Date of Interview: 8 August 2025
Interviewer: Robin Khor
Interviewee: Kumiko Mendl
ROBIN KHOR
Good morning Kumiko. So thank you very much for joining us in this interview for the New Earth Theatre’s 30th anniversary exhibition. So do you want to start by telling us how the seed of New Earth Theatre began?
KUMIKO MENDL
Okay, so in my, from my story and my perspective, what happened was when I came, I didn’t know anyone in the East and Southeast Asian theatre world, or anyone you know, of BESEA heritage who was making theatre in the country.
I’d been training in France at Lecoq and I came back, went up to Edinburgh, and then I thought, it’s quite a small scene, I don’t really feel I fit in there. So I came back down to London and answered an ad in the paper, and this was actually for a Mulan production. So they were a British Chinese theatre company, I would say.
But they were doing work, they were established, and I came on as a movement director, and I met David, who was one of the actors in it, and then he invited me to come along, he knew I’d just come from training, and he invited me to come along to this audition that was being held at the Polka Theatre.
So he was looking for British, East and Southeast Asian actors who were interested in sort of movement, had sort of, kind of movement background, because we were looking to create this piece and they were looking to use Beijing Opera as one of the forms of telling this story. So I came and auditioned, and the five of us ended up being in the show, and then we got on really well.
We had a great show, and I know David had been talking about or even thinking, but he’ll tell you, but I believe he, he’d already been thinking about setting up a company and he’d done something, I think he may have done a reading under the name of Yellow Earth Theatre, you need to check with him. But he did say shall we form a company?
And I think the main connection was that we got on very well and we had interesting backgrounds in terms of everyone who had gone to a Western theatre school, trained, so the other four, Tom, Veronica, David and Kwong, they’d all gone to drama school here. I hadn’t, but I’d gone to Lecoq, which is a kind of European training, quite movement focused.
Tom was a Wushu champion and martial artist, and Veronica and David had done Beijing Opera before, and probably Kwong too, and we were interested in, I was interested in Noh and Kabuki, and I had done little bits with little tiny workshops, you know, just to get a taster. So those kinds of skills we brought together, we weren’t straight out of drama school.
We weren’t like 18 or 20. We were, we were a bit older and we’d already been working in the industry. We all had our equity cards as far as I knew, we’d all had professional experience, were all working as actors. So we sort of said to each other, we’re going to do work when we can get the money to make the work, because we didn’t feel like we wanted to do it for free at the time.
I think that’s true, but David was really the one who was really pushing it forward. And we said, you know, we’ll support you. And he was the one who really wanted to get, you know, a company off the ground. You know, we’d have informal meetings. And then we became more formalized and we brought in a board of trustees.
We became a charity. We were able to access funding. We had the Arts Council, which was then the London Arts Board, gave us some initial money. I think the very first piece that David directed, none of the founder members were in it, actually, but David directed it. We supported him to put it on because we were all freelancing and, you know, doing other work and jobs and things.
So it was like something we were sort of holding and also continuing with our other work. So it was quite a loose collective in a way. With David, he became the artistic director. I remember he was quite keen that we, he thought we should have a rotating, maybe we should rotate the artistic directorship. But the board advised it might be better to have one sort of person they can see as the artistic director, or maybe the Arts Council could see as artistic director.
So that’s how David became artistic director. And it felt natural because he was doing a lot, a lot of the hard graft at the beginning, you know, really getting out there and getting the name out and directing and writing and working very closely with the literary manager, who became the literary manager, Philippe Cherbonnier.
ROBIN KHOR
Wow. Okay.
KUMIKO MENDL
So that’s how it began.
I mean, obviously we were also fed up with the kinds of parts that we were being offered, maybe were very, you know, very limited. There was very little work going on for any, you know, there were very few, if any, ESEA stories being told and film, you know, TV and screen was just like, just the classic stereotypes; very few words as a gangster or, you know, someone behind a takeaway.
