A new opera explores the death of a young soldier from Manhattan's Chinatown

The New York premiere of the opera "An American Soldier," based on the story of Pvt. Danny Chen, opens at the Perelman Performing Arts Center on Sunday.

Hwang knew that the composer Huang Ruo had been commissioned by Washington National Opera to write “an American opera,” and was looking for a subject. The two decided to collaborate on "An American Soldier." Danny Chen grew up in Chinatown with his parents, who don’t speak English, and his cousin Banny Chen, who now acts as spokesperson for the family.

But seeing Danny's ghost on stage gave the family some sense of what he might have said, according to Banny. Huang Ruo said those scenes are closer to theater. But opera offered the possibility of poetic touches, like the character named Josephine, a high school friend of Danny’s. The real court martial of the sergeant who led the hazing ended with him being convicted of a lesser charge. But the opera concludes instead with a haunting scene, which David Henry Hwang refers to as “a kind of surrealistic lullaby that Mother Chen is singing to the ghost of her son. The end of the opera is the only time that the mother can see the spirit of the son.”

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