Wang's elder son, Wang Ta, woos Linda Tung, but on learning that she has many men in her life, drops her he later learns she is a nightclub dancer. Wang also has a severe cough, which he does not wish to have cured, feeling that it gives him authority in his household. While his sons and sister-in-law are integrating into American culture, Wang stubbornly resists assimilation and speaks only two words of English, "Yes" and "No". His sister-in-law, Madam Tang, who takes citizenship classes, is a regular visitor and urges Wang to adopt Western ways. The wealthy refugee lives in a house in Chinatown with his two sons. Lee's novel centers on Wang Chi-yang, a 63-year-old man who fled China to avoid the communists. The publishing house did, and bought Lee's novel, which became a bestseller in 1957. The reader was found dead in bed, the manuscript beside him with the words "Read this" scrawled on it.
The firm sent the manuscript to an elderly reader for evaluation. Lee initially had no success selling his novel, but his agent submitted it to the publishing house of Farrar, Straus and Cudahy. He had hoped to break into playwriting, but instead wrote a novel about Chinatown, The Flower Drum Song (originally titled Grant Avenue). By the 1950s, he was barely making a living writing short stories and working as a Chinese teacher, translator and journalist for San Francisco Chinatown newspapers. Lee fled war-torn China in the 1940s and came to the United States, where he attended Yale University's playwriting program, graduating in 1947 with an M.F.A. It received mostly poor reviews in New York and closed after six months but had a short tour and has since been produced regionally.Ĭ.Y. Hwang's story retains the Chinatown setting and the inter-generational and immigrant themes, and emphasizes the romantic relationships. The piece did not return to Broadway until 2002, when a version with a plot by playwright David Henry Hwang (but retaining most of the original songs) was presented after a successful Los Angeles run. When it was put on the stage, lines and songs that might be offensive were often cut.
The musical, much lighter-hearted than Lee's novel, was profitable on Broadway and was followed by a national tour.Īfter the release of the 1961 film version, the musical was rarely produced, as it presented casting issues and fears that Asian-Americans would take offense at how they are portrayed. The team hired Gene Kelly to make his debut as a stage director with the musical and scoured the country for a suitable Asian – or at least, plausibly Asian-looking – cast. Rodgers and Hammerstein shifted the focus of the musical to his son, Wang Ta, who is torn between his Chinese roots and assimilation into American culture. Lee's novel focuses on a father, Wang Chi-yang, a wealthy refugee from China, who clings to traditional values in San Francisco's Chinatown.
It was adapted for a 1961 musical film.Īfter their extraordinary early successes, beginning with Oklahoma! in 1943, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II had written two musicals in the 1950s that did not do well and sought a new hit to revive their fortunes. It premiered on Broadway in 1958 and was then performed in the West End and on tour. It is based on the 1957 novel, The Flower Drum Song, by Chinese-American author C. Flower Drum Song was the eighth musical by the team of Rodgers and Hammerstein.
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