But I wasn’t really seen for, well I was seen for those parts or for the whatever – young attractive woman, the exotic woman. But, you know, I never seemed to fit the part because I sounded too English. And, you know, I wasn’t exotic or foreign enough. So, I didn’t really get much TV and screen anyway.
And my background was much more, I was much more interested in theatre at the time anyway. So we devised and created work as well and adapted pieces and things. Yeah. So it was like working, you know, creating work for ourselves.
ROBIN KHOR
So you said that the first production was mainly put up by David and you always supported
So can you remember the first production and you all came together and worked it out together as a co-founder or like with, with more members?
KUMIKO MENDL
Yeah. Apart from Magic Paintbrush, I don’t think there was a show that all five of us were in ever. The one that the four of us were in was Blue Remembered Hills, and that was probably the maximum.
So in different productions, some of us were in it and some of us weren’t, and then in some productions none of us were in as actors. We didn’t start the company for all of us to be in every show, no we were doing, I mean, David was sort of in a sense, he was, you know, putting the shows that he wanted to do on.
And they required different skills. And we, you know, for various reasons, we were all involved in other things because we were, as it were, semi-established as actors in the industry. So we were doing other work. So it wasn’t all like we sat together and we did everything together. It was quite a loose collective in a way, but we would, we were supporting, you know, we were making it happen, like we were also producing.
And, you know, if we were available you know, we would audition. He was quite adamant, especially when we got to Blue Remembered Hills well, every show was auditioned for. So it wasn’t like we were naturally going to be in it. It was whoever’s right for the part. So it was like that. It wasn’t like we wanted, you know, we were making work just solely together as a five.
It was broader than that. So we already had that sort of vision of opening it up and bringing lots of different people in and different creatives. Whoever was right for the show, David and Tom worked very closely together because Tom had this very strong physical language, a sort of martial arts, physical language, and he was a great performer and physical theatre person.
So they worked quite closely together. So I would say Tom was in most of the early ones. But not all of us.
ROBIN KHOR
Am I right, or are we right to assume that you guys were helping in different ways, shape or form?
One is admin…
KUMIKO MENDL
Yes, yes.
ROBIN KHOR
There is no sense of..
KUMIKO MENDL
Yes, exactly.
And we’re devising and you know, we were five directors and we were part of the company that would meet the trustees as well.
The idea, sort of people’s different interests developed so that people would do directing or they’d do their own show under the auspices of Yellow Earth. And then as it evolved and as it grew, people became, you know, interested in pursuing other things. And so it evolved and people stepped away. But I remained because I was very interested in the outreach and community work, because I also, I had trained as a teacher, a long time back, and I also had children.
And that in terms of just making it practical, touring became much more difficult when I had my second child and also doing evening shows because my partner worked evenings, we sort of juggled childcare, you know, I became and did much more sort of daytime work. So it was like young people’s theatre and community and workshops. That’s how I sort of got involved in that side.
And so I kept on as a sort of outreach. Veronica and I were doing outreach, community participation work after about, I can’t remember when we actually started, 2000, so maybe after about five years or so or six years. And then Veronica stepped away to do more of her Playback and then I stayed on. And then I was there when there was a moment when the leadership changed. Second time after Jonathan and Phillipe and, yeah, the board asked me to apply, so I did, for the role, but it wasn’t in my game plan,
ROBIN KHOR
To be an artistic director?
KUMIKO MENDL
Yeah, it wasn’t. Yeah. Hadn’t really been. It wasn’t something I’d naturally thought I would do. It’s interesting. There are different ways of being a leader, and it’s like discovering and understanding what your strengths are and how you know, how you can bring those to the fore and how they can be put to good use.
Before I took over, we had already started different kinds of development training programs like Yellow Stages, Yellow Ink. We’d never done one for actors though, so that was something new. For Young BESEAs, ESEAs, it was like, that’s the first entry point usually to theatre is like, through seeing people perform, you know, you don’t know about the backstage stuff, you don’t know about.
You didn’t think about writing or directing. You’re thinking about, oh, I’m really interested in acting or I’m interested in trying that out. And so that’s why I think the fact that we started an academy for actors really helped grow the sort of community, because there were more people interested in that initially. Then they become interested and get thinking, I am quite interested in directing later on, whatever.
