Poor Yella Rednecks
Written by Qui Nguyen
Directed by May Adrales
Manhattan Theatre Club
December 2, 2023
Production website
💉💉💉 out of 5.

Poor Yella Rednecks was best captured by a review that summarized it by calling it a “merry mashup of hip-hop, pop culture, cursing and kung fu.’  Yep, that just about sums it up – and really it was little more – and it could have been SO much more.  Basically, it tells the story of a Vietnamese family that has been transplanted to the deep south of the United States to eke out a life in a world that doesn’t understand them and clearly dislikes them.  Inside this insular family, there is a marriage that is in trouble due to the man being still in a marriage to a woman with two of his children back in Vietnam and pursuing a  current love interest with a Vietnamese woman in the States.  Most importantly, the Vietnamese woman in the deep south must decide if she is going to spend time with the man who has such a past. Add to this projections and rap music and comic kung fu scenes with puppetry, and lots of other added fun things and you pretty much got the whole play.  Metaphorically the play seemed to be a lot of frosting without much attention to the cake.