Never before has a television series sparked as much enthusiasm, attention and concern among California's expat Vietnamese community, the largest in the world, as “The Sympathizer.”
HBO's seven-part spy thriller depicting the Vietnam War and its aftermath (or the American War, as seen in the title card that opens the series) premiered Sunday, with new episodes airing weekly through the 26th. of May. It was co-created by South Korea. from director Park Chan-wook and Don McKellar, and features Oscar-winning actor Robert Downey Jr. in various roles (he is also an executive producer). “The Sympathizer” is based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name by Viet Thanh Nguyen, which follows a French Vietnamese communist spy.
The series is innovative in casting Vietnamese actors or actors of Vietnamese descent in the lead roles and much of the dialogue is spoken in Vietnamese, although it was made for American audiences. And the opening episode takes place in Vietnam, depicting the fall of Saigon and a harrowing escape on an airstrip.
For a younger generation, the series is an opportunity to showcase Vietnamese stories globally, but for an older generation, “The Sympathizer” has sparked some discontent, especially among those who fought in the war. They point to the show's main character, the Captain, a communist spy who infiltrates the South Vietnamese army and follows the general, his boss, to Los Angeles, where they resettle, saying that he glorifies the communists, the enemy, the present the contemptuous attitude of the spy. Views on the South.
Such sentiments were among those shared at a party hosted by Alan Vo Ford, held at Pink Moon, a Chinese restaurant in Beverly Hills, where the premiere episode aired for 30 friends from the Los Angeles and Orange County area on Sunday. . Ford, 49, a Westminster resident, real estate broker and producer of Vietnamese films such as “A Fragile Flower” and “Journey From the Fall,” said he felt compelled to organize the event because it is so rare for a major series of Hollywood about Vietnamese people to do.
“I felt it was my duty as a Vietnamese American to spread the word so the world would know about Vietnam and American history during this historical period,” he said. Ford said that when he was a baby, his mother held him while he “ran and dodged bombs for the last few days,” like in the last scenes of the first episode. His father was in a re-education camp for 9 years and his family arrived in the United States in 1985.
“This is a revolutionary series for the Vietnamese community to be on HBO and work with superstars like Robert Downey Jr.,” said Don Nguyen, 55, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel and cybersecurity consultant, who attended Party. He said that as someone who was part of the first generation of Vietnamese to join the U.S. military, he knows what it's like to break barriers. “It's a signal to the global community that we've arrived in Hollywood.”
“We have many talented doctors, lawyers, engineers [in the community]. But in cinema we are still in the initial stage,” he stated. He is the son of Thanh Tuyen, a Vietnamese singer whose Bolero songs were popular during the war.
Despite some of the generational differences, there is agreement in the community that this is a significant moment for Vietnamese representation in Hollywood that furthers their desire to see more Vietnamese stories told.
And that's what Viet Thanh Nguyen advocated: that the series, like his book, present a Vietnamese point of view on the war. He said that for too long Hollywood has portrayed “Vietnamese characters who must be killed, raped, hurt, silenced, demonized or rescued while serving as a backdrop for American moral dilemmas.” The war and its aftermath have been depicted in pop culture largely through an American lens in films such as “Apocalypse Now” and “Rambo.”
“We should count at least as many Vietnamese perspectives on this war as American perspectives,” he said.
The cast of the series is predominantly Vietnamese, with Hoa Xuande, an Australian actor of Vietnamese descent, in the lead role as the Captain. Other actors in supporting roles include Kieu Chinh, Toan Le, Fred Nguyen Khan, Vy Le, Nguyen Cao Ky Duyen and Alan Trong.
“This is a historic moment for Vietnamese artists, writers and filmmakers in Hollywood,” said Chinh, an acclaimed Vietnamese actress who plays the Major's mother (Phanxinê, a Vietnamese filmmaker in her acting debut), a character whose story takes on leadership. mid season. She knows firsthand what the war was like, since she lived through it. The chaotic evacuation scene at the end of the first episode was familiar to me.
Kieu Chinh, left, with Phanxinê in a scene from “The Sympathizer.”
(Hopper Stone/HBO)
“I heard loud bomb explosions around us as we tried to flee. It was scary and very emotional,” Chinh said. “During filming, I simply relived my past. “I didn't have to act.”
The actress is known for her role as Suyuan Woo in 1993's “The Joy Luck Club,” an adaptation of Amy Tan's best-selling novel. It was the first time a film with an almost exclusively Asian cast was a box office hit in Hollywood. However, despite the film's success, it did not bring an increase in Asian-centric films or roles for Asian actors at the time. Chinh said she believes “The Joy Luck Club” was too early to make a breakthrough. She now believes it's time for a Vietnamese series to appear on mainstream television.
