unmanageable. I want someone who will not let thousands of dollars worth of education and/or his own sanity be overshadowed by one role.

Finally, I wanted to find an East Asian man to play Song. I have seen YouTube clips and read reviews of productions that have a Caucasian man in "yellow face" (incidentally, that's the name of another DHH play), and it's just… not what I want. I want M. Butterfly to be the focus of attention, and cross-race casting would jeopardize that. Cross-race casting is not out of the question, but it is far from ideal.

(And yes, I would cast a Japanese or Korean man in a Chinese role, if he were the most appropriate choice. I do think that general aesthetic is very important, given that the play revolves around one man's inability to see anything but dichotomies, but that ethnicity is more flexible. And if you take offense, I will remind you that you are reading my personal, subjective ideas. I don't expect you to agree, but I hope you understand.)

So that's why I thought that I would need to cast a wider net (a butterfly net? Wow, that was awful) in order to get the Song that I wanted.

Or I may have been grossly mistaken, and I could have done an incredible production of M. Butterfly with university backing, but have been using a bunch of excuses for the past 2 1/2 years to avoid addressing my own fears and shortcomings.

… I think it's the former.