For me, when I started, the Academy had just begun, but it was sort of like a question of building it, and obviously it sort of bloomed and blossomed. And that’s also partly there’s a lot more people who are interested in, you know, which comes chicken or egg, which came first? So, yeah, they you know, I mean, it’s not because we have the academies, but, you know, in terms of, you know, visibility and sort of sense of people wanting to take on these, having that confidence to, to go for it or having the support in it, because often people don’t have a sort of network or they don’t have any support around them.
And the family. It’s not, it’s not really something people think of doing, you know, within the community, within our community. So that’s all changed,and social media has really helped us, you know, connect people, I think.
ROBIN KHOR
How has New Earth contributed to the visibility of British East and Southeast Asian stories and artists?
KUMIKO MENDL
I’d like to think it’s played an important role.
You know, we are now, the sort of, you know, the most established and longest serving ESEA/BESEAtheater company. And through the programs, there have been so many people who’ve come through, and that’s just brilliant. So, you know, now I’m in My Neighbor Totoro, you can say, you can look at that cast. I could look at that. Even this cast now, which is the third one on.
There’s a good number of people who have been through the academy or I’ve, I have met or I’ve known through the bursary and that sort of thing. And I think, who knows, if we hadn’t existed. It’s always difficult to say, isn’t it? But I feel like that, particularly those academies and the bursary we run so that we meet, you know, drama school students coming out of drama school, who we really, you know, make an effort to see everybody, at least, you know, ask them to send tapes and then we select them, then we audition and then there’s a bursary awarded. So that’s really key as well.
I met you through that, you know, and I met Vic Chen who’s playing Mei in My Neighbour Totoro. So that feels really important, that sort of connection and sense of, you know, sense of the company and, and I think politically, you know, there have obviously been different movements and moments, like with the Orphan of Zhao in 2005. You know, that was a big watershed moment for the community. And that also brought a lot of people together. So I think the various elements that have helped, you know, shape and build and establish, you know, that sense of, you know, we have every right to be part of, you know, the UK theatre scene and, you know, and I say theatre, in a sort of broad term because I feel like theatre can cover all sorts of, you know, you can have all kinds of different kinds of theatre.
It’s not just plays and writing, it’s different modes of making performance work.
ROBIN KHOR
Do you want to give us a broad overall breakdown of the 30 years? What has evolved over the years?
KUMIKO MENDL
I suppose it’s like David’s tenure, David as artistic director, and he was very, he was, he’s an incredible producer as well. He was really out pounding every street and every place, putting in the work, saying, this is who we are, this is what we’re doing. Come and see. Come and see the show. And, you know, of course we didn’t have social media then at the beginning it was very much leaflets, putting posters up in community centers or wherever, restaurants or going to places and handing out leaflets, you know, trying to build audiences. And that was a lot of the hard graft, you know?
So that was a lot of work. He had big ambitions in terms of creating plays on big stages. So it was always like, we’re always looking to do sort of mid-scale work. And he did. We were at the Barbican in 2008 with Running the Silk Road.
And as part of the RSC festival, you know, 50 years festival or whatever it was for Shakespeare. And then they were bringing Shakespeare’s from across the world. And David did his King Lear. So, you know, there were all sorts of quite large scales as well. So there was, there was quite a sort of out there very much David coming from David’s, David’s work, David’s interests.
I think you could do this job for so long and then you could go oh, it’s quite overwhelming. There’s so much to do. And he needed to break and step away. And then there was a sort of gap. And then we had two people, Philippe and Jonathan, who came in. And I think with any sort of company who’s been led quite strongly, I would say very strongly led by David.
And I was doing my sort of outreach education stuff, which was connected to the main shows, and sometimes it wasn’t. I was quite doing my own thing as well, which was nice. I had a lot of freedom in a way, and we worked together well in that sense. And then Jonathan and Philippe came in and they tried to work together.
