Miku, and the gods follows the story of a young girl navigating the waters of grief. It is written by Julia Izumi and directed by Alyza Delpan-Monley playing at Artswest traditionally (in-person) and via video (what this review is based on) in order to remain Covid accessible. Written by someone of color it quickly becomes apparent that this story was written with minorities in mind. And while pockets of this 100 minute no intermission play are filled with delightfully authentic waters of grief other parts are difficult to swim through.
Though this production of consists of five characters, the character development is mostly lost. This is due to the constant scene changes where nothing actually changes except the lighting and sound. However, the ways in which Annie Liu of lighting and Madelyn Zandt of sound interact with each other on a round stage with essentially no set at the very least make the show interesting. Despite regular voice overs telling the audience of different scenes via phrases such as “Note #2″ or “Movement 5” these just become words as the significance or differences between the two are never explained. It comes across as a pretentious artistic choice that might work in an academic theatre setting, but is too confusing beyond that. Lighting is the only thing that differentiates the Underworld from a pool from a temple from every other setting and it simply is not enough. The play was more than halfway through before it started becoming a bit less foggy as to what the plot was trying to convey.
Without giving away too much of this unique story miku, and the gods with the titular character acted by Lola Rei Fukushima, is about more than a 12 year old wanting to graduate from her minor—as in unimportant AND not yet age of majority, both of which the audience are explicitly told as opposed to shown—role in life. She wants to be as big as the “beautiful sky” she was named after. She is precocious in a story market over-saturated with tweens clearly projecting the thoughts of their adult writers. She is dealing with the multifaceted concept of loss and the myriad of emotions that accompanies it. That said Fukushima does well with the constraints they were given, but the tattoos were incongruent with the space-bun hairstyle and “childlike” behavior. In a larger theatre and a production that wasn’t being recorded up-close the tattoos wouldn’t be noticeable or distracting.
Naho Shioya expertly plays a grandmother not ready to say goodbye.
Neve shines as the sage and witty, One Who is Wise.
The acting is not where miku, and the gods struggles, it’s the writing. The story doesn’t seem to know who it really is. It feels like a 12-year-old pretending that they are more than a kid and trying on a bunch of costumes to find the one that fits. That said, the diversity that this play creates might be enough for some theatre-goers to ignore the fact the show ultimately bites off more than it can chew.
