By Andrew Hamlin
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY
One theater. A little more than 24 hours. Fifty-plus local Asian writers, actors, musicians, and designers.
It sounds like madness, but it’s part of Pork Filled Productions’ “Instant Noodles 24 Hour Play Festival,” kicking off on the evening of March 7. The randomly-paired creative folks will work through the night, to prepare plays out of nothing at all or close to it. The public then comes in over the weekend for the premieres of these fresh works, on March 8 and 9.
“I really loved participating in the Seattle local festival called 14/48,” recalls Instant Noodles’ mastermind, producer/director/actor Kendall Uyeji, recalling a festival which turned out 14 shorts plays in 48 hours. “I thought about doing something like that since it created such a fun community and celebration.”
Kathy Hsieh, co-founder of the local theater company SIS Productions and an “Instant Noodles” collaborator, emphasized community in putting the festival together, mentioning herself alongside Uyeji and Pork Filled Productions’ own Roger Tang.
“The three of us make a great team bringing our shared experience for this kind of format to the project. 14/48 is fabulous, but we wanted to have one that featured all Asian American talent. There are well over 100 Asian American theatre artists locally, and this is a fabulous way for about 50 of us to all get to work together.”
SIS Productions partnered with Pork Filled last year with a critically acclaimed production of “Vietgone,” by Qui Nguyen that was an audience favorite and received the Gregory Award for Outstanding Production of the year. According to Hsieh, SIS and Pork Filled will also co-produce Exotic Deadly: Or the MSG Play in September.
“I, personally, have known about Pork Filled Productions since before its inception,” she explained. “It evolved from a late-night sketch comedy program known as 11:07, because they did their shows at 11:07 p.m. after the mainstage shows at the Northwest Asian American Theatre, where I was working at the time. We were young and crazy enough to stay up and perform at that time of night and people actually came out to see us!
“I was a part of those shows, and then the founders of 11:07 eventually evolved [that] into Pork Filled Players and then when they started doing full-length plays rather than just sketch comedy, they became Pork Filled Productions.”
The selection process for “Instant Noodles” went fairly easily, Hsieh continued. “We each have our own theatre companies and also invited a couple of other Asian American companies to suggest artists as well. We put out a call to company leaders to suggest names, then all got together to put together a list that represents several generations of artists, so that there’s a great cross-section of them involved. Part of the goal is to build our Asian American theatre community with this project.”
Hsieh will concentrate on acting for this festival, while Uyeji will concentrate on hosting, producing, and writing.
Asked if the writers will make everything up from scratch, Uyeji replied, “Start from scratch ideally. They can always bring in ideas, but they will have certain actors and a random theme for the night that might make them have to change their ideas or think more creatively.”
A 24-hour turnaround for finished plays makes for a grueling schedule, but Pork Filled plans to keep folks awake and alert. “We are offering free breakfast and dinner for everyone,” said Uyeji. “Coffee, tea, and lots of Asian snacks. Including instant noodles!”
Elaborated Hsieh, “We will have lots of coffee and tea! We joked about just spending the night, but usually with festivals like this, the playwrights stay up all night writing and then sleep during the day, while the actors and directors, designers, band and tech crew rehearse all day. Then everyone comes together to present the shows on Saturday evening and Sunday afternoon.”
Asked what he wanted folks to take away from the festival, Uyeji summed up, “Community. I just want a project where all of the amazing AAPI artists get to perform, be seen, and be in community together.
“There are so many AAPI artists and such a lack of opportunity for them to perform and be their full selves. Hopefully this will be successful and there will be plenty of these for many years to come!”
“Instant Noodles 24 Hour Play Festival” plays March 8 through March 9 at the Theatre Off Jackson, 409 7th Avenue South in Seattle. For more information, visit https://theatreoffjackson.org/event/aapi-24-hr-play-festival/.
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