Seoul Players providing live laughs

Ed Miller, left, and Lyle Arnason perform in the play “Dinner on the 14th Floor,”a production by the Seoul Players now showing in Haebangchon, Seoul. By Moon Gwang-lip.

Park Chung-wook is a young Korean fan of American TV dramas, and he discovered a new source of fun Saturday.
Live theater.
His discovery was an English-language play in Korea that he hadn’t known existed.
Park was invited by an American friend to the show, “Dinner on the 14th Floor,” the latest production by an expat theater group called the Seoul Players.
“The play was as fun as American dramas,” Park said after the 60-minute comedy ended to applause at the Orange Tree, a bar in Haebangchon, Seoul. “It was different from Korean plays.
“The acting was good,” Park said. “I think many Koreans would like to come and see these English plays once they find out about them.”
The Seoul Players were performing their 10th production since starting out in November 2001. They are not an amateur group ― most members have some background in professional acting and some have five years of experience or more, according to Margaret Whittum, the Seoul Players director who is from the state of Colorado in the United States.
The quality of acting in each production is controlled through auditions for roles, Whittum said.
“For this show we had 16 people audition for the four roles,” Whittum said.
Dinner on the 14th Floor features two couples, one straight and one gay, living in the same apartment in Toronto, Canada.
Written by Canadian Evan Placey, the comedy sketches the highs and lows of the couples before a meal they were supposed to share.
Ed Miller, a straight American playing a gay man stuck in an elevator, said acting gay was not that difficult ― neither was standing still while the other couple was acting.
“It’s not too hard to stand still,” Miller said with a chuckle. “And actually it’s not that hard to play a gay character. I’m not gay, but you know, these guys have been together for five years ― I had a partner for five years so I know how I would act in that situation.”
In the play the straight couple gets into an argument because the husband has become something of a couch potato. The squabble intensifies to the point where his wife shoots up the television set with a gun.
Daami Cagney, an Australian playing the husband, says he really had to stretch in his role.
“I don’t actually watch television,” Cagney said. “I hate it. So the character is quite different from me.”
Cagney said the play has a message that makes it more than just comedic entertainment.
“I think the No. 1 goal of the playwright is definitely to entertain, but it’s interesting to see the problems that both couples are having,” Cagney said. “A lot of people have similar problems in most relationships. I think that’s why a lot of people find it funny, because they experienced that situation to some extent.”

Molly Berg, left, and Daami Cagney.

One of the audience members was Brian Rose, a 56-year-old divorced British man. Rose could relate to the play.
“I know what it’s like being married, and the kind of spat they had was very similar to the kind of spats I think most men and women have,” Rose said.
The Seoul Players hope their next production will be a bigger attraction with the help of Koreans.
“We have very few Korean volunteers,” said Canadian Pamela Munoz, a promoter of the Seoul Players. “We are looking for translators and people who can do some PR with local Korean-language newspapers.”
The play began on Nov. 25 and runs Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It starts at 8 p.m. Friday and 6 and 8 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Tickets are 10,000 won ($11). For information call producer Diana Underwood at (011) 9368-2915.

By Moon Gwang-lip Staff Reporter [joe@joongang.co.kr]