Jovanni Sy is a Chinese/Filipino Canadian actor, director and playwright who has become known for reworking classic plays and putting a modern and often Asian spin on them. As part of Stratford Festival’s 2024 lineup, his play “
Salesman in China” dramatized and extrapolated upon the real-life events of American playwright Arthur Miller who traveled to Beijing in 1983 to direct a Mandarin version of Death of a Salesman featuring prominent Chinese actor Ying Ruocheng in the role of Willy Loman. Performed in both English and Mandarin (with surtitles), Salesman in China ponders how these two artists from differing cultural, political and linguistic backgrounds can learn to collaborate, while delving into each man’s personal history. We will see Salesman in China as the last show of our 2026/27 Mirvish subscription series.
This season, Sy is back at Stratford directing his latest play, “
Tao of the World”, which is a re-working of the iconic Restoration Comedy, “
Way of the World”, written by William Congreve in 1700.
Restoration Comedies were written and performed between 1660-1710, beginning during the reign of King Charles II, and sought to rebel against the previous morally-strict Puritan regime led by Oliver Cromwell. As such, the plays featured risqué humour, provocative themes of sexual intrigue and adultery, fast-paced plots, and witty dialogue. Way of the World is also considered a “
Comedy of Manners” in that it satirizes the behaviour, etiquette, and conventions of the upper classes.
In “
Way of the World”, the charming but manipulative rake Edward Mirabell wishes to marry Millamant, who is set to inherit a sizeable dowry, but only if her aunt Lady Wishfort approves of her choice of husband. Unfortunately, Lady Wishfort despises Mirabell, who previously spurned her sexual advances. Instead, Wishfort considers her nephew Sir Wilfull Witwould as a more suitable spouse for Millamant. Mirabell previously had a secret affair with Wishfort’s daughter Arabella, who he then forced into a loveless marriage with his rival Fainall. Still smitten with Mirabell, Arabella helps him with a plot to compromise and blackmail her mother into agreeing to the marriage. Mirabell arranges for his manservant Waitwell to marry Lady Wishfort’s maid Foible. He then disguises Waitwell as his wealthy (but non-existent) uncle Sir Rowland in order to woo Lady Wishfort. He hopes to cause such a scandal once Waitwell’s identity and marital status is revealed that Lady Wishfort will be forced to consent to the marriage in exchange for suppressing the details. Fainall and Mrs.Marwood (who are also having an affair) find out about the plot and try to blackmail Mrs.Wishfort and Arabella themselves, since they also found out about Arabella’s affair with Mirabell. Fainfall demands control of the family fortune in order to preserve the reputation of the family. But clever Mirabell had anticipated this possibility and had previously arranged for all of Arabella’s assets to be transferred into his control. Grateful for his help, Lady Wistfort agrees to the marriage between Edward and Millamant.
In his graduating thesis for his Master of Fine Arts degree at the University of Calgary, Jovanni Sy discussed how he originally intended to stage Way of the World as written, just to prove that a “person of colour” could direct a Restoration Comedy. But while he was reviewing the play, he encountered elements of the plot that have not aged well and would be “problematic for modern Canadian audiences”. These issues included sexist tropes and double standards, lack of agency for the female characters and the overly cruel treatment of Lady Wistford which would no longer be considered funny. Mirabell’s character and actions make him so unlikeable by today’s standards that it would be difficult to portray him as a romantic hero. Also, a five-act play would not go over well with the limited attention spans of audiences today.
All these issues led to Sy’s writing of “
Tao of the World”, which takes the basic plot points of Congreve’s play but transposes it to the modern-day world of Singapore’s uber-rich, mixing Restoration Comedy with influences from the 2018 hit movie Crazy Rich Asians. Sy has created a hilarious, fast-paced, intelligent romantic comedy that addresses or modernizes the less acceptable aspects of the source material. The female characters now have agency and drive much of the plot. Arabella is the protagonist of this story instead of Edward. Millicent is strong-willed, sexually adventurous and not afraid to pursue her desires. Arabella’s mother, Lady Helen Yu, is still a vain controlling woman, but her comeuppance is silly and farcical instead of cruel and humiliating. And this is a two-act play where you are having so much fun that the time just flies by.
In Sy’s version, Arabella is a spoiled, privileged rich heiress who was once romantically involved with Edward Lim but broke up with him and married Trevor Flynn instead. She regrets this decision and is still in love with Edward. When he declares that he is in love with and plans to marry her younger cousin Millicent, Arabella is crushed but schemes to break them up. Edward and Millicent’s path to marriage is blocked by Arabella’s mother Lady Helen Yu, who controls access to Millicent’s trust fund inheritance which will be released to her upon her marriage. A second stipulation states that Millicent must still be a virgin (which she already is not at the start of the play—a fact that she tries to conceal). Arabella pretends to help the couple but secretly tries to pair Millicent up with another suitor, Dr. Wilson Wong. Hilarity ensues when it becomes apparent to all that Wilson is gay and very attracted to Arabella’s good friend and confidante Devan, who is in a closeted relationship with his partner Jackson. Devan is the son of a former beloved servant who passed away during the COVID pandemic, a fact that becomes important towards the end of the play.
Following the twists from the source material, Edward tries to gain advantage over Lady Helen by finding incriminating photos from her younger days when she had a tryst with a shockingly famous and influential man who became a monk. As a running joke, each time his name is spoken aloud, it is bleeped over by perfectly timed sound effects including very soft bleeps the one time the name is whispered. Playing on her fascination with Buddhist monks because of her lost love, Edward convinces Jackson to dress up as one in an attempt to steal the salacious photos. Trevor Flynn and his illicit paramour Eleanor Marwood wind up with the photos and try to blackmail Lady Helen themselves, as well as gain access to half of Arabella’s fortune through divorce. Using a similar plot device as Way of the World, Flynn is thwarted when it turns out that Arabella had signed over the shares of her company to Devan, in a show of love and act of contrition relating to another plot point. With the photos retrieved and the marriage blessed, we get the same happy ending as in the original play.
Sy wrote his comedy in 2021 during the tail end of COVID but set the action in the near future when the pandemic has run its course but is still fresh on everyone’s minds. At the beginning of the play, many of the servants wear masks and there is mention of vaccines. Sy modernized his play by adding gay characters at a time when homosexuality was still illegal in Singapore (repealed in 2023) and gay marriage was prohibited (as it still is today). His female characters are unabashedly overtly sexualized and he gives a voice to the servants who initially just silently observe the hi-jinx of their employers but eventually get to express their grievances. In scenes where karaoke or singing is involved, well-known Mandarin songs are used to give authenticity to the world that Sy has wrapped his characters in. Not understanding what was being sung (or occasionally being said) in no way detracted from the fun being had.
This was a joyous play to watch with superb acting and comedic timing, especially by Agnes Tong who plays Arabella and Michael Man who plays Wilson. As Arabella, Tong’s facial expressions are priceless, especially when she presents a fake happy face to Edward, then breaks the fourth wall and turns towards the audience to show how she really feels. Man’s portrayal of Wilson’s flustered anxiety and gag reflexes left the audience howling with laughter. Kudos to Stratford for this avant-garde show that strays from its comfort zone of programming Shakespearean or classical dramas. I think it helped that Tao of the World was performed at the smaller and beautifully renovated
Tom Patterson Theatre with its elongated thrust stage, while leaving its mainstream shows in the large theatre spaces.