And of course they’re very different. And they both also wanted to do their work, both directors, I think all three of them were directors. And then when I came in, I was actually directing my first, full professional production I happened to be as part of and under the sort of my role. So it was a family show. And so I was quite a novice.
I’m quite sort of ambivalent about directing. I sometimes love it, it has to be exactly the right thing. I’m not someone who would take a text and go, right, I can see this. I’m going to put this on. Oh, so you know, it takes the right thing. And so when I came in, I was, I was interested in, so I think there was a period of in terms of actually who else is out there, because if you do one show a year, which is roughly what we were funded to do, sometimes you might have done two, but it’s usually one a year.
You know, you’d have like five actors or something. You know, that’s a small team and we wouldn’t have assistant directors and we wouldn’t have assistants, and, you know, that came later. And that’s actually much more, it’s assumed that you would have those even for a small company that’s really important to have those assistant roles. But back then, you know, that wasn’t something you did automatically and there wasn’t really the funding for that.
So when I came in, it was much more about seeing who was out there, who with other artists that we hadn’t connected with, who were the writers. We’d been doing Typhoon every year, pretty much every year, which was very much profiling ESEA writers, mainly from outside of the UK, hoping that other directors would take up these plays and put them on, produce them.
And that was, you know, that was a hard, slow slog to do, you know, and people were developing work here through us as well a little bit, but nothing quite took off at that point. So in a way, I was picking up those things and developing them further. So like the professional writers programme that came with this two year programme, we really could focus on four playwrights and develop a piece from an initial scene to the end, you know, through the whole two year bespoke program and produce it.
I mean, that was, always was the aim is to then produce the pieces ourselves or if someone else could pick them up, great. But the reality is people like to be there at the beginning of development. So it’s like getting the venues on board. I mean, that’s another way of doing it. But we just, I just went for the writers programme to start with and then try and bring people in that way.
The other thing was we were looking, you know, initially we were all interested in exploring Asian art forms, Western art forms, Western theatre forms, Asian theatre forms and seeing, could we make a hybrid? Could we make our own language? So that’s why we were using elements of Beijing opera elements of Noh, you know, trying to interweave.
So that’s quite, that was quite interesting. And that was quite important. And Tom was a key part of that with his physical, Asian physical theater background. And then when Tom left, that’s when we became a little, I would say more, I suppose, writing focused, you know, it was like, well, where are the writers? Where are our writers?
There were established writers outside, a lot in America, Asian American writers, and they were beginning to be produced by British venues. But there weren’t, you know, homegrown writers here, just my personal circumstances. Well, I couldn’t travel a lot, you know, I was very much interested in, actually, who’s around us, who’s on our doorstep. So that’s why that became a thing.
And then now, you know, when we first started the academy, the acting academy was really about a taste of drama school it was about encouraging people to think about training, because there were a lot of people who were doing things, who may have a few lines here and a few lines there, and they might say, well, I’m an actor, but in terms of understanding the craft, developing a craft, all that sort of thing and drama schools is a big commitment.
I was hoping these people who were sort of doing bits and pieces of acting might think about drama school training or give them a sense of what it might involve, but that evolved as well. So it’s now people come, the Academy Plus at Central (Central School of Speech and Drama) is for people who actually are trained, and there’s a lot of people who are coming who have not trained here, but trained elsewhere outside of the UK and are coming to connect, to make community, develop, work together through, I suppose, a Central, Central School of Drama training.
ROBIN KHOR
So what are the major challenges?
KUMIKO MENDL
I mean, David will have more detail and memory in terms of what he was experiencing as an artistic director. I know, you know, in terms of programing or producing work, we had to be very canny or he was very canny in terms of like thinking what anniversaries are coming up, what kind of marketing opportunities, so that venues will be thinking, oh yes, we might get an audience for this because of course everyone’s like, well, there is no East Asian audience.
And to an extent that was always true. That was true because there wasn’t a big East Southeast Asian theatre going audience. There weren’t any young people also interested particularly. But we were a touring theatre company. That’s another major factor. We’ve always been a touring theatre company, so we’re always reliant on venues. Whatever we produce has to be able to be, has to sell, has to be able to be picked up by other venues who think, oh, this is, we can sell this.
