Have you ever sat through a play and realized a few scenes in that the same actors are playing multiple roles? That’s called a dual-role or doubling, a theater technique that took me by surprise in Mike Lew’s latest play, “Tiger Style!” a refreshing portrayal of tiger parenting and the consequences that follow. The fast-paced dialogue and bizarre characterization were my least favorite parts of the play, but the doubling and staging techniques embraced by the cast of five were flawlessly executed.
Star students and dueling siblings Albert and Jennifer Chen blame their 30-something life crisis on their parents' tiger-style upbringing, a child-rearing method made famous by Amy Chua’s 2011 bestselling book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother.” Much like the provocative novel, director and writer Mike Lew attempted to make a comedic splash in the theater world, but unfortunately his writing fell flat. The dialogue was delivered at lightning-fast speeds and the audience could barely keep up. Watching the two siblings quarrel over their existential life crisis felt like I was holding my breath underwater, hoping for a gasp of air to bring a moment of relief for these hopeless “adults.”
The play’s hail-Mary was by far the outstanding three supporting actors that managed to change characters throughout the performance. Actor Bobby Labartino is a brusque and tall person in real life, which applies well to the series of characters he portrayed in “Tiger Style!” He went from playing Russ the Bus, a hilarious and ignorant co-worker of Albert’s, to Reggie, the hopeless, rude and immature ex-boyfriend of Jenny, to the security guard at an American customs desk, and several other roles in-between. Despite his prominent demeanor, he managed to fool me until well after Reggie's scene that he was in fact changing outfits and characters entirely. I spent the first half of the play thinking that these characters were different actors, which is an indication of tremendous talent on Labartino’s part.
Francis Jue is another stand-out actor that portrayed multiple roles in this two-hour performance. He begins the play as a pesky and intrusive fellow Asian-American that tries to pry information from Albert, a role similar to the Chinese government official he portrays later in the play. Sometime in the middle, he manages to fulfill the roles of Albert and Jennifer’s father and a jail guard. His thin gait made his character changes the most apparent. Actress Emily Kuroda is the last of the five-actor ensemble that underwent multiple doubling roles in “Tiger Style!” The audience first sees her as the uptight Asian mother that embodies every aspect of the tiger-style parent. She is a cold portrayal of a tiger-mom, donning a light pink button-up and a fierce “bitch face.” It doesn’t take long for her to transition to Jennifer’s therapist and a long-lost cousin in China as the scenes unfold.
Aside from the acting, the staging during this performance was excellent. Every scene was executed to perfection and the set-up in each felt just right. The backdrop featured an array of funky L.A. silhouettes and the curtain at intermission went from saying “Tiger Style!” to “Style of the Tiger” in Chinese. Overall, it was impressive how the three supporting actors managed to change characters without a single hiccup, at least as far as the audience noticed. There was a minor glitch with the sound about halfway through the performance, but the cast straightened it out by the end of intermission. “Tiger Style!” may not have had the strongest delivery by the two main sibling characters, but the standout supporting actors created an enjoyable show, with a few laughs in between.
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