From the 1940s into the 1960s, Asian-American variety performers could make a steady living playing San Francisco and New York theatres and clubs irreverently known as the Chop Suey Circuit. One of its brightest stars was Larry Leung, a handsome, cocky and talented crooner and tap dancer who worked the circuit with his elegant wife, Trudie. He landed a coveted spot on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1950 and performed in an early production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's 1958 musical Flower Drum Song before giving up his tap shoes and becoming a PGA golf pro.
The couple's story, as told by their daughter, actor Jody Long, is the subject of the engaging documentary Long Story Short, which has its Canadian premiere Saturday at this year's Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival. While the North American Asian film-fest circuit isn't exactly Chop Suey's modern-day equivalent, many fine films that could appeal to broad audiences get stuck there - and Long Story Short is one of them. It has won several awards on the circuit, including the audience award at Los Angeles' Asian fest."So many Americans, black or white or whatever, can identify with this story," says the film's director, Christine Choy, who has been frustrated by the lack of interest from non-Asian-themed fests and broadcasters. Choy, who will attend Reel Asian, received an Oscar nomination for her 1987 doc Who Killed Vincent Chin? and has made several award-winning films while working the past 20 years as a film professor for New York University. She says Long Story Short not only captures a forgotten period of showbiz history, but also draws a subtle parallel to similar challenges faced by Asian-American actors today.
"Jody is still struggling, still being typecast," Choy says. (Despite this, Long played a judge on five episodes of Eli Stone this year, a departure from her typical film or TV credits.) While Leung quit the biz after one too many disappointments, his daughter is tenacious. Jody Long's one-woman autobiographical stage show provides the documentary's storytelling spine. We also see her determined efforts to land a role in the 2002 Broadway revival of Flower Drum Song, reworked by playwright David Henry Hwang, and meet 90-year-old Chinese American author C.Y. Lee, who wrote the 1957 novel (a love story involving an illegal Chinese immigrant and partly set in a nightclub) on which the musical was based.
Wonderful archival material is woven throughout the film, adding to its value as a history piece, while emotional depth comes from intimate details of Long's family life. It's a rich film experience, all the more impressive considering how the project began. After running into Long three years ago, Choy agreed to go through 40 hours of footage the actor had gathered for a potential doc that would connect her and her father's experiences of working in Flower Drum Song. "I'm sorry to say [Jody's]friend who was taping didn't know camera work. The footage was well organized but terribly shot," laughs Choy, who directed additional filming and ensured a top editor was on board.
"I love crisp beautiful cinematography, but sometimes raw material has a raw energy," she adds. "This stuff had an urgency, it was screaming for attention. But when I saw the Ed Sullivan footage, I started drooling and knew there was a strong story here about the Asian-American experience."
A different kind of showbiz family is represented this evening in Reel Asian's opening night film, The Drummer (7 p.m. at the Bloor Cinema), which stars Jaycee Chan, the son of popular action star Jackie Chan. The young Chan delivers a standout emotional performance - with a touch of his dad's comic gift - as Sid, the reckless son of a Hong Kong gangster who is sent to rural Taiwan to hide out after he has an affair with his father's rival. In the mountains, Sid discovers a community of Zen drummers (most played by members of an actual performing troupe) and insists on joining them, even though his rock 'n' roll demeanour clashes with their spiritual lifestyle.
Special to The Globe and Mail
Reel Asian's 12th festival - presenting 15 features and 60 shorts from 14 countries - is definitely a family affair: From Toronto filmmaker Min Sook Lee's Hot Docs hit Tiger Spirit (Nov. 16, 5:30 p.m., Innis Town Hall), about separated families in a divided Korea, to the heartwarming Malaysian father-son story Flower In Pocket (Nov. 15, 6 p.m., Innis Town Hall), which won best film at the prestigious Rotterdam festival.
Reel Asian International Film Festival runs Nov. 12-16 in Toronto. Long Story Short premieres Nov. 15 at 3:45 p.m. at Innis Town Hall (2 Sussex Ave.). For more information and film schedules, visit http://www.reelasian.com.
Reely good films
PAUL WONG REMASTERED The festival shines its Canadian spotlight on Governor-General Award-winning visual artist Paul Wong, who presents a retrospective of his groundbreaking work and premieres new videos. (Nov. 14, 6:30 p.m., Innis Town Hall)
FULL BOAT Showcase of animated and conceptual Asian-Canadian shorts, featuring new work from Ann Marie Fleming, Jenny Lin, Ho Tam, Blair Fukumura and others. (Nov. 13, 8 p.m., Innis )
WEST 32ND Grace Park ( Battlestar Galactica) and John Kim (the Harold and Kumar films) star in this stylish drama set in the Big Apple's underground Korea-town. (Nov. 15, 8:15 p.m., Innis)
HANSEL AND GRETEL Chilling Korean psychological horror adaptation of the Brothers Grimm tale, featuring incredible performances from its child stars. (Nov. 13, 9:30 p.m., Innis)
ADRIFT IN TOKYO Weird and entrancing road movie pairs two odd characters and offers an eye-opening journey through the inner city. (Nov. 16, 8:30 p.m., Bloor Cinema)
J.P.