So I think David tried that. We tried lots of different ways, you know, reasons. I mean, he can talk about the reasons why he produced each piece. I do remember, you know, at one point someone saying, have you got anything that’s got sort of martial arts in it? And you go, no, you know, and it’s like, oh, or ‘we had you last year, we can’t have you again, you know, we’re going to have you like once probably in our lifetime’.
You know what I mean? It’s not like, you know, there was never thinking of, oh, we’re going to regularly program you. And so we’re going to build the audience that way. It was like, well, we had you last year and I’ve got other things to be programming. There was always a thing about, well, we could, we could do it for Chinese New Year.
That’s a hook. Anything East Asian can be hooked onto Chinese New Year or Lunar New Year. It was Chinese New Year then. And to be fair, a lot of my early work was quite focused on Chinese culture, work that sort of came from that particular part of East Asia, I think. Yeah. So because people saw that there were Chinese people around or felt that there was more of a community there.
But if you were to do something from Malaysia, we did some pieces in the Typhoon as play readings, you know, hoping that people might pick it up, but that was, you know, it’s far too obscure. So that was always a challenge of how we could create pieces that venues would feel confident they could sell. And it had a resonance for their British audiences or had a meaning.
Of course, there are lots of, you know, misunderstandings. I said, well, what’s the kind of work it was? Because we did have a physical theatre aspect. You know, Tom was a martial artist and a brilliant physical theatre performer. And we did bring Beijing Opera in, and we did bring those things in in a beautiful way, I think, you know, to really enrich the storytelling.
But, you know, people could get the wrong idea and think, oh, that’s what we just sort of pandering to white community or, you know, we’re doing something that’s there’s, there’s an element of pragmatism to be able to get the work out there or you stay in the margins and the margins at those points, it’s always that thing about, do you try and work with the with establishment, or do you just go and do your own thing?
And I think, you know, you can, there’s a place for both really. But I think David and I would say to ourselves, we were trying to sort of open things up within the establishment so that we were part of it. Not, not part of the establishment, I suppose part of the theatre ecology of the UK and recognised as such, as opposed to sort of something on the side, you know, people would say, you know, you get ghettoizing yourself by just doing stuff on your own.
Why don’t you just go and work as a freelancer and der der, der? And another thing I think is really interesting, and David may talk about this, but, you know, at one point I know well, and I don’t know how David feels about it now, but yellow earth, the whole point of Yellow Earth is not to exist. Finally, we don’t need it.
Everything is so integrated, we wouldn’t need a company just for East, South East Asians. But I think that’s very different, I feel very differently now because I feel I never really necessarily bought into that. But I think having a space for ourselves and I know where we’re loads of it’s not like one community. We’re from different, very different backgrounds.
But I think it’s still really important to have that voice and to be able to come together and to be in that room where we don’t look like the only person who looks like us. I think that is a really important and powerful space, and I think that’s what the academies have helped to build and grow. That’s really important and we can feel proud of.
And, you know, people will go on to do other things. And some people have never come, have never really worked with us. You knew about us, which is great. Not everybody knows about us. And some people discover as much later go, I’ve never heard of you, you know. Oh my God. And then some people weren’t ready to come, didn’t want to be part of it because they want to be more in the main, you know, they want to be part, they didn’t want to feel like they’re being ghettoized, you know what I mean?
So that’s quite interesting. So all those things are all factors in it. But I think what was important is that we existed, that we were there and we were, I hope, very welcoming. And people like yourself or anyone who wanted to engage in different ways could. Early on, we were doing, it was very much a play each year.
And of course, like I said, that’s not an opportunity for many people. It’s like a handful of people to actually be professionally employed. And it is hard because the funding is, people think, oh, you’ve got loads, you’ve got lots of money because you’re an established company. But actually we were working on a shoestring. Everyone is, you know, unless you’re the National Theatre it’s all tight, you know.
