By Karel
Charles Karel Bouley
I've been thinking a lot about icons, iconic roles and what makes something iconic. Maybe it's because I'm aging, watching things from my youth become "classics." Mamma Mia recently came through Orange County at the Segerstrom Center For the Arts on its final tour and I couldn't help but remember being at its opening at the Prince Edward Theatre in London's West End some 17 years ago with my late husband Andrew Howard. And as we danced throughout the show with the normally reserved Brits we knew this was a hit. But a classic? As I sat with the much more stoic OC crowd almost two decades later, still singing every song, I couldn't help but be amazed.
So when I was asked by Benny Aguayo from Nederlander's Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles if I wanted to talk to Jose Llana, who plays the new King in the classic The King And I I immediately thought of that 17 year old boy in 1979 sitting in the very Pantages theatre watching Yul Brynner in the role he had won an Oscar and two Tony's for, that young gay kid being gobsmacked by live theatre, the costumes, the dancing, the magic.
And now, 37 years later (yes, I'm 54) the man in the lead was coming on my show, was going to be in my column. And it was as much a full circle event for him, as it was for me.
"I started as the young lover in the show 20 years ago," Jose Llana told me just hours before he was to open at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood, CA. "So to have the lead role is something that is a dream fulfilled, it is a 'bucket list' kind of goal. Plus, it's such an iconic role, one that every time it is revived seems to gain an entirely new audience, yet with a universal message."
The message of the play is not lost on Llana or myself in the time of Trump's ascension to power. The play follows the exploits of the King of Siam and his fight to modernize his country, but not from his point of view.
Jose Llana by Matthew Murphy in The King and I at the Pantages Hollywood
"We must remember, the play was written for Gertrude Lawrence," Llana reminded me, "from the source material of 'Anna and the King of Siam' by Margaret London. The 1944 novel tells the story of a British school teacher sent to teach the children of King Mongkut of Siam in the early 1860s. Yet, the ideals, the values seem so present in today's world. The King was at a turning point, as America seems to be. He wanted to modernize his country and protect it from war. He was about advances in technology and culture, in fact, he was dubbed 'The Father of Science and Technology' in Siam," the actor explained.
"He wasn't met with universal approval," he went on as he prepared for the evening's performance. "Many liked the old ways, very misogynistic, women as property, uneducated, old traditions, but the King was conflicted by it and knew there was no future in it."
So would he 'Be with Her' or try to 'Make America Great Again,' I had to ask?
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