Theatre in Review: The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G (Ma-Yi Theatre/Vampire Cowboys/Theatre Row)I know that we live in the era of all things meta, but there's got to be a limit. Consider the case of The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G. Ostensibly the intrigue-filled tale of Hung, a Vietnamese-American man who returns to the country of his birth to confront the daughter of the man he murdered, it's really a controlled experiment in anarchy. Every few minutes the actors rebel, demanding changes in the script and forcing the author, Qui Nguyen, to appear and defend his choices. Qui's girlfriend helpfully points out what she sees as the script's many deficiencies. Someone notes that most of Qui's ideas have already been employed by David Henry Hwang. Qui explains some of his play's more sensational aspects by noting that the artistic mission of the Vampire Cowboys Theatre Company -- where he is co-artistic director -- is to create theatre using the conventions of comic books and other pop culture phenomena. I fear I am doing nothing to advance the cause of clarity when I add that The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G is the third play in Qui's Gook Story Trilogy -- and the second play has never been staged. The first play, Trial by Water, apparently got mixed reviews; to prove the point, Qui brings on a Greek chorus of drama critics who read his notices, both pro and con. ("It clumsily imagines two tempest-tossed young boat people and their plight into the unknown," says The New Yorker, not too felicitously.) A gaggle of academics appear to scold Qui for not conforming more closely to the standard conventional model of modern playwriting. To dramatize Qui's aesthetic indecision, we get alternate versions of the same scene, played out in a variety of styles. There are more head-scratchers: Temar Underwood, who plays Qui, isn't Asian; he's black, because Qui grew up in a black neighborhood and, as he says, "My heart is black." And Neihmah Djourabchi, who plays Hung, is Caucasian, because -- well, I haven't any idea. He can do a mean Asian caricature, when called upon -- squinting his eyes, adopting a moronic smile, and mixing his Ls and Rs. Let's just say it's hellzapoppin' on stage at Theatre Row's Beckett Theatre, and leave it at that. The most glaring aspect of Agent G is its self-defeating nature. Qui, infuriated by all this running commentary about his writing, complains that he has been stymied in his attempts at making a play out of the harrowing adventures of two cousins who escaped Vietnam at the end of the war. "All I ever wanted to do was to tell my family's story," he says. "To tell it the way it actually happened. But all I ever got was notes. Notes on how it could be more dramatic. Notes on how it should be structured and told and rewritten...It was broken the minute I decided making a 'good play' was more important than making a truthful one." There's an interesting idea here -- I was reminded of Rinne Groff's Compulsion, about the various parties who jousted for control of the stage version of Anne Frank's diaries -- but the author is so prone to digressions and inside theatre jokes that his story is sidelined until the last ten minutes, when he decides to tell it in, of all things, a rap song. Until then, The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G is a series of interruptions in search of a play. This might work as satirical social commentary if the level of wit was a little higher, but much of the script traffics in a kind of mock crudeness that seems aimed at 12-year-old fanboys rather than adult theatregoers. Addressing us, Hung says, "And what you are about to see is all completely true. And as we all know, true stories wet your vaginas and get your dicks hard. True stories are awesome!" Defending his decision to load the narrative with spies and weapons, Qui announces, "This is a Vampire Cowboys show, bitch!" When Bonnie Sherman, as Qui's girlfriend, delivers a thick paragraph of facts on Ho Chi Minh City, he shouts, 'You've just been Wikipedia'd, bitch!" Then there's the appearance of a Henson-like puppet known as the Gooky Monster, and the letter from an enraged audience member, who says, "It was sad to see such talent wasted on such a horrible, horrible play." Sometimes you don't need a reviewer at all. Robert Ross Parker imposes considerable form on this chaos, keeping things moving at a fast clip and downplaying some of the flatter bits. He has a highly enthusiastic company, including Jon Hoche, playing a range of sinister and/or grasping Vietnamese characters, and Brooke Ishibashi, as the startlingly glamorous cleaning lady of a Vietnamese brothel. The show also has an extremely inventive production design by Nick Francone, dominated by a series of human-size letters -- spelling out "Vietnam" -- which serve as screens for Matt Tennie's scene-setting video sequences. (There's also a post-curtain call video sequence, which proves that David Henry Hwang is nothing if not a good sport.) The lighting, also by Francone, the costumes by Jessica Wegener Shay, and the sound design by Shane Rettig are similarly highly professional. But, in the last analysis, The Inexplicable Redemption of Agent G is a derailed effort that finds very little amusement or enlightenment in its author's creative conundrums. After he finishes his rap number, Qui says, "Well, it's a start." Maybe, but just barely.--David Barbour 
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