So I think the academies have helped in terms of at least giving opportunities that you don’t have to pay for and then connecting with other people and, you know, supporting other people to try and hopefully, yeah, secure funding or find funding or lending our name, etc. etc. So that’s yeah, that’s all part of it. But yeah, lots of challenges and, and that’s in addition to the usual challenges of running any theatre company, you know.
Oh God. It’s mad. Yeah. But you know, I think also the funding, you know, in terms of how the funding climate, the economic climate, the social climate is, that has obviously shaped the different stages. And I can say, you know, when we started, I suppose at the end of the Blair years, and then it got quite, quite tricky.
And then we got totally cut when I came on, came into post. And then it was sort of like building up again. And then of course we had, you know, Covid and Black Lives Matter, which really, you know, was quite an explosion for institutions, white-led institutions. A lot, a lot of change happened. And now we’re seeing the reverse, the pendulum swinging back in some, you know, with what’s happening in the States.
And so the rise of the far right. And so it’s yeah, these all impact and of course the Arts Council are in a very difficult situation. We’ve even got a Labour government. But that’s not that priority. It’s really hard. So I’m feeling for everybody now. For your generation, you know, and younger, coming through. But there’s still space and it’s important to hold space.
It will change again. Yeah. Yeah.
ROBIN KHOR
Thank you very much. It feels like our existence now doesn’t come without effort. So I think that’s really me, I’m very grateful I would say I’m very, very grateful about this. Is there a particular production that you’ve done that you felt very strongly about, like you have a strong sort of memory about?
KUMIKO MENDL
I saw that as one of the prompts. And I thought actually, for me personally, I think we did a production that I co-directed and produced, which was The Last Days of Limehouse, which was actually a bit later on. So that felt really special in many ways, because of the kinds of stories we were telling. We were trying to sort of look at what was the original Chinatown in Limehouse, and what were the stories there that we didn’t hear.
And we did it in Shoreditch Town Hall, where originally I’d seen a piece that had told a tale of Limehouse, and there were Chinese characters in it. They were sort of, we didn’t see much about them. And I felt like I wanted to know what their stories are. We were able to bring the academy in, which was really great.
So we had that year the academy did classes, and then they were also like part of the show and that was part of the training. So they had that professional experience and they and it meant that we had a nice big ensemble group and we were in a non theatre space and it was like a promenade. And we also had various different elements, and I think it connected also to oral histories, which is something I’ve become very interested in and archives and, but there was an exhibition downstairs and there was an audio tour because there’s nothing left to see in that area, because there’s a couple of street names and an a statue that marks this is the original Chinatown in London that grew up around the Limehouse and then moved to Soho later. Brilliant piece. I really enjoyed that. It was the summer and we were very fortunate. We found this enormous space through Veronica that was empty in Islington to rehearse in, and so we had this enormous space and we didn’t have much money. Of course, it was a big production and we had to beg, borrow and steal, kind of thing. We were loans and costumes and they were all like winter costumes. So they were like thick fur coats because this was also it was set, first of all, in the 1950s. And again, it’s generational. It started off in the 50s and we had a heatwave the two weeks we ran it at the Limehouse. It was so hot and I could just see the actors. Sweat was pouring off them and they were gallantly trying to act in this space. And everyone was crowded in and it did really well. You know, we had really good audiences and it was a really exciting vibe. It just had a real buzz about it. And we also, had development time, which was great.
So we developed the script and then we also did outreach and we had schools coming in on the weekends to meet some of the actors in situ. So they learned about time, you know, what was happening then. And we worked with various different organisations and Moi Tran (designer) did an amazing fit up of the whole place. She covered these ten foot windows with old photos of Chinatown.
It was fantastic and lots of signs were hanging everywhere. It was amazing. So that was exciting. And Ruth Chan did the music, the composing, it was really beautiful.
That was really exciting and it brought people together. And then we were able to use the space afterwards. We had a few events and talks and thing panels and, you know, and that sort of was the precursor for me for the Tsunagu/Connect, which is something I did was was the last thing I did at New Earth, which was the Japanese Women’s project, which is a very personal thing about women coming to UK and looking at the British Japanese community through that lens.
