THE HANGOVER REPORT – Too soon for a play abound the pandemic?: KRISTINA WONG, SWEATSHOP OVERLORD doesn’t think so

Kristina Wong in “Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord” at New York Theatre Workshop (photo by Joan Marcus).

Last weekend, I attended a performance of Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord, which recently opened Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop. Ms. Wong’s solo show – the first to grace the stage of the renowned East Village venue since last March’s lockdown – dares to unpack the events of the last year-and-a-half through the lens of her own pandemic enterprise, which involved sewing and freely distributing masks with the help of an army of family and friends (whom, collectively, Ms. Wong affectionately refers to as “The Aunties”).

Too soon for a play about the pandemic, you may be asking? For some, perhaps. But what makes the show go down so easily are Ms. Wong’s irrepressibly upbeat attitude, as well as the buoyant production that surrounds her. Costumed like a child’s vision of an action hero, Ms. Wong quickly establishes an aggressively cute tone which may initially seem out of sync with stark reality of recent events. But as I examined the show more closely, it dawned on me it uses comedy as a defense/survival mechanism to cope with all that’s transpired. For Ms. Wong – and by extension, her audience – good humor serves as a means to remain psychologically unscathed by it all.

The production has been directed by Chay Yew, who shapes the show from its stand-up comedy roots to something that approaches legitimate theater. Comedic skills aside, Ms. Wong is a compelling storyteller who does a stealthy job of camouflaging her underlying agenda. As a race, we humans have been notorious for our dangerously short-lived memories. Krisitina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord seeks to mitigate this trend by asking us to relive the numerous events of the pandemic, but in a way that inspires collective healing and maybe even catharsis (as only live theater can).

RECOMMENDED

KRISTINA WONG, SWEATSHOP OVERLORD
Off-Broadway, Play
New York Theatre Workshop
1 hour, 30 minutes (without an intermission)
Through November 21

Categories: Off-Broadway, Theater

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