Krista Marie Yu still remembers being a 10-year-old budding skater, flower placed neatly in her hair, taking the ice for one of her earliest competitions. She stood in the middle of the rink as the opening strains of Richard Rodgers’ overture for “Flower Drum Song” played through the speakers before gliding to one of her favorite pieces of music.
She’s left the skates behind, but Yu will again get to glide — and sing — to the newest incarnation of “Flower Drum Song.” The 1958 Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II musical, which received a celebrated pre-Broadway premiere at Downtown’s Mark Taper Forum with a reworked book by David Henry Hwang in 2001, is back.
Hwang has refreshed his book for East West Players. Helmed by the Artistic Director Lilly Tung Crystal, starring Yu as Linda and veteran actor Gedde Watanabe, “Flower Drum Song” opens April 23 at Little Tokyo Aratani Theatre as part of the company’s 60th anniversary season.