And there was a similar kind of idea in terms of bringing, you know, different aspects of community. Schools as well, because I’m always thinking of the next generation too, I think that’s important.
ROBIN KHOR
You know, you said a lot about the shows being martial art driven and then like, it sounded like there’s more Chinese interest. But I think also slowly you can see that New Earth has expanded in a way that you’re trying to cover a bit more the East and Southeast Asian stories. Like, does it feel natural or does it feel like it’s very challenging? Obviously, Asia is very big. I think often in the Western context they forget how big it is and how different it is. And there’s like painful histories amongst each other. Yeah. I was just wondering, like, do you want to talk a little bit about that and then how you feel about that? Now that you are you know, going into your more personal phases now. Yeah.
KUMIKO MENDL
Yeah, it’s slightly misunderstood because actually, David was always very keen on being Pan Asian as a term. Right from the beginning that we would try and serve, that sounds terrible, you know, we would try to be an organisation for everyone.
So in his programing, he literally, you know, he programmed a Vietnamese piece, a Filipino piece which was Play to Win. The Vietnamese piece was Butcher’s Skin. And we were very, we tried to make it clear that we weren’t a Chinese company. And that’s. Yeah, I don’t know if that’s partly because it was Mulan or it was in existence and they were very much more Chinese focused. But also, our original logo had Huang, the character for yellow, and that looked very sinocentric and Yellow Earth came from the sort of Beijing New Wave cinema, Yeah. The film Yellow Earth.
So people had an impression that we were. And then four out of five had Chinese backgrounds. What, Malaysian-Chinese, Hong Kong-Chinese. So that’s not surprising in some ways. But David was very much trying to be Pan Asian. And it was when I came in that I realised, oh, I was doing a lot of Chinese focused work because I was working with more Chinese communities.
But then I think, like you say, the programming, you know, in terms of finding things like we did Tamburlaine, which was quite a surprise for people, you know, suddenly tackling this massive classic British classic. And yet the central character is sort of Asian, seen through the eyes of a 16th century British playwright, Christopher Marlowe. So that was really interesting.
And I liked sort of making surprises that people didn’t say, oh, we know what Yellow Earth’s work’s like. We wanted to try different things, and if we did Blue Remembered Hills, which was another iconic piece that was Dennis Potter’s piece that was under David’s AD-ship and that and we were actors. That was the one. There were four of us out of five in the show, and that was an amazing experience as an actor.
But we got a lot of people going. I don’t understand why you’re doing this, what’s this to do with East Asia? And that wasn’t an East Asian story, but it was us in a story. And, you know, I like the fact that we did those kinds of things so that we weren’t so predictable. We could say, oh, yeah, I wonder what that’s going to be like.
But it also works against you because they go, well, I don’t know what the next thing’s going to be. You know what I mean? Yeah. Interesting. Yeah.
ROBIN KHOR
Did you guys have the same experience even when you were doing Miss Julie? Because that’s quite recent already, right?
KUMIKO MENDL
No, but I would say Amy. Amy adapted Miss Julie. We didn’t do it straight, Miss Julie.
She adapted it to be in Hong Kong at a particular time. So that made sense to people as well.
ROBIN KHOR
I think you guys adapted Tamburlaine.
KUMIKO MENDL
Yeah. Yeah, but it was a sort of quite neutral, you know, we had a very plain white wall. It was very. It was more conceptual in a way. But Blue Remembered Hills, we just did the script as is.
So we set it in the South, where it’s written in the southwestern dialect. So we did as we just happened to be a mixed race company. We weren’t all East Asian, but there were four of us who were, you know, and it was just a tale about six, seven kids in the countryside. So that’s interesting, I suppose. In terms of what’s accepted now, it’s much more broad and sort of expected that you are going to do something a bit different and wild and that’s what’s exciting. You know, we can bring something different.