Anna Chi, a filmmaker whose work includes “The Disappearance of Mrs. Wu,” worked on “The Joy Luck Club” as an assistant director while studying at UCLA film school; She attended the party with her husband, Douglas Smith, Oscar winner for visual effects for “Independence Day.” She agrees with Chinh that “The Joy Luck Club” was ahead of her time. Although progress has been made, Chi said there is still much work to be done for Asian cinema. She sees “The Sympathizer” as an important step toward this goal.
While “The Sympathizer” is not the first time a story has been told from the Vietnamese point of view, previous efforts have not been as well received due to tensions that have persisted since the war. In January 1994, when Le Ly Hayslip, author of “When Heaven and Earth Changed Places,” visited Orange County on a press tour for the Oliver Stone film based on her memoir, dozens of protesters called her out. traitor It was billed as the first film about the Vietnam War from a Vietnamese perspective, but anti-communist protesters were outraged because it had aided Viet Cong soldiers.
The premiere of “The Sympathizer” comes two weeks before the 49th anniversary of the fall of Saigon on April 30, known as Black April or Táng tư đen in Vietnamese. The Vietnam War, the second longest war in American history, killed hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese and American soldiers. For those who fought on the side of the South and were displaced, the wounds of the war remain unhealed.
“Vietnam did sensational things to fit in with the American spy thriller, and from that perspective, the show is very intriguing for viewers. He wrote it from the perspective of a communist Viet Cong spy and therefore the South Vietnamese were portrayed as corrupt and cruel,” said Quan Nguyen, a doctor and director of the Museum of the Republic of Vietnam, a non-profit organization. profit in Little Saigon, Orange County. . It was opened in 2016 to honor the veterans who fought for South Vietnam and to educate future generations.
“This could reopen many deep wounds within our anti-communist community,” says Quan Nguyen, whose father was a military doctor.
In “The Sympathizer,” Hoa Xuande plays the Captain, a communist spy for the South Vietnamese army.
(Hopper Stone/SMPSP/Hopper Stone/SMPSP)
Party guest Jenny Thai, 58, originally from Garden Grove, agrees. Thai said this inspired her to make her own film highlighting South Vietnamese heroes. She remembers when she was a child in Vietnam, in the final days of the war, everyone was crowded around the radio and the announcement came that Saigon had fallen, and the adults around them burst into tears. Weeks later, all men and women associated with the previous regime were sent to re-education camps. She says her family escaped Vietnam by boat in 1990.
“Most Saigon residents stayed home and listened to the radio. It was the only way to follow what was happening,” says Thai, who has produced short films. “Only a small portion of those who worked with the embassy or American officials knew about the evacuation.”
And he adds: “I am anti-communist, but I don't hate northerners. We are all Vietnamese; We are all brothers and sisters from the same country. It is politics that destroyed us, war.”
Although there are divergent opinions, “The Sympathizer” has stimulated conversations about representation in Hollywood, how the story of war is told and who tells it. Ysa Le, executive director of the Vietnamese American Association of Arts and Letters, a nonprofit that co-hosted a screening of “Sympathizer” and a press meeting with the show's cast in Orange a week before its debut, says welcomes you to the series.
“For the first time, we have so many Vietnamese talents, both in front of and behind the camera, working on this American series,” said Le, 53, a pharmacist in Fountain Valley. He was five when the war ended and his father was sent to a re-education camp for six years after failing to flee Vietnam.
“It could inspire aspiring filmmakers to pursue their own projects,” Le said.
Phong Dinh, 91, a former two-term councilor in the spa town of Vung Tau, Vietnam, who spent three years in a re-education camp, said he understands the antipathy toward communists, but the spy character created by Viet Thanh Nguyen and depicted in the series does not bother him.
“It was a well-known fact that our government was infiltrated from President [Ngo Dinh] Diem regime, and continued with the president [Nguyen Van] Thieu,” he said. Dinh, a father of seven, experienced tragedy after the war: he lost his youngest daughter to malaria because medicine was not available and his wife suffered permanent hearing damage due to an artillery explosion near her house.
Now a resident of Huntington Beach, Dinh joined his youngest son, Viet, former chief legal officer of Fox Corp. and deputy U.S. attorney general, to watch the premiere episode. She gave it an A+.
“Our people have suffered enormously. I am lucky to have my family. “I want my children and their children to be good citizens, contribute to society in America and help our people,” she said. “If this TV series opens doors for our young Vietnamese, then it is worth it.”
