‘h*ello k*tty syndrome’ @ Undermain Theatre
Photos by Paul Semrad
—Martha Heimberg
Undermain Theatre closes its 41st season with the professional premiere of a rambunctious show titled h*llo k*tty syndrome, a work by Vietnamese/Chinese playwright Brian Dang (they/them) “with devising by the ensemble.” The asterisks and acronyms are there to avoid copyright issues with the Japanese company that now peddles over 50,000 branded items in 130 countries. Google it. Or just ask a little girl.
Dang, the recipient of Undermain’s 2022 Katherine Owens Fund for New Work award, basically instructs the audience in how to respond to HK in their program notes. This cat-like character with no mouth (and a neutral expression that can be interpreted as happy or sad) has become a kind of mirror upon which millions of consumers project their expectations. “Must we mangle her into our own conception of what she can and cannot be?” Dang asks of this adorable feline? Listen up, oh ye controlling, manipulative, judgmental jerks who would mangle the identity of another. Dang laughs when pissed off.
HK, played by empathetic and eagerly engaging Captain Milbourn (they/them), stands a foot taller than the others onstage, thanks to the huge head mask of their Hello Kitty mascot costume, designed for pure fun by designer Aaron Patrick DeClerk.
Director Garret Storms maintains a swift pace and playful tone for 90 minutes, without drumming too hard on the show’s driving beat: We humans and HKs gotta wade though a lotta BS to be our own authentic selves. Why? Because society wants to pack us in a tight box with a relentlessly stereotypical script—and make us perform in unhealthy working conditions.
Here, Dang’s episodic, absurdist plot and melodramatic characters hit the stage like a pack of noisy coyotes pursuing a rabbit onto set designer Leah Mazur’s fairy tale cottage with a picket fence—and a big door to slam. We get divorce, we get mystery killing, we get betrayal. We even get rebellion. And what to do if the characters turn on their director in mid-play?
So this is comedy? You bet. Undermain’s powerhouse cast gets every laugh and then some. These characters are giving up on looking for a credible creator. Unlike the wanderers in Pirandello’s absurdist masterpiece Six Characters in Search of an Author, they’re busily inventing themselves as we watch.
Marianne Galloway is Susan, a clueless detective and hilariously hapless divorcee with blonde bombshell confidence. Suddenly, she assumes the compressed energy of a mime, and stuns by delivering a perfectly compelling American Sign Language interpretation.
Ryan Michael Friedman is a viral, lanky cowboy with an occasional yen to kiss a man. He’s currently undergoing an identity crisis, what with no rodeos lined up, and only his Stetson and a stuffed toy bull standing between himself and a breakdown. Tough pony to ride.
Jess Anoruigwe is a clever young Black woman fed up with being told she can be anything she wants to be in this fair land. Really? Given her color and gender? She tells it like it is to huge applause when given her own moment to critique conventional plotting.
Parker Gray, a dynamic actor who shifts shapes from clown to demon with a wide smirk, is a voraciously manipulative stagehand intent on screwing up everybody’s lines, seducing the innocent and stealing the show—even if it means working the crowd in a hilarious bit toward the end when the actors take the mike, one by one, and deliver their personal “devises” to the script.
Poor HK. So many needy characters are bent on sucking the poor creature into their own melodramas, constantly demanding to remove that big head and give up any and all biases and complexities. Give this cat a break! Whose business is it if they’re male or female or what color their fur is?
Maximum laughs and just a teasing pinch of audience participation, I’m glad to report. Bring your improvisational spirit and enjoy.
W*EN: May 1-25, 2025
WH*RE: Undermain, 3200 Main Street, Dallas
W*B: undermain.org