ROBIN KHOR
This is inspired by Tom (Wu). Do you have anything you want to share with us like, that is like?
KUMIKO MENDL
“I met my wife. Yeah, I met my wife doing” which he did. I was like, you see an image of that? Yeah. That’s so funny. I can’t say I met my husband there.
I’ve made lifelong friends, but the one photo that actually Vicky gave me of us at Veronica’s where we would have Da Bin Lo, you know, we would have. It’s sort of a party up. Yeah, for the board meeting. Those are all board meetings around the hotpot. There’s a photo. I don’t know if I can find it. Of The Last Days of Limehouse, where just spontaneously, the academy students are dancing, which I really enjoy. I just love it because they just did it. It’s not a great photo, but I just like it. I just like the energy there. I don’t if you can see them all having it. Yeah, I was talking about Moi, you know, these big windows actually blew up these photos and she’d hung up these signs.
This was 2000, and I think it’s 13 or 14.
ROBIN KHOR
It looks very classic like.
KUMIKO MENDL
Yes. When it was 1950. So this is where I dressed up something about that energy I love. And spontaneity. This is at the start of the show. So this is people milling around before the show started and there was mahjong going on. People were just sort of looking, learning, and there was, we had a slide show because it started off with a sort of lecture by the main character, looking back at the old Limehouse, to give it context, she was an American who’d left when she was a child and gone to America and come back. Because the story of Limehouse is massive.
So we were trying to find a way in, and she comes in and tries to rejuvenate the Limehouse that she remembered from her childhood. And then she meets the people who are there now at that point, which was in the 50s, where they’d had slum clearances and they’d had the Second World War, and they were trying to rebuild, and very few businesses had stayed.
And then there is a photo of us all in Singapore when we first went under Yellow Earth to do the Polka production of Magic Paintbrush, we took it out there and there’s five of us doing a pyramid thing where we’re all in our swimsuits, but it might be a bit much, but it’s quite funny. But that’s when we were all young.
And then there’s also one of us when we all shaved our heads in the Blue Remembered Hills rehearsal room, and we got number two as the face of you guys. Yes. Yeah. Plus the other actors. Yeah, four of us. And we had three other actors in it. Yeah. So I could dig that Blue Remembered Hills one. It’s good.
ROBIN KHOR
So what does it mean for you to be part of the New Earth’s 30 year legacy? At least, a big part of your career and your time is spent with New Earth…
KUMIKO MENDL
Yeah. It’s true. I owe everything to being part of New Earth, Yellow Earth, New Earth. I feel really proud that we’ve survived and that we will continue to survive and hopefully thrive. And we’ve gone through really tough times, and that’s the nature of it. I do feel there’s a need, and it’s an important place for people to connect with at different times in their life, kind of to be a sort of launch pad or a springboard into something.
And that’s wonderful. I mean, I love seeing people who’ve come through or been involved and seeing them now where they’re at, what they’re doing. This whole industry is really tough. It’s very difficult to have a career, you know, to have an easy line through. You know, you’re as good as your last job, often if you’re an actor.
But I think I’m grateful, I’m really grateful. I don’t know if I like the word grateful, but I am, you know, I am happy and I feel very blessed in the way, you know, lucky. I think Tom said this, you know, being there at the right time. And it just happened to be at the right time. And I met a wonderful group of people who I am still in connection, you know, connected with.
And that’s really important. Being part of My Neighbour Totoro I have to say it’s like another BESEA family I mean . tt’s for me, it’s quite natural. It’s a natural progression in a way.
ROBIN KHOR
Yeah.
KUMIKO MENDL
But I although I’m just an actor. It’s fun and it’s, you know, it’s great to meet other people too and feel like I’m part of a family, you know.
And I have to give thanks to the Arts Council for sticking by us, because I think without them, it would not have been possible to keep continuing. And even though we lost, you know, they cut us completely. We did apply for everything that I wanted to do, and we were successful with those applications. And of course, now it’s a very different climate.
I know, you know, seeing what New Earth is doing now. I think it’s really exciting and it’s really positive that those opportunities continue.