‘What Do I Do With All This Heritage?‘ – a kaleidoscope of monologues produced by the Braid and Lunar Collective – tours to Palo Alto, Los Gatos and S.F.
By Lily Janiak
May 13, 2024
Some were adopted. Others converted for a life partner. Still others are multiracial.
One even claims both Judaism and Islam.
But regardless of their origins, the Asian American Jews involved in “What Do I Do
With All This Heritage?” share a through line: having to explain their origins. Over.
And over.
And now with their world premiere — which they’re billing as the first show ever
dedicated to their identity — they’re explaining one more time. Produced by Los
Angeles Jewish theater company the Braid and community organization the Lunar
Collective, the show seeks to broadcast more widely not just the fact of their
existence but its richness, joy, humor and drama. “What Do I Do With All This
Heritage?” is a kaleidoscope of monologues and song by authors of geographic and
age diversity, from one eighth grader to septuagenarians. For Bay Area audiences,
the piece tours Palo Alto, Los Gatos and San Francisco on May 18-19 and runs
online through June 9.
One of the actors, Lillian Mimi McKenzie, said that when she meets new people,
she tries to preempt their surprise. She adopts an exaggerated showman’s
intonation with a “you wouldn’t know this, but” before the big reveal: “I’m also
Jewish.” As a result of that setup, she told the Chronicle, “I haven’t really gotten
huge pushback.”
“That gives me hope for the younger generations,” co-producer David Chiu
countered, laughing, during a group Zoom interview. He said that when he has
brought up his identity over the years, he has gotten a range of cringeworthy
responses: “You must be very confused,” “Are you more Asian, or are you more
Jewish?” and “How does that work?”
Chiu got the idea for “What Do I Do With All This Heritage?” from “True Colors,” a
Braid show dedicated to Jews of color more broadly. The new piece – hewing to
the Braid’s specialty of bringing nonfiction stories to life, in what it calls “salon
theater” – features a laugh–out-loud segment about adult circumcision, a made-
for-a-romcom tale about a Chinese man who winds up on JDate, a dating website
for Jews, and a dilemma of a monologue about being torn between your modern
Orthodox parents and your K-pop star aspirations.
San Francisco native Chelsea Eng, who contributed a piece about what it would
mean to raise a Jewish child, told the Chronicle she frequently feels imposter
syndrome as both an Asian American and a Jewish convert. But she found ballast
in some wisdom imparted by Rabbi Jonathan Singer, of San Francisco’s
Congregation Emanu-El: “Being Jewish, it’s not about genetics, folks,” she recalled
him saying. “It’s about being engaged and being a blessing.“
“What Do I Do With All This Heritage?” arrives amid increased reports of
antisemitism coinciding with the Israel–Hamas war. While the Braid and the Lunar
Collective are not political organizations, Chiu said, “What we do strive for is to
bring people together.
“The lines that divide us are blurred,” he went on. “We try to create these sharp
lines; we try to put people into simple boxes. But we’re complex people. In those
blurry places, those gray areas, sometimes that’s where some of the most magical
art can come.”
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Originally published in the San Francisco Chronicle.