Kpop by Jason Kim (review)

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Reviewed by:

• Kpop by Jason Kim
• Kyungjin Jo

KPOP. Book by Jason Kim. Music and lyrics by Helen Park and Max Vernon. Directed by Teddy Bergman. Circle in the Square Theatre, New York. November 27, 2022.

When KPOP opened in 2017 as an immersive off Broadway production, curious audience members moved from room to room in a two-story building in Hell’s Kitchen that had been reimagined as a K-pop factory. The show allowed them to voyeuristically observe the manufacturing process for K-pop idols and eavesdrop on their private conversations. K-pop was portrayed as a peripheral subculture waiting to win US acceptance and approval, and the audience became a focus group empowered to share their input on how K-pop could successfully cross over to the US market. Five years later, in 2022, KPOP proudly heralded K-pop as a “global phenomenon” as it ventured onto Broadway. This hybrid production, which blended elements of a backstage musical and a K-pop concert, explored K-pop idols’ struggles and triumphs and celebrated K-pop as a representation of Korean identity and culture, staking its claim on the Great White Way.

KPOP follows the journey of K-pop idols signed to the fictional Korean label RBY—female solo singer MwE, the boy group F8, and the girl group RTMIS—as they prepare for their international debut in New York City. The central tension is MwE’s emotional breakdown as she verges on quitting during dress rehearsal, revolting against Ruby, the label’s dominating CEO and her surrogate mother, in an attempt to pursue her artistic and personal independence. [End Page 110] Through fla hback scenes, the audience learns about MwE’s eighteen-year career progression, from her audition as an 8-year-old K-pop trainee for the RBY label to her rise as a global star.

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View full resolution F8.

and RTMIS perform “Blast Off” in KPOP. (Photo: Matthew Murphy.)

One of two subplots highlights F8’s internal strife. Brad, a mixed-race Korean American who joined the group for the US tour, is shunned for being “not Korean enough.” In another plotline, RTMIS’s relentless pursuit of perfection pushes them to the edge of disbandment as they struggle to endure their grueling training regimen. The idols ultimately persevere through the chaotic dress rehearsal and successfully make their New York debut. The show’s final twenty minutes are a spectacular concert.

In performance, KPOP presented K-pop as a platform to joyfully celebrate Korean and Korean American identities. The upbeat and lively electronic dance track “This Is My Korea” introduced K-pop as an exuberant medium to claim and affir Korean culture. The lyrics exclaimed, “This is my Korea / This is my story-a / A new category-a / To make you dance and clap your hands.” “Han Guk Nom (Korean Man)” by F8 depicted the archetypical Korean man as a cool and rebellious badass. F8’s performance of “Amerika (Checkmate)” (note the deliberate use of k instead of c) presented K-pop as a powerful, masculine weapon conquering the US market while alluding to the military-like training members of the group undertook in order to become idols. In equally gendered terms, RTMIS’s “Super-goddess” referred to the group as “moogoonghwa,” Korea’s national flowe .

While centering on Asians, KPOP ridiculed and alienated whiteness. In an otherwise all-Asian cast, a particular standout was Harry—a US film director hired to shoot a documentary about the label’s New York tour. His presence as a documentarian served as a dramatic device to allow the audience to eavesdrop on MwE’s private moments via his secretive backstage recording while also enabling a critique of his exploitative white gaze. KPOP mocked Harry’s extractive desire to dig into “a goldmine” to discover what goes on behind the scenes of the K-pop world and “spice up” the story through his lens as an arrogant tendency of US white-dominant mainstream culture, which consumes K-pop as an exotic cultural item catering to white US audiences’ tastes.

While KPOP’s plot shows idols resisting conformity to a white-dominated media landscape, the underlying premise of...