By Andrew Hamlin
NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY
The challenge: Construct a vivid portrait of Bruce Lee’s early life, taking into consideration his many relocations, his family and loves, his martial arts moves, his mistakes, and his preparation to become a legend.
Cast and crew of “Young Dragon.” Keiko Green stands third from right. Courtesy of Seattle Children’s Theatre.
Intimidating. But if you’re a half Japanese playwright from the American South, you’ve tasted life as a peripatetic outsider. For Seattle playwright Keiko Green, the mind behind “Young Dragon: A Bruce Lee Story,” it’s all grist for the mill.
“I am a 5’9” Asian American from the South, who has stuck out like a sore thumb no matter where I am,” said Green. “I think the feeling of being an outsider and a bit of a freak made me really comfortable with having a unique perspective. I’m proud that my brain works perhaps a little differently than a lot of other people, and it’s become a major superpower in my writing career.”
Green grew up just outside Atlanta, Georgia, with her mother, father, and two older brothers. She describes her younger self as “a major tomboy” who wore her brothers’ hand-me-down sweatpants, and enjoyed the popular anime “Dragon Ball Z” and movies like “Fight Club.”
While Green’s father is a white American, Green’s mother is Japanese, and English isn’t her first language, “so that’s always something I’m thinking of when writing.”
“I don’t want to write plays that are only dialogue-focused or just inside jokes for artists,” she continued. “I try to make sure plays are written to be visually engaging and full of entertainment, so you can still follow along, even if you miss some language here and there.”
She fell in love with theatre watching big touring musicals that would come to Atlanta.
“My favorite was ‘The Phantom of the Opera,’” she recalled. “I’ve always loved tragic, misunderstood characters. But the first time I really was inspired to be on the creative side was when I was in high school, and I got to see the National Theatre’s production of ‘The Powerbook,’ which was a love story about two women meeting online, who tell each other love stories and ultimately fall in love themselves.”
“It was so ahead of its time,” she continued. “It was the first time I saw such spectacular stage pictures that encompassed how something feels, rather than just what a situation might authentically look like.”
After earning a Master of Fine Arts at the Experimental Theatre Wing of New York University, she settled into dividing her time between Seattle and Los Angeles, as both a writer and an actor.
She originally spent time working on some of Seattle’s big stages as an actor, but found she wasn’t being taken seriously as a playwright at those very same theatres.
“I decided to apply to the best fully-funded MFA Playwriting programs in the country, just to see if I’d make it into one of them,” she recalled. “I ended up going to UC San Diego, partially because they were encouraging about pursuing film and TV as well, but also because Naomi Iizuka, an iconic playwright, runs that program. She taught me about structure and flow and finding my unique voice. I was the only playwright selected to attend that year.
As for tackling Bruce Lee’s early years, Green “really liked the idea of humanizing a figure that felt beyond human when I was a kid. Instead of focusing on the icon he becomes, we get to focus on how he became that person.”
“I think it’s important to know about all the trouble he got into. This isn’t a story about someone who was born perfect and had a straight line to success. Even for someone who represents ‘excellence,’ there was learning and listening that had to happen for him to become the legend we know him as,” she explained. “My goal isn’t to have kids walking away thinking that Bruce is some mythological figure, but instead to have them walking away thinking they are also capable of achieving the impossible. To achieve excellence.”
“Young Dragon” plays Feb. 19–March 22 at the Seattle Children’s Theatre, at the Eve Alford Theatre, 201 Thomas Street in Seattle Center. For prices, showtimes, and other information, visit https://www.sct.org/onstage/productions/young-dragon-2026.
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