Pearls and Irritations

Only in Australia could such an edgy political satire be put on stage. Sharp and witty, Donald’s Inferno, written and directed by Jon-Claire Lee, was launched in Sydney this month to a modest but discerning audience. Buried in its wacky story, the comedy pulled no punches in its description of current tensions between the Chinese Mainland and Taiwan. It concluded with a surprising message of hope.

The Donald of this story is Australian journalist W.H.Donald (1875-1946), who was a senior advisor to Chiang Kai-Shek during the Second World War and subsequent civil war in China. The story revolves around his afterlife in purgatory where he is appointed host of the television station. In this capacity he interviews Chiang and his arch enemy Mao Zedong, who naturally engaged in some biffing.

Both Chinese leaders had several wives during their lifetimes. Soong Mei-Ling and Jiang Qing both appear on stage. A fifth character is American Communist Sydney Rittenberg, eternally faithful to the Chinese Communist Party in spite of two prison sentences condoned if not ordered by Mao. The twist in the story is that a mysterious train trip takes Mao to Taipei and lands Chiang in Beijing. When a bomb explodes in the middle of the Taiwan Straits, the two leaders have to prevent an international crisis. They suspect the US is responsible, aiming to prolong conflict between the two sides and therefore they decide to resolve matters between themselves.

The excellent cast of local Chinese Australian actors is led by Les Asmussen who steals the show as Donald. Jon-Claire Lee, writer and director, is a graduate of acting and directing from New York University who has been working in Australia since the 1990s and has many film, TV and stage credits to his name. A review of the play is available on the Facebook page of Sydney Talent Company.

In his program notes for Donald, Lee writes:

“You may wonder why I would write a play about a Lithgow-born journalist not many people have even heard about… Do I write a historical drama or documentary about his sojourn in China when the last dynasty turned into a new republic? … I decided to use my Catholic upbringing to write a comedy in purgatory… in a ‘Truth or Consequences’ game show with conflicts revisited, alliances tested, or even new possibilities explored.”

Donald is presented in English. The audience was expected to have a modicum of understanding of the events of the Chinese Revolution, the Civil War, the Cultural Revolution and of the reasons why the Nationalist government relocated to Taiwan, causing continuing political and military tensions between it and the Communist government in Beijing.  In decades past both here and in East Asia I observed deep hostility between pro-mainland and pro-Taiwan elements. A play that presented even a fictional account of a meeting between Nationalist and Communist leaders would have been unthinkable. That feeling has moderated over the years, although even today Donald would not be staged in China, Hong Kong or Taiwan. In Sydney relations between the two sides are managed in an elegant way and the community is tolerant and respectful of differences of opinion. That is why I believe that this performance could only take place here.

The play is generally even-handed in its account of historical events. I found it interesting that the performance was endorsed by the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Australia, particularly as the plot suggests that political tensions with the mainland are to some degree farcical and certainly are capable of solution if both sides can meet either here or in heaven.

As 2024 lurches to a close with wars and rumours of wars like thunderclouds looming on the horizon, it is refreshing to find a comedy like Donald to lighten the mood and even promise that things can get better if there is dialogue and compromise.

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