Soft Power

My friend Judith had an extra ticket to see Soft Power at the Ahmanson.  I had seen the lamppost banners, as I pass the Music Center every day as I go to work, but knew nothing about the play itself and it had no local buzz.  I accepted because ( in no particular order) I  love theater and I don't get to go that often;  I like seeing Judith and it was a chance to catch up and; she has amazing seats and how often do you get to enjoy something from the front row? 

Soft Power is defined as a persuasive approach to international relations, typically involving the use of economic or cultural influence.  This play was part play, part musical.  It was nothing short of amazing.  Frankly, the description of the play made me think it was going to be a drag- something like a Chinese film producer comes to America and falls in love with the President Hillary Clinton.  WAY OFF.  The play does concern a relationship between the producer, Xue Xing and Mrs. Clinton but it's really much more than that. It is VERY political and critical of the current Administration, "Dear Leader" in particular.  My takeaway was that although the direction this country is going is bad- the environment, education and our relations with other counties is in the dumpster, in my opinion- Democracy is STILL the best way to go. We should NOT give up, just because those in power  seem to have all the power. The play makes the point that counties in power are exerting "soft power" on other nations to get what they want.  Our country seems to just want to blow things up.  

Due to horrendous traffic, we were late to the theater and missed the first twelve minutes, except there IS a monitor in the bar and you can watch the show from there so we DID get the gist of the premise. When we did get in, our seats are near the aisle so it wasn't TOO intrusive and we moved quickly- I noticed that the man sitting two seats away was SOUND asleep and snoring to beat the band ( literally, at one point during the pause he let out a RIP of a snore that could be heard all over the theater)  He and his seat mate were NOT impressed with the play, his seatmate grousing to us in the elevator that they needed to "go back to page one and re-write the whole thing"  I thought it was wonderful  The cast was terrific. If you go, look for a nod of the cap to "The King and I" and Aaron Copland ( I think one of the dance sequences was from Appalachian Spring, but it COULD be Oklahoma, I am unsure)  The entire cast, except for two characters whose race HAD to be non-Asian- were Asian.  

I thoroughly enjoyed the play and recommend it.